Literacy Coach’s Kick-off: Goals for

the Year

Sharon WalpoleMichael C. McKenna

Goals for the Day Present our overall plans to improve differentiation

Guide you to examine your data from last year to see where differentiation is most needed

Provide you a chance to see differentiation in action in each grade level

Key Features of this year’s PD

1. Cohort 1 and Cohort 2 will be merged

2. We will all be doing one comprehensive book study

3. We will be focusing attention on coaches supporting teachers to plan and implement differentiated instruction

Here is our additive plan

Why focus on Tier 2?

Our data indicate that we are very successful with the children who start out at least at benchmark achievement.

Our data indicate that we are doing increasingly better with children who start out at intensive -- and we also know that implementation of intervention is varied.

Our data indicate that our success rate for children who begin at strategic is relatively stable.

85.6 87.2 85.1

Cohort 1 Year 2 Cohort 1 Year 3 Cohort 2 Year 1

Benchmark to Benchmark

Effectiveness of Core Instruction

In both Cohort 1 and Cohort 2, we are nearing our goal of 90% of beginning-of-year benchmark students maintaining that status at the end of the year

Our basic program of whole-group and small-group instruction is working for them.

43 44.5 39.2

Cohort 1 Year 2 Cohort 1 Year 3 Cohort 2 Year 1

Intensive to Strategic or Benchmark

Effectiveness of InterventionsFor children who begin the year with intensive needs, Cohort 1 schools have made small improvements towards our goal of 50% moving out of that category. Cohort 2 schools will be able to focus more attention this year.

Our basic program of whole-group, small-group, and intensive intervention instruction is beginning to work for them.

45.4 45.4 43.7

Cohort 1 Year 2 Cohort 1 Year 3 Cohort 2 Year 1

Strategic to Benchmark

Effectiveness of Differentiated Instruction

For our students starting the year at the strategic level of achievement, we have had fairly stable results across years in Cohort 1 and in the first year of Cohort 2. We had hoped for 75% success for them.

Our basic program of whole-group and small-group instruction is not yet working for enough of them.

Things for you to consider These data are aggregated across the grade levels. In your school, you will find grade-level scores that are very different from the state trends; use them to focus your attention.

Remember that these data only include children who were present at both fall and spring; your own data will also include children there at any one time point.

This text will help to keep all of us focused

on planning differentiated instruction.

Here are our strategies: Coaches deepen the concept of differentiation by presenting the module that your Regional Coordinator shared.

Coaches spend more extended time planning and observing differentiated lessons with teachers.

Remember the Big IdeasGather your resources

Instructional materialsAssessment toolkit

Consider your children’s needsPhonemic awareness and phonicsPhonics and fluencyFluency and vocabularyVocabulary and comprehension

Plan and implement three weeks of instruction

We have made templates for you

These will be posted on the Architects’ site so that you can print them or adapt them.

They are meant to target your thinking.

Refer to your template as we explain them.

Generally, The first page reviews the needs of each group, identifies the group members, lists assessment data that will help in planning, and reminds you of the instructional strategies and materials you will need

The second page reminds you to select the actual letters, words, patterns, and texts teachers will use each day for three weeks with that group

Remember our groups

Phonemic Awareness and Phonics/Word Recognition

Need letter names, sounds, full segmentation

Phonics/Word Recognition and Fluency

Can segment and blend, but need to work on decoding and automatic word recognition

Fluency and Comprehension

Few decoding problems, but weak automaticity

Vocabulary and Comprehension

At or above grade level in fluency measures

PA/Phonics/WR: Assessment Data

PA Level

ABC Level

Unknown Letters

Unknown Sounds

HF Words

SyllableOnset-RimePhoneme

Sing ABCsSay ABCsTrack ABCs

These data may be gathered from multiple sources. They are likely to be necessary for planning for this

group.

Instructional Strategies for PA

Initial Sound Sorting

Segmenting/Blending

Say it and Move it

Pictures Pictures or word lists

Elkonin Boxes, markers, word lists

Teachers can choose any one of these strategies. There are sections in the book to describe exactly how to

use them.

Instructional Strategies for Phonics/Word Recognition

Letter Names and Sounds

Sounding and

Blending

Letter patterns

High Frequency Words

Letter cards or plastic letters

Word lists

Word lists, word cards

Word cards, Elkonin boxes

Teachers can choose any two of these strategies. There are

sections in the book to describe exactly how to use them.

Phonemic Awareness/Phonics and Word Recognition Planning

This chart reminds coaches and teachers to select the actual items for instruction in advance. All phonemic awareness strategies require lists of words or pictures. Word recognition strategies require letters or words.

Manipulatives can make the lessons more interactive.

Phonics/WR/Fluency: Assessment Data

Unknown Letters

Unknown Sounds

Unknown Pattern

s

HFWords

Text Reading

Phonics-controlledBelow Level

Grade-Level?

Instructional Strategies for Phonics/Word Recognition

Letter Names and

Sounds

Sounding and Blendin

g

Letter patterns

High Frequency Words

Decoding by

Analogy

Letter cards or plastic letters

Word lists

Word lists, word cards

Word cards, Elkonin boxes

Clue words, new words

These strategies are the same as before, with the addition of decoding

by analogy.

Instructional Strategies for Fluency

Echo, Choral, Partner, Whisper

Timed Repeate

d Reading

Choral Partne

r Readin

g

Fluency Develop-ment Lesson

FORI

Texts Texts, stop-watch, chart

Texts Texts BasalStory

The same text can be used more that one day, but we should consider ways to maximize the number of texts that

children read.

Phonics/Word Recognition/Fluency Planning

Again, select the words and texts in advance. This sort of comprehensive planning will allow teachers to really focus their instructional attention on repetitive strategies and to monitor student progress.

Fluency/Comprehension Assessment Data

Unknown Patterns

High Frequency Words

Reading Rate

Text level

Below grade level

On grade level

These children may need a dash of word recognition work; it can be accomplished very quickly.

Phonics/Word Recognition/Fluency Strategies

These are the same as those described for the previous group; the instructional strategies overlap.

Instructional Strategies for Comprehension

Question Clusters

QARs Story Map-ping

Text Struc-ture

Direct Explan-ation

Summar-

ization

TextsQuestions

TextsQAR ChartQuestions

StoriesMap

Informa-tional TextsGraphic Organ-izers

TextsStrategy descrip-tions

TextsSummary procedure

For our final group, add vocabulary to comprehension!

Tier Two Words

ELL Storybook

Concept of

Definition

Semantic Feature Analysis

Concept Sorting

TextsWordsScript

Texts, segmentedWords, definitions, examples

Texts, Words, Word Maps

Texts,Related Words,Feature Chart

TextsWord Cards

Don’t panic! We will roll out each of these groupings gradually over the year; you don’t have to do all of them now.

We will improve our planning templates as we hear from you and from your regional coaches.

We are excited to work with you to improve differentiation!