2019-2020 FMS - Principal Directed Day
Section: INST20200096Summary
Commnets
Strengths:
Responses: 6"It was nice to get together as a 6th ELA team in order to try to keep the district assessments on track."
"We had time to come to a consensus on what genre we are teaching for R8.3/W8.3"
"Looking at the assessments and what worked and what didn't"
"Great for vertical alignment of library curriculum and national standards."
"The use of "A Novel Approach" was the best part. We should have just used that book instead of going over generic templates for unit planning. I felt it was a tremendous waste of district human resources and money. Maria Losee's presentation was one that appeared to come from someone who was so disconnected from the classroom, very theory-driven with no practical data to back up claims she was making regarding effectiveness. She offered no data on achievement from schools that may have been using her templates."
"Time for PIO and FMS to work together as a 6th grade team."
Suggestions:
Responses: 5"The district should find people within our own district that understand our specific needs and not spend money on outside agencies that clearly do not understand our school district. Such a disappointing use of my time. "
"We should find time for horizontal group collaboration more consistently throughout the year."
"Need to have a set agenda and expectations laid out in advance. Like Amber Birks use to do for us"
"The presenter, Maria Losee, was very ineffective because she didn't understand the District adopted Design in 5 lesson formatting or the curriculum (SpringBoard) that we have been using."
"It was frustrating that we weren't able to follow the agenda we had originally created at the previous day together because one school wanted to do something different. It put their teachers in an awkward position and the continuity of our forward movement in jeopardy. We've worked hard to come together and work as a team (in spite of being at different schools) to create (and continuously refine) solid assessments. This kind of cohesive movement doesn't come easily and without planning and time. We really needed the time that day and didn't really get what we needed. I'd like to go back to have a regular ELA meeting after school with representatives from each school and grade meeting. It was there we set the agenda for these day and were able to continue to progress as a district."
Questions:
Responses: 1"Why do we need to seek out outside help when we have so many talented and knowledgable people within our own district?"
Comments:
Responses: 3"Productive day"
"Afternoon was great!"
"I would really like to use PD days for teachers to work on creating assignments based on both standards and SpringBoard."