Shifting to Academic Writing

Team:

Selah Bryan, our Literacy CSS, came to support our school yesterday in the area of academic writing. You received a hard copy of the presentation yesterday. Below please click the image below to download a PDF of the DRAFT of the document for your review.

https://sites.google.com/site/belairecoachscorner/academic%20writing%20ppt%20pdf.pdf?attredirects=0&d=1

It is important that we understand this shift in order to tailor our instruction to prepare our students for the demands of the FSA.

As always, please see Ms. Chapman if you need assistance in implementing academic writing in your classroom.

iReady PPT and Webinar for Viewing

As you are all aware, the district has purchased iReady for both Reading and Math. It is being highly recommended that you view the training webinar in order to ensure proper implementation of the diagnostic assessment as well as the program itself. The district has made available to PPT presentation and webinar for you to view.

Click the link below to download. You will need to be on the dadeschools network:

DOWNLOAD

Anchor Chart Presentation

Literacy Team:

Our CSS, Selah Bryan, created and shared with our school a PPT presentation on anchor charts.

To download the document, click here. Enjoy!

Promethean Resource Pack Download

Teachers and staff:


I hope you have enjoyed the Promethean training that you have been participating in over the past two days. Please download the Resource Pack that was provided to us by Ms. Nogales. The resource pack is FILLED with documents for Reading, Math, Science, Social Studies, and more.


Please see Ms. Jomarron or Ms. Chapman if you need further assistance.


CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD


We hope that you find this useful!! Enjoy!

Division of Language Arts & Reading Website

Reading teachers:

It is being strongly recommended from the district that you utilize the Division of Language Arts website. There is a lot of great information on there. It is being updated and overhauled to be even more user friendly. Add this great resource to your favorites if you haven't already.

http://languageartsreading.dadeschools.net/resourcesandlinks.asp

Stay in the Know: READ YOUR WEEKLY BRIEFINGS

Please see the weekly briefing below regarding the FSA (Florida Standards Assessments).

Briefing ID #: 15862 ALL SCHOOL PRINCIPALS: ITS - Information regarding the Online Portal and Resources for the Florida Standards Assessments Category: For Your Information

Audience:	All Principals/APs
Post Date:	Jul 03, 2014
Due Date:	n/a
Meeting Date:	n/a
Master Calendar:	n/a
Attachment(s):	15862_-_ATTACHMENT_-_CBT_Transition_Chart.pdf

To notify principals and assistant principals with information regarding the Florida Standards Assessments (FSA) online portal as well as the release of some FSA resources.

• The Florida Department of Education has released information on the new FSA online portal available at  http://www.fsassessments.org/.   Districts, schools, students, parents, and the general public can access this site for information on the new assessments. 
• In addition, this portal will serve as the primary location for schools and district administrators to access resources for test administration and to conduct activities related to computer-based testing (CBT), test management and reporting.
  • TIDE is American Institutes for Research (AIR’s) online test management system and Online Reporting System (ORS) is AIR’s test results delivery system.  Both sites will require a username and password.  More information regarding these systems will be provided in early fall. 
• The memorandum by the Commissioner of Education may be found at this LINK outlining the following resources now available on the portal:
  • Training Tests are intended to provide students, parents, and educators with an opportunity to become familiar with the item types and functionality of the new CBT platform produced by AIR.
    • Sample items for different grade levels and subject areas are available for the following: 
      • Grades 4-11 FSA English Language Arts (ELA) Writing Component  
      • Grades 3-11 FSA ELA (Reading, Language, and Listening)
      • Grades 3-8 FSA Mathematics
      • FSA End-of-Course (EOC) Mathematics
    • Please note the following important information regarding the training tests:
      • The new platform allows users to select new features such as color contrast/print size, zoom, and audio that were previously only available as an accommodation for students with disabilities on the FCAT and EOC assessments.
      • CBT accommodations, such as text to speech for students with disabilities, are not available on these training tests at this time. Information on the CBT accommodations will be provided when it becomes available.
      • Assessments for students in Grades 3 and 4 will be paper-based in 2014, 2015, however sample tests are provided for these grades as well which illustrate the types of items that will be available once each assessment moves to online delivery (please refer to the attached CBT transition chart). 
      • The ratio/percentage of items of each item type in the training tests is NOT representative of the ratio/percentage of items of each that will appear in the operational tests.
  • DRAFT Test Design Summary/Blueprints provide more detailed information about the assessments, including the percentage of items in each content category, cognitive complexity and appropriate number of test items.
  • DRAFT Test Item Specifications guide the development of statewide assessment items and define the content and format of the test items for each grade level and subject.

DOK Question Stems

DOK Question Stems

 

 

Download the DOK question stems by clicking here. Ask yourself: Are your students given the opportunity to move beyond DOK1? We will be taking a closer look at HOT questioning and the DOK Question stems during upcoming grade level planning sessions.

2013-2014 Classroom Environment Checklist

Please download and review the 2013-2014 Classroom Environment Checklist as you begin to prepare your classrooms. These are recommendations based on instructional best practices.

Download

Common Core Tools Courtesy of North Carolina



North Carolina has unpacked the Common Core Standards for ELA and Math!

Please visit the tools that they have to offer to add to your "Common Core Toolbox"  including: crosswalks, unpacked standards, exemplar documents, and graphic organizers. There are documents available for both ELA and Math.

http://www.ncpublicschools.org/acre/standards/common-core-tools/

Thoughts? Questions? Leave a comment below.

ELA Common Core Simplified

We all know that the transition to the Common Core can seem overwhelming. Luckily, there are a lot of useful tools from around the country that we can utilize to help make planning and implementation a little bit easier.

The Tulare County Office of Education has put out templates for the each of the ELA Common Core Standards from grades 1-5. Each template provides a comprehensive breakdown of the standard including: the standard, anchor, essential skills, academic vocabulary and Spanish cognates, teaching notes and strategies (with performance tasks pulled directly from Appendix B), question stems, and the correlating standard for the grade above and the grade below.

This is a very helpful document as we try to navigate through the Common Core. To download the template for your grade level, click on the link below.

Common Core Templates at Common Core Connect

Did you find this document helpful? If so, let us know in the comments!

Corrective Feedback and Interactive Journaling PD

Teachers and Interns at Bel-Aire came together for a Professional Development session on Corrective Feedback and Interactive Journaling. We created our own "model" journals  to practice the left side/right side strategy and used student assessment and DI folders to practice implementing corrective feedback to our students. Check out the participants hard at work below! Thank you to all of the participants who came and to Ms. Thompson and Ms. Lawson for leading the session!

     

**Download the Feedback Starter Stems handed out at the session here.

Make it HOT: Developing Higher Order Questions

Reading teachers have been working hard at developing higher order (HOT) questions to stimulate student thinking and develop deeper comprehension of a variety of texts.

Here are some additional resources to assist you in developing these questions for your lessons! Please see Ms. Thompson if you have any questions or need additional assistance utilizing these tools.

1. Reading Stems From ISAT Sample Test (2012) -- Download

2. Reading Stems From ISAT Sample Test (2013) -- Download

3. Inferential Question Maker -- Download

4. Literal Question Maker -- Download

5. What Questions Would a Common Core Teacher Ask? -- Download

Text Features Posters

Click the link to download text features posters:

http://it.pinellas.k12.fl.us/Teachers3/gurianb/files/362137734487401A81C56540107F99B7.pdf

Interactive Journaling and ETO Forms

As discussed at opening of school (via ETO Collaboration Hub):

Journal Forms and Process

Lesson Plan Templates

Data Chat Forms

Instructional Focus Calendars (Reading) and Other Important Documents

Intermediate Reading Teachers:

Your IFC can be downloaded here. Click on the grade level to download the document.

3rd Grade

4th Grade

5th Grade

Other Important Documents:

Updated Reading Coach Request

Depth of Knowledge - DOK

We now have an updated DOK chart. Please utilize this chart in your lesson planning. Download it by clicking on the preview below.

PLC Session 2 Agenda and Materials

The Summer PLC agenda and materials are now available to download for your convenience if you were unable to attend.

PLC Agenda
Power Point - CIS Model
Reading Task Card
Writing Task Card
Discussion Task Card
Vocabulary Task Card
CIS Lesson Timeline
Promethus Handouts
Prometheus

Differentiated Instruction Tracking: Kinder

Our fabulous K teachers came up with these sound tracking and monitoring sheets for DI during the '11-'12 school year. Download them below:

DI Spreadsheet Checklist
DI Individual Student Folders

Month by Month Sight Word Tracking:

September
October
November
December
January
February
March

MDCPS Reading/Writing Rigorous Planners

The Division of Language Arts has provided some planning templates that may be helpful to you as you prepare for the upcoming school year. A special thank you to Ms. Perry who has shared these documents from the district Grade 3 Common Core training she attended earlier in the summer. Click the picture to download the editable planner.

Grade 3 Writing Planner

Planning for a Rigorous Reading Lesson

Planning for Instructional Rigor

Daily Planner



Summer PLC Documents

Summer Common Core PLC Participants:

Attached please find the downloads from our first PLC session. Click the link to download the attachment.

• Session 1 PowerPoint: Common Core
• Session 1 Agenda
• QAR Chart
• The Fisherman and His Wife Close Reading Exemplar (Grade 3)
• Depth of Knowledge
• Common Core Suggested Reading List
• Text Complexity Rubric
• Comprehension Stems (Informational)
• Comprehension Stems (Narrative)
• Text Complexity Scale
• Because of Winn Dixie

Remember that our next session will be held on July, 25, 2012 at 10:00 a.m. Please make sure to complete your follow-up activity prior to the session. See you there!