Januar 14, 2026

PD Workshop:  Bard College Institute for Writing and Thinking (IWT), Writing to Learn

Date(s): March 11, 12-5 AND March 12 8:30-2:00

Target Audience: Selected teachers 6-12

Format/Location: In-person workshop, Location TBD

Session Overview:  This workshop introduces participants to IWT’s foundational writing-based teaching practices and how writing can generate equity, community, and responsibility within a classroom. The goal of the work is to create, nurture, and sustain a writing-based classroom. The workshop is purposely communal and collaborative: teachers read and write together, exchange ideas, and respond to one another’s work. This workshop is multidisciplinary and draws upon a variety of works including historical sources and literary texts. The central focus is modeling lively and collaborative ways to use writing to explore texts, pose questions, and scaffold discussions of complex concepts by connecting seemingly disparate sources. Working together, we will explore how writing-to-learn practices can transform how our students navigate challenges, develop agency, and share in the joy of discovery.

Goals for Educators: 

• Participants will engage in the IWT techniques and strategies

• Participants will apply strategies and techniques learned in their own classroom

• Participants are willing to engage in post workshop collaboration by sharing their practices with one another and be willing to showcase their successes with others in the district

Please email Sara Dingledy with questions

PD Workshop:  Culture Reframed

Date(s): March 11, 1:00-2:00

Audience: All MVYPS Staff, content most focused on those who work with students grades 6-12

Format: In-person presentation

Location:  MVRHS PAC

Session Overview:  MVRHS SWEAR has partnered with Culture Reframed, a nonprofit that provides science-based resources, education, and support to help professionals, parents, and communities address the harms of pornography and hypersexualized media on children and youth. The easy access and impact of graphic and hypersexualized material is a public health issue causing both immediate and long-term harm to youth development and affects the mental health of its consumers who are as young as 10 years old. As educators we are seeing the effects of this epidemic on a daily basis in our classrooms and our offices. 

Goals for Educators:  The goal of this PD is to raise awareness of the social, emotional and cognitive effects on our students, shift the cultural narrative around pornography, and support the resilience and well-being of our island youth.

This presentation is a district initiative--any teacher who is not already engaged in a district workshop (ie, HMH K-2 or 3-5 and the Bard workshop), is expected to attend this Professional Development offering.  Thank you!

Please email Amy Lilavois with questions 

PD Workshop:  Best Practices for Indigenous Content, Students, and Families

Date(s): March 11, 2:00-4:00

Target Audience: All MVYPS staff

Format/Location: In-person workshop @MVRHS

Presenter:  Brad Lopes, Aquinnah Cultural Center and Education Director for the Wampanoag Tribe of Aquinnah

Session Overview:  For many Native students and staff, school can be challenging. With roots in settler colonialism, schools today often fail to reflect the traditional pedagogies and methodologies Native people have employed for thousands of years. Join Aquinnah Wôpanâak educator Brad Lopes as he introduces an array of best practices for approaching Indigenous content, working with Native communities, and building relationships with sovereign Tribal Nations. Participants will learn about and discuss multiple pedagogies and methodologies grounded in Indigenous practices and traditions. Exploring epistemologies thousands of years old, this workshop aims to prepare participants to best support Wampanoag and other Native students, staff, and community members.

Goals for Educators:

• Be introduced to and discuss the structural and systemic foundations of the United States’ public education system and how it has impacted Indigenous Nations, beginning in Wôpanâak and other Eastern Woodland homelands.

• Understand the current realities of Indigenous content as reflected in educational standards and practices across the United States.

• Learn about Indigenous pedagogies and methodologies you can introduce to your practice to support Indigenous content, students, and communities.

• Self-reflection and discussion on the importance of Tribe-School collaboration, cultural literacy, and the role of Tribal agency and sovereignty in education, with the goal of supporting strong, culturally aligned outcomes for Indigenous students, colleagues, and communities that benefit all students. 

Please email Sara Dingledy with questions and to RSVP for this workshop

PD Workshop:  The Unique Needs of ELLs, Newcomers, & SLIFE, Part 2: Addressing Learning and Behavioral Difficulties Through Strategies

Date(s): March 11, 2:15-4:15 

Target Audience: All MVYPS staff

Format/Location: In-person workshop at MVRHS, Culinary Arts Dining Room 

Presenter:  Dr. Donna M. Sacco is a senior technical assistance consultant at the American Institutes for Research, specializing in multilingual learners, special education, and MTSS. She has shaped major national and state initiatives, developed resources for districts in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Virginia, and Tennessee, and led English Learner projects for the National Center on Intensive Intervention. Dr. Sacco holds a PhD in special education from George Mason University and brings over twenty years of experience as an educator, professor, and author focused on English learners with learning disabilities.

Session Overview:  Join us for a hands-on, strategy-focused workshop exploring the unique needs of ELLs, Newcomers, and SLIFE students. Building on Donna’s recent district-wide sessions, this follow-up provides an opportunity to apply your learning by diving into a real case study from your own experience.  This collaborative, learner-centered session is designed for all educators. Together, we’ll engage in practical strategy work grounded in a culturally and linguistically sustaining (CLS) and strengths-based approach to teaching.

Goals for Educators:
By the end of this workshop, participants will:

• Explore ways to analyze learner needs through thoughtful hypothesis development.

• Practice sustainable collaboration routines that promote shared decision-making.

• Examine instructional moves that foster meaningful growth for ELLs.

Preparation
To make the most of our time together, please come prepared to discuss an ELL student for whom you have questions. Your real-world context will enrich our collective learning and help you leave with actionable next steps.

Registration required: please complete this form to register: https://forms.gle/ZSKnuAoCbujjdMyo8

Please email Leah Palmer with any questions 

Title: HMH 

Location: Tisbury Cafeteria

Facilitator: Patrice Bruny HMH Lead Facilitator

Target Audience: K-2 ELA, Special Education, and ELL Teachers, Reading Specialist and Interventionist. 

Time: 1:00-3:00

Purpose: This session will focus on topics and questions provided by PLC leaders’ next step notes. These topics include foundational skills, reading comprehension skills, using leveled readers, writing and dictation. We will discuss how to best determine and eliminate the appropriate resources in each module to fully cover the module’s standard focus and what supporting assessments should be used. We will discuss best ways to “fit” all aspects of the literacy program into our literacy block.  

Goals for Educators:  The goal for this workshop is to provide directed collaborative time for educators to continue to unpack the HMH program while determining important focus areas at each grade level. Providing time to work in district wide grade level teams during a question-and-answer time with Patrice is the requested goal for this workshop. 

Location: Please contact Megan Farrell with questions.

Title: HMH 

Location: Tisbury Cafeteria

Facilitator: Patrice Bruny HMH Lead Facilitator

Target Audience: Grades 3-5 ELA, Special Education, and ELL Teachers, Reading Specialist and Interventionist. 

Time: 3:00-5:00

Purpose: This session will focus on topics and questions provided by PLC leaders’ next step notes. These topics include foundational skills, reading comprehension skills, using leveled readers, writing and dictation. We will discuss how to best determine and eliminate the appropriate resources in each module to fully cover the module’s standard focus and what supporting assessments should be used. We will discuss best ways to “fit” all aspects of the literacy program into our literacy block.  

Goals for Educators:  The goal for this workshop is to provide directed collaborative time for educators to continue to unpack the HMH program while determining important focus areas at each grade level. Providing time to work in district wide grade level teams during a question-and-answer time with Patrice is the requested goal for this workshop. 

Location: Please contact Megan Farrell with questions.