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Happy New Year!
I am hoping your holidays were good! The new year always provides a fresh start for all of us as we enter into our work with some reflection on practice, rested and ready for this important work. I hope in this issue you find some good information to guide your work and we would love to see you at one of our professional learning sessions, such as our upcoming one focused on not just collecting data...but knowing how to manage and utilize it. Please check out CLUES: What Do We Do With All This Data for a location near you and send a team for a great day of learning and networking!
You will also find in this issue an invitation to not only attend our KSDE summer academy in June...but to submit a proposal to share the great work that you are doing! There is a link to proposal submission below if you would like to share your work based on one of our KSDE priority fundamentals: Structured Literacy, Balanced Assessment Systems, Standards Alignment and/ or High-Quality Instruction.
Wishing you a healthy and happy 2024!
Laurie
Dr. Laurie Curtis
KSDE Early Literacy/ Dyslexia Program Manager
Don't miss your chance to sign up your team! Sessions start soon!
CLUES: What Do We Do with All This Data?
A KSDE Professional Development Event
Addressing Balanced Assessment System/ Structured Literacy
8:30 am – 2:30 pm; $35.00 (includes lunch)
January 23, 2024: Orion Education Center, Clearwater, KS Register HERE
January 31, 2024: Smoky Hill Education Center, Salina, KS Register HERE
February 2, 2024: ESSDACK Service Center, Hutchinson, KS Register HERE
February 6, 2024: Greenbush Service Center, Girard, KS Register HERE
February 22, 2024: Southwest Plain Service Center, Sublette, KS Register HERE
March 19, 2024: Greenbush Service Center, Lawrence, KS Register HERE
Who: PLCs or Building/ District Leadership teams
This professional learning opportunity will provide building and/ or district teams of three more with structures and processes to discuss data and design action steps to improve student outcomes. This day of professional learning is designed for teachers and leaders of any/ all grade levels. Expect a day of discussion, processing, and planning! The discussion for this day will focus heavily on English Language Arts and reading data, however many of the processes can be transferred to other content areas if you chose to implement them at your school site.
Outcomes:
Collaborate with your leadership teams/PLCs to improve student outcomes
Learn how to utilize protocols to improve data driven conversations
Utilize an improvement cycle to select actions steps and monitor your impact on student learning
Explore best practices in data analysis
What to bring:
Bring a team- together everyone accomplishes more! Bring at least three individuals from your school or district who are interested in collaborating to bring this work forward in your district. To support teams of teachers and administrators during this session, it is crucial to have access to digital data or printed reports available. This can include a variety of sources, but at minimum please bring state assessment and academic screening results. Additional data can include common assessments, interim results, office referral rates, attendance, SEL screeners, surveys, and other relevant data collected by your school and district. By utilizing data, teams can make informed decisions and effectively address the needs of their students.
Presenter: Casey Peine, KSDE Teacher Leader Consultant: Casey Peine presently holds the position of Director of Teaching and Learning in Clearwater, USD 264. Throughout her educational career she has undertaken diverse roles, including service as a TASN consultant, administrator, instructional coach, and teacher. Her passion resides in the cultivation of teacher teams’ capacity to make informed decisions using data and evidence of student learning.
Building Knowledge and Vocabulary...making sure we address all parts of that reading rope!
We can't neglect the upper strands of the Reading Rope! This season, the Amplify Podcast is highlighting knowledge building, and the episode on vocabulary is helpful. Have you wondered, "is there the perfect vocabulary list I should be using in delivering my instruction?"
While the title of Episode 5 gives away the answer- no perfect list, there are helpful strategies and information to help provide explcit and meaningful vocabulary instruction. What does the type of vocabulary instruction need to look like that will lead to greater comprehension. Find answers below in Episode 5. Another resource suggested is Etymonline. To build your own knowledge of words as you build the knowledge base of your students! Look up the words that you are targeting in your instruction this week and dig deeper into the world of words!
Episode 5: No perfect set of words: Building vocabulary with Margaret McKeown
There has been a change for KSDE Literacy Lifeline!
To provide a broader opportunity for all teachers to get questions answered, brainstorm solutions and for our team to assist you better, we have made a change to our KSDE Early Literacy/ Dyslexia Literacy Lifeline for 2024. Rather than have a set time on Thursdays where you can Zoom in to ask your questions, we are going to offer "on call" help when and how it works best for you! If you have a question and would like some help in solving it...or want to consult with someone on the Early Literacy/ Dyslexia team, you can do so by completing this brief form: KSDE Literacy Lifeline Request Form
On the form you can request a day/ time to visit virtually with someone on our team or you can ask a question and receive a response to your question via email if that is better... or you are welcome to pose a question you would like addressed in this newsletter and we will try to provide that information in a future issue. Just know... we are here to help!
Structured Literacy Component Checklist with Supporting Video!
If you were at the KSDE fall conference, you perhaps were able to attend our KSDE Teacher-Leader Consultant, Amy Bybee's, session where she discussed the important elements of structured literacy and the KSDE Structured Literacy Component Checklist tool. While conceivably it could be used as a "walkthrough" tool, it would best be used as a continual improvement tool used by an informed observer to help teachers reflect on practice- whether that be with their mentor, administrator or a knowledgeable peer. The tool notes that it is best alongside professional learning, and now there is a video that outlines what structured literacy would include in classroom practice and introduces the tool. Both of these will be housed on the KSDE Dyslexia page and are included below so you have them for future use!
KSDE Structured Literacy Component Checklist
Video: Professional Learning Support for the KSDE Structured Literacy Component Checklist
KSDE 2024 Summer Academies!
Making Learning Happen: Invigorating Tier 1 Instruction
The call for proposals is now open for the KSDE Summer Academies and we would be honored if you join us in this great time of professional learning. If you are interested in sharing your great ideas with others, you are encouraged to submit a proposal using the QR code at the right or the link below. For consideration, proposals should clearly support one or more of the KSDE Four Fundamentals:
Standards Alignment
High Quality Instruction
A Balanced Assessment System
Structured Literacy
Additional Information can be found HERE
The KSDE Summer Academy registration link can be found HERE
Proposals can be submitted via the QR code or at Summer Academy Proposal Submission
Happy Birthday Kansas!
January 29th is our state's birthday!
If you are looking for some interesting material on Kansas to read-aloud to your students or if you are seeking informational text about Kansas, consider using the free resources provided through the Kansas Foundation for Agriculture in the Classroom. The Kansas Kids Connection magazines or their other resources are perfect to build background knowledge and vocabulary related to our incredible state!
For additional information: See the Education Center at Kansas Foundation for Agriculture in the Classroom
The Institute of Education Sciences provides practice guides that can be helpful as you strive to align your classroom practice with how well a practice works (tiers of evidence). The link below, that is offered through the Florida Center for Reading Research, does a nice job putting the guides, supporting videos and the evidence tier notation all in one spot. You can find that assistance linked below:
IES What Works Clearinghouse Practice Guides | Florida Center for Reading Research (fcrr.org)
Question: Are there ELA "priority standards", and if so, what are they?
Answer: We do not have "priority standards" identified by KSDE for English Language Arts.
The adjacent photo of this adorable 4-month-old child was sent by a friend and professional colleague. It is never too early to engage a reader in a love for literacy!
Happy 2024!
If you know someone who would like to receive this newsletter, please ask them to contact me at ELitDyslexia@ksde.org to request being added to the Early Literacy/ Dyslexia listserv, or visit the KSDE Dyslexia page and select the purple HERE button and select Newsletter to see the current and past issues.
"School improvement is most surely and thoroughly achieved when teachers engage in frequent, continuous and increasingly concrete talk about teaching practices...capable of distinguishing one practice and its virtues from another."
Judith Warren Little, Education Researcher.
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