Search Results: (16-30 of 67 records)
| Pub Number | Title |  Date |
|---|---|---|
| REL 2021053 | A Second Grade Teacher’s Guide to Supporting Family Involvement in Foundational Reading Skills
This Second Grade Teacher's Guide provides information for second grade teachers on how to support families as they practice foundational reading skills at home. It serves as a companion to the What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) practice guide, Foundational Skills to Support Reading for Understanding in Kindergarten Through 3rd Grade. Both guides present four research-based recommendations and how-to steps: the WWC guide is for teaching children at school, and this guide is to help teachers support families in practicing foundational reading skills at home. The information in this Second Grade Teacher's Guide is designed to assist teachers in supporting out-of-school literacy activities that are aligned to classroom instruction, informed by student need, grounded in evidence-based practices, and facilitated by ongoing parent-teacher communication. The Teacher's Guide provides a framework for literacy support activities presented during schools' family literacy nights and parent-teacher conferences. This Teacher's Guide includes:
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2/8/2021 |
| REL 2021057 | Tool for Assessing the Health of Research-Practice Partnerships
Education research-practice partnerships (RPPs) offer structures and processes for bridging research and practice and ultimately driving improvements for K-12 outcomes. To date, there is limited literature on how to assess the effectiveness of RPPs. Aligned to the most commonly cited framework for assessing RPPs, Assessing Research-Practice Partnerships: Five Dimensions of Effectiveness, this two-part tool offers guidance on how researchers and practitioners may prioritize the five dimensions of RPP effectiveness and their related indicators. The tool also provides an interview protocol for RPP evaluators to use as an instrument for assessing the extent to which the RPP demonstrates evidence of the prioritized dimensions and their indicators of effectiveness. |
2/2/2021 |
| REL 2021062 | Self-Study Guide for Evidence-Based Coaching for Literacy: PreK–Grade 12
This Self-study Guide for Evidence-Based Literacy Coaching PreK-Grade 12 was developed to help improve the effectiveness of literacy coaching in order to increase the knowledge, skill, and ability of teachers to implement evidence-based practices. This self-study guide was designed to help administrators, teacher leaders, and coaches reflect upon literacy coaching strengths and challenges, spark conversations among staff, and identify areas for improvement. The guide provides a template for data collection and guiding questions for discussion that may improve the implementation of literacy coaching, increase the percentage of teachers receiving coaching services that use evidence-based practices in their classrooms, and improve student achievement in literacy. |
2/1/2021 |
| REL 2021052 | An Approach to Using Student and Teacher Data to Understand and Predict Teacher Shortages
Addressing teacher shortages has been a persistent concern among leaders in schools, districts, state education agencies, and the federal government. This report describes an approach to identifying patterns of teacher shortages that was collaboratively developed by the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education and the Regional Educational Laboratory Central. The approach is implemented using widely available software. It can be adopted or adapted by education agencies that wish to understand and predict teacher shortages, including shortage trends in content and certification areas, in their own contexts. Education agencies may also use teacher shortage predictions to inform efforts to address inequities in students’ access to excellent educators. |
12/15/2020 |
| REL 2021045 | Professional Learning Community: Emergent Literacy
REL Southeast developed Professional Learning Community: Emergent Literacy to build the capacity of preschool educators to provide 3–5-year-old children evidence-based emergent literacy instruction. Early childhood teachers can help build the foundation to improve emergent literacy skills related to school readiness outcomes. The goal is to engage preschool teachers in collaborative learning experiences to support implementation of evidence-based language and literacy strategies that, in turn, can benefit children. A facilitator will use the Facilitator Guide and accompanying suite of materials to lead a team of preschool teachers through professional learning community sessions. The materials, developed in collaboration with the REL Southeast School Readiness Partnership, include four modules: 1) Print Knowledge; 2) Phonological Awareness; 3) Vocabulary; and 4) Oral Language. Each module is comprised of three resources:
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12/14/2020 |
| REL 2021048 | Creating and Using Performance Assessments: An Online Course for Practitioners
This self-paced, online course provides educators with detailed information on performance assessment. Through five modules, practitioners, instructional leaders, and administrators will learn foundational concepts of assessment literacy and how to develop, score, and use performance assessments. They will also learn about the role of performance assessment within a comprehensive assessment system. Each module will take approximately 30 minutes to complete, with additional time needed to complete the related tasks, such as creating a performance assessment and rubric. Participants will be provided with a certificate of completion upon finishing the course. |
11/2/2020 |
| REL 2021014 | Continuous Improvement in Education: A Toolkit for Schools and Districts
Continuous improvement processes engage key players within a system to focus on a specific problem of practice and, through a series of iterative cycles, test changes, gather data about the changes, and study the potential influence of these changes on outcomes of interest (Bryk et al., 2015). This practitioner-friendly toolkit is designed to provide an overview of Continuous Improvement processes in education, with a focus on the use of Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) cycles (Langley, Moen, Nolan, Nolan & Norman, 2009). It also offers related tools and resources that educational practitioners can use to implement continuous improvement processes in their own schools, districts, or agencies. The toolkit includes a customizable workbook, reproducible templates, and short informational videos. The toolkit begins with an introduction to continuous improvement, followed by customizable content for a series of meetings that guide a team of educators through the process of identifying a common problem, generating a series of evidence-based change practices to test and study, testing those change practices, collecting and analyzing data, and reflecting on and using evidence to identify next steps. The toolkit leads educational practitioners through a series of PDSA cycles, designed explicitly for an educational setting. Real-world case examples illustrate the process in an educational context. |
10/26/2020 |
| REL 2021042 | A First-Grade Teacher's Guide to Supporting Family Involvement in Foundational Reading Skills
A First Grade Teacher's Guide to Supporting Family Involvement in Foundational Reading Skills will be part of a suite of resources teachers can use with families to encourage and facilitate literacy support for children at home. The suite of resources will include a Teacher Guide, Family Activities, and Family Videos. The information in the Teacher Guide will be designed to assist teachers in sup-porting out-of-school literacy activities that are aligned to classroom instruction, informed by student need, grounded in evidence-based practices (the Foundational Reading Skills Practice Guide), and facilitated by ongoing parent-teacher communication. The Teacher Guide will provide a framework for literacy support activities presented during schools' family literacy nights and parent-teacher conferences. The Family Activities will contain evidence-based literacy activities that the teacher can give to the parent during family literacy night or at parent-teacher conferences for the parents to do at home with their child. Each activity will use family-friendly language and include a user-friendly format. Materials needed (e.g., letter cards) for each activity will be included. The Family Videos will depict families using the activities to support children's literacy at home. The videos can be shown at the school's literacy night or during parent-teacher conferences to illustrate family involvement in first grade literacy. Similar guides for kindergarten and grades 2 and 3 will also be available. |
10/14/2020 |
| REL 2020032 | Guide to Conducting a Needs Assessment for American Indian Students
American Indian communities often bring a deep sense of connection, relationships, and knowledge to their children’s education. However, education research has repeatedly shown that American Indian students trail their peers in achievement, attendance, and postsecondary readiness. Regional Educational Laboratory Central, the North Dakota Department of Public Instruction, and educators across North Dakota collaboratively developed needs assessment surveys for the state. These surveys are a primary focus of this tool which can be adapted for use in other state and local education agencies across the nation. These surveys can be used to identify and monitor the needs and successes of schools serving American Indian students. Survey development involved rigorous processes to ensure that the surveys were technically sound and culturally appropriate. The surveys provide a means to evaluate different characteristics of schools and the resulting data can guide focused supports for American Indian students. For example, state and local education agency staff may use the information from the surveys to identify target areas of need in order to provide additional resources, such as professional development activities, curricular materials, instructional strategies, and research articles, to schools. As education agencies begin to implement strategies and programs, the surveys can be readministered to monitor progress toward goals. The tool also provides guidance on administering the surveys and analyzing and interpreting the resulting data. |
9/17/2020 |
| REL 2020025 | Self-Study Guide for Evidence-Based Practices in Adult Literacy Education
The purpose of this self-study guide is to help adult literacy education providers collect, organize, and analyze evidence that they can use to improve program performance. It was designed to help educators consider which types of evidence to collect and which components of adult education instruction may be important for evaluating implementation. Sources of evidence for this review include records and data such as lesson plans, rosters, and student results confirming that processes are in place to monitor teacher and student success. The components important to evaluation of implementation were determined based on a thorough review of the literature on adult education. The guide was developed in partnership with the Regional Educational Laboratory Southeast's Florida Career Readiness Research Alliance. It was pilot tested with Florida adult literacy educators through the support of the Institute for the Professional Development of Adult Educators. |
5/4/2020 |
| REL 2020018 | Guide and Checklists for a School Leader’s Walkthrough during Literacy Instruction in Grades 4–12
This tool was developed to assist school leaders in observing specific research-based practices during literacy instruction in grade 4–12 classrooms and students’ independent use or application of those practices. The tool aims to help school leaders conduct brief and frequent walkthroughs throughout the school year. The tool consists of three parts to be used with students in three grade bands: grades 4 and 5, grades 6–8, and grades 9–12. The first is the Pre-Walkthrough Meeting Guide, for use in all grade bands, to facilitate conversation between school leaders and teachers before the walkthrough. The second is a set of eight walkthrough checklists, differentiated by grade band and classroom type (that is, whole class, English language arts class, content area class, and literacy intervention class), which are based on best practices in literacy instruction. The third is the Post-Walkthrough Meeting Guide, for use in all grade bands, to facilitate debriefing between school leaders and teachers. |
3/9/2020 |
| REL 2020016 | Kindergarten Teacher's Guide to Supporting Family Involvement in Foundational Reading Skills
This Kindergarten Teacher's Guide provides information for kindergarten teachers on how to support families as they practice foundational reading skills at home. It serves as a companion to the What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) Foundational Skills to Support Reading for Understanding in Kindergarten Through 3rd Grade. Both guides present four research-based recommendations and how-to steps: the WWC guide is for teaching children at school, and this guide is to help teachers support families in practicing foundational reading skills at home. br/> The information in this Kindergarten Teacher’s Guide is designed to assist teachers in supporting out-of-school literacy activities that are aligned to classroom instruction, informed by student need, grounded in evidence-based practices, and facilitated by ongoing parent-teacher communication. The Teacher’s Guide provides a framework for literacy support activities presented during schools’ family literacy nights and parent-teacher conferences. |
1/6/2020 |
| REL 2020010 | A review of instruments for measuring social and emotional learning skills among secondary school students
This purpose of this resource is to support state and local education agencies in identifying reliable and valid instruments that measure collaboration, perseverance, and self-regulated learning among secondary school students. This resource, developed by the Regional Education Laboratory Northeast & Islands in collaboration with its Social and Emotional Learning Alliance, presents social and emotional learning instruments and the reliability and validity information available for those instruments. Specifically, this resource indicates whether psychometric information was available for reliability and seven components of validity—content, substantive, structural, external, generalizability, consequential, and fairness. To identify and review instruments, researchers conducted a literature search, determined the eligibility of instruments, reviewed the reliability and validity information available for eligible instruments; and determined whether the reliability and validity information provided met conventionally accepted criteria. In total, 17 instruments were eligible for inclusion in the resource. Eligible instruments included six measures of collaboration, four measures of perseverance, four measures of self-regulated learning, and three measures of both perseverance and self-regulated learning. With 12 instruments developed for use in research and 5 instruments developed for formative instruction, practitioners should use caution when using any measure for summative use that has not been developed and validated for that specific purpose. With schools and districts ramping up their efforts to measure social and emotional learning for formative and summative use, practitioners would benefit from the development of additional measures for these specific purposes. Among the 17 instruments eligible for inclusion in this resource, 16 instruments have information on reliability and at least one component of validity. The component of validity most commonly available for eligible instruments was content validity whereas only three instruments had information on fairness and no instruments had information on substantive validity. Practitioners should use caution when using instruments that lack information on substantive validity or fairness, since these measures may not be appropriate for all students that are evaluated. |
10/16/2019 |
| REL 2019002 | Professional Learning Community: Improving Mathematical Problem Solving for Students in Grades 4 Through 8 Facilitator's Guide
REL Southeast developed this facilitator's guide on the topic of mathematical problem solving for use in professional learning community (PLC) settings. The facilitator's guide is a set of professional development materials designed to supplement the What Works Clearinghouse practice guide, Improving Mathematical Problem Solving in Grades 4 Through 8 (Woodward et al., 2012). The practice guide provides research-based recommendations for teachers to incorporate into their classroom practice. The facilitator's guide is designed to complement and extend the practice guide by providing teachers in a PLC setting with additional, step-by-step guidance for the best ways to implement some of these evidence-based recommendations. The facilitator's guide focuses on three of the five recommendations from the mathematics problem solving practice guide to ensure in-depth coverage of the topics and to provide ample practice opportunities and time for reflection. The three practice guide recommendations on which the facilitator's guide is based are: teach students how to use visual representations (Recommendation 3), expose students to multiple problem-solving strategies (Recommendation 4), and help students recognize and articulate mathematical concepts and notation (Recommendation 5). REL Southeast chose these three recommendations because they are interrelated and include critical content to address the two high-leverage regional needs communicated by the Improving Mathematics Instruction Research Alliance which include improving classroom discourse in mathematics and enhancing students' mathematical problem-solving skills. |
6/10/2019 |
| REL 2017214 | Workshop on Survey Methods in Education Research: Facilitator's guide and resources
Regional Educational Laboratory Midwest has developed a tool for state and local education agencies to use to organize and conduct training for their staff members who design and conduct surveys. Surveys are often used by education agencies to collect data to assess needs, inform policy decisions, evaluate programs, or respond to legislative mandates. The workshop presentation materials draw from evidence-based research from the field of survey research methodology and offer guidance on designing and administering high-quality surveys. The materials provide practical advice and examples drawn from experiences in developing surveys for local, state, and national education applications. The workshop includes eight modules that describe the steps of survey design and administration—from planning to data collection—and covers the following topics: planning for a survey, exploring existing item sources, writing items, pretesting survey items, sampling, data collection methods, response rates, and focus groups. The facilitator's guidebook includes the goals for each module, considerations for adapting the materials for various purposes, an annotated agenda, and participant handouts (slide decks and accompanying notes, activities, and handouts). Individuals and groups who are developing surveys can use these materials to facilitate workshops, guide a survey project, or ensure that they are adhering to best practices for designing and conducting surveys. Although this guide is intended to help survey researchers in state and local education agencies organize and conduct a training for their staff, the materials also can be used as a stand-alone resource for anyone wishing to learn the basics about survey design and administration in education settings. |
4/11/2017 |
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