Improving Student Learning

A companion to the ASCD best-seller Improving Student Learning One Teacher at a Time, this breakthrough approach to supervision offers principals a simple, positive way to help teachers make the right adjustments in curriculum, instruction, assessment, and feedback -- the four areas of practice that make the most difference in how learners learn.

A how-to manual for achieving excellence despite budget cuts This book offers a comprehensive framework to enhance student achievement in good times and in bad. The author provides a school improvement action plan and then shows how to target resources to implement that plan. More than just a “theory” book, this text describes concrete, specific actions that can be taken immediately. Key strategies include: Using data to support boosting student performance Focusing on effective instruction Setting goals to drive resource allocation priorities Setting priorities for situations that require budget cuts Hiring top teachers and providing ongoing professional development Providing needed technology resources

Using Self-Assessment to Improve Student Learning synthesizes research on self-assessment and translates it into actionable guidelines and principles for pre-service and in-service teachers and for school leaders, teacher educators, and researchers. Situated beyond the simple how-to frameworks currently available for teachers and graduate students, this volume illuminates self-assessment’s complexities and substantial promise to strategically move students toward self-regulated learning and internalized goals. Addressing theory, empirical evidence, and common implementation issues, the book’s developmental approach to quality self-assessment practices will help teachers, leaders, and scholars maximize their impact on student self-regulation and learning.

In this second edition of Improving Student Learning One Teacher at a Time, Jane E. Pollock and Laura J. Tolone combine updated research and real-world stories to demonstrate how it takes only one teacher to make a difference in student performance. Their approach expands the classic three-part curriculum-instruction-assessment framework by adding one key ingredient: feedback. This "Big Four" approach offers an easy-to-follow process that helps teachers build better curriculum documents with * Curriculum standards that are clear and well-paced, and describe what students will learn. * Instruction based in research, from daily lessons to whole units of study. * Assessment that maximizes feedback and requires critical and creative thinking. * Feedback that tracks and reports individual student progress by standards. Pollock and Tolone demonstrate how consistent, timely feedback from multiple sources can help students monitor their own understanding and help teachers align assignments, quizzes, and tests more explicitly to the standards. The Big Four shifts the focus away from the basics of what makes a good teacher toward what makes good learning happen for every student every day.

This book offers a coherent research-based overview and analysis of theories and practices in using data to improve student learning. It clarifies what 'use of data' means and differentiates the different levels of decision-making in education (relating to the system, district, school, classroom, or individual student). The relationship between data and decision-making is considered and various movements in the use of data to improve student learning are analysed, especially from the perspective of their assumptions and effects. This leads to a focus on effective educational decision-making as a social process requiring collaboration among all relevant participants. It also requires a clear understanding of educational aims, and these are seen to transcend what can be assessed by standardised tests. The consequences of this analysis for decision processes are explored and conclusions are drawn about what principles might best guide educational practice as well as what ambiguities remain. Throughout, the focus is on what existing research says about each of the issues explored. .

In this second edition of Improving Student Learning One Teacher at a Time, Jane E. Pollock and Laura J. Tolone combine updated research and real-world stories to demonstrate how it takes only one teacher to make a difference in student performance. Their approach expands the classic three-part curriculum-instruction-assessment framework by adding one key ingredient: feedback. This "Big Four" approach offers an easy-to-follow process that helps teachers build better curriculum documents with * Curriculum standards that are clear and well-paced, and describe what students will learn. * Instruction based in research, from daily lessons to whole units of study. * Assessment that maximizes feedback and requires critical and creative thinking. * Feedback that tracks and reports individual student progress by standards. Pollock and Tolone demonstrate how consistent, timely feedback from multiple sources can help students monitor their own understanding and help teachers align assignments, quizzes, and tests more explicitly to the standards. The Big Four shifts the focus away from the basics of what makes a good teacher toward what makes good learning happen for every student every day.

Research has identified the importance of helping students develop the ability to monitor their own comprehension and to make their thinking processes explicit, and indeed demonstrates that metacognitive teaching strategies greatly improve student engagement with course material.This book -- by presenting principles that teachers in higher education can put into practice in their own classrooms -- explains how to lay the ground for this engagement, and help students become self-regulated learners actively employing metacognitive and reflective strategies in their education.Key elements include embedding metacognitive instruction in the content matter; being explicit about the usefulness of metacognitive activities to provide the incentive for students to commit to the extra effort; as well as following through consistently.Recognizing that few teachers have a deep understanding of metacognition and how it functions, and still fewer have developed methods for integrating it into their curriculum, this book offers a hands-on, user-friendly guide for implementing metacognitive and reflective pedagogy in a range of disciplines. Offering seven practitioner examples from the sciences, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields, the social sciences and the humanities, along with sample syllabi, course materials, and student examples, this volume offers a range of strategies for incorporating these pedagogical approaches in college classrooms, as well as theoretical rationales for the strategies presented. By providing successful models from courses in a broad spectrum of disciplines, the editors and contributors reassure readers that they need not reinvent the wheel or fear the unknown, but can instead adapt tested interventions that aid learning and have been shown to improve both instructor and student satisfaction and engagement.

Improving Schools to Promote Learning is a concise and common-sense examination of all the moving parts that drive student learning. The book ties together the research, policies, and practices relative to the state, district, school, classroom, and family, and explains their effects on student learning. The author covers an array of topics, including technology, charter schools, turnaround initiatives, and instruction in specific subject areas. Herbert J. Walberg’s book continues the work of previous publications from the Center on Innovation & Improvement (Handbook on Restructuring and Substantial School Improvement and Handbook on the Statewide Systems of Support) that connect research to practice at various levels of the education system. The book is accessible to a wide audience, including educators, school board members, parents, and policy makers. Walberg includes action steps in every chapter, providing practical recommendations for improved student achievement. The author also offers select references for additional material on the best research and most effective practices.