1. Instructional Rounds Educational Leaders 2012
Instructional Rounds in Education: A Network Approach to Improving Teaching and Learning
August 2, 2012
“Schools with a high degree of ‘relational trust’ are more likely to make the kind of changes that help raise student achievement. Improvements in such areas as classroom instruction, curriculum, teacher preparation and professional development have little chance of succeeding without improvements in a school’s social climate.
(Bryk, A. and Schneider, B., 2002)
Educational Leaders 2012

2. Learning Goals Understand: Who is here? Why are we here?
Build common language, expectations and norms for conducting Rounds
Become familiar with the steps of Rounds and learning goals behind each step
Understand how the instructional core is the heart of Rounds and of improvement efforts
Develop skills in observing teaching and learning – describe what we see – and debriefing observations 2

3. Learning Goals Review current practices, plan for future actions
Understand and develop a Theory of Action
Understand and develop a Problem of Practice 3

4. Theory of Action
If we as educational leaders create an environment of collaboration among administrators, focused on improving instruction, then shared responsibility and accountability will create support for continuous improvement of learning for ALL students.

5. Introductions: Leaders are Learners
Think of three things:
Something non-education related that you know lots about
Something non-education related that you know little about
Something education-related that you would like to learn 5

6. Introduce yourself and discuss
Introduce yourself and share one of the three items from above.
Introduce your new friend to the group. 6

7. Review Norms
What do you want to ask of your colleagues to help you have the best experience possible with this work?
What do you want to ask facilitators to help you have the best experience possible with this work? 7

8. Group Norms
Covenant

9. Why Rounds? Build Professional Community
Develop a Common Language for Understanding and Analyzing Instructional Practice
Develop a Culture of Shared Practice
Develop Collective Efficacy Around Improvements in Student Learning
Build Common Understanding of System-, School- Level Improvement Strategies

10. PROFESSIONAL NETWORKS BUILD COMMITMENT AND LATERAL ACCOUNTABILITY

11. Inspired by the medical profession
Based on the model of medical rounds
Good practice is highly contextualized
Education is a “profession in search of a practice”

12. Practice: A definition
A set of protocols and processes for observing, analyzing, discussing and understanding instruction that can be used to improve student learning “at scale”.
The instructional rounds process is an example of a specific practice.

13. Rounds are not:
Walkthroughs
PLCs
Improvement Strategies

14. Key Idea: Everyone is working on their practice.
Everyone is obliged to be knowledgeable about the common task of instructional improvement.
Everyone's practice should be subject to scrutiny, critiques and improvement.

15. Not Walkthroughs:
Walkthroughs presume we know what we are looking for and will monitor
Walkthroughs do not ask us to reflect on our own practice and to grow
Instructional Rounds are about the leaders growing

16. Not PLC’s:
Rounds can be the vehicle for PLC work

17. Not improvement strategies:
Rounds inform and are informed by improvement strategies
Rounds start with a POP, one that emerges from improvement strategies and ends with ideas for making our improvement strategies more effective
Rounds are a vehicle for improving our strategies and making us more reflective about our work.

18. Medical Rounds

19. Rounds are a special kind of walkthrough, a special kind of PLC and a special kind of improvement strategy integrated into one practice.

20. A Picture of Rounds A four-step process:
Identifying a problem of practice from the theory of action that is guiding our work.
Observing classrooms, as individuals or in small teams, gathering descriptive, non-evaluative evidence.
Debriefing using the ladder of inference
Focusing on the next level of work.

21. Rounds can be understood as a(n)…
Organizational process
Learning process
Culture-building process

22. Questions for Reflection
What are your reactions to the notion that education is a profession in search of a practice?
How would our work differ if we understood our work as practice?
To what extent does our work in this district already embody the notion of professional practice? In what ways is our work lacking in this dimension?
What specific examples from our district’s experience or from your own professional practice illustrate or conflict with any of the issues noted so far?

23. Reality Check…
“Each of us has in our minds a map of reality. The problem is that the map is not always indicative of the territory.”

24. True or False? Cleveland, Ohio is northeast of Tallahassee, Florida.
Toronto, Canada is southeast of Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Los Angeles, California is southeast of Reno, Nevada.

25. Current Practice What is your current practice for observation?
How do you record and understand what you see?
How do you use that data?

26. Classroom Observation #1
Use your current practice for observations to record what you what you observe in this 6th Grade Science classroom

27. Descriptive vs Evaluative
Rounds is like…….
Use card activity

28. Using Descriptive Language
Specificity
Specific
General
“The choice of Huckleberry Finn as text was inappropriate for this age group”
“The teacher did a fabulous job of holding the students’ attention”
“At about three minutes into the lesson, the teacher asked two students to respond to the question, “Why did Huck decide to leave?”
“The teacher introduced a writing prompt”
Judgmental
Objectivity
Descriptive

29. Evidence: Sticking to the Facts!
What do you see?
Just the facts please, Ma’am!
She did a great job of transitioning from the whole class lesson to independent work time. 29

30. Just the facts…?
At the end of the lesson, the teacher asked students what materials they needed to get for their upcoming independent work. She took a few responses and released students to go to their desks four at a time.

31. Just the facts…?
During a period of 20 minutes, the teacher asked 1 question.
The teacher used a very interactive teaching style.

32. Developing the Discipline of Seeing
Seeing is a discipline
It’s like a muscle—it gets stronger with repetition
Foundation of our practice:
Specific description
non-evaluative, non-judgmental description 32

33. Classroom Observation #2
This time as you watch the 6th grade science classroom, record your observations focusing on using descriptive feedback vs evaluative feedback.

34. Instructional Core Instructional Rounds Educational Leaders 2012
Instructional Rounds in Education: A Network Approach to Improving Teaching and Learning
Educational Leaders 2012

35. Instructional Core
How does the idea of instructional core correspond to your own understanding of how classrooms work? What does it reveal? What does it exclude?

36. Instructional Core The “Instructional Core” is the interaction of:
Level of content
Teachers’ knowledge and skill
Student engagement
CONTENT
Task
STUDENT
TEACHER

37. Instructional Core
Only improvements in the instructional core will actually make a large difference in learning,
Improving one element of the core must lead to improvement in the other two
CONTENT
Task
STUDENT
TEACHER

38. Instructional Core Task
Principle #1: Increases in student learning occur only as a consequence of improvements in the level of content, teachers’ knowledge and skill, and student engagement.
Principle #2: If you change one element of the instructional core, you have to change the other two.
Principle #3: If you can’t see it in the core, it’s not there.
Principle #4: Task predicts performance.
Principle #5: The real accountability system is in the tasks that students are asked to do.
Principle #6: We learn to do the work by doing the work.
Principle #7: Description before analysis, analysis before prediction, prediction before evaluation.
CONTENT
Task
STUDENT
TEACHER

39. Instructional Core Count off to form groups of 3
Each person reads one of the principals of the Instructional Core (pgs 24 – 34)
Discuss as a group what each of these principals mean to you.

40. Instructional Core Task
Principle #1: Increases in student learning occur only as a consequence of improvements in the level of content, teachers’ knowledge and skill, and student engagement.
Principle #2: If you change one element of the instructional core, you have to change the other two.
Principle #3: If you can’t see it in the core, it’s not there.
Principle #4: Task predicts performance.
Principle #5: The real accountability system is in the tasks that students are asked to do.
Principle #6: We learn to do the work by doing the work.
Principle #7: Description before analysis, analysis before prediction, prediction before evaluation.
CONTENT
Task
STUDENT
TEACHER

41. Instructional Core
The best way to get a glimpse of the instructional core is to look at what the students are doing, not necessarily what the teacher is doing

42. Instructional Core
Feedback and guidance for the teacher should focus on the tasks students complete, with attention to how the three dimensions of the instructional core must be addressed.

43. Instructional Core
Instructional rounds is a practice that can be learned through repetition, reflection, and analysis at progressively higher levels of skill and knowledge.
Rounds is a way of focusing on the instructional core of teachers and students in the presence of content.

44. Instructional Core
In your experience, what features of classrooms do practitioners tend to focus on when they observe teaching and learning? How does the framework of the instructional core focus your attention in classroom observation?

45. Instructional Core
School leaders are conditioned to jump from observation immediately to evaluation
Rounds process asks us to break this perpetual habit by using:
Description before analysis
Analysis before prediction
Prediction before evaluation

46. Theory of Action Instructional Rounds Educational Leaders 2012
Instructional Rounds in Education: A Network Approach to Improving Teaching and Learning
Educational Leaders 2012

47. Theories of Action and the Problem of Practice
We all have theories of action:
“If…then” formulas that guide our thinking and decision-making in all aspects of life.
Made up of a set of assumptions and action strategies to accomplish a particular purpose.
They are the “story line that makes a vision and a strategy concrete.”
Understanding and effectively using theories of action to enhance our self-reflective capacities can greatly improve our professional practice. A unique feature of the rounds process is its use of theories of action as a conceptual framework.

48. An example from everyday life
“If I brush my teeth twice a day, then I won’t get cavities and will keep my teeth for a long time.”
Based on certain assumptions.
Based on past experience.
Formulated using an action strategy.
Assumptions: a myriad of assumptions about what constitutes good dental hygiene and how to accomplish it.
Experience: I’ve had cavities, but not in a long time, because my diet has improved and so have my brushing and flossing habits.
Action strategy – brush, then no cavities.
Testable – but also tentative – I’ve gotten cavities as an adult, gums have changed, body chemistry changes, etc.
Ask participants for other examples from everyday life.

49. Theories of Practice
Most theories of action (sometimes called theories of practice) in the workplace are based on a whole network of assumptions and action strategies much more complex than teeth-brushing.

50. Hidden theories of action
Most of our theories of action are in our subconscious until we start to intentionally name and work with them.
Espoused theories are the theories we claim to use to solve various problems.
Theories in use are the actual theories of action that guide our behavior.
There is often a gap between our espoused theories and theories in use.
Exposing this gap and uncovering our tacit theories of action is a fundamental step to reflective practice.

51. Liz City
Video Clip on Theory of Action

52. Criteria for using theories of action in the instructional rounds framework
Must begin with a statement of a causal relationship between what I do and what constitutes a good result in the classroom.
Must be empirically falsifiable; I must be able to gather evidence that would either prove or disprove that the causal relationship I assume in the theory of action actually exists.
It must be open ended; that is, it must prompt me to further revise and specify the causal relationships I initially identified as I learn more about the consequences of my actions.

53. A draft theory of action
Ideally, theories of action for instructional rounds should be collaboratively developed. This is just an example.
Exploring the differences among our theories of action would be very revealing.
There are multiple theories of action that could be starting points. This is one example, focused on learning targets.

54. A first attempt
“If teachers use learning targets to guide instruction, then higher student achievement will be the result.”
Problematic on a couple of levels…

55. Problems… Vague Makes no reference to the student
Leaves out many things that must occur between the “if” and the “then.”
A common problem with theories of action, which, if explicitly stated, suggest something like, “If we do x, then…a miracle will happen…and then higher student achievement will result.”

56. A second attempt
If lessons are guided by clear learning targets aligned to established content standards, and if students and teachers use effective formative and summative assessments of learning aligned to those targets, then students and teachers will have richer information to guide the teaching and learning process and to differentiate learning for individual student needs, and higher student achievement will be the result.”

57. Reflection Activity
Using the criteria analyze the usefulness of these theory of action for instructional rounds:

58. Write your own Theory of Action

59. Problem of Practice Instructional Rounds Educational Leaders 2012
Instructional Rounds in Education: A Network Approach to Improving Teaching and Learning
Educational Leaders 2012

60. Problem of Practice: Purposes
Set a common frame of reference for rounds visits
Anchors rounds in work that advances the school’s and the district’s improvement strategy
Build diagnostic capacity of teachers and administrators
Model continuous improvement

61. Problem of Practice
Begins to shape what, specifically, we’ll be looking for during the rounds.
Emerges from the questions raised by the assumptions embedded in our theory of action.
So… if the first assumption is
If lessons are guided by clear learning targets aligned to established content standards…..
Could imply the following problems of practice
While teachers have been developing learning targets, we haven’t really given them any training on how to use the targets to guide lessons. Is this training needed, or is this obvious? How would we find out? If we need to train them, we need to develop a strategy for doing so.
How do we as leaders support and monitor teachers in effectively using the learning target to guide lessons?

62. Problem of Practice: Criteria for Useful POP
Criteria for useful problems of practice
Focus on the instructional core (the interaction of students, teacher, and content)
Is directly observable in class
Is actionable (is within the school or district’s control and can be improved in real time)

63. Problem of Practice: Criteria for Useful POP
Criteria for useful problems of practice
Connects to a broader strategy of improvement
Is high-leverage (if acted on, it would make a significant difference for student learning)
Address the what, not the how

64. Problem of Practice: Reflection Activity
How Question : What evidence do you see of Six Traits Writing strategies? What Question: What evidence do you see that students are producing high levels of writing?

65. Problem of Practice: Things to Avoid
Compliance language:
“Are teachers enacting the key elements of the XYZ curriculum”
Global terms that haven’t been defined by prior work:
“Are students engage?” “Is the work challenging?”
Structural, physical things not connected directly to instructional core:
“Are students working in groups?” Are the instructional objectives on the board?”

66. Problem of Practice: Reflection Activity
Review the draft problem of practice and analyze based on the criteria established above.

67. Problem of Practice: Reflection Activity
Create a problem of practice for your school based on the assumptions from your theory of practice and using the above guidelines.

68. Problem of Practice Discuss at your table:
Review at your table each other’s POP keeping in mind the elements of a good POP.

69. Reflection What was your experience like as a learner?
What did the facilitators do that contributed to that experience?
What are the implication for your own work?

70. Today’s Reflections + -
Plus
Minus
Delta