The Collaborative for Teaching and Learning

Dr. Linda F. Hargan, President and CEO

VOLUME 1, ISSUE 1

DECEMBER 2002

IN THIS ISSUE...Adequate Yearly Progress
	ESEA: What the Law Says|Issues & Updates| Best Practices| How We Can Help| Recommended Reading|NCLB Resources
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WHAT THE LAW SAYS

Following is a brief summary of what the law says regarding student achievement:

ESEA and Student Performance: AYP

• Annual Testing: Annual, statewide assessments in reading and mathematics for grades 3-8  must be administered by the 2005-06 school year.  Each state can select and design its own assessments, but the test must be aligned with state academic standards.  Results are to include individual scores segmented by race, income, and other categories to measure overall trends as well as gaps between various subgroups.
  
  
• Academic Improvement: Within twelve years, states must attain academic proficiency for all students based on a minimum performance threshold that must be raised at least once every three years.  A "safe harbor" will be provided for those schools that demonstrate that students in a particular subgroup are making significant progress toward proficiency, but have not technically made adequate yearly progress.

ISSUES & UPDATES

ESEA legislation has raised many issues for schools and school districts regarding how to meet the Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) targets.

Following are excerpts from The Reporter's Notebook, [Education Week, 25 Sep 2002], relevant to measuring AYP:

An analysis of data by Thomas J. Kane, an economist at UCLA, found that states and schools with diverse student populations are at a particular disadvantage because of the difficulty of hitting target for every subgroup in a school every year. "What's going to determine failure rates between states is the percent of schools with African American or Latino subgroups, " he asserted.

Moreover, he found little evidence that separate performance targets have the desired effect. In California, he found black and Latino students do no better in schools that face separate performance targets for those children than in schools that do not. For the latter, he looked at schools where the number of minority youths fall just below the threshold required for reporting performance by race or ethnicity. "I do believe that incentives matter," Mr. Kane said, but he called the subgroup rule, "silly."

Researchers recommended a number of ways to improve measures of annual progress and to reduce the volatility of test scores. Mr. Robert Linn (co-director of CRESST and professor of education at the University of Colorado) suggested states set a minimum size of 25 students for reporting subgroup scores, although he said there is no magic number.

He also pointed out that a flexible interpretation of the law would permit states to create an "index score" to measure progress. Such a score would give schools at least partial credit for improving performance of students well below the proficient level. In that way, Mr. Linn said, a school's entire attention would not focus solely on students just below the proficiency bar.

BEST PRACTICES

See below for a summary of classroom practices that help you meet AYP goals for your students.

Meeting Annual Improvement Targets/Improving Classroom Practice

Principals and teachers feel enormous pressure to boost student achievement to meet No Child Left Behind targets.  The legislation requires that schools show growth in student achievement for all groups of students and that they close the achievement gap between majority/minority, affluent/poor students.  Following are some guidelines aimed at helping teachers improve classroom practice and student learning.

Engage in regular assessments of student learning: By frequently assessing students using multiple formats, teachers can ensure that no student is falling through the cracks. While ESEA and state reforms require annual testing, such tests do not provide data regularly enough to ensure that students are progressing or that learning difficulties are identified early and addressed.  Instead, assessments that are embedded in classroom instruction and that require students to demonstrate what they are learning, help teachers identify strengths as well as gaps in content knowledge and skills.  Since students learn in different ways, assessments that are sensitive to multiple intelligences are most effective in letting students show what they've learned.  A paper-pencil test provides only one kind of data about student learning.

Build on what students know. All students possess prior knowledge that allows them to make sense of new learning.  A key classroom strategy is helping students gain access to what they know through their own background and experience, to form a building block for new learning.  As classrooms grow increasingly diverse, it is not likely that the teacher will know enough about every student's background and culture to incorporate them into lessons.  However, students can be counted on to relate new learning to their family traditions and stories, their language, and their history.

Account for differences in learning: The technology of teaching has some staple activities that transcend the years.  These include use of textbooks, chapter questions and worksheets, lectures where students take notes, and tests using multiple-choice or fill-in-the-blanks formats.  For students who have strong verbal-linguistic intelligence, using Howard Gardner's framework for Multiple Intelligences (1987), these activities are useful.  However, for students whose learning coincides with bodily-kinesthetic, logical-mathematical or any of the other eight intelligences, these activities alone will not meet their needs.

Engage the emotions and imagination: While no one will deny the importance of academic learning, students cannot separate their intellect from their emotions and their imagination.  According to Eric Jensen in Teaching with the Brain in Mind (1998), teachers need to consider the emotions in two ways: 1) making sure that students are in a threat-free environment where they are willing to take risks; and 2) using the arts as a way to engage the students' hearts and imaginations.  Arts-based curricula like Different Ways of Knowing, a CSR national model developed by the Galef Institute and offered by The Collaborative, help teachers use the arts to engage students and further their learning.

WE CAN HELP

The Collaborative is currently developing professional development tools to help you meet NCLB requirements. For additional information, please contact Dr. Deborah Walker

New Products
Getting Results*	Incorporating research-based strategies to improve learning
Gathering Evidence of Student Learning*	Assessing student performance to assure student progress
Closing the Achievement Gap*	Strategies for closing the achievement gap, collecting and analyzing data, and expanding instructional practices

* Available Spring 2003

The following products and services are currently being offered by the Collaborative for Teaching and Learning to build on whole school quality and performance:

Existing Products and Services
Different Ways of Knowing	Arts-infused practices to insure success for all learners
Learning Xpress™	Software and training to design lessons/units
Standards Based Teaching & Learning	Solid framework for continuous improvement
Accelerated Schools Project	Whole faculty involvement to insure powerful learning

For additional information on the Collaborative's programs, please contact Christie Maloney

RECOMMENDED READING

Law Mandates Scientific Base for Research, Lynn Olson and Debra Viadro, Education Week, 30 January 2002

NCLB RESOURCES

No Child Left Behind Teaching Quality Brief

ESEA Teacher Quality Dollars in the Southeast

FEEDBACK

The Collaborative for Teaching and Learning is a non-profit, tax exempt corporation founded in 1994 to assist schools in the implementation of comprehensive school reform. Please feel free to contact any of the Collaborative's officers for additional information on the organization and its work.

Dr. Linda F. Hargan/President and CEO

Dr. Deborah Walker/Senior Vice President

Mr. Dennis Horn/Vice President, Resource Development and Communications

Ms. Christie Maloney/Vice President, Programs

Collaborative for Teaching and Learning
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