Marie Sharpe Elementary

2017-2018: Calvin Dubray continues to support the PLC work at Marie Sharpe this year. The school's area of focus is:

Focus: Self-Regulation and Self-Reflection using the Successful Learner Traits
Checking: The PLC this year was ‘tweaked’ from its original intent in which our Primary and Intermediate teachers met during our ‘Buddy Reading’ time to incorporate the Successful Learner Traits (SLT) as a strategy to assist in regulating behaviors but at the same time have the students reflect on their learning and becoming more successful. The Primary group agreed on introducing 1 Successful Learner Trait per month and taught explicit lessons to those traits using suggested books that demonstrated those traits. Teachers then built lessons out of these stories to further expand the knowledge of students in ways that these traits could be demonstrated in their school day. Teachers intentionally used the Successful Learner Trait terminology and ‘caught’ students demonstrating the trait and referenced to the class what the students was doing to demonstrate the trait. One of our primary teachers compiled a list of resources of books that demonstrated the traits and shared it with other primary teachers (there is an attachment to this document of some of those resources in a write up from a teacher). Our classes really used the SLT cards when they noticed students reflecting a trait that they were focused on for the month. Our Kindergarten class, a very vulnerable group, were using many trait cards during the year, in particular in the last half of the year (see attached pictures). They became very comfortable in reflecting on their learning in the assessment piece for their report card. These pieces were adapted to reflect what these students could do in their own way. Our Intermediate group looked at the statement ‘Will the use of direct, explicit instruction of the Successful Learner Traits and incorporating them into all aspects of school life, increase motivation, independence and increase their self-esteem as being successful learners?” Many of our Intermediate teachers used the targets and goals posters that were in their packages (see pictures of example). Some other teachers tweaked the goals area to be ‘to do lists’ and then used this as a ‘checklist’ and checked things off as they did them. The teachers used a ‘step method’ and had no more than 4 of them and found that students felt very successful and good about their learning as they checked off each step (see attached lesson plan of spaghetti bridges). It was found to be incredibly successful to increase independence and went from a class climate of ‘what do we do next?” to feeling accomplished and reflecting back on their work and learning more frequently. Successful Learner Trait cards were attributed to those demonstrating that in their reflections.
Reflection: Our staff has found the incorporation of the Successful Learner Traits (SLT) to be a nice parallel with our Zones of Regulation program but the SLTs are more definitive in having students reflect more on their learning and what they believe themselves to be successful at. Every student has an opportunity to be successful at one of the traits as we as educators ‘dig deep’ to find those and create opportunities in which even our most vulnerable learners can demonstrate them. We believe that the Successful Learner Traits also lend itself to creating that celebration of individualistic learning of each child and that our teachers now have a more precise avenue of directing their teaching to accommodate for this; now they know the SLTs in which each student can reflect or are more successful in. We were fortunate to have a few teachers last year delve into the use of SLTs last year after Sue Bannisters workshop and they were able to assist other teachers and model in their classrooms of how to get started. Our one primary teacher was able to compile a list of book resources for our other staff and librarian based on the SLTs and we have purchased some of these books and will continue to do so for next year. We do have some staff that are not fully engaging in the use of the SLTs but we believe that will change next year as other staff have shared their success stories. I have agreed to purchase more resources such as cards and posters to help support those teachers that continue to move forward in this and those that need a lift. We believe as a staff that the SLTs have had a positive impact on our students and school and it has increased the self-esteem of students in feeling successful at school; for some of our vulnerable students who have felt little success at all, it has made a remarkable difference in not only their learning but the regulation of their behavior as well because they have become more confident. Some of the challenges we faced this year was the amount of time we would like to spend collaborating with each other to the amount of time we are allocated. We know this is not only an issue at our school level but of one at the District level. Our teachers crave more collaboration and sharing time and imagine the growth that would take place if this was recognized in our school calendar. We also did not incorporate the SLTs into our announcements or Zones board as everyone was at different stages it seemed, and we will look at next year to be more formal and intentional on a school level like we are with Zones. We are looking forward to the continued work on Successful Learner Traits as we will have new staff, so we will be reteaching what we do here at MSE. Overall, I am proud of the work my staff has done this year with SLTs and the sharing and collaboration amongst our new staff that joined us later in the year has gone a long way to impacting our students yet in another positive way.

2016-2017: Calvin Dubray is once again supporting the PLC work at Marie Sharpe this year. The school's question is:

How will using explicit instructions based on developing grit, build self-confidence in students so they can learn to complete difficult tasks without feeling frustrated or defeated?
Analysis: The focus was to improve students’ perseverance and confidence as learners so they can become more independent. Our staff used 2 key assessments to take a baseline and a follow up of where students rated themselves in their self-esteem as learners (LSEQ) and their perseverance and persistence as a learner (12 Item Grit Scale). Measurements were taken in October and then again in May. We had to modify the 2 questionnaires for some of our primary classes because it was difficult to understand the concepts and language. We incorporated the Optimal Learning Model from Regie Routman and worked with the gradual release of responsibility when we were teaching ensuring that ‘front-end’ loading was key as many of our students don’t have background knowledge or experiences they can draw from. Much of the lessons initially in the beginning of the year were spent in the ‘dependent’, ‘we-do together phase’ because of this lack of prior knowledge or confidence to go and apply skills. We used the Successful Learner Traits and the Growth Mindset to teach our students about ‘grit’, persistence, perseverance from a strength based approach. This, accompanied by many of our SEL programs such as Zones of Regulation and Superflex gradually led into many of our students becoming more confident in their learning and willing to take risks. Data collected from the Fall and Spring on the 2 assessments LSEQ and 12 Item Grit Scale showed the following: Nature Kindergarten – 85% of the students rated themselves in ‘average to above average’ in GRIT and Learner Self-Esteem which is up from 32% in the Fall; Kindergarten – 76%students scored themselves in the ‘average’ range in GRIT and Learner Self-Esteem which is up from 60%; Grade 1 – 87.5% of students rated themselves ‘above average’ in GRIT and Learner Self-Esteem; Grade 2 – data was incomplete (only 6 students rated themselves in the average to above average category); Grade 3 – 88.8% of students rated themselves ‘average to above average’ in GRIT and Learner Self-Esteem up from 48% at the beginning of the year; Grade 4 – 80% of the students went from ‘below average in grit’ to ‘gritty or very gritty’ and 80% also went from ‘below average to average or higher’ in learner self –esteem; Grade 5 - only 40% of students rated themselves at ‘average to above average’ in LSE and 44% as ‘gritty or very gritty’ in the Fall and this increased to 84% for both scales by the end of the year; Grade 6 – Only 25% of students rated themselves as ‘average to above average’ with respect to grit and learner self-esteem in the Fall. This changed dramatically in the Spring assessment as now 75% of students rated themselves as falling into that category which bodes well for going on to Middle School. Many of the successful changes in grit, self-regulation and learner confidence noted were reflected in report comments as well such as; ‘he is able to regulate his emotions and display good work habits’……’he displayed a lot of perseverance during small group math lessons on fractions’…..’even though T likes to stay in his comfort zone, he has been more willing to take risks with his learning’……’even if something was frustrating she would work through it without giving up’….’at first she was self-conscious about others watching her (in PE) but by the end of the year she just played without worrying about that’… ‘he has demonstrated more maturity and grit towards the end of the year’…….’gained more self-confidence as the year progressed and was more willing to take risks and accept challenges’. These comments were selected from our most vulnerable students and those students that made the most gains in becoming ‘gritty’, self-confident learners who became more independent throughout the year.
Reflection: The incorporation of using explicit teaching of grit did help many of our students become more independent, grittier, self-confident learners. We understand the importance of partnering SEL programming such as Zones and Superflex in keeping students grounded and should be embedded in the lessons as tools/strategies to also give students independence and self-confidence. There was a lot of data collection and we feel that we need to come up with an easier way to compile this. We also realized that we had to modify some of the questionnaires to fit grade appropriate levels and this created some problems with data consistency but also interrupted our progress. Our move to STEM based afternoons once a week in most classes allowed for students to problem solve and become more confident in their learning because it was a collected effort on what they wanted to learn about and create. The collaboration with each other allowed them to become more independent from the teacher. Students were given more opportunities to share their learning in class and school wide assemblies and project/science fairs which provided for them to risk-take more. Increased outdoor learning opportunities allowed for students to inquire about their learning, have deeper thinking and once again have opportunity to collaborate and risk-take. The consensus from staff is that we were able to move along the Optimal Learning Model continuum and spend more of our time in the latter part of the year in the independent areas of ‘we do it’ guided practice and ‘you do it’ independent practice. This was the case even more so for some of our most vulnerable students both academically and behaviorally.

2015-2016: Calvin Dubray is once again supporting the PLC work at Marie Sharpe this year.

To what extent will using explicit instructions and frameworks improve the students’ ability to increase their stamina and become better independent risk-takers.
Analysis: Using explicit instruction and frameworks greatly improved the students’ ability to increase their stamina and become better independent risk-takers. At our school, behavior challenges and self- regulation of one’s emotions and behaviors have been a barrier to academic stamina. We have been working hard on communicating through a common language of explicit instruction and using frameworks like the Optimal Learning Model (OLM), Daily 5, AFL, Zones of Regulation and Trauma Informed Schools to achieve increased student independence and academic stamina. In our Kindergarten class we used the medium of social story through pictures to depict behavioral expectations of the teacher as this is a very busy group (see picture, right). This created a common language and a visual focus point for students to see what was expected of them. Students would be referred to these pictures when they needed a reminder of expected behaviors in their certain scenario. This built up stamina and independence in transitions and academic time. This group also went to a ‘Community Circle’ model first thing in the morning which consisted of discussion about the previous day and any ‘baggage’ that needed to be offloaded. Also, discussion about how the day was going to unfold (front-end loading) and learning intentions were relayed. This seemed to settle the students and better prepare them for the day; building their stamina. This group made many trips into the community; specifically Scout Island for Nature Based Learning. In April when students first went (mind you with their new Australian teacher) they really struggled and I often had to pick students up because of their behavior (lack of stamina). It was reported by the teacher and witnessed by myself and other staff, that after 5 or 6 excursions that there was a remarkable difference in stamina and independence. Students were very inquisitive about their learning and the environment around them; their behavior was more regulated and staff were more willing to risk-take by going out into the community to do other trips. Providing more learning opportunities in the community allowed students to make better connections that reflected back in their inferences they were able to make in literacy. Similar experiences occurred with our other classes. One thing we did with our classes, especially our Kindergarten class, is have them work with every other class in the school; with our intermediates being mentors on stamina and independence.

We realized as a staff from the previous year that we needed to work on more ‘front-end loading’ and background knowledge when using explicit instruction with our students. Our entire teaching staff attended the Summer Learning Institute and made a commitment to using the OLM as a framework to explicit instruction and the Learning Walks format to observe each other’s teaching practices and suggest and independence through observation of ‘on and off task’ behaviors as one method. Our Trauma Informed School project has gone a long way in addressing the behavioral barriers to learning by providing students with strategies to ‘ground themselves, self-regulate, and refocus’. One of these strategies was establishing a ‘Zones Toolbox’ in each classroom that provided ‘calming’ tools for students so they could build stamina and become more independent (see picture, left). Our students have been involved in further risk-taking in their learning with the many events and programs that they have participated in throughout the year. We have many students who have anxiety getting out and performing in front of their peers and the community, we have some of our most vulnerable students reading to our Strong Start children and many students who have become more confident and independent in showcasing their learning during the 7 Great Things part of our student recognition assembly (see picture, right). Our move to Place Based and Nature Based learning this year has allowed our students to become more independent and has built stamina that translates back into the classroom. The deeper, richer learning and inquiry by students has allowed them to become bigger risk takers in their learning.

Reflection:

2014-2015: Calvin Dubray, the new principal of Marie Sharpe Elementary, is also the PLC Facilitator for the school. This staff is working on the following inquiry question:

Will implementing clear learning intentions and using explicit instruction within an instructional framework improve independence in students?
Analysis: Implementing clear learning intentions and using explicit instruction within an instructional framework greatly increased students’ independence. Our students writing and reading volume and stamina have noticeably increased from October to May. Student independence in these two areas has increased from managing less than 5 minutes of on-task time before the teacher was interrupted or had to refocus to an average of 20 minutes where students were on-task and engaged in their learning. This was evidenced in the comparison in volume and content in their SWW from the Fall to the Spring. More than 80% of our students were able to sustain a focused write for more than 20 minutes and this showed in the volume of writing. We have also noticed that reading and writing conversations with teachers is more student led when it comes to stimulating their own learning and generating their own ideas rather than it being teacher directed. The students are more willing to take risks and problem solve as opposed to looking for the teacher for every answer. We noticed an increase in reading levels from our PM Benchmarks from the Fall to the Spring as well as the ‘Daily 5’ structure with clear learning intentions was a focus in our grade 1 classroom. This is a very vulnerable group and establishing this routine earlier in the year (with the assistance of other staff) allowed these students to become more independent and engaged in their learning; thus resulting in progression in reading levels. With our clear instructions and learning intentions within a framework, our students have learned the skill of working independently to complete tasks (refer to pictures of Gr. 1 & 2 Daily 5 and Gr. 4/5 Guided Math). Such items as “School Wide Read” and “Buddy Reading” that was a struggle at the beginning of the year and could not be sustained for more than 5 minutes in our intermediate classes has now been consistently sustained for 30 minutes (see video Gr.4/5, pics Gr. 5/6). Other proof of increased independence is our Project Based approach to learning in some classes where at the beginning of the year students needed to be led step by step through the process often having to be refocused because of off-task behaviors (Gr.3 anecdotal and PBL video/pics). From my own personal perspective and analysis, I noticed a difference in independence when conducting assemblies and the sustained focus students had in comparison from the beginning of the year to the end of the year had remarkably increased. Implementing the “Zones of Regulation” program in classes has assisted our students in understanding and regulating their behavior thus enabling them to be active, engaged learners. Our students are becoming more confident in their learning, cooperative skills and abilities.
Reflection: