Standard of Practice # 4: Leadership in Learning Communities
Members promote and participate in the creation of collaborative, safe and supportive learning communities. They recognize their shared responsibilities and their leadership roles in order to facilitate student success. Members maintain and uphold the principles of the ethical standards in these learning communities.
The Literacy and Numeracy Secretariat's "Capacity Building Series" outlines 6 layers of the model Professional Learning Community:
1. Ensuring Learning for All Students
2. Focus on Results
3. Relationships
4. Collaborative Inquiry
5. Leadership
6. Alignment
Ensuring Learning for All Students: Class and Student Profiles
Collaborative, safe and supportive learning communities are created in many ways, one of these being the development of class and student profiles:
Reviewing the the document, Learning for All, and thinking about the importance of creating class and individual profiles, may I suggest two points about why this is an essential practice to be completed at the beginning of the school year and then maintained throughout the year:
Why is the creation of class and individual profiles essential at start and throughout?
1. Differentiation: the clearer your understanding of your students’ needs, the more “flexible, supportive, adjustable, and focused on increasing all students’ access to curriculum” your instruction and assessment can become. Plans would document strategies identified and employed, particularly students who are in need of greater support or in need of greater challenges.
2. Consultation: since some students may benefit from expertise beyond that found immediately in the classroom, in order to best access and inform in-school teams and out-of-school resources, including community agencies, these class and individual profiles act as an important reference for the collaborative review of teaching strategies and interventions. Recommendations can therefor be more informed and therefore more productive.
Focus on Results: Being Mindful of EQAO Testing in the Junior Classroom
An important element of ensuring student success is the support of their understanding of EQAO testing:
1. There are certain advantages to using the information found on the EQAO site and in Understanding Levels of Achievement:
EQAO site:
By accessing past tests for model questions
By sharing videos with parents/students during information sessions
For model answers for use as student exemplars
Remaining up to date with EQAO standards and practices
Teacher Bulletin advertises the call for participation in assessment committees
Shares results summaries and offers strategies for teachers
“6 Questions to Ask When Looking at Your School Results”
Understanding Levels of Achievement
Thorough explanation of scales for reading, writing and mathematics
Support materials suitable for students at various levels
Extensive resource suggestions
Variety of student answers for each level
2. How to assist parents in understanding how their child is being prepared for the EQAO test?
It would be important to inform parents that the literacy program in my class includes preparation for the EQAO but that the test is not the ultimate objective. I would stress that their child’s literacy skills are assessed using multiple strategies, and that the EQAO test is but one of the many.
In the first parent information session of the year I would make a few moments available where I would share the date of the EQAO test and in general terms review the format, the implications, and the other logistics surrounding the test. A page summary in the parent booklet for the grade would be suitable too. I would also direct them to the sub pages of the www.eqao.com website so that they could access the parent’s guide available in 21 languages! It wouldn’t hurt to encourage the school board to share such links more deliberately on their website.
Parent teacher conferences would present an ideal opportunity to demonstrate how their child is being prepared. They would have the chance to review sample practice questions and to receive feedback on the level of reading, writing, and mathematics their child demonstrates in those cases (though I’d be very careful about making predictions).
It would be worth the time and effort, when sharing news items / program updates with parents, either through newsletters or on school web platforms, to make clear the literacy / numeracy connections with the curriculum and how they tie into the EQAO tests.
Members promote and participate in the creation of collaborative, safe and supportive learning communities. They recognize their shared responsibilities and their leadership roles in order to facilitate student success. Members maintain and uphold the principles of the ethical standards in these learning communities.
The Literacy and Numeracy Secretariat's "Capacity Building Series" outlines 6 layers of the model Professional Learning Community:
1. Ensuring Learning for All Students
2. Focus on Results
3. Relationships
4. Collaborative Inquiry
5. Leadership
6. Alignment
Ensuring Learning for All Students: Class and Student Profiles
Collaborative, safe and supportive learning communities are created in many ways, one of these being the development of class and student profiles:Reviewing the the document, Learning for All, and thinking about the importance of creating class and individual profiles, may I suggest two points about why this is an essential practice to be completed at the beginning of the school year and then maintained throughout the year:
Why is the creation of class and individual profiles essential at start and throughout?
1. Differentiation: the clearer your understanding of your students’ needs, the more “flexible, supportive, adjustable, and focused on increasing all students’ access to curriculum” your instruction and assessment can become. Plans would document strategies identified and employed, particularly students who are in need of greater support or in need of greater challenges.
2. Consultation: since some students may benefit from expertise beyond that found immediately in the classroom, in order to best access and inform in-school teams and out-of-school resources, including community agencies, these class and individual profiles act as an important reference for the collaborative review of teaching strategies and interventions. Recommendations can therefor be more informed and therefore more productive.
Focus on Results: Being Mindful of EQAO Testing in the Junior Classroom
An important element of ensuring student success is the support of their understanding of EQAO testing:1. There are certain advantages to using the information found on the EQAO site and in Understanding Levels of Achievement:
EQAO site:
Understanding Levels of Achievement
2. How to assist parents in understanding how their child is being prepared for the EQAO test?
It would be important to inform parents that the literacy program in my class includes preparation for the EQAO but that the test is not the ultimate objective. I would stress that their child’s literacy skills are assessed using multiple strategies, and that the EQAO test is but one of the many.
In the first parent information session of the year I would make a few moments available where I would share the date of the EQAO test and in general terms review the format, the implications, and the other logistics surrounding the test. A page summary in the parent booklet for the grade would be suitable too. I would also direct them to the sub pages of the www.eqao.com website so that they could access the parent’s guide available in 21 languages! It wouldn’t hurt to encourage the school board to share such links more deliberately on their website.
Parent teacher conferences would present an ideal opportunity to demonstrate how their child is being prepared. They would have the chance to review sample practice questions and to receive feedback on the level of reading, writing, and mathematics their child demonstrates in those cases (though I’d be very careful about making predictions).
It would be worth the time and effort, when sharing news items / program updates with parents, either through newsletters or on school web platforms, to make clear the literacy / numeracy connections with the curriculum and how they tie into the EQAO tests.