Instructional Rounds in Education: A Network Approach to Improving Teaching and Learning

1. Instructional Rounds August 2, 2012 “Schools with a high degree of ‘relational trust’ are more likely to make the kind of changes that help raise student achievement. Improvements in such areas as classroom instruction, curriculum, teacher preparation and professional development have little chance of succeeding without improvements in a school’s social climate. (Bryk, A. and Schneider, B., 2002) Educational Leaders 2012 Instructional Rounds in Education: A Network Approach to Improving Teaching and Learning

2. Learning Goals • Understand: Who is here? Why are we here? • Build common language, expectations and norms for conducting Rounds • Become familiar with the steps of Rounds and learning goals behind each step • Understand how the instructional core is the heart of Rounds and of improvement efforts • Develop skills in observing teaching and learning – describe what we see – and debriefing observations 2

3. Learning Goals • Review current practices, plan for future actions • Understand and develop a Theory of Action • Understand and develop a Problem of Practice 3

4. Theory of Action If we as educational leaders create an environment of collaboration among administrators, focused on improving instruction, then shared responsibility and accountability will create support for continuous improvement of learning for ALL students.

5. Introductions: Leaders are Learners Think of three things: Something non-education related that you know lots about Something non-education related that you know little about Something education-related that you would like to learn 5

6. Introduce yourself and discuss Introduce yourself and share one of the three items from above. Introduce your new friend to the group. 6

7. Review Norms What do you want to ask of your colleagues to help you have the best experience possible with this work? What do you want to ask facilitators to help you have the best experience possible with this work? 7

8. Group Norms Covenant

9. Why Rounds? • Build Professional Community • Develop a Common Language for Understanding and Analyzing Instructional Practice • Develop a Culture of Shared Practice • Develop Collective Efficacy Around Improvements in Student Learning • Build Common Understanding of System-, School-Level Improvement Strategies

10. PROFESSIONAL NETWORKS BUILD COMMITMENT AND LATERAL ACCOUNTABILITY

11. Inspired by the medical profession • Based on the model of medical rounds • Good practice is highly contextualized • Education is a “profession in search of a practice”

12. Practice: A definition • A set of protocols and processes for observing, analyzing, discussing and understanding instruction that can be used to improve student learning “at scale”. • The instructional rounds process is an example of a specific practice.

13. Rounds are not: • Walkthroughs • PLCs • Improvement Strategies

14. Key Idea: • Everyone is working on their practice. • Everyone is obliged to be knowledgeable about the common task of instructional improvement. • Everyone's practice should be subject to scrutiny, critiques and improvement.

15. Not Walkthroughs: • Walkthroughs presume we know what we are looking for and will monitor • Walkthroughs do not ask us to reflect on our own practice and to grow • Instructional Rounds are about the leaders growing

16. Not PLC’s: • Rounds can be the vehicle for PLC work

17. Not improvement strategies: • Rounds inform and are informed by improvement strategies • Rounds start with a POP, one that emerges from improvement strategies and ends with ideas for making our improvement strategies more effective • Rounds are a vehicle for improving our strategies and making us more reflective about our work.

18. Medical Rounds

19. Rounds are a special kind of walkthrough, a special kind of PLC and a special kind of improvement strategy integrated into one practice.

20. A Picture of Rounds A four-step process: • Identifying a problem of practice from the theory of action that is guiding our work. • Observing classrooms, as individuals or in small teams, gathering descriptive, non-evaluative evidence. • Debriefing using the ladder of inference • Focusing on the next level of work.

21. Rounds can be understood as a(n)… • Organizational process • Learning process • Culture-building process

22. Questions for Reflection • What are your reactions to the notion that education is a profession in search of a practice? • How would our work differ if we understood our work as practice? • To what extent does our work in this district already embody the notion of professional practice? In what ways is our work lacking in this dimension? • What specific examples from our district’s experience or from your own professional practice illustrate or conflict with any of the issues noted so far?

23. Reality Check… “Each of us has in our minds a map of reality. The problem is that the map is not always indicative of the territory.”

24. True or False? • Cleveland, Ohio is northeast of Tallahassee, Florida. • Toronto, Canada is southeast of Minneapolis, Minnesota. • Los Angeles, California is southeast of Reno, Nevada.

25. Current Practice • What is your current practice for observation? • How do you record and understand what you see? • How do you use that data?

26. Classroom Observation #1 Use your current practice for observations to record what you what you observe in this 6th Grade Science classroom

27. Descriptive vs Evaluative Rounds is like…….

28. Using Descriptive Language Specificity Specific General Judgmental Objectivity Descriptive

29. Evidence: Sticking to the Facts! What do you see? • Just the facts please, Ma’am! She did a great job of transitioning from the whole class lesson to independent work time. 29

30. Just the facts…? • At the end of the lesson, the teacher asked students what materials they needed to get for their upcoming independent work. She took a few responses and released students to go to their desks four at a time.

31. Just the facts…? • During a period of 20 minutes, the teacher asked 1 question. • The teacher used a very interactive teaching style.

32. Developing the Discipline of Seeing • Seeing is a discipline • It’s like a muscle—it gets stronger with repetition • Foundation of our practice: • Specific description • non-evaluative, non-judgmental description 32

33. Classroom Observation #2 This time as you watch the 6th grade science classroom, record your observations focusing on using descriptive feedback vs evaluative feedback.

34. Instructional Rounds Instructional Core Instructional Rounds in Education: A Network Approach to Improving Teaching and Learning Educational Leaders 2012

35. Instructional Core How does the idea of instructional core correspond to your own understanding of how classrooms work? What does it reveal? What does it exclude?

36. Instructional Core • The “Instructional Core” is the interaction of: • Level of content • Teachers’ knowledge and skill • Student engagement CONTENT Task STUDENT TEACHER

37. Instructional Core • Only improvements in the instructional core will actually make a large difference in learning, • Improving one element of the core must lead to improvement in the other two CONTENT Task STUDENT TEACHER

38. Instructional Core • Principle #1: Increases in student learning occur only as a consequence of improvements in the level of content, teachers’ knowledge and skill, and student engagement. • Principle #2: If you change one element of the instructional core, you have to change the other two. • Principle #3: If you can’t see it in the core, it’s not there. • Principle #4: Task predicts performance. • Principle #5: The real accountability system is in the tasks that students are asked to do. • Principle #6: We learn to do the work by doing the work. • Principle #7: Description before analysis, analysis before prediction, prediction before evaluation. CONTENT Task STUDENT TEACHER

39. Instructional Core • Count off to form groups of 3 • Each person reads one of the principals of the Instructional Core (pgs 24 – 34) • Discuss as a group what each of these principals mean to you.

40. Instructional Core • Principle #1: Increases in student learning occur only as a consequence of improvements in the level of content, teachers’ knowledge and skill, and student engagement. • Principle #2: If you change one element of the instructional core, you have to change the other two. • Principle #3: If you can’t see it in the core, it’s not there. • Principle #4: Task predicts performance. • Principle #5: The real accountability system is in the tasks that students are asked to do. • Principle #6: We learn to do the work by doing the work. • Principle #7: Description before analysis, analysis before prediction, prediction before evaluation. CONTENT Task STUDENT TEACHER

41. Instructional Core • The best way to get a glimpse of the instructional core is to look at what the students are doing, not necessarily what the teacher is doing

42. Instructional Core • Feedback and guidance for the teacher should focus on the tasks students complete, with attention to how the three dimensions of the instructional core must be addressed.

43. Instructional Core • Instructional rounds is a practice that can be learned through repetition, reflection, and analysis at progressively higher levels of skill and knowledge. • Rounds is a way of focusing on the instructional core of teachers and students in the presence of content.

44. Instructional Core In your experience, what features of classrooms do practitioners tend to focus on when they observe teaching and learning? How does the framework of the instructional core focus your attention in classroom observation?

45. Instructional Core • School leaders are conditioned to jump from observation immediately to evaluation • Rounds process asks us to break this perpetual habit by using: • Description before analysis • Analysis before prediction • Prediction before evaluation

46. Instructional Rounds Theory of Action Instructional Rounds in Education: A Network Approach to Improving Teaching and Learning Educational Leaders 2012

47. Theories of Action and the Problem of Practice We all have theories of action: • “If…then” formulas that guide our thinking and decision-making in all aspects of life. • Made up of a set of assumptions and action strategies to accomplish a particular purpose. • They are the “story line that makes a vision and a strategy concrete.”

48. An example from everyday life • “If I brush my teeth twice a day, then I won’t get cavities and will keep my teeth for a long time.” • Based on certain assumptions. • Based on past experience. • Formulated using an action strategy.

49. Theories of Practice Most theories of action (sometimes called theories of practice) in the workplace are based on a whole network of assumptions and action strategies much more complex than teeth-brushing.

50. Hidden theories of action • Most of our theories of action are in our subconscious until we start to intentionally name and work with them. • Espoused theories are the theories we claim to use to solve various problems. • Theories in use are the actual theories of action that guide our behavior. • There is often a gap between our espoused theories and theories in use.