What is the VPA?

Throughout the state of Vermont, the Vermont Principal’s Association, commonly referred to as the VPA, is best known for their affiliation with high school athletics. Funds from tournament ticket sales go directly to the association, their banners are posted at every playoff event, and their logo is on each trophy. Most Vermonters are aware of their involvement in athletics, but many are unaware of the educational advocacy and professional support they provide to school administrators on a daily basis.

The current executive director of the VPA is Jay Nichols. Mr. Nichols is a former teacher, coach, principal, and superintendent in the state of Vermont. In his role at the VPA, he serves as a consultant to school leaders on a wide range of issues, as well as a mediator between policy makers and school administrators. On a typical day, Mr. Nichols provides expert professional advice to any VPA member that may reach out. Most VPA members are either principal’s, assistant principal’s, athletic directors, or other school administrators, and they are required to pay yearly dues to receive such support. Whether it’s a problem that relates to students or staff, implementing school change, or consulting a school leader through contract issues, Mr. Nichols at the VPA helps guide members through the appropriate process. Mr. Nichols is also often at the State House where he serves as a representative of the VPA. At House Education Committee meetings and hearings, Mr. Nichols will either provide an individual testimony or a joint testimony in conjunction with the Vermont Superintendents Association and Vermont School Boards Association.

In addition, the VPA also provides an array of professional support to school leaders. The VPA sponsors mentoring programs for young, inexperienced school principals, and offers professional development summits on many educational topics. For this year, the VPA held three separate summits that revolved around building a culture of equity in schools. In order to manage the increase in professional development events that the VPA wishes to promote, they have hired another associate director effective July, 1, 2019. Serving in this role will be Mike McRaith, current principal of Montpelier High School. Mr. McRaith will coordinate most of the professional development and mentoring programs, as well as serve as a liaison between the Waddington Leadership Initiative, a program that sends school leaders to the Centerfor Creative Leadership  in Greensboro, North Carolina, and Vermont school leaders.

Click Here to visit the VPA website.

State House: Capacity of the Vermont Agency of Education Reflection

On February 27th, 2019, I attended a Vermont House Education Committee hearing inside the State House in Montpelier. The topic of this hearing focused on the capacity of the Vermont Agency of Education, and in particular, the low staff numbers they currently have working at the agency. In the moments before the meeting, I had the opportunity to meet and speak briefly with Mr. Dan French, Secretary of Education in the state of Vermont. I asked him what the focus of the hearing would be and wanted to get an idea into what his testimony to the House Education Committee would look like. Mr. French proceeded to explain to me how the agency is seriously understaffed, and raised concerns about not only filling those vacancies, but filling them with adequate people for the job. In addition to the lack of employees, Mr. French also shared his perspective on the workload given to the agency by the House Education committee. As initiative after initiative pile up at the agency, the staff begins to feel overwhelmed and people are asked to do things outside of their role, due to their low numbers. Mr French’s testimony and presentation can be viewed here.

One consideration that I took away from the House Education Committee hearing is the idea of filling vacancies inside the agency appropriately. As act 46 has taken place in Vermont, education leaders have been needed at the district level to properly consolidate schools in order to increase student opportunity and achievement. Due to a variety of factors, effective education leaders in Vermont have chosen not to join the agency or made a decision to leave their position at the agency. The mission of the agency is to provide support to people in the field of education, but the reality is that people feel more impactful and fulfilled in their work when they do so in the field, rather than from a state policy position. Recruiting out-of-state candidates has been just as hard, and the agency has faced similar challenges in recruiting employees that has hindered many other job markets in Vermont. As Mr. French pointed out in his testimony, capacity is directly related to the complexity of the work. Through this experience, I have learned that it is imperative for elected officials to be aware and mindful of the makeup and inner workings of the state agencies that work to implement the policy changes they set forth.

Vermont Principals Association Executive Council Meeting Reflection

Through my internship, I had the opportunity to attend the Vermont Principals Association Executive Council meeting on January 31, 2019, at the Stoweflake Mountain Resort in Stowe, Vermont. At the beginning of the meeting, some members announced they would be stepping down from their position on the executive council, and advised standing members to begin to fill the vacancies they would leave behind. This prompted one member on the executive council to ask the executive director if he could create a Google Map that showed where executive council members were represented in the state of Vermont. As the intern, I proceeded to create the Google Map the following week.

After listening to the conversation about their ideas for prospective members and considering my own reflections, I have two important takeaways in regards to the representation of statewide leadership: demographics and gender. Before the January meeting, the demographic representation on the VPA executive council heavily favored the schools in the southern part of the state, as well as schools in the far northern regions of Vermont. To an outsider, this may sound balanced, but to anyone that is aware of Vermont demographics, they would question the lack of representation from Chittenden and Washington. This was certainly a concern among members, and many requested to search for prospective members from these regions of the state. Chittenden County serves the largest number of public school students in the states, and it would only be appropriate to represent these students, teachers, and administrators as a statewide advocacy association.

Another important factor that executive council members were mindful of was the representation of gender on the council. Prior to the meeting, the VPA executive council was already balanced in the representation of gender, but the executive director stressed that they should keep an equal balance of numbers between male and female. Both a male and a female chose to step down from the executive council, so they plan to fill their positions, in regards to gender, accordingly.

Vermont Superintendent's Association Member Meeting Reflection

Dan French, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Education, spoke to many Vermont Superintendents Thursday January 17, 2019. Mr. French highlighted his perspectives on educational issues that affect communities statewide, and in conclusion, believes that the Vermont education system is overly complex for its size and total number of students. He believes that the complexity of the system interferes with the ability to ensure quality and equity to all students. In addition, he believes the current system is inefficient in addressing a population that is declining and Vermont public school numbers have reduced.

Mr. French proposed the Greatly Simplified School District model, which ultimately would be one school district for the entire state. Other topics were explored, but superintendents were left uneasy and held a passionate conversation around the GSSD model. The purpose of this model is not only designed to simplify the school system in Vermont, but also to “meet unmet needs”. The “unmet needs” that the agency of education highlights in their January report include: encouraging student voice, increasing public engagement in student outcomes, supporting open education and open curriculum processes, and giving schools more resources for communications and outreach.

The report released in January can be read here

Other benefits in regards to positive community engagement can be viewed below

 





I am not entirely sure what the implications would be, but some believe it would create a more organized and coherent allocation of funds towards education, paralleled with funds from Human Services to create a more equitable educational experience for all Vermont students. Act 46, the previous governance reform on education that consolidated schools, has already produced outrage and lawsuits from communities, and many believe this proposal would exponentially increase those concerns.

Same Sun Here Author Visit

Each year, the St. Michael’s College Education department has a common read for everyone throughout the department, and typically invites the author to visit for a talk at the school. This year, we read the epistolary novel Same Sun Here written by Silas House and Neela Vaswani, and had the chance to listen to Neela Vaswani talk about the book in mid-October. At the talk, she discussed the process of writing the book and why she included certain aspects of the plot, but she also mentioned how to teach the book to students and was also open to ideas about other possible ways to teach the book. One aspect of the event that I really appreciated was learning about how she and her co-author wrote the novel, which consisted of sending letters back and forth to each other, without discussing their any of the content in person. The novel itself is written through letters between a young girl from India living in New York City and a young boy from Kentucky, and each of the authors, according to Neela, has a personal connection to each of their characters. Silas House wrote as the young boy from Kentucky named River, and Neela wrote as the girl living in New York City named Meena. As a reader of the book, I really like that they chose to take this genuine approach, and as an educator, I really appreciated the thoughts shared by Neela Vaswani on different ways to teach the book.

Attending this event allowed me to draw connections between the Vermont Educator Performance Criterion and the St. Michael’s College Education department mission statement.  One performance criterion that this event connects to is 10.1: Candidates are prepared to collaborate with learners, families, colleagues, other school professionals, and community members to ensure student learning. At this event, she welcomed new ideas to teaching this book and we also looked at more specific ways to teach the novel in our education classes. We were split up into groups to come up with a learning activity based around this book. My group decided that one engaging and purposeful way to examine this book would be to stage a debate around mountaintop removal, which is something River, as a character, struggles with in his hometown in Kentucky. This Performance Criterion is also connected to this event because, in my opinion, one of the most influential demonstrations of learning and growth from a student is through student activism, which was also a topic discussed at the author’s talk. River portrays an example of a student activist in the book by standing up to the governor at the State House fighting for tougher environmental regulations to protect the beauty of his hometown, and Neela touched upon how this book could inspire students in our classrooms to become activists in their own communities. One way we as educators could facilitate this type of student activism would be to allow for a opportunity for students to perhaps write to a local official, or even a state congress or senate official. This aspect of education connects to the St. Michael’s College Education Department mission statement, which states “Our graduates are change agents committed to social justice and sustainability”.

After the event, there were two main themes that stood out to me which I will take away with me as a future educator. These two themes were the importance and value of interdisciplinary learning and the collaborative process it took to compose the novel they wanted. After reading and analyzing the novel Same Sun Here it is apparent to anyone in the field of education that this book could be used to teach from multiple different perspectives, and from multiple content areas, as well. I think novel’s like these are serve students well because this type of book doesn’t compartmentalize valuable learning concepts. One could look at many different factors, from friendship building, to mountaintop removal, to fixed housing prices. Studying a book like this in a class does not put student thinking in a box, but rather would assist in sparking young student’s imagination due to all of the different angles an educator could take while teaching a book like this.

The second takeaway from this event that I value as an educator was gaining insight on the collaborative process the two authors went through to produce a genuine novel of letters.  The two authors knew each other quite well before beginning the novel, so they knew if they wanted to create the book they both had envisioned, it had to be done by actually sending each other letters and really pretending to be their characters. I may not be a co-author of a book anytime soon, but I do plan on collaborating with colleagues inside of my content area and outside of my content area with other teachers and school professionals to ensure student learning and growth. One key point she had for working in a pair like this was that she had to respect his ideas (and vice-versa), even when the book was not going in the direction one of them may have wished. This makes me think, as a future educator, how important it is to always add your opinion, but most importantly, how important it is for you to listen to other’s opinions and try to make compromises when differences arise.

Back-to-Back Mini-Lessons

This past week in my Literacy/Curriculum education courses, we conducted back-to-back 20 mini lessons for our chosen unit for the semester, with one lesson being taught on Tuesday and the other part being taught on Thursday during class time. For this lesson, I chose to teach a lesson on the different advantage factors between the North and the South at the very beginning of the war. Linked below is a Google folder that contains all of the parts to my unit, including this particular lesson plan and materials (Nearpod presentation, graphic organizer, kahoot formative assessment, a creative writing formative task).

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1jUpsNGq8jOhIErEGvz0M0_-zBqCuFw3w

Standards addressed in Lesson:

D2.His.14.6-8:  Explain multiple causes and effects of events and developments in the past.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.6-8.4:
Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text, including vocabulary specific to domains related to history/social studies.

To begin the lesson on the first day, I presented a Nearpod slideshow that focused on four influential factors that would eventually lead and determine the outcome of the Civil War. These four factors included Population, Military leadership, differing economies, and their respective infrastructures at the time. The slideshow, as well as the accompanying graphic organizer students that was handed to fill out during the presentation, were both formated in a clear compare and contrast manner between the North and the South. At the end of the slideshow, the students gathered into a group to compare each other’s graphic organizer notes, as well as creating a group Venn-diagram comparing and contrasting the difference in factors. My reasoning for doing this was because my accomodation focus for this lesson was to assist students with note-taking anxiety. Students were able to listen and gather their own notes, had an opportunity to convene with fellow classmates to write down anything they may have missed, and created a Venn-diagram to discuss, recap, and confirm the newly presented material.

To begin the lesson on the second day, I conducted a four question formative Kahoot assessment that had a question on each of the four factors we discussed on Tuesday. Students demonstrated their understanding of the content in both the graphic organizers and kahoot assessment to a point where I felt it was appropriate to begin to apply the knowledge to writing. Students were then prompted to complete the creative writing task, where they essentially summarized the difference in factors at the beginning of the war, as well as taking on a perspective from either the North or the South. The final summative performance assessment task for this unit is a creative writing assignment, so my reason for completing this creative writing task was to begin to creative writing, which entails taking on a role, writing to a specific audience, and using a tone separate from the student’s usual writing tone. Through employing this write-to-learn activity, I felt the students were much more engaged and were able to demonstrate a deeper understanding of the content. I could have asked students to just write a summary, but allowing students to take on a perspective from the North or the South and having them defend which side holds the superior difference at the onset of the war created a much more memorable and effective learning experience. This activity also created an opportunity for students to demonstrate learning for the standards I chose to address in this lesson. Students were able to effectively explain the difference in factors between the two sides, as well as demonstrating their understanding of unit vocabulary. This lesson would probably take place after an extensive vocabulary lesson, so this was also used as an opportunity to become more familiar with Civil War related vocabulary and big ideas.

The three Performance Criterion I was looking to address through planning and administering this lesson are:

Performance Criterion 3.1: Candidates design learning environments that support individual learning marked by active engagement.

Performance Criterion 5.2: Candidates integrate cross-disciplinary skills (such as critical thinking, creativity, and collaborative problem solving) to help learners demonstrate their learning in unique ways.

Performance Criterion 6.1: Candidates implement multiple methods of assessment to monitor learner progress to  inform instructional practice.

Performance Criterion 3.1 was addressed through providing a graphic organizer to students as they followed along to the Nearpod slideshow. This gave students an opportunity to take clearly formatted notes that assists their understanding of the comparisons and contrasts between the North and the South. Students also had an opportunity to work in a group to go over any content they may have missed and constructed a Venn-diagram for evidence. My focus for doing this was based off of the Gradual Release of Responsibility Model (I do, we do, you do). The ‘I Do’ would be the nearpod presentation, the ‘We do’ would be the graphic organizer and Venn-diagram, and the ‘You Do’ being the kahoot assessment and creative writing task on the second day.

Performance Criterion 5.2 was addressed through administering the creative writing task, which gave students an opportunity to practice their creative writing skills, and writing skills in general. Students were using the writing strategy RAFT to construct their responses. In retrospect, I wish I could have provided time to go over RAFT and conduct a pre-writing activity to get students cognitively thinking about what RAFT means and how they could apply it their creative writing throughout the unit.

Performance Criterion 6.1 was addressed through students being assessed on the content multiple times in multiple ways over the course of the lesson. Students were assessed on the first day by turning in their graphic organizer and group constructed Venn-Diagram. On the second day, they completed both a selected response (Kahoot)  and an essay (creative writing task) assessment.

In teaching these two mini-lessons back-to-back, I learned a lot about lesson planning and execution. One aspect of lesson planning and teaching that I have noticed to be crucial is connecting every learning activity to the standards I am addressing, as well as making the desired standards and focusing questions transparent with the students. On the first day of the lesson, I never communicated with the students what the focusing questions for the lesson were and never introduced them to the standards we are trying to address. I made sure to begin my second lesson period by telling the students what the focusing questions were for the lesson, and felt as if students were able to begin class with a better focus of what is being taught and what they are about to do/learn. I also realize that in failing to be transparent with my students about the desired learning outcomes, I am not  aligned with my Accomodation goals for this particular lesson. As I continue to construct lesson plans for this unit, I will continue to think about and create specific learning opportunities that adequately addresses the standards I am wishing to meet with my students. Another focus I will have moving forward in every lesson that I design and implement in my classes is to be clear with my students on the focusing questions for that particular lesson. This will keep students focused on the expected learning outcomes, and it only takes about 1 minute of time do at the beginning of each lesson.

Gradual Release of Responsibility Model

Vocabulary Lesson for Unit Reflection

In my Literacy in a Middle/High School course, we prepared a 15 minute vocabulary lesson based off of our chosen units to teach for the duration of the semester. The unit I have chosen to teach is a US Civil War and Reconstruction Era unit, and for the vocabulary lesson, I chose to examine the terms ‘scalawags’ and ‘carpetbaggers’, in context with the Reconstruction era. To teach these terms, I began the lesson with a nearpod slide asking my classmates, in general, if they have ever heard of either of the words before. After responses came in, we looked at a reading from history.com titled “What are the difference between a carpetbagger and a scalawag?”. My classmates took turns reading passages aloud from the article. We then briefly discussed the terms, basically creating a solid definition and differentiation with the two words. I then passed out a song from 1868 written by T.E. Garrett called “The Carpetbagger Song”. We first looked at the cover page of the song as a class to see if the drawing conveyed a meaning of the term carpetbagger. After a quick discussion, I had planned on simply reading over the lyrics to the song, but one of my classmates was quick to volunteer to sing along to the song. Following the song, I asked a few discussion questions about the song to my classmates. To finish the lesson and to check for understanding, I asked my classmates to answer a nearpod slide asking them to write down one similarity and one difference between a carpetbagger and a scalawag in the Reconsturction Era. My lesson plan to this vocabulary unit is linked below.

Lesson Plan for Vocabulary Unit

https://docs.google.com/document/d/11hFd-HtCiCGsRP4ELHuUK0MpHPc6kBsA5HT6E0LNTT0/edit?usp=sharing

In my view, this vocabulary lesson adequately addressed Performance Criterion 5.1: Engage Learners and 5.2: Integrate Cross-Disciplinary Skills. To engage my classmates in the vocabulary lesson, I presented them with two sources, one primary and one secondary. I felt as if it was appropriate to review the secondary source first in order to ground a basic understanding of the two terms.  To present the primary source, I printed out two copies of the lyrics, with one copy being the original lyrics written in music format, as well as an easier copy to read of the lyrics in case they were unfamiliar with reading music. Through analyzing the song, the students were able to gain context for the vocabulary words by examining both the cover page and the meaning of the lyrics. As I mentioned previously, I had originally planned to simply review the lyrics, but one of my classmates asked to attempt to sing along, so this shows me that my classmates were engaged and appearing to have fun with the vocabulary lesson.  I also feel as if this is cross-disciplinary with Language Arts because throughout the lesson, students were given two types of texts differing in styles and asked to read them aloud to the class. Throughout the lesson, my classmates were gaining an understanding through examining texts and class discussions.

The first reason I chose these two words to explore more in depth is because both of these terms arose out of differing perspectives between Southern democrats and those who supported the Reconstruction efforts. I feel as if it is important for students to understand why and how negative terms and labels for groups of people come about, and why Southern democrats may have felt negatively towards Northerners coming to the South and Southerners siding with the Union. I also felt like it was important to discuss and learn these terms because throughout history, and in general, carpetbagger carries a general meaning and it is important to discuss the context of the word as it pertains to this era of history. Another reason why I feel it is important to cover these terms for my unit is because the final performance assessment is individual profile project where students will in depthly research an individual from the US Civil War and Reconstruction Era and they will be writing their ‘mock diary’. Some students in the class may be interested in doing their project on an individual who was influential in the Reconstruction efforts, so it will be important for these students to realize there was a difference of opinion among Reconstruction efforts in the South and the negatives labels these individuals had due to a difference of opinion and perspective.

From this vocabulary assignment, I have gained insight about the progress I am making with my presence and pose while teaching, as well as continuing to learn about how to teach vocabulary within my content area. In regards to my teacher presence in front of a classroom, I have been focusing on enunciating my words better and not trying to rush my thoughts to the students. After reviewing my recording, I do feel as if I am improving on making my voice more clear for students to understand and did not seem to find any place where I felt rushed. One area that I do still need to improve on is being more prepared on what discussion questions I should ask when I turn to the students for answers. In this video, I believe I ask relevant discussion questions to the readings we reviewed, but do not feel that these questions provided the understanding I had originally intended for. Moving forward, this forces me to think about how important it is for myself as the teacher to plan backwards, starting with what I want students to know and understand at the end of the lesson, and planning more concise discussion questions around those concepts. Although I do wish I had worded and guided our discussion a little differently, I still do feel as if my classmates learned the vocabulary words because they all provided sensible answers to the formative assessment at the end of the lesson. Teaching vocabulary in history or social studies is unique because each area of study and each era within that area of study has vocabulary that is particularly relevant to that moment, and understanding the vocabulary is part of understanding the historical big ideas. Through this vocabulary lesson, I learned it was effective to find analyze a primary source because it creates an engaging and hopefully memorable experience for the student. If they can remember a few words to the song or have an image of the cover page in their head, they will always remember these two terms while continuing their work in the unit. In regards to teaching vocabulary in the future, I hope to provide more unique and engaging formative assessments to check for learning. In my last few teaching episodes, I feel as if I am only providing Nearpod formative assessments, so I hope to look into other ways to formatively check for understanding of ideas, and in particular to literacy, vocabulary.