Embedded Files
MCS Instructional Norms:
Norm 1: During instruction, teachers provide students with multiple and frequent opportunities to discuss and collaborate using complete sentences and academic language.
Norm 2: While reading, teachers create predetermined text-dependent questions requiring students to cite textual evidence in their response.
Norm 3: During mathematics instruction, teachers provide frequent and ample opportunities for teachers and students to demonstrate standards for mathematical practice.
At Thomas Downey High School, we implement successful strategies to develop professional learners.
Please feel free to contact me if there are any instructional strategies that you would like to discuss further! Please join the Digital Teaching Toolkit group in Schoology with access code JP6KM-K8K74.
Please feel free to contact me if there are any instructional strategies that you would like to discuss further! Please join the Digital Teaching Toolkit group in Schoology with access code JP6KM-K8K74.
Ace the Question
Ace the Question
*Double click on the image and drag the dot to the right to enlarge.
Academic Conversations
Academic Conversations
Book by Marie Crawford and Jeff Zwiers
Common Core State Standards (CCSS) expect students to effectively prepare and participate in collaborative conversations. This text explores various strategies, in multiple content areas, for students to have academic dialogue while in class. The authors supply practices to be used in planning the conversation through evaluating conversations. The book also provides scaffolds for differentiation and modifications.
*Double click on the image and drag the dot to the right to enlarge.
Visible Learning for Literacy
Visible Learning for Literacy
Book by Douglas B. Fisher, John Hattie, and Nancy Frey
This text describes what instructional practices/strategies provide the most improvement in student outcomes. The results are accumulated from over fifteen years of research and over 800 meta studies! At the link provided, you can watch a webinar with two of the authors. Included is also a graph showcasing some of the most effective instructional practices discussed in the book, however, there are many more to consider.
*Click on the book cover to be taken to the website Visible Learning website. There are a ton of resources and a webinar with two of the authors.
*Double click on the image and drag the dot to the right to enlarge. The image displays strategies/practices with their effect sizes.
Learning Objectives
Learning Objectives
Learning objectives provide students an opportunity to engage in their own learning. By having an objective, both the teacher and the student know what the expectation of the lesson is. It is even more beneficial to have students interact with the objective throughout the lesson/unit to monitor progress.
*Click on the images to watch the videos and go to a website to learn more about writing effective learning objectives.
Text-Dependent Questions, Grades 6-12
Text-Dependent Questions, Grades 6-12
Book by Douglas B. Fisher, Heather Anderson, Marisol Thayre, and Nancy Frey
The authors give strategies on how to scaffold throughout a text by close reading and questioning to aide students in grasping the big concept from the text. Below are two articles giving more background on the subject matter.
https://education.illinoisstate.edu/downloads/casei/4-02A-Engaging%20fisher.pdf
http://bpsassets.weebly.com/uploads/9/9/3/2/9932784/text-dependent_questions_in_close_reading.pdf
*Provided are two links to learn more about text-dependent questions. Double click on the image and drag the dot to the right to enlarge.
Vocabulary for the Common Core
Vocabulary for the Common Core
Book by Julia A. Simms and Robert J. Marzano
In addition to covering the three different types of vocabulary words students encounter (tier 1, tier 2, and tier 3), the authors cover a six-step process for vocaulary instruction:
1. Provide a description, explanation, or example of the new term
2. Ask students to restate
3. Ask students to construct a representation (picture, symbol, graphic)
4. Engage students periodically in activities that help them add to their knowledge of the terms (assignment, notebook)
5. Ask students to discuss the terms with one another
6. Involve students periodically in games that allow them to play with terms
*Double click on the image and drag the dot to the right to enlarge.
Academic Moves for College and Career Readiness, Grades 6-12
Academic Moves for College and Career Readiness, Grades 6-12
Book by Barry Gilmore, James Lee Burke, and Jim Burke
Research shows mastery of fifteen academic words can help students across content areas. Instructional strategies, assignments, culminating tasks, etc. are included to help students gain mastery of the academic terms throughout Webb's DOK process. The words are: analyze, argue, compare/contrast, describe, determine, develop, evaluate, explain, imagine, integrate, interpret, organize, summarize, support, and transform . . .
*Double click on the image and drag the dot to the right to enlarge.
Anita Archer
Anita Archer
Famous author and educational consultant, Dr. Anita Archer, has visited MCS several times to provide professional development in regards to writing instruction.
http://explicitinstruction.org/anita-l-archer-phd/
*Provided is PDF of when Dr. Archer visited MCS.
Writing Informative 2016 (1).pptAVID
AVID
AVID’s mission is to close the achievement gap by preparing all students for college readiness and success in a global society.
Below, is Downey's own AVID resource page.
Academic Language Mastery: Conversational Discourse in Context
Academic Language Mastery: Conversational Discourse in Context
Book by Ivannia Soto and Jeff Zwiers
This book gives instructional protocols for peer-to-peer interactions since conversation and academic language are powerful tools in learning, especially for our ELs. Various strategies to help students engage in conversational discourse include: if-when chart, conversation skills poster, observer cards, written conversations, sentence frames, negotiating ideas, and many more. There are three other books in the Academic Language Mastery Series: Vocabulary in Context, Culture in Context, and Grammar and Syntax in Context.
*Double click on the image and drag the dot to the right to enlarge.
Classroom Management
Classroom Management
Assertive Discipline, by Lee Canter, discusses how teachers control the classroom in a firm but positive manner. Here is a wiki space that gives an overview of strategies you can use.
Robert Marzano is one of the most prolific educational researchers in regards to classroom management. Check out his website.
Because-But-So
Because-But-So
In Judith Hochman’s Teaching Basic Writing Skills., she describes the power of writing as the most rigorous and challenging skill to learn, and wisely advises intense, consistent intentionality in teaching it- that is, not just having kids ‘write a lot’ but having them learn to create the basic forms of writing, especially the sentence, in a methodical progression that shows them how and has them complete exercises repeatedly until fluid.
An example of a productive exercise she suggests is “But, Because, So” in which students are asked to take a short independent clause and expand upon it using each of these three conjunctions. Hochman advocates using a range of “sentence expansion” exercises like this to build literacy and thinking skills. One of the benefits is that it causes students to think about different ways they might develop the same clause. Another is that it causes students to get familiar and fluid with syntactical forms they will use over and over. A third is that “exercises” like this are best when they are applied… that is when they are used to process what students are already learning in class. Any class. So they can and should use this exercise across the curriculum.
Technology
Technology
Please refer to the district's Information & Technology Services (ITS) website for a plethora of resources on Schoology, Nearpod, Lanschool, Google, Adobe, Class Dojo, various Microsoft products, Turnitin, Surface Pro, and so much more! In addition to being able to register for a training on the calendar by clicking on the training tab, you can request appointments (via phone, in person, etc.). The Instructional Technology department works diligently to assist MCS staff in acquring technology literacy.
Bloomin' Apps has various applications that are organized by correlation to Bloom's Taxonomy!
Bloomin' Apps has various applications that are organized by correlation to Bloom's Taxonomy!
Page updated
Report abuse