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Extra-Curricular Efforts from PDS Educators The Curriculum Redesign team has come a long way since last school year. Since then, new University and K-12 school partners have joined the team to support the delivery of innovative changes in teacher preparation. College of Education departments continue drafting and implementing comprehensive curriculum designs including more field experiences for students and more professional training for educators. The new school year began after a productive summer building out training opportunities for teachers and students working with the Teacher Performance Assessment (TPA). As the year continued, educators from all venues and disciplines kicked off a year of collaboration in the newly-formed Professional Learning Teams, which operate to identify and apply best practices while building support structures for their effective use in the classroom. New Curriculum Last spring, we covered Secondary collaborations between faculty and school partners. This fall, we feature the Elementary and Early Childhood (EEC) department as they began implementing broad curriculum changes, creating more field experiences and new learning opportunities. By scaling down credit requirements and consolidating course offerings, the department added a third block of field experiences and broadened the scope of the teaching license. The third block offers experiences working with special populations in the schools, and new teaching methods began in the schools themselves. Dr. Karl Matz took his first class of students into the schools to deliver on-site instruction immediately following the students’ field experiences. These students were in a pre-block Introductory course, which involved 5 half-day observations over 5 weeks. One section met at Rosa Parks Elementary on Tuesday mornings, while the other section visited Monroe Elementary on Tuesday afternoons. One of the students, Matt Bristow, commented on the benefit of addressing “ The PDS transition has been beautiful, the TOSA’s have been fabulous, and the partnership is only getting stronger and better. We just have to have them involved, said Peg Ballard. relevant issues from the observation right away with Dr. Matz, who has the wisdom of experience. Heather Johnson enjoyed the combined perspectives of the whole group, which could help fill in any gaps of experience in her own observation. Mari Hutchinson and Lindsey Johnston-Waddick agreed and added that the option to reflect on experiences still fresh in the mind kept them from forgetting anything important. EEC faculty member Peg Ballard attributes the strength of the PDS partnerships already in place to the success of implementation efforts. As students encounter more intensive coursework framed by more experiences with the new Teacher Performance Assessment and Charlotte Danielson’s Framework for Teaching, PDS Teachers-On-Special-Assignment gauge their impact in the schools and meet regularly with department faculty to discuss relevant issues and adapt delivery methods. “The PDS transition has been beautiful, the TOSA’s have been fabulous, and the partnership is only getting stronger and better. We just have to have them involved,” said Ballard. To learn more about the EEC curriculum, visit their webpage on the Minnesota State University, Mankato, website at ed.mnsu.edu/eec/ Collaborative Support To augment the force of initiatives catalyzed by NExT project funding, the Curriculum Redesign team found additional funding for Academic Redesign to fully support the efficacy of forces like the new Teacher Performance Assessment (TPA). As of this school year, all teacher candidates will complete all parts of the assessment, and University faculty, along with K-12 school partners, will support candidates’ understanding of the assessment and its implications for effective teaching practices. 14 http://ed.mnsu.edu/csup/ ”
After the last full school year of collaboration, the Redesign team foresaw a need to make the assessment accessible to all its users, that this would ensure timely collaboration and a full understanding of the requirements as they relate to practice. So this summer 18 teacher education faculty and K-12 school educators developed an online module complete with multimedia resources, documents, and tools. “The goal is to make expectations for the TPA clear throughout coursework and in our teaching,” says Kitty Foord of the K-12/ Secondary Programs department. Five teams covered the initial four tasks of the assessment with a team “ overseeing the technology use. Each team gathered a mix of materials to address the objectives, measures, evaluations, and resources for each task, including sample videos and student work in specific applications. Additional resource files were added for technology and literacy issues. Now, both teachers and students include resources from their current curriculum in Winter 2012 Partnership the module. This is gradually building learning communities particular to districts and school buildings, which in turn affects faculty instruction with the assessment and opportunities for more development. Meanwhile, four Professional Learning Teams use the module as a base from which educators extend applications to their practices that arise in their discussions of the assessment, and the meetings provide a forum for reporting the results. Learning Teams As new curricula emerge and morph with current practice, educators from across institutions accepted a call for collaboration in creating common, effective teaching practices. Over 30 teaching faculty and K12 teachers began meeting regularly this fall to build knowledge and practice with topics they collectively identified last fall in surveys and focus groups as important to their schools and classrooms. Seven teams cover areas such as the TPA, differentiation, and co-teaching this fall, and expect to add more learning teams reviewing mental health and/or technology in spring 2012. We’re learning to use differentiation as a tool, not merely as a generalized concept, because the bottom line is what’s useful for us in the classroom, said Jeff Pribyl. ” Curriculum Area Lead, Kitty Foord, commented, “We can’t transform practice, or integrate theory or ideas or learning, without ongoing, job-embedded development to support it.” Some groups meet face-to-face, which in many cases means transportation to and from common destinations, while others meet in online forums at least four times over the semester. Jeff Pribyl, a Chemistry content area professor, meets with two elementary educators from Le Sueur-Henderson and Assistant Director of the Office of Field & International Experience, Laura Bemel, to discuss differentiation strategies. “We’re learning to use differentiation as a tool, not merely as a generalized concept, because the bottom line is what’s useful for us in the classroom,” Pribyl said. The Learning Teams are based on K-12 Professional Learning Community empirical research, which focuses on ongoing development, diverse membership, fostering collaborative relationships, and meeting diverse needs. Pribyl added, “To be able to use or know the material, we must talk to people who are using it regularly.” He said it’s more effective when each of them think specifically about instructional techniques they use in their own courses. The team found a common resource in a book called The Differentiated Classroom, and members alternate teaching each other about the material through the lens of their own practices, which can come through life experiences as well as classroom environments. The development of these resources and practical strategies will inform the practice of future teachers and education faculty, so a common language and understanding surrounds the flux of its practice. In an agile response to this flux, the Learning Teams’ success depended partly on the participants’ ability to extend learning into increased collaborations in their respective environments. Educators from the College of Education and related content areas mixed with K-12 educators from Mankato, St. Peter, Le Sueur-Henderson, and Sibley East school districts. If you’re curious about participating in upcoming Learning Teams or would like to catch up on the learning and products that have come out of current teams, talk to your PDS colleagues. They could be TOSA’s, administrators, teachers, or professors, and they’re willing to share. 15
Page 1 and 2: artnership PCENTER FOR SCHOOL-UNIVE
Page 3 and 4: TABLE OF CONTENTS Winter 2012 Partn
Page 5 and 6: Note From the Editor Ben Pendarvis
Page 7 and 8: Heather Verstraete, Bloomington TOS
Page 9 and 10: of the Leadership Institute, which
Page 11 and 12: How has AVID impacted your school,
Page 13 and 14: ng Deeper and Wider Pipeline #2 - P
Page 15: QUT students and exchange program f
Page 19 and 20: Marti Sievek can speak to the posit
Page 21 and 22: 7th Annual Fall Play Therapy Confer
Page 23 and 24: Innovative Program Targets Coaching
Page 25 and 26: if a student can make one strong co
Page 27 and 28: Teaching Fellows ? ? Describe your
Page 29 and 30: Jenna Haala Graduate Program: Maste
Page 31 and 32: New Systems for Working Together Th

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