Week of 24OCT22

UAI Staff News

Volume X

Issue 9

October 24th, 2022

Today's Post comes from our very own Amanda Etheridge, HS Math Teacher and Action Researcher Extraordinaire!  I've had to edit chunks out to make sure it fits on the blog, but you should definitely read her full article HERE

Who has Power in the Classroom?  At the start of the year, my school changed part of their mission from “empower all students“ to “help all students maximize their power and potential.” ...Power is not something you give to students – it is something they have had all along.

What does this look like in a classroom and how do we even start? .. What are the students doing? How are they interacting with each other and with you? What are you doing? Who is doing the talking, the thinking, and the work?  How does what you [envision actually match ... your classroom today]? How does your classroom reflect your beliefs about power, student learning, and your role as an educator? 

Consider the ... ideas below... some you may already be doing, some may be long-term goals to work towards, and some may seem (or be) insurmountable in your current environment. Let [these ideas] inspire you to think about a manageable next step. Because, just like students, we are always learning and growing one day at a time.

Consider the Space

Is your desk the focal point of the room? Do you find yourself sitting at it often, creating a physical and psychological barrier between you and the students? There’s a growing number of teachers (myself included) who have given up their desks for this reason and in doing so, find themselves having more interactions with students as you sit and move among them more. Are students able to move freely through the space or are there “no go” zones? What does this say about the inherent trust (or lack thereof) we have in our students? Are students able to retrieve materials (extra paper, pencils, necessary manipulatives, their work) on their own or do they have to ask for it? As we increase access to things students need when they need them, we decrease their reliance on us and break down one of the most common power structures in a classroom-that this space is mine and you are merely a student in it...

Consider Student Interactions

Who do students interact with in the classroom?  Do they rely on their peers when they are stuck or immediately turn to you? The more we can encourage students to talk with and depend on one another, the more we break the notion that teachers are the only source of information in the classroom and level the power dynamic between teachers and students...

Liljedahl found that a teacher will answer between 200 and 400 questions in a typical day with almost 90% of them being questions along the lines of “is this right?” This stops student learning and reinforces the belief that only the teacher knows the process and has the right answer. As you’re circulating, take note of who is understanding the concepts and redirect students with those types of questions to them. Strategies and routines... where students are explaining a topic to another and are encouraged to ask clarifying questions, all support the goal of elevating students as holders of knowledge.

Consider Grading Practices

Is student work recognized in a way that celebrates their achievements and highlights the benefits of perseverance? Do our grading practices and our grade books reflect what we say about the importance of mistakes and how they are a learning opportunity or do they unintentionally penalize students and impact them more than a performance task? 

Two popular phrases adorn many classroom walls: “Mistakes are proof that you are learning” and “Mistakes are expected, respected, inspected, and corrected.” However, the way we traditionally grade students runs counter to this idea.  Joe Feldman writes in Grading For Equity “[s]tudents’ mistakes are penalized during the very stage of learning when students should be making mistakes. If mistakes on any work-homework assignments, a test, quizzes, in-class worksheets, discussions-are always penalized with a score that is incorporated into a grade no matter whether those mistakes occur at the beginning, middle, or end of learning, then the message is that mistakes aren’t ever acceptable, much less desired, and they certainly aren’t ever valuable. Students will be discouraged, not encouraged, to take risks and be vulnerable.”

We recognize that mistakes are part of learning, “But this mechanism only works if students trust the teacher enough to reveal mistakes.” This trust, or lack of trust, is built each time a teacher responds to a student’s mistakes, whether positively with care and understanding, or negatively with indifference or judgment....

How and how often are you giving feedback to students? .. Feedback can take many forms-written and spoken, verbal and nonverbal, informal and formal-and building this culture of ongoing feedback builds communication and trust between students and with you. Descriptive feedback helps students identify next steps for learning and continues the learning process. It enables students to make their own choices about what to focus on and puts the onus of improvement back on to them. 

These ideas are only a small piece of the many different ways we can support students in recognizing and maximizing their power. They are not a one-size-fits-all remedy and certainly not the only thing you can do to meet this goal. Some of these practices will take time to implement in a meaningful and impactful way and you will find yourself tweaking them until you find something that works for you and your students-rarely is someone proficient at something the first time they try it. Just like you tell your students that learning is a process and takes time, remember to tell that to yourself.  Letting go of the power we traditionally hold can be incredibly difficult-as we attempt to do so, it can seem like we are losing control over our classroom. Remember that what you are really doing is helping students recognize and use their own power.

Many THANKS to Amanda for sharing her research and insights with all of us!!

Amanda will also be hosting a Thursday PD session on these ideas and helping students learn to value learning over grades.  (It will either be this Thursday or next - still need to confirm with her!)

Important dates. 

• Monday, 31OCT22.  Halloween - Costume Parade

Announcements & To Dos

First Round of Evaluative Observations Begin.  Annie and I will begin our first round of informal observations this week.  Please review Danielson and the UAI Look For Document.  Our goal is to complete the round of informal observations by November 8th.  As a reminder, the observation requirements are:

• Tenured Teachers - minimum of 1 fall informal and 1 spring term informal observations (unscheduled min 15min observation)
• Untenured teachers - minimum of 4 observations (2 in fall and 2 in spring) - 3 informal observations and 1 formal observation (scheduled, full period observation)

All teachers are welcome to ask for more observations - these are just the minimum.

Thanksgiving Charity.  As the festive season is quickly approaching, Aisha, Jen, and Jelissa are again seeking your assistance in putting smiles on the faces of some of our students as we did last year with our food hampers and turkey giveaways.

If you were not part of Team UAI last year, through the contributions of staff and through ground work from Miss Jay and her significant other,  we literally turned our main office into a farmers market. Many of our students were able to walk away with bags of fruits and vegetables and turkeys for Thanksgiving. 

We know that this year things have changed significantly and prices have increased exponentially, nonetheless, we still want to try to gift our students with turkeys again this season.

So again, we seek your assistance in donating whatever you are able to in an effort to assist us in being a blessing to some families this year.

We will accept cash, or you can cash app your donation to $AHuggins4. Of course, we will keep a record of all monies sent and the final figure will be presented to all who donated. A HUGE THANK YOU IN ADVANCE FOR YOUR ASSISTANCE.

Yours in unity:

Miss Aisha

Miss Jen

Miss Jelissa

UAI Instructional Rounds Begin.  This week and next the English and Social Studies teams will embark upon our first rounds of instructional rounds (IR).  IR is a pedagogical practice that school and districts use to elevate the quality of teaching and learning.  Focusing on a problem of practice & theory of action to address that problem, teams of educators make rounds of visits to a variety of classrooms.  Using low-inference observations, the team collaboratively develops an informed understanding of the current state of affairs in the classroom vis a vis the problem of practice, and the team works collaboratively to problem solve and propose next steps to leverage up the quality of teaching & learning.

For this first round, the humanities teams are going into classrooms to investigate how we can better structure lessons, tasks, questioning and assessments to increasingly promote student thinking vs. students doing.  In many classrooms, lesson activities are asking students to complete tasks, and many students are actively completing those tasks. However, the level of intellectual rigor is inconsistent across classrooms.  This was also something that Fred saw in his visit last week.  Working together, we plan to make observations and uncover barriers in planning or teaching that unintentionally inhibit student thinking.  With this new understanding, we will also collaboratively developing strategies to maximize student thinking.

Good Luck IR teams!  We're all looking forward to what you learn and we look forward to you sharing your work so that we may all benefit and collectively leverage up the quality of classroom instruction across UAI!

E-Waste Pick Up.  Before the end of the month, we are removing e-waste from the building.  Do you have e-waste (100% useless tech) in your classroom / office? Do you have something that might be e-waste but you're not sure?  Please set it aside, label it, and then contact Jason (jasonpr@uainstitute.org) in a separate email.  He will retrieve your e-waste and move it to a central location for DIIT.   Please contact me in a separate email and I'll inspect the tech.  If everyone quickly scans their classrooms and offices, we can complete this task before the end of the day on October 25th. Let's work together to reclaim space in the building!

Interim Assessments Continue.  This week we will be starting our MAP Math assessments for students in grades 6-11.   Students who have not yet completed the DRP can continue their work this week, but both MAP Math and DRP must be completed by Friday.

• Week of Oct 24.  The MAP Math test will be launching for grades 6-11.  As with the DRP, students will take this exam during Learning Lab.  Amanda is our testing coordinator for the MAP Math exam and will be reviewing how we will administer the test in Monday 24OCT22's PD.
• Monday Oct 31.  The DESSA is a social-emotional skills inventory that teachers complete about students.  We will use PD time on 31OCT to complete this inventory.  Jen is our testing coordinator for the DESSA and will lead staff through what it is and how to complete it during PD.

<<Repost>> Student Password Reset.  Any UAI staff member can reset a student's email and look up their DOE email account.  With your DOE credentials, you should have access to reset a student's DOE password (you don't need the email - just a student's OSIS - which you can find on their schedule)

1. Go to https://idmapps.nycenet.edu/passwordreset/(Open external link) and sign in with your DOE credentials. If you don’t have access, scroll down to the bottom of the page for instructions.
2. Enter the student’s OSIS ID number.
3. Enter a password for the student.
4. Provide the password to the student. 
5. When you give the password to the student, tell them to sign into the Student Password and Account Management tool(Open external link) and reset their password to something unique (if you gave them a generic password).
6. Once they reset their own password and set up their account, they are all set and can begin accessing DOE digital learning platforms.

Per Session Postings

For ALL per session activities (view all 2022-23 postings here),
please complete Per Session Application For

11OCT22 Posting

UAI After School Supervisor.  This position would be the person supervising UAI after school courses on Wednesday & Thursdays from 3-5PM.  The role would be to manage any communications with home around pick up making sure parents kids who need pick up are picked up, and managing any issues that may arise during after school (mediating any conflicts, assisting teachers with needed resources, monitoring student movement throughout the after school spaces).  This position would operate out of the deans office and would be in charge of managing all UAI after school activities on these two days.  Two positions available for the year.

Per Session Postings Now Closed