True teachers are those who use themselves as bridges over which they invite their students to cross; then, having facilitated their crossing, joyfully collapse, encouraging them to create their own. ~Nikos Kazantzakis
This is one of the weeks our school is measured by others. Oh, there are many of those times in Benton’s near future, but this week our school will go through our bi-annual District Data Consult and Walkthrough. The process is simple. District officials, usually our Associate Superintendent and Assistant Director of Secondary Education, visit Benton for four hours to discuss areas of celebration and improvement for our school. The conversation, which in the fall takes upward of three hours, is followed by a walkthrough our building where the officials will talk to you and to our students to verify topics discussed in the consult. Most often, your administrative team selects the topics of conversation. If we select incorrectly, our district officials set the conversation. We prefer to choose wisely. 
This fall, our topics of conversation will center on our celebrations and hard work realized in our data teams focus. We have collected the data from Power Standard 1 along with assessments from almost every team. It was stupefying how much we all learned, from team members to administrators, in our conversations this first round. The magnitude of having data teams in every department is a celebration of its own. To have them all operational is amazing. Other topics we will discuss include our focus on assessments and grades, ACT Academy, EOC scores, attendance and alternative referrals. We feel it’s just smart to be open and honest about our work and talk through our plans. The most rewarding part of a data consult is to have our plan affirmed and get ideas for solutions.
Following the consult, your admin team will debrief and create a letter to inform everyone of the results of our consult and walkthrough. The information in this letter is our self-report to our staff of where we shine and what we need to work on together. It’s a great letter. The reflection always makes me realize how fortunate I am to work at Benton.
Data Teams – Power Standard #2
As you move into the next round, please remember the high points of our learning from the first Power Standard.
- A Power Standard cycle is from pretest to posttest.
- Start with your posttest (you know what you want to measure) and create your pretest to measure similarly but by scaffolding (breaking down the process and/or content needed prior to learning what you are asking them to learn) the questions.
- Your power standard MUST be grounded in curriculum objectives. Know what those are – especially the operative verbs and the content expectations.
- Bundle (taking several part of different objectives) or chunk (breaking down a large objective into small manageable chunks) your power standard and create your instructional time frame by topics of instruction and amount of time needed for mastery (or almost mastery). Those points of instruction become your CHECK POINTS (which may or may not be a graded check for mastery). Your checkpoints are a required part of the Power Standard #2 cycle. Make sure you identify the topic(s) you are measuring.
- Measure your Power Standard success through your formative and summative data.
- Look for trends and concerns. If your students are less successful after you instruct, ask why. If your students are all successful on your pretest, question your approach.
Week 13 – A Look Ahead
This week our administrative walkthrough will focus on instructional objectives. We will look and ask to see if students know what they are learning and how that applies to them as a learner. Do you post your objective each day? Do the students write it down so they can refer to it when you remind them? Do they know what and why they are working on in your classroom? We will ask them to tell us.
Monday – 2 Hour Early Out for Veteran’s Day. Thanks to MAJ Stackhouse and MSG Rivera for their service.
Tuesday – 7:00 a.m. Benton Leadership Team Meeting with Dr. Dial in Room 106. 8:00 – 12:30 District Data Consult & Walkthrough
Wednesday – 2:50 p.m. Staff Meeting in Auditorium (30 minutes); Regular BLT Meeting canceled due to Tuesday meeting.
Thursday – Intruder Drill @ 9:15 a.m.
Friday – Wizard of Oz – 7:30 p.m
Saturday – Wizard of Oz – 7:30; JROTC Ball – 6:00 p.m.
~Excellence is a journey not a destination.~
All images are available CC from Flickr: “Measuring Time” by aussiegall; “Measuring up 3” by chris runoff; “Vertical Speed Indicator” by Barnaby Kerr Photography; “Balance Scale” by Sepehr Ehsani