Academic / General Resources
CORE Instruction and
MTSS Guidance
CORE INSTRUCTION: Core is what happens in our classrooms every single day, academically and behaviorally, vertically and horizontally throughout our buildings.
Who is affected by Core Instruction? All students
What happens during Core? The ABSS Differentiated Core documents define the elements of core behavior and academic instruction such as direct instruction, small or guided groups, and fluency building opportunities.
Differentiated Core is the basis of everything. The stronger the Core, the less need for intervention.
Core instruction must be differentiated because all students are part of it.
Core support (sometimes referred to as Tier I) includes general academic, behavioral, and social-emotional instruction and support designed and differentiated for all students. Core academic instruction should be aligned with the North Carolina Standard Course of Study (NCSCOS).
CORE INSTRUCTION
in
PRACTICE
D = Data Evaluation (measures of student learning and adult impact)
I = Instructional practices to deliver curriculum (academic, behavior, and SEL)
C = Curriculum (materials, instructional programs, texts, and standards maps)
E = Environment (time/schedules, building layout, and atmosphere...)
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Defining and Strengthening the Core
Within curriculum, the NCSCOS for each content area guides instruction on a continuum towards college and career readiness. The elements of DICE (see above) support students to meet the curriculum standards. Instruction should provide equitable access for all students, should be rigorous, aligned with standards and differentiated to meet individual student's needs. The components of systematic instruction include careful modeling, deliberate and frequent feedback, scaffolding, and practice.
Strengthening the core involves teacher clarity about the curriculum standards within and between grade levels. Intentional discussions around rigorous instruction, students' productive struggle, providing practice aligned with the intent of the standard as well as assessment analysis should be regular aspects of PLC meetings.
Components of an effective lesson
Explicit instruction: A carefully thought-out lesson plan which includes clear, concise instruction, quality practice with feedback, and formative assessment to gauge mastery. Effective lessons follow a predictable pattern:
● Opening: Gain students attention, make relevant connections, and review prerequisite skills
● Teacher Input, or “I do”: Teacher demonstrates using clear, consistent and concise language while engaging the students (various strategies to elicit frequent responses)
● Guided Practice, or “We do”: Prompted or guided practice with effective feedback
● Independent Practice, or “You do”: Unprompted or independent practice (students should display high levels of accuracy or the teacher returns to “we do”)
● Closing: Review critical content, preview next lesson, assign independent work
Adapted from: Archer, A. L., & Hughes, C. A. (2011). Explicit instruction: Effective and efficient teaching. New York: Guilford Press.
Universal Screeners for Core Instruction
A universal screening system allows for broad generalizations regarding the future performance and outcomes of all students at individual and group level (e.g., classroom, grade, school,district).
In ABSS, aimsweb®Plus screens and monitors the reading skills of students in grades 4-8 and math skills of K–8 students. With its standards-aligned measures, aimswebPlus is proven to uncover learning gaps quickly, identify at-risk students, and assess individual and classroom growth. aimswebPlus also has add-on screeners for behavior and dyslexia for a comprehensive, all in one system.
For the 2021-2022 school year, ABSS will use mCLASS DIBELS 8 to screen and monitor the reading skills in Kindergarten-3rd Grade students.
Data and Assessments
Benchmark assessments are given at regular and specified intervals throughout the school year, and are designed to evaluate students' knowledge and skills relative to a specific set of academic standards.
Within a healthy MTSS, teams should use benchmark assessment data to evaluate the overall health of instruction for all students and also to assist in determining next steps. The power of benchmark assessments is amplified when teams of educators come together to problem-solve the data gained in order to plan future instruction.
Academic
NC Check Ins (3-8, English II and Math 1)
Imagine Math
Imagine Literacy
Achieve 3000
Behavior/SEL
Panorama Survey
aNALYZING CORE and next steps
Early Warning System
ECATS has been chosen as the ABSS Early Warning System. It is a central place to gather data from the Universal Screening tools, attendance and other data points. This encourages data that is indicative of student risk to be gathered and analyzed together using predetermined data decision rules or "thresholds".
Problem Solving
Using a consistent model of problem solving across a district and across schools allows for the development of a common approach to working with data. School and district teams collect many important data points. Using a common approach to problem-solving allows teams to move from acknowledging a problem to solving a problem.
ABSS Progress Monitoring Guidelines
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Teachers should measure all students’ progress frequently in order to ensure they are on track for success. Some key reasons for progress-monitoring of interventions are the following:
Measure student growth over time
Inform instructional decisions
Measure a student and/or a group response to intervention and instruction
Intervention
The way in which schools address interventions for at risk-students varies. What should remain consistent is having data decision rules in place for addressing risk based on the percentage of students demonstrating risk, available resources, and general capacity.
Refer to the Data Decision Rules for more information.