Module 2, Week 4

CLO 1 - Describe the diversity of students and its impacts on schools.

CLO 2 - Examine various educational models and the role of schools in communities and with government. 

CLO 3 - Analyze teacher practice and decision-making. 

CLO 4 - Explore the professional and ethical complexities of teaching. 

CLO 5 - Synthesize foundational elements of education into a personal philosophy of education and teaching. 

CLO 6 - Evaluate professional learning of pre-service and in-service teachers and educators. 

• Examine a variety of schools across and within contexts.

• Identify indicators of values present in schools.

• Analyze school values for connections to broader social, political, historical, and economic themes. 

• Generate feedback on peers' perceptions of school values across contexts. 

Conceptual Framework for EDEF 310 - Education in American Society

Academic Vocabulary in the Field of Education

Professional Vocabulary in Hawaiʻi Public Schools

Think for a second about a paddling club/team. Each club has its roots and history. Each club has its history, stories, language, and communication methods. Each club has its leaders, workers, and new members. Each club has its strong members, thoughtful members, and weaker links. The variability increases between clubs depending on the place, state, or country, though some aspects could be similar. 

Clubs must work together one `Ohana to accomplish their task, whether to win a race, catch some fish, or cross the sea. To develop this teamwork, people must have roles, responsibilities, and ideas to follow. They have a culture. Those with a strong culture have solid results.

Think about it, though...team culture, ethnic culture, and local culture are just one aspect of all the cultures you come into contact with. 

We constantly communicate across ethnic, age, location, class, and cultural lines. 

Primary Concept - What is the purpose of schools? 

In the following video, Do Schools Kill Creativity?, you will see the most-watched TED talk of all time (Over 50 million views). 

Primary Concept - How are schools organized? 

Schools often have several things (culture and structure) that allow them to operate smoothly and functionally (which means that they can effectively provide education and learning for students):

• history, mission, and philosophy,

• buildings,

• schedules, 

• teachers,

• staff,

• rules and procedures,

• events and extracurricular activities, and

• assessments.  

Not to mention, considerable social and community structures surround schools. Notice a large structure before you even get to the school level.  

Pay particular attention to the fact that the Board of Education (BOE), an elected governing body, rules the top layer of school politics, though this may change to an appointed board. The board consists of members from Hawaii and the mainland. Some are former educators, but many come from the business community. This board sets a majority of general school policies and is the foundation of the school philosophy. 

The BOE appoints the DOE superintendent. Currently, the superintendent is Keith Hayashi, former Principal of Waiaphu HS. Waipahu was regularly lauded as one of the state's most innovative "turnaround" schools. Under the superintendent's leadership, Waipahu HS increased graduation and college-going rates. 

You can find out enormous amounts of information about the DOE from their website.

If you are still interested in what people claim makes schools great, here are some more recent studies:  

• School Turnaround Studies - What makes one low-performing school turn around and build momentum over time while another seemingly similar school tries the same strategies but continues to struggle? It’s not just particular programs or practices but the interplay of school implementation with district policies and support, according to the Institute of Education Sciences’ Turning Around Low-Performing Schools project—the most comprehensive federal research on such schools to date. “There’s not a lot out there on how you know that a school has turned around—and will stay turned around rather than just jumping up for a year,” said Rebecca Herman, a managing research analyst and school improvement expert for the American Institutes of Research. The AIR collaborated on the project with Policy Studies Associates, the Urban Institute, and Decision Information Resources.

• Building Student Ownership of Schools - We hear it all the time. “Students should take ownership of their school.” But how do we make that happen?

Last spring, Childersburg High School (CHS), which serves nearly 500 students in rural Talladega County, Ala., began transforming with a sharp focus on college and career readiness. 

Many changes were primarily about pedagogy and learning tools: the instructional shift to a project-based learning curriculum; the addition of advanced placement courses and honors pathways to increase academic rigor; the addition of desktop computers, Smart Boards, and networked printers to all classrooms; and a course-management system to facilitate the new digital environment.

Primary Concept - How are schools organized? 

Letʻs take a tour through a number of different schools to get an idea of what is important to them. Some schools will be from Hawaiʻi and may be culture based institutons, some schools will be on the mainland and be tech and future focused, while others are trying to serve a specific community and managing as much their own history as their future. 

As you watch the video: 

• Examine a variety of schools across and within contexts.

• Identify indicators of values present in schools.

• Analyze school values for connections to broader social, political, historical, and economic themes. 

The reality is that values are represented by structures (visible or invisible) and actions or behaviors (subtle, procedural, proactive, or reactive). Every School is different and cares explicitly and subtly about many things. 

• What do you think the schools see as important? 

• What are the leadership, staff, and teachers talking about?

• What are students and families talking about? 

• What have the schools (and media creators) chosen to highlight? 

• What are the indicators that the schools care about these things or possess these values? 

Examples - How Schools Are Organized and On What Values? 

• Ke’aau, HI - Kamehameha Schools - Hawai’i - ʻAha ʻŌpio president Aisyss Respicio-Ragocos takes ʻohana through a day in the life of a kula haʻahaʻa student at Kamehameha Schools Hawaiʻi.

• St. Louis, MO - Jennings Educational Training School - Alternative High School - In this St. Louis suburb of about 15,000 residents, nearly 44 percent of the community’s households earn less than $24,999 a year, according to U.S. Census data. So when Tiffany Anderson, 42, became the superintendent of the local school district of about 3,000 students in April 2012, her first project was to tend to the most basic needs of students and their families. She partnered with the St. Louis Area Food Bank to open a school-based food pantry for Jennings’ struggling families. More than 90 percent of the district’s students can receive free, reduced-price federal meals.

• Marion County & Indianapolis, IN - Winding Ridge Elementary & Lawrence Township High School 

• San Lorenzo, California - Culture at KIPP King - Critical Thinking at KIPP King Collegiate Academy - With extended school days, rigorous academic standards, and a firm disciplinary code, expectations are high, but so is the commitment to help every student succeed in school, in college, and beyond. 

• Honolulu, HI - Kamehameha Schools (One Voice - Song Contest) - Kamehameha Schools offers a variety of educational programs and scholarship services for Hawaiian learners of all ages across the state. This is a look into the annual song contest. ONE VOICE is an award-winning feature-length documentary following ten young Native Hawaiian high school students for one year as they prepare to compete in the annual Kamehameha Schools Song Contest to celebrate the revitalization of the Hawaiian language.  

• Houston, TX - YES Prep North Central - A supportive and caring environment underpins a strict discipline program. 

• New York, NY - Success Academy - Founder and CEO Eva Moskowitz brings us behind the curtain of a Success Academy School to see the magic of our community.

• Ewa Beach, HI - Campbell HS - A decade ago, Campbell High School in Ewa Beach was a place where mediocrity was epidemic, failure

• was commonplace, and there was more emphasis on vocational skills than college prep.

• San Diego, CA - High Tech High - High Tech High's CEO Larry Rosenstock speaks about this high school's innovative model that combines project-based learning with technology.

• Wyoming - Wyoming Indian High School/Arapaho Middle School - Wind River Reservation - Reservation Education - With high dropout rates, low graduation rates, and numerous social problems, Indian schools face various issues. Will the recent visit by two federal cabinet secretaries to Wind River schools make a difference? Chronicle visits schools on the reservation to talk with teachers, administrators, and students about the state of their schools.

Primary Concept - What Cultural or Value Frameworks Do Schools Use?

Human values and their functions are very relevant to the design of social and organizational structures and even play an integral and iterative (changing) role in the design process. 

On the one hand, whenever we talk about basic needs, goals, motivations, actions and behavior, decision-making, or the culture of human beings, we point to concepts that are formed and influenced by human values. 

On the other hand, products have meanings that convey the human values behind their functions. Values can be embedded in products and services, and the values expressed by the designer and leaders should be accessible or interpreted by the user. 

Exploring the human values behind every human action, goal, or decision is worth doing because it can provide a broad and sensitive view of important questions of purpose and reason. This view is essential for understanding a designer's perspective of what is preferable to significant stakeholders and guiding or making appropriate decisions.

Hawaiʻi Department of Education - General Learner Outcomes (GLOs)

Each school will have its own culture.  You will be responsible for discovering what YOUR SCHOOL does and how they do things….. 

But in Hawaii, one thing can be sure: 

THE HAWAII DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION (HIDOE) HAS SIX OVERARCHING LEARNING GOALS THAT DRIVE EDUCATION IN OUR CLASSROOMS, THE GLOs.

This is the one thing that is supposed to give the school meaning and purpose and hopefully get the administration and staff into the same mindset. These are the ideas that support a school's mission. As far as the state of Hawai’i is concerned, schools have been developed for this purpose. See the DOE GLO Rubric.  

General Learner Outcomes (GLOs) are the overarching goals of standards-based learning for all students in all grade levels. Observable behaviors, which are demonstrated in daily classroom activities, are evidence of GLOs. Student effort, work habits, and behavior are essential, and they must be evaluated separately from academic performance in the content areas (under Board of Education Policy 4501: Assessing/Grading Student Performance).

The GLOs should be an integral part of the school culture, as the GLOs do not exist in isolation. The six GLOs are: 

1. Self-directed Learner (The ability to be responsible for one's learning)

2. Community Contributor (The understanding that human beings need to work together)

3. Complex Thinker (The ability to demonstrate critical thinking and problem-solving)

4. Quality Producer (The ability to recognize and produce quality performance and quality products)

5. Effective Communicator (The ability to communicate effectively)

6. Effective and Ethical User of Technology (The ability to use a variety of technology effectively and ethically)

Hawaiʻi Department of Education - General Learner Outcomes (GLOs) Indicators

GLO 1: Self‐Directed Learner - The ability to be responsible for one’s own learning

1.1 – Sets priorities and establishes achievable goals and personal plans for learning

1.2 – Plans and manages time and resources to achieve goals

1.3 – Monitors progress and evaluates learning experiences

GLO 2: Community Contributor - The understanding that it is essential for human beings to work together

2.1 – Respects people’s feelings, ideas, abilities and cultural diversity

2.2 – Cooperates with and helps and encourages others in group situations

2.3 – Understands and follows rules of conduct

2.4 – Analyzes conflict and applies methods of cooperative resolution

2.5 – Demonstrates responsible and ethical behavior in decision making

2.6 – Reasonably implements a solution

GLO 3: Complex Thinker - The ability to perform complex thinking and problem solving

3.1 – Applies prior learning experiences to new situations

3.2 – Considers multiple perspectives in analyzing a variety of problems

3.3 – Generates creative ideas and approaches to developing solutions

3.4 – Evaluates the effectiveness of solutions and make adjustments as needed

GLO 4: Quality Producer - The ability to produce quality performance and quality products

4.1 – Recognizes quality performances and products

4.2 – Sets criteria to meet or exceed general expectations and standards

4.3 – Produces evidence that meets or exceed general expectations and standards

GLO 5: Effective Communicator - The ability to communicate effectively

5.1 – Listens to, interprets, and uses information effectively

5.2 – Communicates effectively and clearly for a variety of audiences and purposes

5.3 – Reads various types of written materials and literature

5.4 – Communicates effectively through writing for a variety of audiences and purposes

5.5 – Observes and makes sense of visual information

GLO 6: Effective and Ethical User of Technology - The ability to use a variety of technologies effectively and ethically

6.1 – Uses a variety of technologies in producing an idea or a product

6.2 – Uses a variety of technologies to access and generate information

6.3 – Understands the impact of technologies

6.4 – Uses the appropriate technologies

6.5 – Understands and respects the legal and ethical issues of technology

Hawaiʻi Department of Education - Hā Cultural Framework

Over recent years, and in collaboration with Native Hawaiian Education entities, HIDOE has also integrated a more culturally relevant framework to guide students' thinking and social and emotional behavior. It is called Nā Hopena A‘o (HĀ)—the introduction to the framework known as HĀ is located here.  

The HĀ philosophy - HĀ is a set of six outcomes firmly rooted in Hawaiʻi. These six outcomes contain values that are universal to all cultures. Educating students in an environment of HĀ will add value to and strengthen every person who engages throughout a learning journey. Department faculty and staff should also be models of behaviors that direct students to what these outcomes might look like in practice. Those who are moved by the goals and intentions of HĀ are encouraged to use it in their everyday practice. OHE would welcome any moʻolelo (stories) of best practices and successes that you would like to share as we plan forward.

Nā Hopena A‘o (“HĀ”) focuses on the following:

Hawaiʻi Department of Education - Hā Cultural Framework Indicators

• St. Louis, MO - Jennings Educational Training School - Alternative High School 

• Marion County, IN - Winding Ridge Elementary 

• San Lorenzo, California - KIPP King Collegiate Academy 

• Honolulu, HI - Kamehameha Schools (One Voice - Song Contest)

• Ke’aau, HI - Kamehameha Schools - Hawai’i 

• Houston, TX - YES Prep North Central

• New York, NY - Success Academy 

• Ewa Beach, HI - Campbell HS

• San Diego, CA - High Tech High 

• Wyoming - Wyoming Indian High School/Arapaho Middle School - Wind River Reservation

 Assessment 2.1 - School Values (EDEF 310)

Module 2, Week 5 - What are the Hawai'i Department of Education (HIDOE) values and how does this impact communities, schools, teachers, and students?