ALWAYS FREE

COHORT CORNER
D.C. REGION PILOT COHORT / SEPTEMBER 29, 2011
For those of you who have administered diagnostics/ assessments please be sure to send the results my way! By doing so, I can be looped in about where your kids are and we can use the data to inform next steps in our work together. Many thanks in advance to those who have already sent those results in!

Issue # 4

Action Items
PLEASE SEND YOUR TRACKING/DIAGNOSTIC DATA

Announcements
















EXCELLENT SCHOOL VISITS IN NY What: Our cohort will be visiting K-12 classrooms at Achievement First schools as well as The Brooklyn Latin School When: Departing from DC early Thursday evening, October
20th, observing schools on Friday, October 21st, and then returning the evening of Friday, October 21st. Where: Brooklyn, NY Next Steps:Youll have an opportunity to RSVP for the trip in a survey that Ill send next week! UPCOMING PDS What: Stay tuned for logistical updates in TAL mail!
When: 10am-4pm on Saturday, October 15th (During the 3-4pm, 2010 CMs will be asked to attend an Alumni session which will focus on opportunities for soon-to-be alumni!

Making Yourself Unnecessary

math classroom, I watched as students broke out into small groups and executed mini-lessons to reteach their peers unmastered topics. And earlier this week, a high school science teacher asked a student to lead an entire lesson. While she sat in the back grading papers, this student skillfully led the class through a review of the prior nights physics assignment, facilitated an interactive stations exercise, and circulated through the room asking pointed checks for understanding that pushed other students thinking. As you take steps toward cultivating a student-centered classroom, it might be helpful to ask yourself: what am I doing now that I could delegate to my students? Ask kids to lead routines, assign class jobs, ask them to help you plan and facilitate review lessons or walk through their answers to tough questions, empower students to generate and defend their ideas, and ask them for feedback on how you can make your class and instruction better. The more unnecessary we make ourselves, the more empowered and inspired our kids will be.

Resource Spotlight

During these past few weeks, my conversations with many of you have reminded me of that quote by Thomas Carruthers: A teacher is one who makes himself progressively unnecessary. Although this point may seem obvious on one hand, its really counterintuitive and even scary on another. Teachers who choose to pass the reins over to students must take a leap of faith, and releasing responsibility to students means accepting the risk of losing control. In spite of these risks, many of you have realized that NEW TFANET VIDEOS setting your students on a path Check out how a high school teacher successfully toward long-term success means cultivates a growth mindset in students, learn how an AP preparing them for the chemistry teacher prepares her students to reach opportunities and challenges ambitious goals with Sunday tutoring sessions, and see how a 2009 CM uses an interactive Tree of Knowledge theyll face during this school year tracking system to invest her students in
their math and and beyond. One way you can literacy goals accomplish this is by empowering STUDENT TRACKING them to be leaders in your Interested in investing students by helping them track classroom. For example, one social their progress towards mastery over time? Check out the studies teacher recently decided cool visual tracker Jordan came up with! to facilitate student-led seminar TEACHING CHANNEL VIDEO LIBRARY Check out this excellent video library of veteran teachers discussions in which she played the from all contexts implementing concrete strategies. A few role of a spectator while her scholars respectfully pushed each of my recent favorites include a video on teaching kids persistence through
student-centered problem solving others thinking through their use and helping to build a culture in which its OK to make of accountable talk. On Tuesday, I mistakes
watched as a Spanish teacher ACHIEVEMENT NETWORKS VIDEO LIBRARY empowered her students to lead Check out Achievement Firsts full video library of various procedures and routines professional development clips and learn from some master teachers at work.You can access the library at this that tested their peers knowledge. In a PG middle school link and by inputting the login
afvideos and password
respect.

Team Shout Outs

Anamika Dwivedi for rocking THREE preps at her new school while constantly trying to ensure that her students have the most engaging yet rigorous work.--Eliza Varner Cendahl Cornelio-Alter: for quickly implementing feedback which led to dramatic changes in student engagement and for receiving a shout out from her GMU internship advisor for her lesson planning awesomeness!-Joaquin Josh Gillerman: for working his magic in a self-contained classroom. Those kiddos are VERY lucky to have you!--Cendahl CornelioAlter Campbell Glenn: for being the master of PBIS at Ernest Everett Just Middle School!-Megan Gilbert CJ Libassi: for helping me brainstorm a creative way to engage my students in data tables. He told me about radiolabs and suggested that I introduce students to data tables by using tic-tac-toe.--Anamika Dwivedi Meredith Ackerman: for building such a strong relationship with a really challenging student. After a few weeks of conversation and appeals to his better self, she had him dancing at the front of the room in a sombrero!--Joaquin Debbie Sim: for letting me bounce ideas off of her every day. Lunch wouldnt be the same without you!!--Jordan Bock Lauren Delaloye: for inspiring a student to believe in themselves, value the challenge that comes with encountering an advanced placement course, and inspire perseverance and grit. Check out the inspiring exit ticket note the student recorded after a lesson she led on overcoming and embracing challenges! --Joaquin Josh Gillerman: for using precise positive narration and teachable moments to highlight and reinforce a culture of teamwork in his classroom. I was impressed to see so many of his students helping each other and urging their classmates to work together as a team!--Joaquin Gillon Crichton: for sharing an awesome Assertive Discipline quick guide for CMs, which outlines Lee Canters advice on how to effectively manage classrooms. I also loved his student-friendly Ecology Unit plan, which kids keep at the front of their binders to keep track of deadlines and the content that is covered each day.--Joaquin Alex Krupp: for having super ambitious and inspiring post-TFA plans and getting me thinking

about what I can do in the future!--Julia Sadowsky Megan Gilbert: for facilitating some really inspiring 1:1 vision lunch conversations with her K students! This strategy has been so effective at helping her build relationships with her students and investing them in their short and long-term goals.--Joaquin Anne Marie Norgren: for being the most positive person ever and checking in with me all the time to see how Im doing :)--Kelly Gleischman Josh Johnson: for being the BEST ROOMMATE EVER and for rocking out these rst few weeks of school.--Kelly Glesichman Kelly Gleischman: for successfully motivating her students to generate and then strive for a high-level vision for class culture and engagement by showing them what an excellent classroom looks like. Inspired by the clip, her kids decided to create a math class cheer that they now use during transitions between tasks! Eliza Varner: for successfully empowering students to lead lessons in her science class. It was truly inspiring for me to watch as Kawan walked through physics problems and facilitated a successful stations activity entirely on his own. By the end of the lesson, peers were giving him shout outs for his teaching skill and he was proclaiming himself the future president of the United States!--Joaquin Anamika Dwivedi: for making home visits to build relationships with a few hard-to-reach students, getting creative about vocabulary instruction (whether it be through musical ashcards or various vocabulary exercises), increasing investment by incorporating realworld links to content in her lesson plans, using new strategies to streamline her pacing, and for reaching out proactively for feedback around a more challenging mod to ensure she can effectively reach all of her students.--Joaquin Staci Holthus: for successfully executing the rst-ever Socratic seminar that Ive ever seen in a Math classroom! I was so impressed at how well her middle school students used their accountable talk and asked each other pointed questions. My favorite moment: when a student walked up to another during what could have been a tense moment and shook his hand before saying: thank you so much for that constructive feedback, sir!--Joaquin Julia Sadowsky: for creating an amazing class website and showing me how to use the Google site system! It is clear that Julia is going above and beyond to engage families, and Im in awe of her work.--Alex Krupp

Most Viewed Videos of the

1.
Maria Roths Scholars Garden (Grade 1) 2. No Opt Out (TLAC Resource) 3. Guided Reading Lesson (Kindergarten) 4. Spanish Parent Night (Secondary) 5. Ms. Rifes Pacing (Middle School) 6 . I n t e r v i e w w i t h M r. McManus (Teacher For the Day) 7. Precise Praise (TLAC Resource) 8. Board = Paper (TLAC Resource) 9 S t r o n g Vo i c e ( T L A C Resource) 10. Rigor in Algebra 1 (Math
classroom)