Helping Students be Academically Present to Learn in the Era of the Common Core

1. Helping Students be Academically Present to Learn in the Era of the Common Core David Osher, Ph.D.National Association of School Psychologists

2. Outline • The Promise of Education • School Effects • The Implications of the Institute for Medicine Report • Improving Outcomes • The Promise and Challenge of the Common Core • Race, Discipline, and Access to the Common Core • Cleveland as a Proof Point • Measurement & Continuous Improvement • Summary

3. Cutting to the Chase • All students should be on track to thrive. • School Psychologists can help students be “present” as learners. • They can do so by: • Helping students and adults develop the competencies necessary for deeper learning, generalization, and application in new areas • Building conditions for learning and teaching • Working promotively, preventively, as well as interventionists

4. THE PROMISE OF EDUCATION • The dream of education • The U.S. • Finland • Bangladesh • The nightmare • Other People’s Children (Delpit) • Learning to Labor (Willis)

5. Example of What Can Be Done: North Lawndale College Preparatory School, Chicago • “This is not about graduating from high school; it is about graduating from college” • Money for counselors, not metal detectors and security staff • One counselor stays with same students grades 9-13; another one follows up 14-16

6. Example of What Can Be Done: North Lawndale College Preparatory School, Chicago • Strong academic press; strong social support • Supports academic risk taking: “teachers are like another set of parents” • Development of moral community • Fellow students “like brothers, sisters, cousins”

7. The Troubled and/or Troubling Student’s Journey • Poverty & exposure to trauma • Poor Executive Functions • Behavior & mental health problems • Behavior & mental health problems • Lessened opportunity to learn • Lessened opportunity to learn • Poor learning outcomes • Increased behavior & mental health problems • School-driven mobility  segregating placements • Suspension  expulsion/ drop out

8. Juvenile Detentionor Secure Commitment Dropping Out Suspension & Expulsion Adult Prison SCHOOLS SCHOOL-TO-PRISON PIPELINE Jeff Sprague

9. What Role Can School Psychologists Play in Preventing The Pipeline to Prison ?

10. The Troubled School Journey • Poverty, exposure to trauma, disciplinary history, and academic underachievement for many students • Excessive behavior & mental health problems • Excessive behavior & mental health problems • Poor conditions teaching • Reactive behavioral approaches • Poor conditions for learning • Poor conditions for teaching & learning • Poor attendance & learning outcomes • Increased behavior & mental health problems • Low faculty morale, poor staff attendance, staff turn-over • Suspension -> expulsion / drop out

11. The Troubled School’s Journey • Poverty, exposure to trauma, disciplinary history, and academic underachievement for many students • Excessive behavior & mental health problems • Excessive behavior & mental health problems • Poor conditions teaching • Reactive behavioral approaches • Poor conditions for learning

12. What Role Can School Psychologists Play in School Improvement ?

13. The Bigger Context • Disconnects between how we organize education and the needs of students • Lack of high expectations for students of color, English Language Learner , students who struggle with poverty, and students who receive services from Child Welfare, Juvenile Justice, and Mental and Behavioral Health. • Focus on management and risk avoidance • Not on academic and social and emotional learning, well being, and thriving • Failure to address impact of trauma, attachment challenges, and other adversities of poverty • Relationship Challenges • Self-Regulation Challenges

14. The Bigger Context • Disparities • Attainment • Discipline • Access to good things • Teacher quality • Engaging opportunities • Enrichment opportunities

15. The Bigger Context Overarching Issues • Increased exposure to trauma • Hyperstimulation • Reinforcement of short-term rewards • Speeded-up lives and breakdown of adult supervision • Deficit oriented approaches to RTI in many cases Specific Manifestations • Bullying • Disparities that are related to implicit biases • Explosive aggression

16. School Effects

17. Schools as Risk Factors • Alienation • Academic Frustration • Chaotic Transitions • Negative Relationships With Adults And Peers • Teasing, Bullying, Gangs • Poor Adult Role Modeling • Segregation With Antisocial Peers • School-driven and Child Welfare-driven Mobility & • Harsh Discipline, Suspension, Expulsion, Push Out/Drop Out

18. Students who are At Risk are particularly susceptible to: • Low Teacher Efficacy • Low Teacher Support • Negative Peer Relationships • Chaotic Environments • Poor Instructional And Behavioral Practices

19. Schools as Protective Factors that Support Resilience • Connection • Academic Success • Supported Transitions • Positive Relationships With Adults And Peers • Caring Interactions • Social Emotional Learning • Positive Interactions With Pro-social (Not, Anti-social) Peers • Stability • Positive Approaches To Disciplinary Infractions & • Services And Supports

20. Example of What Can Be Done: Teacher Student Connection On Students Identified to Be at Risk • Students who were at-risk and placed in first-grade classrooms offering strong instructional and emotional support had achievement scores and student – teacher relationships commensurate with their low-risk peers (Hamre & Pianta, 2005) • See also work on PATHS and the Good Behavior Game

21. How Can School Psychologists Help Turn the Ship Around

22. The Implications of the Institute for Medicine Report

23. Institute of Medicine Report, Preventing Mental, Emotional, and Behavioral Disorders Among Young People (2009) • Mental Health & Physical Health are Inseparable • Multiple Factors contribute to MEB Disorders which are experienced at some time by 14-20% of young people • Variety of factors increase or decrease risk • Individual Competencies • Family Resources • School Quality • Community Factors • Promotion, Not Just Prevention

24. Shared risk factors for multiple rotten outcomes • Impulsivity • Emotion Dysregulation • The Stress Response • Insecure Relations w/ Parent, Teachers, Peers • Trauma and Adverse Childhood Experiences and Environmental Toxins (which can contribute to) the previous four

25. Schools Can Improve Outcomes by Addressing Common Challenges • Shared risk factors Across Multiple Rotten Outcomes • Impulsive Action • Emotion Dysregulation • Insecure Relations w/ Parent, Teachers, Peers • Effect of maltreatment of quality of relationships • E.g., fear of emotional risk, being failed, • The Stress Response • Maladaptive coping strategies and habits • Impact of The Adversities of Poverty

26. Importance of Promotion, not just prevention for well being and success • Individual Competencies • Self Regulation • Problem Solving Skills • Relationship Skills • Nurturing Environments that Promote Resilience • Healthy relations with peers and adults • Safe, Welcoming, Caring Classrooms/Schools • Connectedness

27. What Schools an Agencies Need to do to promote well being and success Nurturing Environments Social & Emotional competence Limit Opportunities for Problem Behavior Minimize Toxic & Maximize Conditions that Support Resilience Richly Reinforce Prosocial Behaviors Adapted from Tony Biglan

28. Improving Outcomes

29. What Affects Learning Outcomes? Competencies Conditions

30. Page  31 • Conditions for Learning: Key Aspects of School Climate

31. Student engagement Positive attitudes towards learning A sense of belonging toward school Academic motivation Academic achievement (Barber & Oson, 1997; Begin & Begin, 2009; Birch & Ladd, 1997, Christenson & Anderson, 2002; Connell Halpern-Felsher, Clifford, Crichlow, & Usinger, 1995; Hamre & Pianta, 2001; Wentzel, 1997; Wentzel & Wigfield, 1998) Supportive Relationships Between Teachers and Students Promote:

32. Comprehensive Review of “Students Need for Belonging in the School Community (Osterman, Review of Educational Research, 2000) • Positive Relationships With Staff And Peers Associated With: • Intrinsic Motivation • Accept Others Authority While Developing A Strong Sense Of Identity • Experience of Autonomy • Accept Responsibility To Regulate Their Own Emotions • Experience Of Acceptance Associated With: • Positive Orientation To School, Class Work, & Teachers • Dropouts Feel Estranged From Teachers And Peers

33. Connectedness • Adolescent perceptions of connections with teachers predicted academic growth in Mathematics (Gregory & Weinstein, 2004) • Students were more likely to perform well on tests when they believe that their teachers care about them (Muller, 2001; Ryan & Patrick, 2001) • this relationship is stronger for students who are judged to be at risk for dropping out of high school

34. What Happens When You Combine Poor Safety and Poor Instruction • Perception of Safety was the highest correlate of attendance in the Bryk et al. (2010) study of Lessons from Chicago School Reform • “Reinforcing Cycle When Safety and Order Concerns Combine with Deadening Instruction” • “We found virtually no chance of improving student attendance in schools that lacked safety and order and where instruction alignment was weak or predominantly basic-skill oriented.” (p. 104)

35. Why Are Conditions for Learning Important? • Maximizing the amount of time that students really attend to learning • E.g., working memory (Davidson, 2002) • Maximizing the opportunity for the teacher to: • Concentrate and differentiate • Teach in the Zone of Proximal Development (Vygotsky, 1978) • Personalizing instruction • Scaffolding learning and support

36. The Zone of Proximal Development for Learning and Development (frustration) challenge ZPD (boredom) support Adapted from: Nakkula, & Toshalis, 2006

37. The Challenge: Be in the Zone of Proximal Development for Every Child ZPD ZPD ZPD ZPD ZPD ZPD ZPD ZPD ZPD ZPD ZPD ZPD ZPD ZPD ZPD ZPD ZPD ZPD ZPD ZPD

38. Work at Three Levels Intervene Early & Provide Focused Youth Development Activities Implement strategies and provide supports that address risk factors and build protective factors for students at risk for severe academic or behavioral difficulties. Provide Individualized Intensive Supports Provide coordinated, intensive, sustained, culturally competent, individualized, child- and family- driven and focused services and supports that address needs while building assets. Build a Schoolwide Foundation Universal prevention and youth development approaches, caring school climate, positive and proactive approach to discipline, personalized instruction, cultural competence, and strong family involvement.

39. Supporting Conditions for Learning • Connection • Attachment • Trust • Care • Respect Social Emotional Learning & Support Positive Behavioral Approaches & Supports • Learning Supports • Effective Pedagogy • Engagement • Motivation

40. Conditions for Learning & Teaching Matrix for Needs Assessment, Asset Mapping, & Planning Safety Support Challenge SEL All Some Few

41. Safety and Statewide Tests

42. Social and Emotional Conditions for Being Off Track

43. Using Data On School Climate and the Conditions For Learning • School Climate and the Conditions for Learning can be measured • Efficiently • In a psychometrically valid manner • Data from measurements can be used for: • Progress monitoring and continuous improvement, • Leading indicators of school change, • Accountability and public transparency • What is the Role of the School Psychologist Here?

44. What School Psychologists Can Do to Support Effective Social & Emotional Development

45. The Promise and Challenge of the Common Core

46. Progress Towards the Common Core (Porter et al., 2013) • All 47 CCSS-adopting states reported having a formal implementation plan for 
transitioning to the new standards. • Most CCSS-adopting states reported progress in planning since 2011. • As was the case in 2011, states are furthest along in their planning related to aligning teacher professional development to the CCSS. • Since 2011, states have advanced their planning to align instructional materials with 
the CCSS. • Most states have plans in place or in progress for aligning their teacher-evaluation systems to the CCSS • What is missing?

47. Deeper Learning in the Disciplines (NRC, 2011) • The standards documents emphasize some 21st century competencies • A cluster of cognitive competencies – including critical thinking and constructing and evaluating evidence-based arguments – is strongly supported across all three disciplines. • Coverage of competencies in the intrapersonal and interpersonal domains is uneven. • Emerging evidence indicates that cognitive, intrapersonal and interpersonal competencies can be taught and learned in ways that promote effective transfer

48. Deeper Learning: Evidence of Importance Social Emotional Competencies (National Research Council, 2011) • Cognitive competencies show positive correlations (of modest size) with desirable educational, career, and health outcomes. • In the interpersonal and intrapersonal domains, conscientiousness is most highly correlated with desirable outcomes, while anti-social behavior is negatively correlated with them. • Years of schooling strongly predicts adult earnings, perhaps because students develop a mix of cognitive, interpersonal and intrapersonal competencies.

49. Deeper Learning:3 Intertwined Dimensions of Competence • Cognitive: reasoning and memory • Interpersonal: self-management • Interpersonal: expressing ideas and interpreting and responding to others’ messages

50. Deeper Learning:3 Intertwined Dimensions of Competence