Study Teams Research Student-improvement Methods
NWESD 189 has been highly successful in assisting school leaders research ways of improving student improvement through school-based study teams, according to Linda Dobbs, Assistant Superintendent for Teaching and Learning.
“The old adage, ‘If you continue to do what you’ve always done, you’ll continue to get what you’ve always gotten,” points to the importance of the research stage of school-improvement planning,” says Dobbs, a leading facilitator with the NWESD’s School Improvement Planning Technical Assistant Project (SIPTAP).
“The research stage is a critical — yet often overlooked — part of the school-improvement planning cycle,” Dobbs continues. “In the past, schools have typically set goals and then written the action plan without taking the time to study and consider the effective practices that will actually support increased student achievement. Yet it is this phase that offers the opportunity for educators to study, reflect and question instructional practice. It is an essential component in getting teachers to second-order-change understanding of what needs to change in the interactions between teachers and students for student achievement to improve.”
At NWESD 189, schools are supported in the research phases in a number of ways, Dobbs says. For one, school-based study teams attend facilitated sessions in Anacortes for effective practice research. They receive an overview of the study-team process along with a study-team packet that includes forms and structures for teams to document their work; a school-specific data packet; and access to books and articles on effective practice in three areas:
These shared insights are an essential part of the research process
- Systems factors that affect student achievement
- Content areas of reading, writing, math and science
- Identified “barriers” that inhibit increased student achievement in the identified goal area
Finally, NWESD 189 assigns a coach to facilitate the entire process.
It is not unusually for more than one school team to be in Anacortes on the same day, says Dobbs.
“Together they work with the facilitator who explains the study-team process and answers any questions the team might have about the process,” she explains. “Then teams work individually with the facilitator in the ‘digging deeper’ portion of the day. During this time, school teams review in-depth data about their school goal area; they learn to write objective narrative statements about the data they review.”
During the intensive school data review in the "digging deeper" part of the day, teams learn to focus on “what is” instead of “why” or “what to do about it,” Dobbs continues.
“This ‘digging deeper’ time allows the team to deepen its understanding of what’s going on in the school in the targeted goal area,” she adds. “These shared insights are an essential part of the research process.”
NWESD 189 worked with OSPI and other ESDs throughout the state to develop a rubric for the selection of effective practice resources, Dobbs says.
For more information on Study Teams, contact Joanne Ward at jward@esd189.org.