••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••
“CHANGE IS INEVITABLE, GROWTH IS
OPTIONAL”
-Todd Whitaker
Boredom…Students Not Engaged…
Driving Questions!
 How would you teach your students if the governor declared that
annual STARR and TAKS testing ended today and would not return
next year?
 What do we really want our students to know?
 Are we about engagement or do we consider compliance with
mandates to be sufficient?
 Are we focused on our students’ learning at profound levels or are
we pleased if students learn just enough to pass the standardized
tests?
TRANSFORMATION RESOURCES
 TASA You-Tube lessons for
teachers
 Self Analysis Tool
 Implementation matrix
 Regional Consortiums
 High Performing Schools
Consortium/legislation
 Buck Institute
 Power On Texas
 Regional Service Centers
WHY?
There are two achievement gaps in this country:
1. The gap between the educational experiences of
middle-class children and those of most poor and
minority children.
2. The gap that between what even our very best
schools are teaching and testing versus what all
students will need to be successful in today’s
globally interconnected, technology-suffused,
information economy.
Source: The Global Achievement Gap, Dr. Tony Wagner, Harvard University
WHAT OUR STUDENTS REALLY NEED TO
KNOW
Wagner’s Seven Survival Skills
 Critical thinking and problem-solving
 Collaboration across networks and leading by influence
 Agility and adaptability
 Initiative and entrepreneurship
 Effective oral and written communication
 Accessing and analyzing information
 Curiosity and imagination
And…they must be used much more frequently than we currently are
doing in our classrooms.
21ST CENTURY LEARNING
 What changes might we expect to see in students, in the
environment in which teachers and students work, in the
focus of our actions?
 What new capacities will we need and how will we develop
them?
BUILDING CAPACITY
 Increase people’s collective power to move the district
forward
 Can be a missing element, even when people agree on need
for change
 Must acquire new skills, understandings, and increased
commitment – examples?
 Must Let Go!
Where did we start?
With Buy In
Why Change
Vision and
Goals
Toured
Schools
Access to
Tech Tools
Professional
Development
I. The New Digital
Learning Environment
VI. A More Balanced
and Reinvigorated
State/Local Partnership
II. The New Learning
Standards
Creating a New Vision
for Public Education
in Texas
V. Organizational
Transformation
III. Assessments for
Learning
IV. Accountability for
Learning
Rockdale ISD Vision
The vision is to be a world class
school system in our global
environment where every
student is a learner, every
learner is a graduate, and every
graduate is a success.
Rockdale ISD Goals
Provide high performing
campuses resulting from quality
and effective instruction, coupled
with high expectations for all
stakeholders in the Rockdale
educational community.
Through meaningful
relationships, educators will
engage students at their
individual ability and interest
levels in order to
appropriately prepare all students
for their future.
Hire and retain a highly
competent and committed staff
of educators.
Motivate parents and community
members to be engaged partners
in educating all Rockdale ISD
students.
Appropriately communicate
educational change and district
restructuring to parents, staff,
community and students.
Learning Environments to Engage
Students
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Flipped Instruction
Socratic Questioning
Project Based/Challenged Based Learning
Students as Teachers
Blended Learning
Project Share
Collaboration with other schools
PROJECT BASED LEARNING
Source: Buck Institute www.bie.org
Where we are now?
nd
2
–
th
5
grade PBL
training
6th – 8th grade ELA PBL
training
9th & 10th grade core
classes
STUDENT CENTERED
STUDENT CENTERED
FUTURE READY
When is a tablet better than a piece of paper? Digital image. HP. HP Technology for Teaching
philanthropy initiative in higher education. 27 January 2012.
Engagement in the Classroom. Digital image. Cooperative Learning. Copyright © 2011 Kagan
Publishing & Professional Development. 27 January 2012.
RESULTS
 Attendance Rate increased 1%
 Discipline referrals were reduced by 150%
 Failure rate was reduced by 5%
If I am your teacher and I am designing an assignment for you,
what would I have to build into the assignment for you to find it
worthy of completing it in a quality manner?
“let students teach
the class”
“let students work
with a partner”
“to work through the
problem and get the
answer together”
“give us the freedom
to design our own
learning from the
question/problem”
“we need to be
motivated to work on
something”
“allow us to be
creative”
“use our artistic
expression”
“make it real world”
“guidelines for the
project”
Describe an assignment that was really fun and from which you
know you learned a great deal?
“a science class”
“making a
movie”
“doing a lab that
didn't already
have an answer”
In all of the answers students were
doing something that required
them to think or role play.
A teacher’s view
Thanks Dr. Wright! I am really enjoying this Schlechty conference-thank you for the opportunity to come! It's one of the few PD
workshops that have really made me think about the way we teach.
It's also reaffirmed our use of PBL in Rockdale. Last year was hard for
us, to start something new with the 9th graders, but the last few
weeks I've been able to see the fruits of our (and the students') hard
work in the sophomores.
I wanted to let you know that I do support PBL, and I do see the good
it's doing in our school. I'm excited to go back tomorrow and start
implementing what I'm learning here in Dallas.
Miss Williams
Another teacher’s view
I heard three very positive pieces of info today that must be shared.
1. We had student volunteers helping with Alg I tutorials in Miss Hrozek's
room yesterday!
2. Sophomores are telling their teachers that they like, yes LIKE, project
based learning!
3. Students are asking for daily task sheets to keep them on track with
organization during projects!
THIS IS SO NOT APATHY! Our students are becoming engaged! Way to go
everyone! I feel we are seeing progress!
Blessings,
Elaine
••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••
Regional Consortium
Meetings/sessions/presentations
Joint Board meeting
Visiting schools/networks
Professional Development
School Visits
Administrators, teachers, and school board members visited schools
Coppell, Manor, College Station, and New Caney for site visits to learn
about PBL, block scheduling, CATE programs, credit recovery strategies,
flipped instruction, and opportunities for networking.
WOW!
Academy
Project Based Learning combined with technology integration training
for teachers in our district. Held over 3 day periods during the summer.
Formative
Assessments
During the summer teacher teams planned and developed formative
assessments for the coming school year.
Professional Development
Bring Your
Own Device
Implemented Bring Your Own Device
policy for our students.
Break-out
Sessions
Held break-out sessions at the beginning
of the school year to give teachers choice.
PLNs
Fostering and encouraging a culture of
Professional Learning Networks.
TECH TOOLS
SymbalooEDU
Chromebooks
iPads
Google Apps
My Big Campus
IMA Process
Campuses
purchased
recurring
necessary
instructional
materials.
Campus teams
developed
priorities for
additional
instructional
materials.
Representatives
from each
campus team
met at district
level to share
campus needs.
Priorities
identified
throughout
district and
remainder of
funds allocated.
Schletchy Center
Working on the
Work
Administrative
training
Board Training
Leadership
team
Campus Design
Teams
• Engaging Students
book study
District Design
Teams
Dr. Howell Wright, Superintendent
hwright@rockdaleisd.net
@howellwright
Pam Kaufmann, Asst Supt for Instruction & Admin
pkaufmann@rockdaleisd.net
@pamkaufmann
Rebecca King, Dir of Teaching & Learning
rking@rockdaleisd.net
@rebeccakingRK
CONTACT INFORMATION