INTRODUCTION
The goal of my Mentor Project to Guide Future Teacher Leaders is to provide professional development and peer coaching to educators on the use of LEAPP strategies as quality classroom tools to be used within the Professional Learning Communities of our schools.
During my twenty-six years of teaching in Barrington, twenty-three years of that time has been spent educating students at Primrose Hill, a preschool-grade 3 school. Over the past three years, it has been my good fortune to be involved in the professional development initiative called LEAPP (Lead, Educate, and Promote the Profession). During the first year, the group of individuals who were chosen to participate worked with two consultants, Denise Holliday and Brenda Clark. Much of the work focused on building a Professional Learning Community. We read the book, Cultures Built to Last, by Michael Fullan and Richard DuFour. During that time, there were large group meetings and building based meetings that centered on continuous student improvement in classrooms. There were Five Guiding Learning Centered Questions that were presented to us:
1. What do students need to learn?
2. How will we know they have learned it?
3. How will they learn it?
4. What will we do differently if they don’t learn it?
5. What will we do differently if they already know it?
2. How will we know they have learned it?
3. How will they learn it?
4. What will we do differently if they don’t learn it?
5. What will we do differently if they already know it?
Many quality classroom tools that could be used within classrooms to engage students and improve performance were introduced and tried throughout the year.
In the second year, Paula Morrissette and Eliza Pyliotis, from the high school conducted walk-throughs and worked with elementary and secondary educators during large group meetings after school. School based meetings that focused on teaching and learning were held at Primrose Hill School with a team of teachers that serviced second graders. Our focus was on improving evidence based responses to demonstrate skills in reading comprehension for informational text. Initially, baseline data was gathered and shared with the students so they knew what needed to be accomplished to meet the criteria set for their grade level. Information was posted about topic sentences, evidence taken from the story, elaboration to explain the evidence, and concluding statements. During that time, some of the tools that classrooms used included “I Can” target statements, consensograms, Plus-Minus-Delta’s, individual and group goal setting sheets based on needs, and issue bins. By the end of the year, all students made significant improvements in their writing of evidence based responses.
Some members of the original group chose to volunteer for a third year. The two high school teachers conducted LEAPP walk-throughs twice to collect data on the use of the quality classroom tools by teachers within Primrose Hill School. Although some were utilized, it was evident that further training was necessary to move our school forward. Therefore, I decided that for my final project as I retire, professional development and peer coaching on the use of quality classroom tools would be valuable to teachers within our building and throughout the district.
Portions of four faculty meetings, four grade level meetings, and three Friday chats were devoted to modeling and teaching everyone about LEAPP, the philosophy behind it, and the useful classroom strategies used for student accountability. An additional walk-through was completed by three members of our school staff. Teacher surveys were distributed and the results were complied. Comments and suggestions were submitted. Through oral group discussions, feedback about the use of the tools was gathered from students. The project was shared during a faculty meeting with educators at the school.
On a Weebly website that has been created, there are descriptions of the LEAPP quality classroom tools with pictures of samples taken from different grade levels (preschool-grade 3). For some of the strategies there are videos showing teachers and students working together. Tools are introduced, explained, and modeled during small and large group lessons for other educators to view when they want to try them in their own classrooms. This information will be available for use by other teachers within the district, as well as the staff at our school.
In the second year, Paula Morrissette and Eliza Pyliotis, from the high school conducted walk-throughs and worked with elementary and secondary educators during large group meetings after school. School based meetings that focused on teaching and learning were held at Primrose Hill School with a team of teachers that serviced second graders. Our focus was on improving evidence based responses to demonstrate skills in reading comprehension for informational text. Initially, baseline data was gathered and shared with the students so they knew what needed to be accomplished to meet the criteria set for their grade level. Information was posted about topic sentences, evidence taken from the story, elaboration to explain the evidence, and concluding statements. During that time, some of the tools that classrooms used included “I Can” target statements, consensograms, Plus-Minus-Delta’s, individual and group goal setting sheets based on needs, and issue bins. By the end of the year, all students made significant improvements in their writing of evidence based responses.
Some members of the original group chose to volunteer for a third year. The two high school teachers conducted LEAPP walk-throughs twice to collect data on the use of the quality classroom tools by teachers within Primrose Hill School. Although some were utilized, it was evident that further training was necessary to move our school forward. Therefore, I decided that for my final project as I retire, professional development and peer coaching on the use of quality classroom tools would be valuable to teachers within our building and throughout the district.
Portions of four faculty meetings, four grade level meetings, and three Friday chats were devoted to modeling and teaching everyone about LEAPP, the philosophy behind it, and the useful classroom strategies used for student accountability. An additional walk-through was completed by three members of our school staff. Teacher surveys were distributed and the results were complied. Comments and suggestions were submitted. Through oral group discussions, feedback about the use of the tools was gathered from students. The project was shared during a faculty meeting with educators at the school.
On a Weebly website that has been created, there are descriptions of the LEAPP quality classroom tools with pictures of samples taken from different grade levels (preschool-grade 3). For some of the strategies there are videos showing teachers and students working together. Tools are introduced, explained, and modeled during small and large group lessons for other educators to view when they want to try them in their own classrooms. This information will be available for use by other teachers within the district, as well as the staff at our school.
