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In addition to Earth Day, today is Ralph Tyler’s birthday—an important day for Learning List because of Tyler’s influence on curriculum design.  Tyler was born on April 22, 1902, and is recognized as the principal developer of the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). His thinking also influenced the policies that were formalized in the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965.  Tyler’s seminal work “Basic Principles of Curriculum and Instruction” was a best seller when it was first published in 1949.  It remains in print today and continues to influence curriculum development. The small book (just over 100 pages) lays out what has come to be known as “Tyler’s Rationale,” which asserts that effective curricula are organized around four basic questions: What educational purposes should the school seek to attain? What educational experiences can be provided that are likely to attain these purposes? How can purposes be organized? How can we determine whether these purposes are being attained? Tyler’s work in “Basic Principles” reshaped educational thinking.  Prior to its publication, educators understood curriculum as an established, static program to be taught and tested. Tyler introduced the understanding that curriculum should be dynamic and student-centered, and that it should be continually evaluated and revised to ensure that students’ learning experiences are aligned with instructional objectives. Happy Birthday Ralph Tyler, and thank you!

Discover Financial Services seeks to ensure that all students have the skills needed for a successful financial future. In support of this goal, Discover administers the Pathway to Financial Success (PFS) program which provides grants to U.S. public high schools that implement a financial literacy curriculum.  Per the PFS website, in order to be eligible for grants a high school: Must implement or be looking to implement a financial education curriculum; Use a measurement tool to assess participation in and comprehension of the financial education curriculum; and Agree to share overall results of the measurement tool's pre and post-curriculum testing with Discover upon the program's completion, to assess what worked and what didn't. Grant awards are determined on a program-by-program basis.  For more information about the grant program and  the complete RFP, click here .

Research has increasingly shown that many children from low-income homes arrive at school with weaker language skills than their more affluent peers, and that early gaps in literacy are difficult to close and frequently predict lower academic outcomes as students progress through school. Recognition of the importance of early literacy has fueled the push for government funded pre-K programs for 4-year olds, but new research has identified gaps in children’s language processing skills as early as 18-months and suggests that to be effective, intervention must begin much earlier and include parents and caregivers. Programs such as the Thirty Million Words Initiative , Too Small to Fail , Zero to Three , and Abriendo Puertas/Opening Doors , work with parents, communities, and schools to help ensure all children arrive at school with the vocabulary and skills needed to be successful. While there are variations in each program’s approach, most focus on increasing the amount of time parents and caregivers speak to children and provide a home-based early literacy curriculum to help to parents understand the importance of talking to their young children and to develop strategies for building vocabulary and literacy skills. The New York Times recently reported on new programs, such as Providence Talks , that are using technology to provide feedback and support to low-income parents in developing early literacy skills. Such programs provide families with a small recording device that may be attached to a toddler’s clothing. The device records the words the child hears and detects instances when parents listen and respond to their child’s verbal utterances.  Software analyzes the data, identifying the number of words children hear each day, and program volunteers conduct home visits to help parents make sense of the results. Volunteers coach parents on how to communicate more effectively with their children and identify opportunities to teach language skills.  Devices include safeguards to ensure that family privacy is protected (e.g., actual conversations are not recorded).  You can watch a video demonstrating the device here . Researchers highlight the value of data collected through such programs, explaining that recordings will help them understand whether the information and coaching provided to parents improves children’s vocabulary acquisition in the short term and whether academic outcomes improve in the long term.

Last week, The Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation released a report detailing the practices of Uncommon Schools , the winner of the 2013 Broad Prize for Public Charter Schools . Uncommon Schools is network of 38 charter schools that provides a college preparatory program to low-income and minority students in New Jersey, New York, and Massachusetts. According to the report, a defining feature of the Uncommon Schools program is its emphasis on a rigorous curriculum for all students, frequent assessments, and sophisticated analysis of student data. Administrators quoted in the report explain that while Uncommon Schools have historically outperformed other schools that serve similar student populations, the implementation of the CCSS has raised the bar and fewer Uncommon students are scoring at proficient and advanced levels on standardized tests. “ Common Core is changing a lot of things,” explains an administrator quoted in the report.  “It’s really bringing us together.” Prior to the CCSS, Uncommon Schools in each region developed their own school curricula and interim assessments aligned to individual state standards. With CCSS, however, schools have come together to develop network-wide curriculums, lesson plans, and assessments aligned to the new standards.  A centralized team analyzes student data and provides campus- and teacher-specific feedback and reports to administrators on individual campuses.  Reports focus on a few areas for improvement rather than “a laundry list of things to fix.”  In this way, teachers and school leaders are able to target their efforts on what needs to be “retaught or taught differently.” See the video below to learn more about Uncommon Schools. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CrWr4QW2xHY&list=PLF922DF530D98B20F&feature=share

Last week, EdWeek ran an article about a study by two professors evaluating whether commonly used K-12 textbooks are aligned to the CCSS.  Though the study has not yet been released, the article seems to suggest that the professors found none of the textbooks to be suitably aligned.  I applaud the authors of the study and the article for cautioning educators to examine carefully instructional materials claiming to be aligned to the CCSS. While some publishers may be putting "lipstick on a pig," Learning List has found that most of the publishers whose products we've reviewed are working hard to align their content to the CCSS standards. In fact, our reviewers have found several products to be highly aligned to the CCSS, some even 100 percent aligned to the t, and of the CCSS. However, in some product lines we found dramatic discrepancies in alignment from grade to grade, suggesting that educators must review carefully the alignment of the product for the grade level they are teaching. One reason our experience may be different from the professors’ experience is that we are likely reviewing more current product editions. That’s good news for educators, as it shows that publishers are either constructing new or enhancing older versions their products to more closely align with the CCSS. In response to our alignment verifications, some publishers have added new content to align their products more closely with the rigor required of the CCSS or have changed their correlations to eliminate citations that we found not to be aligned to the standards. Thus, an ancillary but critically important benefit of our service has been to help publishers strengthen the alignment of their products. That’s good news for publishers, for educators and for students, alike

This is the time of the year when all hands are on deck to help struggling students achieve. We, as educators, have a tendency during the crunch time before state testing to work harder and faster but not always smarter. Due to this sense of urgency, teachers often give students stacks of worksheets designed in the same format as the state tests, thinking that more practice is better.  Computer labs are booked solid with students needing additional help on specific skills.  When instructional technologists ask the teachers what the students need to work on in the lab, the answer many times is, “Just pick whatever lesson you can on that particular skill.”  Now, what is wrong with this scenario? One reason that many struggling students are not more successful each year is that the provided instruction is not aligned closely with the academic standards.  If the practice worksheets or online lessons that the teacher assigns do not address standards completely, the student may not be learning a skill or concept or may be learning it wrong repeatedly. That type of damage is difficult to rectify. When a classroom teacher or instructional technologist arbitrarily assigns a lesson without first reviewing it, students may not achieve the intended learning outcome.  Not all instructional materials are aligned closely to the standards, so it is very important to check the alignment first. Learning List’s alignment reports are designed to save teachers time and effort in this process.  Each report lists multiple citations (e.g., lessons, activities, pages) that our subject matter experts have reviewed for alignment to the content, context, and cognitive demand of each standard (or breakout in Texas). If a district purchases a product Learning List has reviewed, teachers can assign the reviewed citations with confidence that they are providing their students with instructional materials that are aligned to the standards.

The ING Unsung Heroes Program recognizes K-12 educators who are innovative in the classroom and positively influence students.  The program provides 100 educators statewide with grants of $2,000 grants each year to implement creative projects in schools or school systems. The top three finalists receive awards of $27,000, $12,000, and $7,000. All K-12 educators working full-time in an accredited public or private school are eligible to apply.  Applications for 2014 grants are due on April 30, 2014, and awards will be announced in the fall. For more information about how to apply click here . http://youtu.be/8EzQjEni_Yw

A recent post on EdWeek ’s Digital Education blog underscores the value of Learning List’s service verifying publisher-provided alignments to the Common Core State Standards . In the post, Benjamin Herold reports on current research indicating that many instructional materials that claim to be aligned to the CCSS are only “modestly” aligned.  His post cites research results indicating that many CCSS-aligned instructional materials do not fully address the CCSS's grade-level content or approach the level of cognitive demand required by the standards.  Quoting one researcher, Herold writes that “districts’ mantra should be ‘don’t trust and still verify’ any claims of common core alignment.” Learning List won’t weigh in on the assertion that districts should not trust alignment claims, but verification of publisher-provided alignments is core to our mission as an instructional materials review service. To support this mission, Learning List has an established cadre of trained subject matter experts with substantial experience and expertise aligning instructional materials to the content, context, and cognitive demand of the CCSS. We suggest a new mantra for districts: Trust but let Learning List verify alignment to the CCSS.

Recently, I presented to a group of school board members and a superintendent. The superintendent made the following observation that I’ve been chewing on since our meeting. In his opinion, instructional materials increasingly are geared towards teachers, rather than students, and, specifically, towards making teachers’ jobs easier. Most people think that’s a good thing; he does not. Teacher editions typically have provided instructional guidance to teachers. Today’s products provide more guidance to help teachers individualize instruction. For example, teacher editions often explain specifically how to adapt their instruction for specific student populations, including English language learners and struggling students.  Publishers do this to meet the market’s demand, as laws and regulations increasingly require that teachers individualize instruction. Most educators appreciate publishers’ guidance to teachers. Policymakers and “education reformers” extoll online resources as a great “leveler” among teachers, arguing that adaptive online products help weaker teachers provide instruction that is as effective as stronger teachers.  That is precisely what this superintendent objects to.  To paraphrase what I believe he was saying, adaptive products lull teachers into believing that the product provides instruction, so they can facilitate or guide, rather than teach. He argues that is not good for teachers, for teaching, and most importantly, that is not good for students. I love meeting people who make me think about things from a new perspective.

Catherine Gewertz’s recent Edweek column, , summarizes current efforts to ensure that instructional materials are aligned to the Common Core State Standards .  Not surprisingly, the column mentions Learning List as one new tool to help educators “size up” instructional materials and their alignment to the CCSS.

As educators seek ways to improve student learning and decrease the dropout rate, individualized learning or what many now call personalized learning is taking the stage in the mainstream classroom.  If used correctly, personalized learning may provide students with the specific instruction that meets their needs and thus improves their achievement. In the ASCD INFObrief, “The Building Blocks of High School Redesign” by Tom Ewing, five strategies are discussed for successful high school reform. 1 Mr. Ewing points out that the first strategy is personalized learning which includes the development of individualized learning plans based on the intellectual capacity, interests, and aspirations unique to each student. Many publishers offer individualized learning paths within their online products.  The learning paths consist of auto-generated activities and quizzes based upon a student’s performance on pretests.  As a principal, I found that in order for a student to be successful in the assigned learning path, teachers needed to consider the following:  Teachers need to review and perhaps revise activities created in the learning path before they are assigned to the student, as:  Some of the learning path activities may be too easy or too difficult for the student; The focus and interest level of the activities may not be appropriate for the age of the student; and, A student may be discouraged and overwhelmed before he starts if too many activities are assigned in the learning path. The activities need to spark the student’s curiosity, relate to real world experiences, and be motivating. If a student is not successful with a particular lesson, the online product should have an effective re-teach component instead of repeating the statement, “Try again”. A strong personalized online product will adjust the difficulty level of the learning activities within the learning path so the student does not experience frustration by being unsuccessful after several attempts. The teacher needs to meet regularly with the student to review and assess the completion of the learning path and the student’s success rate.  If students are placed in an online program and not monitored, the following will likely occur: Students will race through an activity and answer questions arbitrarily; and, Student motivation and the quality of their work will decrease. If implemented correctly, individualized learning paths in online products can be very motivating and successful with students, particularly at the secondary level.  But, educators know their students best and should adjust instruction within personalized learning to maximize student achievement. 1 ASCD INFObrief, Spring, 2007 Number 49, “The Building Blocks of High School Redesign” by Tom Ewing.

In this morning’s New York Times , Quentin Hardy reports in the Bits blog on a push by the non-profit group EductaionSuperHighway to change the way the Federal Communications Commission provides broadband to schools.  With the support of 40 executives, including the CEOs of American Express, Dell, Ebay, and Facebook, EducationSuperHighway has written a letter to the FCC demanding greater transparency and competition in the federal E-Rate program, which connects schools to the Internet. In his post, Hardy notes: EducationSuperHighway’s statistics say schools are overpaying for connectivity. The median cost per school, it calculates, is $25 a megabit, and the top quartile of schools pay $2 a megabit. The bottom quartile pays $85 a megabit. Schools in typically wealthier districts, which float bonds to connect themselves, have negotiated deals to pay as little as 10 cents a megabit. Noting that schools now need approximately 100 megabits per second to support wireless connectivity but will need  10 times that in as little as three years, the letter outlines the case for less expensive broadband.  You can read the letter here .