Added: Continuous PIP

Recently, I have had the opportunity to engage in some amazing, informational professional development sessions, with my district as well as nationally. Most of my in-district training has been centered around our new online math curriculum. Agile Mind, the new program, is being used in Intensified Mathematics classes, designed for students who did not meet standards on one or more end-of-grade exams in middle school. Typically, these students are identified as beginning learners. My district purchased this program for this specific demographic, in hopes to improve math skills and increase student achievement. Although I have attended several training sessions, I am not a fan of the software, nor the strategies used in my school. In my honest opinion, I am hoping that our administrative team reduces the number of classes that we offer for this course.

One of the most exciting professional development experiences I have had was the Visible Learning Conference in Washington, D.C. Last summer, I was super excited about the strategies and concepts that I learned and immediately began planning how I would apply my new knowledge and skills. During preplanning, I met with my co-teacher and my PLC (professional learning community) to discuss some of the strategies I wanted to integrate as a part of our instruction. The first strategy we incorporated was the idea of self-reported grading. John Hattie explains that students are most accurate when they can predict how well they will perform. Also, self-reported grading has the highest influence on student achievement.

I created a template for students to predict how well they will perform on standards and units. The one stipulation I have is that no student could use a score of less than 70% mastery. After students are assessed on these standards, they review predictions and compare their progress scores. Because this strategy has the highest influence, I felt that it was imperative that I share this knowledge with my colleagues and use it in my own classroom. My co-teacher and I used this during the first semester, and I could see the difference in behavior when students felt they had more of an ownership of their grades. Of course, there are not any perfect classes. However, whenever students lost focus, I would tell them to return to the self-reported grading sheet and think about how their behavior aligns with their expectations. Aside from being a great student motivator, this tool is also good for classroom management.

This summer, I am planning to attend two more national conferences, the AVID Conference in Tampa and the Visible Learning Conference again, in Burlington, CA. Advancement Via Individual Determination (AVID) is a philosophy centered around student accountability. It trains educators to use proven strategies that prepares students for success in high school, college, and a career. The program emphasizes teaching skills and behaviors for academic success, strong student/teacher relationships, intensive support with tutorials, creating a positive peer group for students, and developing a sense of hope for personal achievement gained through hard work and determination. I am extremely excited about attending this summer. One of the things I struggle with is increasing student self-motivation. I have more than a handful of students who have poor work ethic and low self-esteem. I am optimistic that the strategies AVID teaches will tackle some of these issues.