Instructional Leaders Meeting

1. Instructional Leaders Meeting September 24, 2013

2. Welcome! • Reflect • Were you able to complete the survey (implementation guide) with your department? • What professional development needs emerged? • Did you feel clear as to the information to share with your departments after our last meeting? • What ideas, questions, or concerns came up in your departments? • Have you had time to talk with your school leadership about this? • What else could I do to make this a better experience for you?

3. Foci for the Year • Keeping you at the forefront of learning about CCSS, SBAC, and Social Studies Best Practices • Collaborating around various ways to implement the Shifts of Instruction and Practice Guides in all of our schools • Learning more about how to ensure students are ready for SBAC • Maintaining and promoting a growth mindset in ourselves and our students

4. Agenda – Information to Share • iTunes University course on the Shifts of Instruction • SBAC practice exams: • http://www.washoecountyschools.org/district/assessment/sbac • Northern Nevada Holocaust Education Conference (this Sat) • Project REAL (www.projectrealnv.org) • Play by the Rules Book Order Form • Your Day in Court Tour Reservation • School Police Office Speaker Request Form • KNPB Nevada Resources • ABC CLIO Free Webinar • Gilder Lehrman Affiliate School • Institute on the Environment and the Economy

5. Information to Share Discuss: What have you found to be the best methods for sharing this type of information with your departments?

6. Agenda – Action Items • Ask your principal if there is money to pay for teachers to attend the Northern Nevada Council for the Social Studies Conference on March 1 for $40. • Last year, seven schools paid for staff members to attend. • Consider presenting at the NNCSS Conference and encourage other great teachers to do so as well. • There may be a survey about CCSS coming to you through email. Please encourage participation.

7. Activity to replicate with your department. Professional Learning – Core Action 1 What is the difference between a fixed and growth mindset? “Give challenging work to all students. Students’ minds grow when they stretch themselves. Try to incorporate tasks that train students’ attention (e.g. learning to tune out distractions), memory (learning to hold a number of things in mind at the same time), and cognitive flexibility (switching back and forth between ideas that can be confusing in their similarity)” (Dweck, 2009, p. 60).

8. Activity to replicate with your department. Professional Learning: Core Action 1 Essential Question: How can the emphasis on complex text in Core Action 1 assist us in nurturing a growth mindset in students? How can we ensure that we are properly using complex text to meet Core Actions 2 & 3? The first step is understanding text complexity. Why? • When we understand why a text is complex, we can teach students explicitly how to navigate that complexity and focus our energy on challenging and meaningful work with life-long skills and an emphasis on understanding versus knowing.

9. ACT Report: Reading Between the Lines

10. ACT Report: Reading Between the Lines

11. ACT Report: Reading Between the Lines

12. “If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters.”― Frederick Douglass

14. Quantitative Measurement • One quick and easy tool… • File • Options • Proofing • Check box for “Show Readability Statistics” • Then, each time you finish spell-checking a document, you will learn the Flesch-Kinkaid grad level.

15. Qualitative Measurement • MEANING • TEXT STRUCTURE • LANGUAGE FEATURES (Vocabulary) • KNOWLEDGE DEMANDS

16. Text Complexity Continuum EXPLICIT MEANING…………IMPLICIT MEANING CONVENTIONAL STRUCTURE………UNCONVENTIONAL STRUCTURE LITERAL………FIGURATIVE OR IRONIC CLEAR………AMBIGUOUS OR MISLEADING CONTEMPORARY OR FAMILIAR………ARCHAIC OR UNFAMILIAR CONVERSATIONAL………ACADEMIC FAMILIAR VOCABULARY………HIGH TIER 2/3 VOCABULARY LOAD SIMPLE SENTENCE STRUCTURE………COMPLEX AND VARIED EVERYDAY KNOWLEDGE………NEED BACKGROUND LOW INTERTEXTUALITY………NEED TO KNOW OTHER TEXTS SINGLE LEVEL OF MEANING…MULTIPLE LEVELS OF MEANING

17. Practice: What makes a complex text complex? • Read through the first two paragraphs of Abraham Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address. • Note: When measured quantitatively with Flesch Kincaid, this text is a level 11.5. • But, what can we pinpoint about this text’s complexity that will help us to write questions and tasks that assist students in navigating it for understanding?

18. What is complex about the sentence highlighted in red? At this second appearing to take the oath of the Presidential office there is less occasion for an extended address than there was at the first. Then a statement somewhat in detail of a course to be pursued seemed fitting and proper. Now, at the expiration of four years, during which public declarations have been constantly called forth on every point and phase of the great contest which still absorbs the attention and engrosses the energies of the nation, little that is new could be presented.The progress of our arms, upon which all else chiefly depends, is as well known to the public as to myself, and it is, I trust, reasonably satisfactory and encouraging to all. With high hope for the future, no prediction in regard to it is ventured. How does understanding the syntax of the red sentence help you understand the syntax of the purple sentence?

19. Why might the term “corresponding” be an important Tier 2 vocabulary term (academic language, cross discipline, multiple meanings depending on context) to explore? On the occasion corresponding tothis four years ago all thoughts were anxiously directed to an impending civil war.

20. Corresponding Definitions • similar in character, form, or function. • able to be matched, joined, or interlocked. • dealing with written communication. Etymology • Latin correspondere, from cor"together, with each other" + respondere "to answer“ Other Disciplines • Math (corresponding angles or sides – same or proportional) • ELA (literary themes and corresponding pieces) • Computer/Business (email vs. letter correspondence) Based on context

21. Analyze the Text with a Partner • What about this text is complex? • Be specific. • Why is it important for students to learn to navigate this? • Discuss with the group: What areas of complexity did you find?

22. Department Learning • Between now and November 13, find one complex text that you plan to teach in late November or December. • Find a quantitative measurement of its complexity. • Analyze the text (like we did with Lincoln) to find the very specific aspects of the text that make it complex. • Bring the annotated text to the next meeting where we will work on questions and vocabulary.

23. Activity to replicate with your department. Professional Learning: Reflection “Students are highly influenced by what we value. We need to convey to them that process--applying effort, trying many strategies, persevering through difficulty--is what we value. They need to know that we consider hard tasks, not easy ones, to be fun and that we admire people who struggle on hard tasks more than people who glide to success on easy tasks” (Dweck, 2009, p. 60). Does our department currently convey the above? If so, how? How can we use complex texts to nurture this types of mindset in a more enduring way?

24. Questions, Concerns, Comments