Saturday, November 21, 2020

Curbing the Pandemic Slide by Putting the Right Students into the Right Instructional Groups

 Which Peas are You Going to Put in Your Pandemic Pod? (Part II)

Dear Colleagues,

[CLICK HERE for the Full Blog Article]

Introduction

   While clearly impacting innumerable areas of our lives, the current pandemic has significantly affected our country’s schools and educational processes.

   Moreover, many students are going to sleep each night asking:

  • “Are we Going to School?” rather than “Have I completed everything to Prepare for School?”;
  •  “Is it Safe to Go to School?” rather than “I can’t Wait to Get to School.”; and
  •  “Will I bring the COVID virus Home after School?” rather than “I can’t to get Home to Share my Day.”

   Our virtual students, meanwhile, are asking:

  • “Will the family computer (that I share with my siblings) be available to me tomorrow so I can attend school?”;
  •  “Will the internet connection be strong enough so I can watch, download, and interact with my teacher and peers successfully and continuously?”; and
  •  “Why should I bother even getting up? I hate Zoom, and I’m not learning anyways?”

   Relative to these latter questions, we know that (a) as many as 4.4 million student households still lack consistent computer access with 3.7 million struggling with internet access; (b) some teachers surveys have reported that less than half of their students were attending virtual classes; and (c) students have not mastered academic material at expected grade levels this Fall, with math skills more affected than literacy skills.

_ _ _ _ _

   In Part I of this Series, we discussed the so-called “Pandemic Slide” by emphasizing the need to quantify it for every individual student, to validate it, and to analyze it—if present—so that the most effective services, supports, strategies, and interventions can be linked to address it.

   In this context, we described (a) how to determine students’ academic skill mastery; (b) how to complete and explain students’ academic information and skill gaps; and (c) why it is important to differentiate between—and intervene differently for—gaps involving progressively taught, sequential, “building block” skills, and contextually taught, integrated, curriculum-embedded skills.

[CLICK HERE for Part I:  It’s Not About the Size of the Pandemic Slide—It’s About Where to Start Teaching]

   At the beginning of this Blog, we asked the following prevailing questions:

   What does it mean for your district or school students—whether in a virtual or on-site classroom—to be “academically behind”?

   How and where (in the curriculum) should you teach each of your students?

   Moreover, we noted that these questions are the critical planning questions that need to be answered right now so that districts and schools can effectively plan their instruction and group their students for January and the second semester of the school year.

_ _ _ _ _

   Throughout the Part I discussion, we also made the following essential points:

  • Educationally, these are challenging times. The pandemic is an event that has created specific conditions that have resulted in academic skill gaps and social-emotional needs for some students. While unique, this event still is similar to having a student who, for example, was unable to attend school for eight to twelve months due to a hospitalization after an unfortunate car accident.
  • We need to adapt to the academic impact of the pandemic by focusing on quality instruction and student learning. It makes no sense to be burdened or dictated to by academic standards and outcomes that are no longer viable.
  • As a rule of thumb, if students—who demonstrated average or expected rates of learning before the pandemic—are now functioning below grade-level academically due to pandemic-related conditions that influenced the quality of instruction or their opportunity to learn, they need to be taught (a) at their current functional, mastery levels—for skills that need to be learned sequentially, and (b) at their current grade-placement levels—when missed skills can be integrated into the grade-level content and curriculum.
  • The rule of thumb above, however, must be adapted if there were pre-pandemic learning conditions—for example, related to student disabilities and other individual student conditions—that need to be addressed.
  •  Once again, where students are “supposed to be”—using pre-pandemic academic and social expectations—is largely irrelevant from a pedagogical perspective right now.

   We ultimately stated that:

   The point of this two-part Blog Series is that (a) educators need to be less concerned about a pandemic slide that focuses on where students “should be” academically in their classes or courses; and (b) more concerned about determining what academic skills students have learned, mastered, and are able to apply, and how to teach from there.

   In this Part II, we will address (c) how to StoryBoard students’ academic status data, organizing different-achieving students into classrooms that allow teachers to successful differentiate their instruction so that students can more effectively learn and master the material presented; and (d) how to strategically use homogeneous and heterogeneous instructional groups—as well as other multi-tiered supports—to facilitate the learning and mastery process for these different students.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

The Current Virtual State of Affairs: Teachers are Struggling, Students Aren’t Learning, and Districts Aren’t Planning

   Before discussing the plans needed by all schools nationwide for this coming January, let’s review the current national “state of affairs” as it relates to student learning, teacher instruction, and district planning. This planning, once again, is essential—especially as the positive rates for COVID-19 are escalating, many schools are moving (or continuing) full-time or hybrid-related virtual teaching, and none of us can truly predict what the New Year is going to look like.

   Relative to teachers, a November 16, 2020 Education Week article reported new data from an October RAND Corporation survey of 1,082 teachers and 1,147 school leaders, from their American Educator Panels, regarding their experiences so far during the 2020-2021 school year.

   The results indicated that:

  • On-site teachers reported that 91% of their students were present every day, in contrast with 85% student attendance for hybrid teachers, and  84% for virtual teachers.
  • On-site teachers reported that 82% of their students turned in most or all of their work, in contrast with 62% work completion for virtual students.
  •  Two-thirds of the teachers said that the majority of their students were less prepared for grade-level work than at this time last year.
  • 56% of teachers said that they had covered only half, or less than half, of the curriculum content this year in contrast with previous years.
  • Virtual teachers reported experiencing more challenges than on-site teachers, and they felt that they needed more support and guidance relative to planning instruction. The specifically noted needing help in adapting curriculum, motivating students, assessing learning, and helping students to progress.
  • Virtual teachers also needed more help in supporting students from poverty, with severe disabilities, English-language learners, and those experiencing homelessness. 

_ _ _ _ _

   A separate report by the Center on Reinventing Public Education was reviewed on November 16, 2020 in Education Dive. Analyzing the 100 most high-profile school districts in the country (including the 30 largest school districts), the Center found that slightly more than half of the districts are providing some type of on-site instruction to their students, and that almost 60% of the districts lacked a “comprehensive” plan to address learning loss this Fall.

   The Center noted that:

  • Many districts are going it alone—procuring equipment and setting up plans to keep children safe in buildings, only to have those plans derailed by rising case counts in their communities.
  • Large numbers of students remain disengaged from learning or going without crucial support services, and it's become increasingly clear that many school systems cannot simply rely on a return to school buildings to solve this problem.
  • Just over one-fifth (21) of the districts explain how they are identifying high-absence students and getting them to participate in remote learning or return to school. The most common intervention is frequent calls to students' homes.
  • In a few districts—when students have not logged in for three to four days, and staff are unable to contact their families—home visits are completed by nonprofit partner organizations, community school coordinators, and other staff.
  • Most districts (80 out of 100) say they have plans to measure student learning, and nearly two-thirds specify strategies like tutoring or small-group instruction for students who fall behind. 
  • But many districts do not provide specifics about what assessment system they'll use or what data they will make available to parents and the public. Relying on assessments tied to specific curricula instead of common standards, or created by individual educators, won't help leaders make crucial system-level decisions. 
  • These most-recent findings show that school districts are so consumed with crisis responses and the logistical challenges of reopening that new strategies for teaching,  re-engaging missing students, and identifying and addressing students’ learning needs are not being developed.

   The results of both of these recent reports reinforce the current gaps in our instructional system, and the need and importance of planning systemically now for the second half of this school year.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Using Student Mastery Data to (Re)Organize January’s Classrooms or Pods

   In Part I of this Blog Series, we noted that, in order to address the assessment, instructional grouping, and multi-tiered service and support needs for all students come January (but, especially, for those students with moderate to significant academic skills and information gaps), districts and schools need to immediately:

  • Assess—validly and functionally—all of their students in literacy, mathematics, science, and writing/language arts;
  • Integrate and “StoryBoard” the results in each academic area to determine the best ways to group students instructionally to maximize the impact of effective teaching and differentiation;
  •  Identify and plan for the students who need multi-tiered services, supports, and interventions;
  • Align the StoryBoard with staff and resources (including Intervention Specialists, paraprofessionals, computer-assisted instruction and intervention, after-school tutoring, etc.). . . with an eye toward student equity;
  • Factor the results into (a modification of) the school’s second semester schedule and logistics; and
  • Evaluate the decisions on an ongoing basis, making “mid-course” grouping, scheduling, and/or logistical changes as needed.

[CLICK HERE again for Part I]

   After describing how to effectively collect and analyze students’ skill mastery and current functional academic status in literacy, mathematics, science, and writing/language arts, we finished Part I by recommending that schools pool each student’s quantitative and qualitative data into a “Grade-Level Equivalent Skill Summary Score.”

   We stated:

While not the most sophisticated psychometric score, a student’s current functional skills in a specific academic area can be categorized as at the Beginning-, Middle-, or End of a specific Grade-Level Equivalent.

 

Thus, for example, a student at the beginning of her Seventh-Grade year might be functioning at the End of Fifth Grade level in Reading, the Middle of Sixth Grade level in Math, and the Beginning of Fifth Grade level in writing/language arts.

 

This Grade-Level Equivalent Skill Summary Score can be compared with the district’s scope and sequence or curricular pacing charts to determine where curriculum and instruction might begin for specific students.

   At this point, we will address how to use these Summary Scores to organize different-achieving students into instructional groups; and how to integrate remediation, core instruction, and acceleration for different-performing students.

_ _ _ _ _

StoryBoarding Students

   In this step, educators in a specific school look separately at the literacy, mathematics, science, and writing/language arts Skill Summary Scores for all of the students in a particular grade level—pooling, or StoryBoarding, the data across students.

   Let’s say that a school randomly distributed its third-grade cohort of 85 students into four classes at the beginning of the 2020-20201 school year. Now—based on the end-of-Fall quantitative and qualitative data collection process, these students have the following distribution of literacy Summary Scores across the entire cohort:

  • 10 Students: Middle of Fourth Grade functioning or above
  • 15 Students: Middle to End of Third Grade functioning
  • 45 Students: Middle to End of Second Grade functioning
  • 10 Students: End of First Grade to Beginning of Second Grade functioning
  • 5 Students: Middle of First Grade functioning or below

   In looking at these data, school staff might say that 10 students are above grade level in literacy, 15 students are at grade level, 40 students are below grade level, and 10 students are well-below grade level.

   BUT. . . given that these students “lost” a number of months of high-quality instruction due to the pandemic last Spring (and, maybe, since September), the school should not be surprised that 45 students are functioning at the middle to end of Second Grade. Indeed, they may reconsider calling them “below grade level.”

   But the more functional, critical issues here are:

  • How are school staff going to (re)cluster these students for January into the most optimal instructional groups?
  • What different-skill-level instructional groups will be (re)assigned to each of the four third-grade teachers’ classrooms?
  • Where in the literacy scope and sequence will these teachers begin teaching these different student skill clusters?
  • How are teachers going to differentiate and teach them?

   As each grade level will be looking at its students’ literacy, mathematics, science, and writing/language arts StoryBoards, respectfully, a decision needs to be made as to which academic area should be used to (re)cluster students into homeroom classes.

   Typically, the literacy data is used to organize kindergarten through Grade 3 classrooms with each teacher receiving only three skill-level clusters so that they can effectively differentiate their instruction.

   Assuming that most students are reading on grade level, the mathematics data is used to organize Grade 4 to Grade 8 classrooms—with each teacher, once again, receiving only three skill-level clusters.

   And, high school students are organized by considering their combined literacy and mathematical skill mastery, as well as their performance in earlier content courses.

   Parenthetically, when homeroom teachers receive three student skill clusters—for example, of above, at, and below grade-level students—their classrooms effectively have a “heterogeneous” group of students made up of three “homogeneous” clusters of students.

_ _ _ _ _

   While we advocate this approach to clustering students into homeroom classrooms in a “typical” year, it will be especially useful given the current pandemic as schools are organizing students into instructional pods and within-classroom quadrants that remain together for the entire school day.

   But what about schools using a hybrid schedule?

   For example, what if a school is using a schedule where one cohort of students comes to school on Mondays and Wednesdays, another cohort comes on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and everyone status home on Fridays? And what if the third grade described above is in this school with its four classroom teachers? And, finally, what if the school decides to use the students’ third grade literacy scores to organize the cohorts—given the importance of literacy in third grade, the integration of writing/language arts in the literacy curriculum, and the fact that the teachers are committed to adapting the Monday/Wednesday and Tuesday/Thursday student groups to accommodate for students’ differential mathematics skills?

[CLICK HERE for a Way to Organize these Staff and Students for Effective Hybrid Instruction in the Full Blog Article]

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Balancing Homogeneous Versus Heterogeneous Instruction

   In the section above, we suggested pooling three different student skill clusters—for example, groups of students functioning above, at, and below grade-level, respectfully—into homeroom classrooms. This would effectively create a “heterogeneous” class of students made up of three “homogeneous” clusters of students.

   This does not suggest, however, that the three student clusters should be taught in separate areas of the literacy, mathematics, science, and writing/language arts curricula, and/or with separate materials.

   These decisions, instead, need to be based on a number of factors related to homogeneous versus heterogeneous instruction.

[CLICK HERE for this Detailed Discussion in the Full Blog Article]

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Tracking and StoryBoarding Pragmatics

   Hopefully, the discussion above has helped create an academic planning blueprint that districts and schools can use right now to prepare for January and the second semester. Clearly, an explicit part of this blueprint involves potentially putting students into Homogeneous Skills Groups.

   And for those who react emotionally when discussions advocating homogeneous skill grouping or teaching students at their instructional (rather than age/grade) levels begin, we hope that our explanations and clarifications have resulted in a level of calm.

   To be more specific: The use of homogeneous skills groups is not ability grouping, and we would never suggest the “old-school” tracking of students.

[CLICK HERE for Why this is Not Tracking in the Full Blog Article]

_ _ _ _ _

StoryBoarding Pragmatics

   After completing the recommended end-of-Fall academic assessments to determine the current functional skill levels of all students, school leaders and grade-level teachers need make strategic decisions on how to cluster students into January’s classrooms and instructional groups. While completing this task, they need to determine which student skill clusters can be taught in the same class and by the same teacher, and how to organize the classrooms and their instructional groups in ways that balance (a) gender, race, and socioeconomic status; with (b) students’ social, emotional, and behavioral status; with (c) everyone’s health and safety at this point in the pandemic.

   Academically, how students are (re)organized for the remainder of the school year will determine teachers’ ability to organize students into Homogeneous Skill Groups and Heterogeneous Comprehension and Application Groups, respectfully. But, functionally, students also should be selected to maximize the positive climate and relationships in each classroom, while simultaneously addressing student equity and representation—all on the road to optimal learning and mastery.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Summary

   Earlier this week, I provided a series of virtual Zoom consultations with a school district in Michigan. While working with different grade-level teams of general education teachers, I told many of them to stop worrying about teaching to prepare their students for the end-of-the-year state standards test.

   Instead, as in this Blog series, I encouraged them to:

(a) stop focusing on where they thought their students “should be” in order to be “proficient” on the test; and (b) focus more on determining what literacy, mathematics, science, and writing/language arts skills their students have learned, mastered, and are able to apply—and how to teach from there.

   Many of these teachers’ students are (predictably) at least 8 to 12 months behind in their core academic skills.

   I asked the teachers if their students would pass—at proficiency or above—their state standards tests if they taught them with grade-level material for the remainder of the school year.

   Virtually all of them said, “No—they don’t have the prerequisite knowledge and skills to learn and master the material at grade-level instruction.”

   Then, I asked them if their students would pass—at proficiency or above—their state standards tests if they taught them at their functional skill levels for the remainder of the school year.

   Virtually all of them said, “No—they won’t be exposed to the grade-level material that will be on the test.”

   I then said to them—“If your students are not going to pass the state standards tests at proficiency or above regardless of the material that you present to them, as responsible and professional educators, at what instructional level do you want to present your academic material?”

   Every one of them said, “We need to teach our students from their current levels of mastery, reinforce their prerequisite skills, and teach them the next set of skills in the scope and sequence—regardless of the grade level of that instruction and those materials.”

_ _ _ _ _

   My friends, we need to follow the science-to-practice of effective instruction and pedagogy.

   Most states are not going to administer their state standards tests this year. Thus, the educators in these states can focus on student learning, mastery, and application without fearing that this snapshot of academic performance will negatively impact their jobs or reputation.

   For the states that are going to administer state standards tests this year, every educator is in the same proverbial boat relative to how the pandemic has affected students’ academic learning and growth. If they all do the “right” thing and teach students for mastery and not mandate, no one will “lose” and everyone—especially our students—will win.

   Given this, as I asked my colleagues in Michigan above,

“Do we want to make the right professional and pedagogical decision, and educate our students for their future success? ... or, do we want to spend our time—between January and June—teaching students material that they are not prepared for and will not learn, only to have to re-teach these materials (and more) again next year?”

_ _ _ _ _

   The thesis of this two-part Blog Series was that (a) educators need to be less concerned about a pandemic slide that focuses on where students “should be” academically in their classes or courses; and (b) more concerned about determining what academic skills students have learned, mastered, and are able to apply, and how to teach from there.

   In Part I of this Series, we discussed the so-called “Pandemic Slide” by emphasizing the need to quantify it for every individual student, to validate it, and to analyze it—if present—so that the most effective services, supports, strategies, and interventions can be linked to address it.

   In this context, we described (a) how to determine students’ academic skill mastery; (b) how to complete and explain students’ academic information and skill gaps; and (c) why it is important to differentiate between—and intervene differently for—gaps involving progressively taught, sequential, “building block” skills, and contextually taught, integrated, curriculum-embedded skills.

   In this Part II, we addressed (c) how to StoryBoard students’ academic status data, organizing different-achieving students into classrooms that allow teachers to successful differentiate their instruction so that students can more effectively learn and master the material presented; and (d) how to strategically use homogeneous and heterogeneous instructional groups—as well as other multi-tiered supports—to facilitate the learning and mastery process for these different students.

_ _ _ _ _

   Now is the perfect time to evaluate the academic status and progress of all students in literacy, mathematics, science, and writing/language arts so that data-informed planning can occur for this coming January and the start of the new semester.

   This is especially important during this pandemic as some schools will welcome their students on-site for the first time this year beginning in January, while other schools—that have taught their students in full-time on-site pods, or using half-time hybrid schedules—need information to continue their second semester journeys.

   We need to adapt to the academic impact of the pandemic by focusing on quality instruction and student learning. It makes no sense to be burdened or dictated to by academic standards, expectations, and outcomes that are not viable right now. Instead, we need to use science, practice, and common sense to serve our students, and honor their futures.

   As always, I appreciate your ongoing support in reading this Blog.  I hope that you, your colleagues, your students, and your families have a safe, healthy, and meaningful Thanksgiving.

   If you have comments or questions, please contact me at any time.

Best,

Howie

[CLICK HERE for the Full Blog Article]

 

Saturday, November 7, 2020

It’s Not About the Size of the Pandemic Slide—It’s About Where to Start Teaching (Part I)

During a Crisis, You Have to Change the Definition of Success

[CLICK HERE for the Full Blog Article]

Dear Colleagues,

Introduction

   The existence and impact of an academic “pandemic slide” has been a frequent topic in the popular and educational press since the beginning of the pandemic earlier this year.

   Related reports have documented that:

  • 4.4 million households with students still lack consistent access to a computer, and 3.7 million lack internet access. While schools provided computers to more than half of their households, only a fraction of these homes received devices to access the internet (September 28, 2020; USA Facts);
  • Many educators stated that their schools covered less material or no new instructional territory during the virtual Spring and early part of the new school year (August 20, 2020; EdWeek Market Brief);
  • Students’ virtual attendance last Spring was significantly down (for example, a majority of the 5,659 educators in one survey said that fewer than half of their students were attending), and this problem has continued this Fall (September 22, 2020; New York Times); and
  • Students have not mastered academic material at the expected grade levels this Fall, with math skills more affected than literacy skills.

_ _ _ _ _

   Critically, this last bullet is the primary focus of this two-part Blog message.

   The Questions?

What does it mean for your district or school students— whether in a virtual or on-site classroom—to be “academically behind”?

How and where (in the curriculum) should you teach each of your students?

   These are the critical planning questions to answer right now as we approach January and the second semester of the school year.

   They are important because some schools will welcome their students on-site for the first time this year beginning in January, while other schools—that have taught their students in full-time on-site pods, or using half-time hybrid schedules—will continue their second semester journeys.

   Either way, all schools nationwide need to “take stock” of their students’ current academic status and progress now so that they can prepare for the instructional changes that may be needed this January.

   Ultimately:

   The point of this two-part Blog Series is that (a) educators need to be less concerned about a pandemic slide that focuses on where students “should be” academically in their classes or courses; and (b) more concerned about determining what academic skills students have learned, mastered, and are able to apply, and how to teach from there.

   In today’s message, we will address these points by discussing (a) the “etiology” of the pandemic slide—and how it needs to be quantified, validated, and analyzed so that it can be linked to the best services, supports, and interventions; and (b) how to coordinate an assessment process to determine what academic content and skills students have mastered.

   In Part II of this Blog Series, we will address (c) how to organize different-achieving students into instructional groups; and (d) how to integrate remediation, core instruction, and acceleration for these different students.

   As is evident from the title of this piece: When in a crisis, the focus is to manage and stabilize the crisis. This often requires a change in the “definition of success.”

   Educationally, these are challenging times. We need to adapt to the academic impact of the pandemic by focusing on quality instruction and student learning. It makes no sense to be burdened or dictated to by academic standards and outcomes that are no longer viable.

   We can facilitate student learning and mastery. . . by maintaining high and reasonable expectations.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

The Etiology of the “Pandemic Slide”

   Words are powerful.

   The phrase “pandemic slide” has—in a few short months—become an “accepted” part of our educational lexicon. It has been discussed without specification and validation. It is already being marketed by vendors trying to sell their assessment and intervention products. And it has created anxiety among administrators and teachers.

   Right now, if we are going to functionally focus on the pandemic slide in schools nationwide, it needs to be quantified for every student, validated as the condition underlying a student’s current academic skill gap, and analyzed relative to needed services, supports, or interventions.

Quantifying and Validating the Pandemic Slide

   On a conservative level, an academic gap (or slide) that is due to the pandemic is evident when there a change in an individual student’s learning curve before the pandemic began, as contrasted with his or her learning curve during this ongoing pandemic.

   That is, if a student’s speed or rate of learning and mastery is significantly lower in a specific academic area during the past five instructional months (i.e., March, April, May, September, and October) than during the one, two, or three years before, we could reasonably conclude (other factors or events aside) that the student has learned less (or “has lost” previous learning) during the pandemic.

   [Note that to be even more precise, we would also factor a student’s typical “summer slide” into the analysis—but let’s keep this practical.]

   Example 1. If a typical student was making 10 months of pre-pandemic progress in literacy for every 10 months in school (a 1.0 rate), then a “pandemic slide” might be evident if they had made 3 months of progress in the five months (i.e., March, April, May, September, and October) since the pandemic began (a 0.8 rate).                                                          

   Example 2. If a “more challenged” student was making 8 months of pre-pandemic academic progress in literacy for 10 months in school (a 0.8 rate), a pandemic slide might be evident if they had made 2 months of progress in the five months since the pandemic began (a 0.4 rate).

   Example 3.  If a different student was making 10 months of pre-pandemic progress in literacy for every 10 months in school (a 1.0 rate), and continued to make this same 1.0 rate progress during the past five pandemic months, we might conclude that there was either no impact due to the pandemic or that the student was compensating for any impacts.

   NOTE that an implicit assumption in these examples is (a) that the academic assessment tools being used and the resulting progress monitoring data are valid and are accurately measuring student learning and progress; and (b) that the outcome data from the assessment tools reflect the same learning skills and content as in the curricular material taught in the classroom.

_ _ _ _ _

Analyzing Academic Gaps to Prepare for Intervention

   If academic gaps exist due to the pandemic, and if we want to effectively close these gaps, we still need to determine the reason or reasons why (i.e., the root cause) the gaps exist.

   More specifically, the pandemic has not caused any valid and existing gaps; the pandemic has created one or more conditions that have caused the gap.

   Among the most likely reasons for an existing pandemic-related academic gap are the following:

  • Student (virtual and/or on-site) attendance, academic engagement, work assignment understanding and completion, motivation, ability to work and learn independently, ability to learn on a virtual or computer-based platform, pandemic-related emotional or mental health reactions, and/or access to a reliable computer and internet connection.
  • Curriculum that has been cut down or truncated due to time; that is not well-designed for home- or self-instruction, or virtual teaching; that is not aligned to district and/or state standards and learning objectives; that does not provide effective prerequisite skill sequencing or scaffolding.
  • Instruction (virtual and/or on-site) that has not occurred or is not developmentally or pedagogically sound; that is delivered without understanding the pandemic’s functional impact on students’ social, emotional, or behavioral status or interactions; that involves students with such varying prerequisite and existing skill levels that differentiation cannot be successful; that cannot be effectively modified to a virtual platform.

   Critically, in order to identify and provide the services, supports, instruction, or intervention that will close existing academic gaps, educators need to know exactly why the gap occurred, and then they need to link the reason to the approach(es) that will address it.

   Example 1. If the gap is because students were never taught (or effectively taught) the prerequisite skills for the instructional unit or skills now being presented, the current teacher may need to teach or re-teach the prerequisites needed as part of the new unit.

   Example 2. If the gap is because students do not have (and can learn) the (metacognitive or other) skills needed to learn in a virtual environment, then these skills need to be taught and applied to curriculum and instruction.

   Example 3. If the gap is because (previous) teachers have been asked to differentiate instruction for too many students functioning at too many different skill levels, then the staff may need to reorganize the assignment of students into specific differentiated instructional groups.

   As a rule of thumb, if students—who demonstrated average or expected rates of learning before the pandemic—are now functioning below grade-level academically due to pandemic-related conditions that influenced the quality of instruction or their opportunity to learn, they need to be taught (a) at their current functional, mastery levels—for skills that need to be learned sequentially, and (b) at their current grade-placement levels—when missed skills can be integrated into the grade-level content and curriculum.

   For example, as many mathematical skills are sequentially taught and dependent on students’ mastery of prerequisite skills, if students have missed six months of quality instruction and learning, instruction may need to “drop back” and start at the last levels of student mastery.

   In contrast, for middle or high school English students, vocabulary and comprehension skills are learned more experientially as they are exposed to different genres of texts, stories, and novels. Here, missed vocabulary and comprehension skills can be “made up” by strategically choosing stories or novels that best addressed existing skill gaps.

   Said a different, “old school” way, if students do not get to Great Expectations because of the pandemic, then they miss that experience. However, the vocabulary, comprehension, plot analysis, and compare and contrast skills that may have been taught during Great Expectations can be embedded into the instruction of a different novel.

   In summary, the pandemic is an event that has triggered (as above—for certain students, for different reasons) specific academic skill gaps. This event is similar to having a student who was unable to attend school for eight to twelve months due to a hospitalization after a car accident.

   In order to best teach students who have missed sequentially-dependent skills, instruction should begin at their points of current skill mastery. When embedded or contextually-dependent skills have been missed, educators—for example, in English, science, and history will need to strategically select which areas of their curricula to emphasize and teach, and how to integrate missed skills and content into their instruction.

   Where students are “supposed to be” is largely irrelevant from a pedagogical perspective right now.

_ _ _ _ _

Determining Students’ Academic Skill Mastery

   Ultimately, as above, a district or school’s instructional plans for January hinge on valid assessments that tell them what content and skills students have learned and mastered in literacy, mathematics, writing/language arts, and science.

   The results of these assessments help identify (a) the current functional, instructional skill levels, for each student, in these core academic areas; (b) the prerequisite skills that students can build on as they progress to the next scaffolded skill, content area, or unit in their school’s scope and sequence or curricular map; and (c) where teachers should start the teaching process.

   In order to facilitate this planning for January, however, the needed assessments should be completed within the next two to three weeks, and meetings to analyze and use the results should be held in early December.

   Based on the collected data, these meetings should focus on (re)organizing students into the best instructional groups in the second semester’s core academic areas, and determining students’ pods or class assignments, schedules, and access to specific teachers and needed support services.

   NOTE that the prevailing assumption here is that the instruction for most students in January should be guided by their pandemic-specific levels of academic skill mastery—unless there were pre-pandemic learning conditions (e.g., related to student disabilities) that still need to be addressed.

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A Blueprint for Assessing Students’ Current Academic Skills

   In order to accomplish the assessment, instructional grouping, and multi-tiered service and support goals related to students with confirmed pandemic slides, districts and schools need to complete a series of important actions.

   These actions are outlined in the Full Blog message, along with how to develop the assessments that accurately measure students’ functional skill and mastery levels in the core classroom curricula (i.e., literacy, mathematics, science, and writing/language arts), and how to pool the assessment results so that they are valid and useful.

[CLICK HERE for these Actions in the Full Blog Article]

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Summary

   In today’s message, Part I of a two-part Blog Series, we addressed (a) the “etiology” of the pandemic slide—and how it needs to be quantified, validated, and analyzed so that students’ learning gaps can be linked to the best services, supports, and interventions; and (b) how to coordinate an assessment process that determines students’ current functional skill levels, and what academic content and skills they have mastered or not mastered.

   In Part II of this Blog Series, we will address (c) how to organize different-achieving students into instructional groups; and (d) how to integrate remediation, core instruction, and acceleration for these different students.

   Across both parts, we are emphasizing that educators need to be less concerned about a pandemic slide that focuses on where students “should be” academically in their classes or courses; and more concerned about determining what academic skills students have learned, mastered, and are able to apply—and how to teach from there.

   We are also emphasizing, especially during these challenging times, the need to adapt to the academic impact of the pandemic by focusing on quality instruction and student learning. Indeed, it makes no sense to be burdened or dictated to by academic standards, expectations, and outcomes that are not viable right now.

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   While we are only half-way through this two-part Series, we anticipate many who will say that these ideas—while research-based and field-tested across the country—are not realistic given the available time, resources, schedules, and even expertise.

   Our respectful response is:

  • We need to know and be guided by research-to-practice blueprints first as we approach our students academically this coming January. If we don’t know the blueprints, then we don’t know how close we can come to these blueprints given the available time, resources, schedules, and expertise in our districts and/or schools

Moreover, if we don’t know the research-to-practice blueprints, we will (in essence) be playing “instructional roulette” with our students’ futures. This puts our students (and staff) at-risk, and increases the probability that our results will be underwhelming.

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  • If we don’t instructionally program our students for academic success, then academic frustration and related social, emotional, and behavioral problems—beyond where these students are now—have a high probability of emerging.

These problems will then (further) undermine these (and other) students’ academic engagement and progress, and this may initiate a vicious cycle.

The result that our students will be further behind—both academically and behaviorally—than when we started.

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  • We need to “go slow to go fast.”

That is, in the absence of valid data, schools may be assuming that they know where students are functioning right now academically, and how much learning progress or loss they have made since March. . . and then, since the beginning of this school year.

At this point in the school year, schools need to re-validate the pods or instructional groups where students are now learning. Perhaps a different instructional group or differentiated learning approach in January will make all the difference in where students are in June?

Academically, we need to accurately, and in a measured way (no pun intended), determine who is ahead, who is progressing, and who is behind. . . and how far they are behind.

If this takes a little more assessment time to get right. . . so that students are assigned to the right classes with the right curriculum and  instruction levels. . . this time will be well-invested.

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   As always, I appreciate your ongoing support in reading this Blog.  I hope that you, your colleagues, your students, and your families are safe and healthy.

   If you have comments or questions, please contact me at your convenience. 

   And please feel free to take advantage of my standing offer for a free, one-hour conference call consultation with you and your team at any time.

Best,

Howie

[CLICK HERE for the Full Blog Article]