April eBook Top 5 Collection OCM BOCES Instructional Support would highlight these selections from our eBook Professional Library. View Professional eBook Library.

Pyramid of Behavior Interventions: Seven Keys to a Positive Learning Environment Transform the research on behavior, response to intervention, and professional learning communities into practical strategies. Read more

Transforming School Culture: How to Overcome Staff Division Explores many aspects of human behavior, social conditions, and history to reveal best practices for building healthy school cultures. Read more

Learning by Doing : A Handbook for Professional Learning Communities at Work An action guide for closing the knowing-doing gap and transforming schools into PLCs. Read more

21st Century Skills: Rethinking How Students Learn Ways to re-envision learning and prepare students for a rapidly evolving global and technological world. Read more

Principal: Three Keys to Maximizing Impact Shows systematically how the principal's role should change, demonstrating how it can be done in short order, at scale. Read more

April 08, 2016

Hold the date for the 6th Annual Teacher Leadership Conference!  It’s an evening of celebrating and learning about teacher leadership. The theme is “Teacher Leadership beyond District Boundaries,” and the workshop will all explore the ways that teacher leadership reaches across district lines to benefit the state [and beyond]. Commissioner Elia will deliver the keynote. The event will again be held at Drumlins, this time on May 31st. Registration will soon be up.

The USDOE has released free, web-based surveys that schools can use to assess school climate.

Carol Ann Tomlinson gives some good advice about formative assessment in this publicly available article from Educational Leadership. Tomlinson says, “Formative assessment is - or should be - the bridge or causeway between today's lesson and tomorrow's.”

Guskey and Jung were here in November, helping us to think about our grading and reporting practices. One of the things they told us was to use our professional judgement rather than computerized grading practices. Now, they've codified the advice into the publicly available article from Educational Leadership.

This video is a simulation of a conversation between a principal and teacher about the use of zeros in grading.

Image CC Esther Vargas

Hey! Your professional book collection now includes Solution Tree and Corwin titles in addition to all of the ASCD titles that you’ve had access to via the OCM BOCES Instructional Support e-library. Enjoy free access to books about RTI, literacy, PLC, social studies, technology, STEM, assessment, PBL, leadership, classroom management, motivation, and much more!

Ken O’Connor has a couple of articles about standards-based grading that might help:

• Redefining Fair: Assessment and Grading in the 21st Century
• Grades: When, Why, What Impact, and How?

PBL 101
5/11, 5/12, 5/18, 5/19	Main Campus Canandaigua Room

PBL-101 is the foundational four-day workshop inspired by the work of the Buck Institute for Education, New Tech Network, Edutopia, and Expeditionary Learning. It provides attendees with the skills and knowledge needed to design, assess, and manage a rigorous, relevant, and standards-based project. The cohort that begins May 11th is the last one during this school year!

This research about PBL has been shared before, but it’s a good reminder of the impact on learning that good PBL can have.

A Problem-Based Learning (PrBL) is scheduled for May 2nd. At the training, participants will analyze different ways to link your curriculum and technology with a PrBL approach to create a rigorous and engaging learning environment for your students. Participants will also utilize workshop time to start planning their first PrBL experience for their students. This session is for middle school and high school math and science educators and administrators who want to learn more about Problem-Based Learning.

The Buck Institute for Education is teaming up with OCM BOCES to offer a four-day conference on the research-driven success of Project-Based Learning. The one-of-a-kind event embraces the Maker Movement and offers a long list of inspiring speakers and workshops aimed at bolstering your understanding and success with student-centered, inquiry-based learning. Don’t miss out on this chance to connect with fellow educators, renowned experts, and PBL trailblazers for an event guaranteed to spark creativity, collaboration, and innovation in the classroom.

Having a makerspace really isn't the goal. Rather, it's a maker culture that we desire... a culture of creativity and curiosity. This column has advice.

Registration is now open for the next round of summer social studies, July 18th – 21st, facilitated curriculum work. Examples that integrate ELA and social studies will be used, especially at the elementary level. There are two threads:  grades 9-12 and grades K-4.

In this short video, Rick DuFour describes the importance of a Professional Learning Community. He suggests that the biggest challenge is overcoming our traditions. In a longer, more recent clip, he frames the present state of education and urges us to move ahead.

This video explains the seven steps to becoming a Professional Learning Community and how, from the beginning, collaboration has to be non-negotiable.

AP collaboration sessions are being formed. If you are an AP teacher, perhaps one of these sessions is a match for you:

• Science and Math teachers (begins Aprils 12th)
• ELA and social studies teachers (begins April 13th)
• Art, psychology, and world languages (begins April 14th)

This article does a nice job summarizing the impact of poverty on learning and achievement.

Details about this summer’s Middle-Level Institute have just been announced! As usual, there’s a great line-up of workshops to choose from: EdTech & Literacy, math, social studies, and RTI.