Reflections On An NGSS Field Test

My first field test with NGSS based curriculum has concluded.  By the numbers, I had fifty-six classroom teachers and around 1100 students participate (demographic breakdown below).  This represents five percent of the total K-2 population. It included students in behavioral programs, severely disabled students, and approximately 40%  FaRMS.  

  So, what do I know now:

1. Teachers need to understand the performance expectations.  Without the "why" they focused on the "what".  See my previous post on unpacking the standards down to learning goals and success criteria.  
2. Creating videos of teachers implementing the curriculum is time consuming, but highly valued.  Being able to watch another teacher do what you are about to do builds confidence.  I need to work on quality control, but it is a start.  
3. Online assessments don't work very well when students are just learning to use computers.  While every student in the field test had a computer, it took them three months to get agile with it.  There are also significant technical challenges that need to be overcome before these assessments are truly viable.  
4. Performance assessments get the most "bang for the buck".  They are also a great way to keep students engaged in learning when they know they get to apply what they have learned to solving a real-world, local problem.
5. Don't expect teachers to be comfortable with NGSS based curriculum the first time they teach it.  It will have to grow on you.

 What do the kids think?  I took a risk this year and created a survey to allow students to comment back about their experiences in the curriculum.  Keep in mind that these were K-2 students.  The majority of responses came from grade 2.  I copied the text based responses into Wordcloud .

What do you want to change? 

Note: The word "nothing" was removed as it overshadowed the other words

What did you like? 

The words beach, wall, and flower are referencing the three units for grade 2.  You can get a full overview of all the K-2 units in my previous post.

What's next?  

The field test for grades 3-5 is next.  I just wrapped up the professional development for that on Thursday.  Great group of teachers hung out with me in a rather sultry and odoriferous elementary school. We covered the big parts to the first two units.  This included a large amount of time discussing scientific argument using the CER model and the KLEWS strategy.  We used the spandex model of the universe as our scientific phenomena.  That's right I introduced General Relativity to elementary teachers and it is part of our grade 5 unit on space.  I blame the folks who developed the NGSS.  They are the ones who put gravity in with the motion of objects in the universe.  I had to find a way to connect the two to maintain a good storyline.  I encourage you to build this model for yourself.  It is awesome!  

A subsequent professional development will occur in December for the last two.  I will have roughly equivalent numbers of teachers participating this year but with a lot more students.  In grades 3-5, almost all the teachers departmentalize.   

Next, I move forward with K-2 for the entire system.  Our board of education saw fit to approve the purchase of materials for all K-2 teachers.  That will be the largest purchase order I have ever signed. My thanks to them for their support.  

In July, a small group of K-2 field test teachers will update the curriculum based on feedback from this year.  That will be a very interesting two-week process.

  

Lastly, I will also be conducting professional development en masse in August.  1200 teachers in one day.  I provided an outline of the plan in a previous post.  The reality of PD at this scale is just now setting in.  

Is Curriculum a Guide or a Script?

It has been a while since my last post.  Actually, it seems like a lifetime ago.  I will diverge from my normal discussion of science curriculum for a moment, but will bring it back around.  Just stay with me.

Last July, my father was diagnosed with an extremely rare form of cancer undoubtedly from exposure to Agent Orange during his year of service in Vietnam.  He was a helicopter pilot and was tasked with spraying the herbicide.  He told me that due to the prop wash, he would come back soaked in it.

My father just prior to deployment in 1968.

I was out of the office almost all of November due to the complications he has endured through this process.  I've learned more about the science and art of medicine in these last few months than I ever wanted to know.  At one point, I found myself sitting at my father's bedside with my mother and the oncologist as we discussed treatment options.  The Mayo Clinic was consulted and a treatment regime was prescribed which had been deemed effective for most patients.  I say "most" because my father has a rather complex medical history.  Complex enough that it should qualify him for a season of "House".

The oncologist read through the recommendations with us and reviewed  my father's most recent test results.  Based on these results, he decided to follow a slightly different regime.   As of this posting, my father has seen a 70% reduction in the "bad cells" and we are hopeful that by the end of January to be in remission.

What are the lessons to be learned here?

• A set of treatments was prescribed.  
• Test results prior to treatment indicated a modified, more individual course of action.    
• The treatment is proving to be successful. 
• There is an art and science to treatment.  

Let's get back on the topic of this blog.  My primary job, at the moment, is developing curriculum based on the Next Generation Science Standards for the throngs of teachers in my system. This curriculum is a suggested course of action.  It provides many of the components needed to assist teachers in developing mastery of the standards in students.  Now, I'm not comparing myself to the Mayo Clinic, but the expectation is that I am the local expert on the NGSS.  Now I could complete this analogy but I think you know where I am going.  Teachers are the doctors and students are the patients.

What is the purpose of curriculum?  As a teacher, I lived two very different realities when it came to curriculum.  As a kindergarten teacher, I had no curriculum.  I based my instruction on the end of grade level expectations.  I had to make up curriculum on my own.  As a high school science teacher, I received curriculum from my supervisor.  A three inch thick binder.  Blue with a green cover as I recall.  I remember looking through it and realizing that, while it had good lessons it did not meet the needs of my students.  Once again, I had to make up my own curriculum, but at least I had a starting point.  

The idea of following a curriculum, chapter and verse, never occurred to me. I always viewed curriculum as a guide developed by people who have a pretty good idea about what most kids need.  We'll call this a science.  It was then my job as a teacher to find the best fit for my students. That takes a little science and a lot of art to make that happen. Great teachers are almost poetic.

As I discussed back in October (Articulating Expectations into a Personalized Learning Environment), I outlined a new set of curriculum expectations developed by my school system.  In summary,  through pre-assessment, we formatively use data to diagnose where students are before instruction starts.  The result is multiple groups of students consuming instruction based on their instructional need in the same room.

 I would hope that the merits of small group instruction are self-evident, but consider this.  In one of my prior jobs, I worked with "gifted" students.  How many of these students coast through instruction they have already mastered?  Conversely, how many students endure instruction for which they are not ready?  

The question is, then what.  How do you logistically manage a class like this. At the secondary level, there are more options.  Students can take different classes.  At the elementary level, it is more self-contained.  A reality lost on many people outside (and some inside) education.

So, I am opening a dialogue to discuss these ideas.  I am going to host a webinar on February 2 (Ground Hog Day) to develop some concrete strategies for all of us.  Click on this hyperlink at 7:00 PM (EST).  The rough agenda will be as follows.

• I will discuss the specifics of the curriculum framework I developed   (I am open to other ideas.)
• Start building a set of management strategies for teachers
• Think beyond the current realities of classroom instruction.  Do we need a different concept of what a classroom is?  What does the field of  educational technology need to offer us?  Do we need to "Amazonify" how students access content? 

I look forward to talking with you at the webinar!

Articulating Expectations into a Personalized Learning Environment

I missed my monthly update so I guess I will have to do two in October.  I wanted to talk about some new attributes to my curriculum that have really altered how teachers and students engage in answering the age old question “Where am I?”.  I touched on this idea in July when I discussed "I can" statements.

Once we have the “I can” statements established, they are then used to form a proficiency table.  These table have filled an important void that existed in my previous curriculum.  We have always offered pre and post assessments to teachers.  Ostensibly, the resulting data was to assist teachers in differentiating the curriculum.  However, it quickly became apparent that most teachers did not have a clear view of how to make that happen.  The proficiency tables are a way to fill in that blank.      
Shown below is an example for grade 3 :

LEVEL	DESCRIPTION BASED ON PRE-ASSESSMENT RESULTS	UNIT SPECIFIC STUDENT EXPECTATIONS	SUGGESTED CURRICULAR PATH
4	Pre-assessment data which indicates students master prior knowledge/processes and current content/process (via performance) are level 4.	I can: Use scientific evidence to explain how a design solution reduces the impact of weight from a weather-related hazard such as a blizzard Design and build a structure to withstand the impacts (weight and wind of a hurricane and/or a blizzard.	Students at this level build  their own structure from scratch to withstand an additional weather-related hazard such as wind from a hurricane and/or blizzard.  They are given the parts to build the structure and may also bring parts from home to build the structure within the construction parameters.
3	Pre-assessment data which indicates students master prior knowledge/processes and on grade level content are level 3.	I can: Explain and interpret data presented in a table, graph, or chart Compare weather v. climate Predict weather based on information presented in a graph, table, or chart Evaluate information from print and nonprint resources Describe and explain how climates vary in different regions of the world Use patterns of change in climate to predict typical weather conditions in different regions	Students at this level should be given more time to conduct the investigations.   The teacher should spend less time modeling the investigation.  Students can also be given more time to design, build, and refine their structural designs.
2	Pre-assessment data which indicates students have mastered the prior content but does not demonstrate understanding of on grade level content and processes are a level 2	I can: Use print and nonprint resources Use data presented in a graph, table, or chart Identify and describe types of weather Identify and describe impacts from weather-related hazards Describe ways weather affects our everyday lives Work with other students to conduct an investigation	Students are ready for grade level appropriate content and processes with modifications as needed.
1	Pre-assessment data which indicates students who do not understand the prior content are a level 1.	I can: Not identify types of weather Not understand how weather changes from season to season Not identify weather-related hazards Not identify impacts from weather-related hazards Not understand data presented in graphs, tables, or charts	Students at this level should be given the opportunity to access digital data from the weather unit from kindergarten to build background knowledge about weather, climate, and visual data representations.

As you move from bottom to top, students expertise increases.  Ultimately, students should be ready for level 4 by the end of the unit (transferring learning to a new solving a new problem).  This idea is very new to me and to my teachers. It will take a lot of refinement over the next several years to get this process "perfected".

Here is the new problem that has developed.  While we are finally able to determine student levels of mastery after pre-assessment, the problem is "then what".  

To be specific,  imagine a classroom where you have students spread across all four proficiency levels.  Three students do not have the prior knowledge necessary to engage with the grade level content (Level 1).  There is one student who spent a summer at meteorology camp and is past level four.  Fifteen students are ready for the curriculum as is (level 2) and the remaining nine pretty much know the content (level 3) and just need time to work on their prediction skills.  That's a class of 29 if you are keeping count.  What do multiple needs groups look like in science?  It is very different than reading where we litterally have moving parts.  If we are working towards a personalized learning environment for students, we need to develop strategies for teachers to manage it.  Anyone have ideas or good references for what this might look like in the elementary classroom?

As always,  keep the comments and questions coming.  We are in this together.

  

Coming to a Classroom Near You!

I dropped a surprise on the curriculum teams this summer when I asked them to present an overview of their unit for video.  They turned out so well, that I thought I would share them with you.

Kindergarten Units

First Grade Units

Second Grade Units

So why change to the NGSS?

Long time no blog.  Sorry for the absence.  I've been a little busy with our STEM Fair.  When 2000 people show up to your house, it takes some time to prepare.  I will discuss the STEM Fair in a later posts and what its future MAY holds for us.   The reason I am not talking about it now is, well.  I have to get permission to do what I want to do first.  I'm sure many of you have been following the discussion on the NSTA listserv to teach the "SCIENTIFIC METHOD" or not.  Clearly the NGSS makes it clear that separating practice from content is not the way to go, but then what?  Stay tuned.  

My timidity in discussing it as this point is due to the fact that I have to make sure the principals (all 110) are on board before making the change.  STEM Fair is not small undertaking.  For those of you that have suffered through the science fair process as a teacher and/or parent can appreciate the consternation it can frequently wreak.  So, any change has to be proceeded with a input from all stakeholders.  A lesson I learned the hard way many moons ago.   

The webinar I am doing is to present the transition plan; most of which you have seen here.  It is also to seek input from principals for those things I have not considered.  Undoubtedly, time will come up.  It is as inevitable as death and taxes.  So here is my response at this point.  Expecting to teach science for thirty minutes a day is a waste of time (cue GASP).  If you go back to my blog entry on "Rough Estimates of Unit Length", I have some idea of how long it will take to teach all that is asked in the NGSS.  With these estimates in mind, I went back to our current suggested schedule and did some calculations based on a daily schedule and if the same time was compressed into longer times but less days during the week.  Would I like to have an hour a day?  Yes, but I know the demands of the elementary day do not make it feasible.  Instead of asking for more total time.  I just want the time allotted to be used for efficiently.  

Please do not take these times as suggested instructional blocks, but look at them as another way to think about the daily schedule.   

Please do not take these times as suggested instructional blocks, but look at them as another way to think about the daily schedule. 

With that out of the way,  the next inevitable question is "Why change?"  I won't take credit for this. The idea came up at our latest state meeting.  One of my fellow curriculum supervisors (name omitted to protect the innocent) reminded the assembled that the last standards were written in 1996.  Starting there, she took the principals on a little journey of what has changed since 1996.  I borrowed that idea and created a slide to illustrate some of  the changes.

Just for some context.  Bill Clinton and Al Gore were elected to a second term. The other guy was our superintendent (which is only relevant if you are a local).  The gray scale picture is what NASA thought was evidence of life on Mars.  Coincidentally, the movie "Independence Day" where aliens come and try to take over came out.  Dolly the sheep was cloned.  Mad cow disease flared up in the UK.  The iconic Macintosh "blueberries" started appearing in classrooms.  Digital storage capacity swelled with the 100mb Zip Drive.  The cell phone of the age had to be shown.  Not the brick of "Wall Street", but close.  Lastly, gas prices went climbing past one dollar.  In another coincidence, Toyota brought out the first Prius.  So, why change?  The fact of the mater is science and now engineering are dynamic.  If progress continues, expect another set of standards by 2023.   If, I don't post again, you will know that I did not survive the presentation.      

Using Assessments To Improve Solutions

I just had two great days of professional development on assessment.  Yes, I said assessment.  Our instructor was Jan Chappuis.  The entire focus was how to use assessment in a formative way rather than just assigning a grade.  As a matter of fact, grading was discussed very little.  Jan's view is that formative assessments should not be graded but used by teachers and, more importantly, students to determine where they are in terms of mastery.  It means establishing clear learning targets and providing time for students to reflect on assessment results.  A really good explanation of these ideas can be found in an article from the November 2005 issue of "School Leadership" (link).

So what does this mean for my curriculum.  The diagram below illustrates a rudimentary outline of a unit (click to enlarge).  

  
The first lesson introduces the unit problem.  This previews unit concepts prior to the students taking a pre-assessment.  The idea is to give students a diagnostic way to see what they need to learn in order to create a solution to the problem.  The lesson concludes with students imagining solutions for the next day.

Theoretically, the teacher will receive the pre-assessment information from the assessment system in order to create student work teams.  During the second lesson, these teams share their ideas, create a plan based on these ideas.  The team then builds an its initial solution.    This may take several forms depending on the performance expectations.  As described in the previous post (2017: Innovation Block) that may take the form of an engineering design solution such as a car.

The one thing I really like about building the prototype up front is its immediate capacity for differentiation.  Students that are really good at designing a solution have a much harder road ahead of them in order to improve on their original designs.  The lowest performing students can then have tremendous growth.

 Once the teams develop their first solution, they will get to evaluate it in light of their pre-assessment information.  This reflection on the pre-assessment is really important as it sets up Lessons 3 to (X).  The "X" is an unknown variable depending on the number of lessons in the unit.  Each lesson should be designed to answer the question "How will this help me improve my solution?"  At the end, teams revise their solutions and test a second time.  This constitutes their summative assessment.

A word about the engineering design process.  I'm sure many of you have seen the many variations of the engineering design process which usually take the form of cycle.  I agree that this process can be cyclic, but in the real world a solution is eventually marketed.  I have created a hybrid of several versions (below).

You will note the spur that says "Final Design". Yes, solutions can always be improved, but if that was the case, no technology would ever be sold.  What changed my mind about this was a video I watched several years ago about IDEO and the process they used while redesigning a shopping cart.  They tested several designs but in the end made one final version.  

Winning the Hearts and Minds

Wow!  I should have thought about sending this out to the NSTA community earlier.  Glad to have you on board.   I thought I would talk a little more about my NGSS transition team.  I made mention of them in my previous post.  The team is made up of 30 classroom teachers.  I made that a requirement for service.  Too often, specialists that are not living the day to day implementation of curriculum ultimately dictate what happens in the classroom.  I feel very strongly that that if a curriculum is going to be accepted by teachers, then teachers must be intimately involved in its creation.  I also made sure the teachers that help develop the curriculum are also there when we conduct the professional development.  I'm not in a classroom so I know I do not of a legitimate voice in front of teachers.

Besides being a classroom teacher, I also wanted representation from all areas of our county.  I have to make sure the curriculum speaks to all students and not just to the "Lake Wobegon" region.  This resulted in six teams of five.  One team for each grade level with a teacher from each of the five geographic regions.

The team has been meeting throughout the year and I am constantly amazed by their endurance.  We are dealing with some profound changes in how science will be taught.  Given that much of the change focuses on the "Practices", I opted to spend a lot of time on those (see image below).  I also wanted to make sure the team had a chance to think about how this curriculum would be reflected in our new Learning Management System (LMS).

Our first workshop was on "Argument Based on Evidence".  I was very fortunate to have Carla Zebal-Saul and her team from Penn State come down to work with us.  After reading her book "What's Your Evidence?", I know their CER (Claim-Evidence-Reasoning) framework was what I wanted for every student.  I will expound about this workshop later.

                                                          

The premise for the second workshop really focused on how do we make math a meaningful part of the science curriculum.  What came out of it was a focus on having students apply the math concepts they should be fluent in for a particular grade level according to Common Core.

I am very excited about the upcoming April workshop.  Spatial literacy is something you will hear me rant about if you keep reading this blog.  A lot of current research points to it being a missing link in developing a STEM ready workforce.  This is particularly true in underrepresented populations.

The goal of the June workshop will be to complete Stage 1 and 2 according to Understanding by Design. This means establishing an essential question, enduring understandings, and a performance based assessment  for each unit.  These blueprints will then be turned over to the curriculum development team in July to complete stage 3.

A Five Year Mission

Maryland has established a five year timeline for implementation of the NGSS (below).  In order to make that transition with all the other constraints on what the elementary science curriculum must be, I had to start in October 2013.

I can't speak to the secondary requirements.  I am only concerned with the preK-5 implications.  Notice I said "preK".  Yes, Maryland will have pre-Kindergarten science standards.  These have not been established.  The bottom line  is that I have to have at least six grades of curriculum ready by June 2017 in order to be ready for implementation in Fall 2017.  

How will I do it?  Well, I won't be doing it by myself.  I have assembled an amazing group of teachers to be my NGSS Transition Team. More about them later.  This team is meeting now to build the unit blueprints based on the Understanding by Design framework.  Their job is to build what I refer to as the bookends of a unit.  Once the performance expectations are established,  essential questions, and enduring understandings help frame the big ideas (Stage one).  They will also develop the initial performance based assessments that students will have to complete in order to demonstrate understanding (Stage two).  The rest of my timeline follows a very simple pattern.  

Once the NGSS team completes the blueprints, they hand it off to curriculum writers (which fortunately will be many of the team).  These writers will write the initial unit drafts (Stage Three).  Once these drafts are complete, my two resource teachers and I will add meat to the bones.  This will include the addition and creation of learning objects for our new digital curriculum system.  It will also mean the development and testing of the materials needed to implement the various hands-on experiments students will conduct.  That's right, I get to play with scientific materials in my job.  Envy me.  Once we are satisfied with the unit drafts, we train a small pilot group of teachers.  The goal is 10-15 schools scattered across our county.  These teachers implement the units and report back on what needs to be changed.  We make improvements and deploy to all schools the following year.  The year I am most fearful of is 2016.  I will be refining grades 3-5 and monitoring the pilot for grades K-2.  

So, what is your plan to bring the NGSS to the elementary classroom?

Bee an Engineer: My First NGSS Unit (Part 1)

I lucked out last year during a curriculum revision project.  I  had two units that were up for revision.  One was on botany and the other was on insects.  After looking at the NGSS, the page shown above just sang to me.  The resulting unit combined the concepts of these two units into one and culminated in students designing and building their own hand pollinator.  Th inspiration for the culminating event came from Engineering is Elementary- "The Best of Bugs: Designing Hand Pollinators".

If you notice the asterisks (*) at the end of the second PE, that indicates a connection to the newest content to enter the science classroom-Engineering.  In our current standards, engineering is referenced under the skills and processes.  Under the NGSS it is now a content like Biology or Physics.  The unit is now being implemented by teachers.  Over the next few weeks, I will update you on the progress students and teachers are making.

Topic or Disciplinary Core Ideas (DCI)

Let's start with the basics.  One of the first decisions to be made is what format to use when formulating curriculum.  For me, the choice was pretty obvious.  I liked the topic based format because it integrated the content under big ideas or themes.  I am hesitant to call them themes, however, as I lived through the end of the last time we organized curriculum by theme.  The idea was good but the execution was bad.  The classic example was students would study Egyptian history in Social Studies.  In math, they would study the geometry of the pyramids.  So far, so good.  The idea would go off the rails when the science teacher would study mummification and the students would make mummy models.  Back on topic.  The integration of content is something that has really come about in the last few years.  It is no longer enough to be a biologist.  You need to understand how Biology integrates with Physics as well.  A more extreme example would be a paleontologist that started as an art major.  The ability to see the patterns and make spatial connections is as important as knowing what rock layer and bone is sticking out of the ground.  The only problem I have is figuring out the logic behind the organization of the PE's.  Was there a plan when they were organized this way or was it more like "yeah, that fits." So where do you stand-Topic or DCI?

Creating the Road Less Taken

I am a ruthless pragmatist and have never found utility in developing a blog of my own until now. As a curriculum developer for a large school system, I have the task of moving a large number of schools and teachers into a Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) based curriculum. For those you unfamiliar with them, I would encourage you to take a look at the standards. Now, just so we are all on the same page, that will be the last time I use the word standards. The NGSS are not traditional standards.  They are written as Performance Expectations (PE).  This means this means that rather spelling out exactly what students are supposed to know, they layout how students are supposed to demonstrate they understand a concept through an action otherwise known as a practice.  For example, in Kindergarten one of the PE's is stated as

Analyze data to determine if a design solution works as intended to change the speed or direction of an object with a push or a pull.

So, why the blog?  Well, I'm glad you asked.  I think there is an opportunity to share ideas and ideas are needed.  Who am I looking for?  Well for right now, I just want to gather input from elementary teachers, principals, and elementary students.  As I go along, I will be updating whatever audience develops on my progress to gather feedback and to hopefully share some best management practices.  Who am I not looking for?  I am not looking for people to want to rant and rave about the PE's or my any typos I make herein.  I have no time for it.  

With all that said,  let me know if you are out there and interested in the NGSS.