Standard 2.1: Curriculum: Schools have a written, cohesive plan for instruction and the learning of all its students that serves as the basis for instruction.
Indicators for Strand 2.1 2.1.1: Articulated: The written curriculum is designed to ensure a continuum of content and skills within and across grade levels and content areas
Rating: 2
We feel like we have partially implemented this indicator. Over the last few years, we have taken on the project of mapping each course offered at Western into a template loaded into Curriculum Trak online software. These documents do outline the core curricular expectations by subject and grade level and are accessible to all teachers so that they can see and build upon material taught in earlier courses. However, no formal vertical or horizontal alignment documents are in place (outside of standards documents such as Iowa CORE,). This kind of alignment at WC often takes place informally, during department discussions and informal conversations. Our AIW initiative has also exposed teachers to each other's curriculum in ways that has not happened before, which has made each of us more aware of what our colleagues teach and allowed us to better complement each other's lessons. Again, however, this alignment is not formally documented or exhaustively done. We are encouraged that our curriculum maps in Curriculum Trak do give us a baseline and a system by which to continue this process in the future.
2.1.2: Biblical perspective: A biblically informed curriculum points to God as the source of all truth, leads students toward biblical wisdom and a response to God’s call to discipleship, and nurtures all students toward Christ-like living.
Rating: 3
We feel that we have implemented this standard. Our student and parent surveys clearly show the belief that our school is definitely Christian, that our students are receiving a high quality Christ-centered education, and that our curriculum clearly reflects a biblical perspective. Additionally, our Curriculum Trak documents show essential questions about biblical perspective for each unit taught. Our AIW revision process asks for teachers to consider better ways to integrate Christian perspective. We also acknowledge that most faculty members have incorporated biblical perspective into student assessments.
2.1.3: Aligned to standards: The local curriculum is aligned to national or state/provincial standards for student achievement, or to another set of recognized standards that are consistent with the school’s mission and educational goals.
Rating: 2
We feel like we have partially implemented this indicator. In Curriculum Trak, our units are explicitly linked to content standards from either Iowa CORE or another set of standards where applicable (CSI Bible standards, for example). We have not, however, ensured that formative assessments systematically monitor student progress toward meeting content standards or that summative assessments measure student achievement of the standards. We know this happens in many instances, but we cannot say that it happens (or is required to happen) systematically.
2.1.4: Curriculum review: The school’s curriculum is reviewed and revised systematically and regularly. There is a structure and process for the involvement of all appropriate stakeholders to participate in the review.
Rating: 2
We settled on the decision that we have partially implemented this indicator. The tradition at Western has been for teachers to have complete autonomy and control over their curriculum, making changes within a course at any time they deem it necessary. Therefore, there is no "process" for them to know to change the written curriculum within a course--it just happens. Hopefully these changes are made in response to their professional learning and research (for example, a presentation on Backwards Design from this fall's inservice). However, we have taken steps in the curriculum mapping process to ensure more consistency in our courses, no matter who is teaching them. The "Essential Questions," "Concepts," "Content," and "Assessment" fields in our unit maps are district-wide, meaning they are consistent between teachers that teach the same course. The "Activities" field is customizable by individual teachers, giving them autonomy over how they achieve the goals in the unit. Since most of our courses only have one instructor, however, this process is still incomplete because it falls within the autonomy of the teacher writing the map. The addition or removal of courses or departments, however, does have a formal review process. Our teachers and education committee meet for an annual curriculum meeting in December, at which time faculty can propose course changes; the education committee can then take the request to the full board, where it can be approved or denied. The board can also take the initiative to add programs or courses without faculty request, as happened recently with addition of our agriculture program.
Standard 2.2: Instruction: Teachers are intentional about the use of processes that facilitate and result in high levels of learning for all students.
2.2.1: Planning for learning--content appropriateness: Classroom lesson content is aligned with the school’s written curriculum. Careful planning by the faculty ensures that the curriculum content integrates a biblical perspective and advances through the grade levels without gaps or unnecessary redundancies.
Rating: 2
We feel as though we have partially implemented this indicator. Over the past few years, teachers have mapped their content through the Curriculum Trak tool, including essential questions and concepts that highlight biblical perspective. Curriculum Trak reports show few gaps in scope and sequence. We do not, however, use student achievement data to evaluate whether there are unseen gaps, and individual lesson plans are not aligned to standards and benchmarks.
2.2.2: Planning for learning—learner appropriate/differentiation: Instructional planning focuses on individual student success by considering faith development, learning styles, aptitudes, cultural differences, and interests.
Rating: 3
We decided that we have implemented this indicator. We debated whether CSI is asking for differentiated instruction on a macro level (using multiple teaching methods to reach different learners, for e.g. group work, lecture, projects, debates, presentations) or a micro level (allowing each individual student to movel through each class at his/her own pace and design). If it is asking for micro-level differentiation, our rating would be lower; however, we feel we adequately differentiate on the macro level. For example, we have a Talented and Gifted (TAG) program as well as a robust resource program to meet different student needs. Our course offerings are differiented in math and English, depending on ability level and post-high school plans. Our resource teacher agrees that most teachers work in close contact with the resource room to help make appropriate adaptations and modifications for students in the program. Additionally, teachers use a wide variety of instructional methods and encourage each other to try new ideas during AIW. Faith development of students is considered when designing essential questions for units, as well as in the prevelance and level of higher order thinking questions on tasks and assignments.
2.2.3: Educational support services: Educational support services are in place to meet the learning, social, and emotional needs of all students who are enrolled in the school.
Rating: 3
We feel we have implemented this indicator with success. As described above, our resource program is robust and has close partnerships with our classroom teachers. At the beginning of the 2016-2017 school year, we hired additional part-time staff to address rising student numbers in that program; additionally, we created Student Success Teams to encourage accountability for failing students and devised a set of criteria for students to enter the resource program. Finally, we partner with the Christian Learning Center (CLC) Network, who describes their mission like this: "As experts in inclusive education for more than twenty-five years, we come alongside your Christian community to help you include and support all of God’s people – regardless of their level of ability – so that the kingdom can be more complete." Representatives of the CLC spend half a day per month with our resource teachers and students, partnering with and supporting them. Educational support staff, however, do not train general education staff on interventions or how to assess them, preventing us from reading an Exemplary status.
2.2.4: Planning for learning--reflection and refinement: Teachers work individually and collaboratively to gather and analyze information to continually modify and improve their instruction.
Rating: 2-3
We fell between paritally implemented and implemented on this indicator. While we do meet collaboratively each week in personal learning (AIW) teams to improve instruction and the teaching of biblical perspective, these teams do not gather or anlayze data or take part in making school-wide decisions on instructional practices and curriculum.
2.2.5: Delivery of curriculum--best practices: The faculty is aware that some instructional approaches and methods have demonstrated effectiveness based upon current learning research; these are called best practices. Teachers use these best practices to design learning experiences and inform their own professional development.
Rating: 2
We feel we have paritally implemented this indicator. We have identified and selected some curricular and instructional best practices (AIW, Backwards Design, Curriculum Mapping), promoted classroom use of these practices, and provided professional resources that explain and model their use. Additionally, the school pays for professional development for teachers that want to pursue best practices in their subject area. We do not, however, insist that all units/lessons be built upon the practices we have adopted or closely monitor the clasroom use of these practices.
2.2.6: Delivery of curriculum--student engagement: Teachers design lessons and assessments that engage their students and promote active learning in the context of the school’s mission and educational goals. High-level thinking skills are employed across all curricular areas. Cross-curricular integrated units enable students to view God’s world holistically and apply their growing knowledge in multiple ways.
Rating: 3
We feel that we have implemented this indicator. In our student survey, 44% of our students strongly agreed or agreed that students here are interested in what they are learning. Another 45% were neutral on the topic, and only 11% disagreed or strongly disagreed. Our AIW standards promote high-level thinking (Construction of Knowledge) and ask teachers to think about and improve how the task fits into our Christian worldview. Students in individual classes are asked to apply their knowledge in a real context, emphasizing this worldview. We do acknowledge, however, that we give students few chances to engage in cross-curricular, integrated units. We see logistics and time management as barriers to this goal.
Standard 2.3: Assessment: The school systematically gathers and uses multiple sources of evidence to monitor student achievement and the meeting of the school’s educational goals and purpose.
2.3.1: Aligned to curriculum and instruction: Assessments are aligned to the curriculum and match the targeted student outcome (examples: knowledge, reasoning, skill, product, or disposition).
Rating: 1
We feel we are getting started with this indicator. At the time of the self-study (Spring 2016), we had no procedures in place to examine our assessments' alignment with the curriculum or content validity. We do feel that individual teachers match up their assessments to their learning goals, but we have no system to validate or examine this. In some cases, teachers have adopted and adjusted the assessments provided by their curriculum (CSI Bible curriculum, CASE curriculum for Animal Science), which ensures that the assessments do align with the curriculum. Additionally, our curriculum maps list assessments, but teachers are not required to link to those or provide them for feedback. To address this lack of assessment examination, we have started (Fall of 2016) using AIW to examine the alignment of our assessments to our learning goals.
2.3.2: Valid, reliable, and bias free: The school assures that assessments are valid (measure what they are supposed to measure), reliable (yield the same results from repeated trials), and free of bias.
Rating: 1
Again, we feel as if we are getting started here. We do think our individual faculty members try to assure validity in their assessments; however, we have no formal process to ensure that this is happening, nor have we had professional development in this area. In order to begin addressing this issue, we did decidd to require that teachers bring assessments to AIW this year (2016-2017), where they are being scored and revised according to AIW standards.
2.3.3: Multiple measures: The school uses a variety of formative and summative assessments including standardized tests, benchmark assessments, culminating assessments, and common assessments.
Rating: 3
This indicator was one area of assessment that we thought we have implemented. Through our experience scoring a variety of teacher tasks and student work in AIW over the last four years, we have all seen a variety of formative and summative assessments from our co-workers. Additionally, the administrator asks for our summative course assessments at the end-of-the-year checkout for his review. We do not, however, feel that our use of these assessments is systematic across the school.
2.3.4: Informs instruction: Teachers systematically modify their instruction and the school’s curriculum based on review of the assessment data.
Rating: 1
Again, this is an area we feel that we are getting started in. We do believe this happens periodically at the classroom level--teachers see poor performance on test items and make adjustments to their instruction accordingly. Each teacher in our group reported practicing this kind of analysis and modification. We also started using AIW this year to review assessments and student work on assessment with teacher teams, but we still feel as though we lack a system of continuous data-driven improvement based on assessment results.
2.3.5: Sharing results: Assessment results are reported to and used collaboratively by teachers, administrators, and parents to revise instruction, provide interventions, improve achievement, and encourage the formation of children’s and young people’s faith.
Rating: 1
While we do have opportunities for parents to meet with staff and discuss student progress, as well as school-wide grading scales and electronic record sharing methods through JMC and Google Classroom, we still feel as though we need to rate ourselves as "getting started" in this area. We say this because there is limited discussion regarding a student's faith journey in any form, and our reporting system is limited in the sense that it only reports grades on assignments and assessments (vs. specific student achievement of the tested benchmarks or knowledge and skills in each subject area).
Strand 2: Summary of Self-Study and Potential Areas of Improvement
Which indicators provide reasons for commendation? What blessings can we identify?
We felt that both Standards 2.1 (Curriculum) and 2.2 (Instruction) were areas that we can be commended for. We are not high on the rating scale yet, but we have started processes (Curriculum Trak, AIW) that are consistently practiced that will eventually help us achieve higher ratings. Specifically, 2.1.2, 2.2.2, 2.2.3, 2.2.4, and 2.2.6 were commendable.
We all felt that, through professional development initiatives like AIW, we are blessed to know more about each other’s curriculum and instruction than we have in the past, and we can authentically say that these are strengths for most of our teachers. While there is still much work to be done, we are confident that we have structures in place to address the needs that we see in those areas.
Which indicators provide reasons for concern or further action and review?
All of Standard 2.3 (Assessment) was a concern for us—namely indicators 2.3.1, 2.3.2, 2.3.4, and 2.3.5. We scored a “1” (Getting Started) on each of those, but we are not sure that we are even that far along. In many cases, the evidence for the indicators was nonexistent here, particularly the use of data to drive decision-making. Unlike the other standards, we have not identified these needs or started any formal processes to address them.
Are there patterns of concern?
Within all strands, we noticed the lack of formal processes, accountability, and data or evidence. Often, we agreed that individual teachers practiced the indicators as described, but we had no formal policy, training, or consistent evidence to back up that belief.
One thing we also see the need for is more accountability and feedback from administration on certain initiatives, but we would like it done without stifling individual teachers’ autonomy and creativity, either. We realize this is not an easy balance, and we have no easy answers, but we think more consistency could be achieved if we had more administrative involvement and/or department-wide collaboration.
Do we see potential areas for improvement that might become goals in our school improvement plan?
We definitely see a need for professional development in the area of assessments, including how to use data appropriately, how to craft level-appropriate questions, and how to accurately measure learning.
Some specific recommendations our group came up with regarding Standard 2 (Assessment) include the following:
develop and implement student portfolios
make assessment a focus of AIW next year
be more intentional about how we administer and use our standardized tests
include more time for department-wide collaboration in our PD schedule