Instructional Services

Staff Development

Mrs. Stacy Ward, Coordinator
Phone: (518) 736-4360
FAX:     (518) 736-4361
E-mail:  sward@hfmboces.org

A variety of workshops are offered throughout the year to keep component school staff members up to date in their instructional approaches and ultimately to improve the quality of education for students. Click here to learn more about our staff development program.

The cost of programs, both registration fees and substitute expenses, is aidable to HFM BOCES component school districts. Non-component school district personnel may attend any staff development program at an additonal 20 percent of the stated cost.
 

What should teachers expect to learn from professional development programs?

Ask James Stigler - a noted researcher in professional development for teachers - and he'll tell you there are three key elements that teachers should be obtaining from professional development programs:

• How to analyze practice, both their own and other teachers', so they can recognize the cause-and-effect relationship between teaching and learning;

• Exposure to alternatives, which can be difficult because in the United States there is less variation in teaching practices than one might think; and

• The experience and judgment skills to know when to employ which method.

Teachers also need to focus more on collaboration with one another, Mr. Stigler said in an interview published in the March 2002 issue of Educational Leadership published by the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
 

How kids learn best...
Research sheds light on effective teaching strategies

Approaches should change as students mature

Teaching strategies used in high school classrooms often receive "far less scrutiny than the acne creams kids are using," says Robert Slavin, a professor at John Hopkins University and founder of the Success for All blueprint for school reform.

The federal No Child Left Behind Act cites the term "scientifically based research" no fewer than 110 times, Slavin told attendees of an in-service conference sponsored by New York State United Teachers in Albany recently.

Clearly, it is the government's directive to encourage best practice in the classroom. And yet, NCLB funding can be allocated to programs based on "good practice," even though those programs may not have been rigorously evaluated, he said.

While more research is still needed, Slavin said there is a growing body of work that can offer educators a roadmap to improved student performance. He said quality research occurs when "someone has compared (a) strategy to control groups" to assess its effectiveness.

What works in early grades:

• Pre-K education shows promise for improving student achievement for the short term.

• Teaching phonemic awareness (the ability to discriminate and hear sounds within words) should be part of the pre-K emphasis on oral language.

• Full-day kindergarten. Slavin said that policy-makers have been slow to embrace the need for both full-day kindergarten and pre-kindergarten for all children.

• Systematic phonics in elementary grades.

Research supports "teaching kids to unlock the code, as well as using decodable text with a high proportion of words that kids can decode," Slavin said. However, this needs to be done in meaningful context, striking a balance between decoding and rich content.

What works in elementary and beyond

• Teaching vocabulary through exposure to art, music, science and other disciplines rich in their own specialized vocabulary.

• Teaching reading comprehension including asking students to stop and assess their own reading at the end of each page. Students should also routinely summarize what they have read and use graphic organizers to represent text.

• Grouping students in reading and math across grade lines. This approach - known as the Joplin plan - has been extensively researched since its inception in 1954. Avoiding the pitfalls of tracking, this approach reshuffles groups every six to eight weeks to allow students to keep making progress.

• Cooperative, small-group learning works well when all members of the group are expected to master the material. It is also effective for boosting writing skills, when students "review each other's work in light of high standards."

• Teaching study skills pays off - and can help many kids become great students. Copious highlighting is ineffective, Slavin said, while passive reading can be more effective if students then transform what they've read by restating it.

What works in middle school

• Personalizing the experience is crucial. Students need to create connections with caring adults. Mentoring or offering double-periods of a class can help. "Otherwise, kids who were pretty good kids in elementary school can crash and burn in secondary," he said. What works in high school

• Career connections. Connecting kids to their future through career/academic programs leads to improved behavior and attendance.

• "Nag and nurture" programs can effectively motivate students who do OK in high school but might not otherwise go on to college.

• At-risk high school students who tutor younger students are less likely to drop-out. "They see themselves in a positive light," Slavin said, by gaining a high-status role. Other classroom management practices

• Pace lessons to maintain momentum, which doesn't mean you teach faster, Slavin said. Proper pacing keeps kids on task and keeps behavioral disruptions to a minimum.

• Frequent student assessment. "Those who do more frequent assessment and provide more feedback are getting better results across a variety of subjects and grades," Slavin said. Students of all ages need to be learning vocabulary... by exposing them to art, music, science and other disciplines.

(Information for this article was excerpted from the 6/4/03 issue of New York Teacher.)
 

[top of page]