Just this past weekend I attended a Common Core English Language Arts (CCSS-ELA) training put together by the Washington Core Advocates from Achieve the Core Student Achievement Partners. Because of my work with the OSPP I was invited to attend this fantastic training. I had the choice of going to the Math training or the ELA training. I wanted to attend the Math training. My thinking was this: I’ve recently had some CCSS-ELA training so I really want to get some Math training to familiarize myself with the Math standards. As a Science teacher I use ELA as well as Math so I should be familiar with the CCSS-ELA and the CCSS-Math. Also, my National Board certification is an Early Adolescent Generalist so Math was the logical next step.
I thought I signed up for the Math training but when I got there I was handed the ELA materials! I sure do hope those in our OSPP cohort who attended the Math training can have time time to share what they learned with the rest of us! I’m sure those of us who attended the ELA training will share with the rest of our OSPP cohort! I am willing.
The other training I had before was from two train the trainer sessions from our state union group, the WEA, for CCSS-ELA. I thought I had a good understanding of the ELA standards because I have been trained as a trainer! Well, I’m very glad that I got attend this THIRD CCSS-ELA training because I think I’m only now really starting to get it! Getting to participate in the WA Core Advocates and Student Achievement Partners training is really helping me start to cement what I have been learning through the WEA train the trainer trainings! Maybe it’s got something to do with three or the third time you learn something. I’m seeing how repetition really helps ME as a LEARNER.
Our Jan 2016 Convening Group
We started our weekend by delving into the three shifts called for in the common core for ELA. Now, I had already delved into the three shifts at the WEA sessions, both of them, but something about going through it for the third time really made it click for me! I had wondered, why are we spending so much time learning about the three shifts and not just jumping right into the standards, but after this weekend I have a very different perspective. I’m shocked it didn’t hit me before. As the presenters explained, the shifts may be shifts for some teachers who need to change but for others, who have shifted, the CCSS shifts can help them “shift into high gear.” Either way, understanding the shifts puts the common core standards into perspective and helps provide focus for teachers to really help our students.
The three ELA shifts that teachers need to keep at the fore of their work with children are:
- Regular practice with complex text and its academic language.
- Reading, writing and speaking grounded in evidence from text, both literary and informational.
- Building knowledge through content-rich nonfiction.
We then spent some time learning about the Matthew Effect, which shows the research and reasons why our disadvantaged children start school behind more affluent children and why they are playing catch up for possibly their entire K-12 career. We focused on one equalizer, vocabulary. In order to make complex texts accessible to all our students, and to provide them the opportunity to learn from complex texts, we need to develop their vocabulary.
We learned some strategies for selecting the academic vocabulary that will help students learn from complex texts and become better readers. A fantastic part of our training was looking at what the research shows about which vocabulary teaching strategies work best and which ones do not work as well as we would hope. As a teacher knowing what works and what doesn’t work will help me make better use of the time I spend working with my students!
I plan to share specifics about what I learned in future posts. It was good stuff and I need to go back and review it before I forget too much! Stay tuned!
Okay, it’s the future now and I’ve been sharing my learning from the WEA Common Core training and from the Achieve the Core training mentioned above. I’ve been blogging for a group called CoreLaborate here in WA so the series of posts I’ve been writing on the three common core shifts are actually there! Here’s what I’ve shared:
CCSS ELA Shift 1, Part 1
CCSS ELA Shift 1, Part 2
CCSS ELA Shift 2, Part 1
CCSS ELA Shift 2, Part 2
CCSS ELA Shift 3
