Welcome Message – Dr. Harter

College and Career Readiness Resources in ConnectEd Studios

The College and Career Readiness staff has built an online resource library available to all district users. Located in the WCCUSD College and Career Readiness Collaborative Group Files and Resources, this collection of resources includes:

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  21st Century Skills
  
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  Argumentative Writing Resources – (Literacy Design Collaborative resources located in this folder)
  
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  Behaviors for Learning and Teaching
  
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  Common Core State Standards
  
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  College and Career Readiness Resources
  
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  ConnectEd Studios Access Codes
  
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  Curriculum Mapping Tool Guide
  
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  Expository Reading and Writing
  
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  Graduate Profile
  
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  Lead Meeting/PD Series Resources
  
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  Project Tool Guide
  
• 
  Sample Rubrics
  

Linked Learning Certification

Linked Learning Certification is a review process developed by a consortium of pathway and academy organizations to ensure high standards for pathway implementation. The Certification Review process is managed by our partners ConnectEd. There is a great deal of information regarding the Certification Criteria and the Review Process at the following link:

http://www.connectedcalifornia.org/schools_districts/certification.

You can review the Certification Criteria and Rubric located earlier in this section to better understand the criteria for Certification. Within the District, Mike Aaronian (maaronian@wccusd.net) is the contact person for initiating a Linked Learning Certification Review.

Section IX – The Behaviors of Learning and Teaching Framework

The Linked Learning Learning and Teaching Framework, developed by ConnectEd, “defines key characteristics of student and adult learning and teaching practice within Linked Learning pathways and illustrates how these characteristics might be observed in the behaviors of teachers and learners, both inside and beyond the classroom.” The Framework also describes the specifics of what teachers can be seen doing, and what students can be seen doing. There is also a developmental continuum of these observable behaviors included in the Framework.

To see the full framework, visit http://www.connectedcalifornia.org/direct/files/resources/BLT%20Overview_Continuum_GSG_121712.pdf. The information below is an overview of the Behaviors of Learning and Teaching that we hope to see in a Linked Learning Pathway or Career Academy.

Behaviors for Learning and Teaching (BLTs)
© 2012 ConnectEd: The California Center for College and Career. All rights reserved. DRAFT v. 121712 Page 2
Linked Learning is…COLLABORATIVE – STUDENT DIRECTED – OUTCOME-FOCUSED – RELEVANT – RIGOROUS AND INTEGRATED

Collaborative (Work with Others) Students can be seen…
 Regularly working with industry partners as learning resources and project clients.

 Experiencing a variety of collaborative teams and settings.

 Practicing industry-specific norms and strategies to make their teamwork efficient and effective.

 Using industry-specific technology and social media tools to foster collaboration.

STUDENT-DIRECTED

Student Directed (Work Students Lead) Students can be seen…

 Designing their interdisciplinary learning experiences.

 Organizing, revising, and self-monitoring a learning plan.

 Learning through an inquiry approach where their questions, choices, insights, and solutions lead the way.

 Self-selecting from a variety of resources across disciplines to support learning and inquiry

 Pursuing mastery through feedback, revision, and defense of work.

OUTCOME-FOCUSED

Outcome Focused (Work with a Goal) Students can be seen…

 Creating, using, and revising plans for project work and for their college and career goals.

 Seeking, offering, and using feedback on their project and personal plans.

 Explaining how their daily work helps them master project, course, and pathway outcomes.

 Reflecting daily on their choices, insights, and growth.

RELEVANT

 Working on problems of genuine personal interest.

 Engaging in complex projects authentic to the industry sector.

 Producing work that reflects standards of the workplace.

 Using state-of-the-art tools and industry-specific technology.

 Participating in a sequence of work-based learning experiences.

RIGOROUS & INTEGRATED

Rigorous & Integrated (Work that Challenges) Students can be seen…

 Engaging in deep critical thinking using challenging material and industry-specific problem-solving tools.

 Designing and publicly defending high quality project solutions.

 Articulating how they are mastering the Common Core State Standards.

 Pointing out connections across subjects in theme-based interdisciplinary projects.

Section X – Integrated Curriculum Design

Creating an Integrated Curriculum

1. 
   Academic and Technical Rigor – Projects are designed to address key learning standards identified by the school or district.
   
2. 
   Authenticity – Projects use a real-world context (e.g., community and workplace problems) and address issues that matter to the students.
   
3. 
   Applied Learning – Projects engage students in solving problems calling for competencies expected in high-performance work organizations.
   
4. 
   Active Exploration – Projects extend beyond the classroom by connecting to internships, field-based investigations, and community explorations.
   
5. 
   Adult Connections – Projects connect students with adult mentors and coaches from the wider community.
   
6. 
   Assessment Practices – Projects involve students in regular performance-based exhibitions and assessments of their work; evaluation criteria reflect personal, school, and real-world standards of performance.
   

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  Identify Themes Through Curriculum Mapping
  
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  Decide on the Topic of the Integrated Unit
  
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  Craft the Essential Question
  
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  Identify Topical or Key Questions
  
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  Assign Responsibilities
  
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  Review and Revise the Curriculum Map
  
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  Set the Learning Scenario
  
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  Establish Student Assessments
  
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  Check Alignment with Standards
  
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  Write Lesson Plans
  
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  Evaluate the Unit
  
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  Integrated Unit Logistics
  

Project Based Learning

• 
  Project Based Learning (PBL) is an inquiry based process for teaching and learning. In PBL, students focus on a complex question or problem, then answer the question or solve the problem through a collaborative process of investigation over an extended period of time. Projects often are used to investigate authentic issues and topics found outside of school. During the inquiry process, students learn content, information, and facts necessary to draw conclusions about the question. Students also learn valuable skills and habits of mind during the process.
  

• 
  PBL is extremely effective as a method for engaging students in their learning. With engagement comes focus, discipline, and mastery of academic content. Further, students have the opportunity to work on problems and issues relevant to their lives, as well as learn vital work and life skills necessary to their success in school or in the work world.
  

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  Design Principle #1: Begin with the End in Mind
  
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    Develop a Project Idea
    
  • 
    Decide the Scope of the Project
    
  • 
    Select Standards
    
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    Incorporate Simultaneous Outcomes
    
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    Work from Project Design Criteria
    
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    Create the Optimal Learning Environment
    
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  Design Principle #2: Craft the Driving Question, also known as the Essential Question
  
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    Drives the Project
    
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    Captures a Project Theme or a “big idea”
    
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    Points Students Toward Mastering Content and Skills that Enable them to Answer the Question
    
  • 
    Not Easily Solved or Answered
    
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  Design Principle #3: Plan the Assessment
  
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    Align the Products or Performances for the Project with the Outcomes
    
  • 
    Know what to Assess – Establish Criteria to Assess each Product and Performance
    
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    Create Rubrics for the Project
    
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  Design Principle #4: Map the Project
  
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    Organize Tasks and Activities
    
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    Decide How to Launch the Project
    
  • 
    Gather Resources
    
  • 
    Draw a Storyboard
    
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  Design Principle #5: Manage the Process
  
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    Share Project Goals with Students
    
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    Use Problem-solving Tools
    
  • 
    Use Checkpoints and Milestones
    
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    Plan for Evaluation and Reflection
    

Integrated curriculum projects or units utilize both formative and summative assessments, as well as student products and culminating events. Teacher teams have found it critical to use some common assessment strategies in order to deliver an effective, engaging project.

The following section features explanations and ideas around assessments for integrated projects. (Designing a Multidisciplinary Integrated Curriculum: A Practical Manual, ConnectEd, http://www.connectedcalifornia.org/curriculum/integrated_units):

Integrated curriculum units offer teachers many op­portunities to move beyond traditional paper- and- pencil tests. Teacher teams can design engaging and challenging performance-based formative and sum­mative student assessments that are well matched to authentic teaching strategies. To create these as­sessments, it is valuable to work backwards. Begin thinking about the summative Culminating Event and then design the formative student work products that demonstrate students’ learning and help them prepare for it.

The Culminating Event is the place where students summarize and present their conclusions about the Essential Question, synthesizing their learning and research across all of the disciplines in the unit. At the Culminating Event, teachers, community repre­sentatives, and industry partners can also assess and evaluate student learning in relation to many of the discipline-specific content standards that were the basis for the Key Questions. This summative evalu­ation is an ideal opportunity for students to display their higher-order thinking skills, problem-solving abilities, effective teamwork, written and oral com­munication skills, and ability to integrate and apply knowledge gained across several academic and tech­nical disciplines.

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  Encourage students to link their presentations to a real-world setting, ideally in the workplace; the setting will further reinforce career development goals identified for the curriculum unit.
  
• 
  Involve the community and industry partners; participation at the Culminating Event will re­inforce community and industry support for in­novative high school improvement strategies and career-themed education.
  
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  Allow students to present in groups or individu­ally, depending on their strengths and learning styles; use these alternatives as a way for students at all achievement levels to participate.
  
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  Ask students to reflect on what they have learned and share their observations; explicitly tie results of these meta-cognitive activities back to the aca­demic and technical content standards that were used to design the curriculum unit.
  

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  Create and deliver a PowerPoint presentation.
  
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  Hold a Science Fair with students presenting tri-folds and visual displays.
  
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  Invite parents to view presentations (PowerPoint or tri-folds) at a Back-to-School night.
  
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  Demonstrate a lesson or activity to industry part­ners, a community group, or a municipal agency.
  
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  Develop a practical manual addressing the topic of the unit and proposing a resolution or plan of action.
  
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  Create a website focused on answering the Essen­tial Question.
  
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  Hold a debate on the Essential Question.
  
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  Develop policies and procedures that deal with the topic of the unit.
  

Integrated curriculum units also lend themselves to a variety of performance-based and standard formative assessments. Teachers can use these assessments to give students ongoing performance feedback and also to avoid having too much of a semester’s final grade rest on a single Culminating Event. This is particu­larly important as many of the Culminating Event formats rely on group activities and presentations and may include limited opportunities to assess and provide feedback to individual students.

The following are several examples of work products that help groups of students prepare for the Culmi­nating Event and offer opportunities for formative feedback to individuals and groups.

• A written project outline, work plan, and sched­ule, or a classroom presentation on the team’s project objectives and work plan.

• A selection of readings (with an annotated bibli­ography) that individuals or teams recommend for outside reviewers who will later evaluate the Culminating Event.

• A scoring rubric for outside evaluators to use in grading the team’s Culminating Event.

• A research paper on one of the Key Questions ad­dressed in a specific discipline.

• A set of drawings, designs, graphic representa­tions, or a photographic portfolio related to the Essential Question or one of the Key Questions.

Assessment Samples

Samples of Integrated Units Showing Formative and Summative Assessments (Student Work Products and Culminating Events)

The following are two examples of assessments for integrated units currently in place in high schools and a third hypothetical example.

Unit Title: Risky Business

Essential Question How can we balance personal freedoms and society’s need to provide accessible, affordable healthcare?

Learning Scenario: School ski trip

Discipline-Related Formative Assessment Assignments:

• Art and English—Create business cards and bro­chures for an insurance company.

• English—Read excerpts from Shattered Air by Rob­ert Madgic (about a tragedy at Yosemite National Park’s Half Dome) and debate risky behaviors.

• Algebra—Calculate entries for actuarial tables and mortality rates for leading causes of death.

• History and English—Explore the history of medi­cal insurance and write an expository essay on the issue of universal health insurance.

• Geography and English—Research and write about the geographical distribution of genetically linked diseases.

• Science—Chart biological pedigrees.

• Information Technology—Use appropriate com­puter software to prepare written reports, bro­chures, statistical tables, and presentations.

• World Languages and English—Research foreign insurance and medical information and write up results in both English and another language.

• Health Science and English—Research medical in­surance and risky behaviors and write up research results.

• Physical Education—Create a Wellness Program/Prevention Plan for an insurance company.

Culminating Event: Small groups of students form their own insurance company. They prepare Science Fair tri-fold presentations where they present their insurance companies’ programs and policies, includ­ing decisions about insuring individuals who engage in risky behaviors. Community healthcare profes­sionals use a rubric designed with student input to grade the student presentations.
Topic: Cultural Differences in Healthcare

Unit Title: Second Opinion

Essential Question How can we ensure the safety and effectiveness of comple­mentary and alternative medical practices?

Learning Scenario: Excerpt from The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, (a book by Anne Fadiman con­trasting Hmong and Western medicine’s interpreta­tions and responses to epilepsy)

Discipline-Related Formative Assessment Assignments:

• Art, English, and Health Science—Design the les­son plan format and content for a lesson on cul­tural competency.

• English—Read an excerpt from The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down; complete an expository writing assignment.

• Mathematics and Chemistry—Measure the bond angles of molecular compounds created in chem­istry class.

• History—Write the script for an “elevator pitch” to a physician about why he or she should be cultur­ally sensitive to patients from different countries.

• Geography and English—Research and write an expository essay about alternative healing prac­tices, including their distribution and how they are spread around the world.

• Chemistry—Create a model of the molecular structures of medicines and research the differ­ences in drugs.

• Computers—Provide web-based research support for all classes included in the curriculum unit.

• World Language—Research and write about heal­ing practices in Spanish-speaking countries.

• Health Science and English—Study and write an essay about cultural difference in healing practices.

• Physical Education and English—Research and write about cultural differences in levels of and attitudes toward physical activity.

Culminating Event: Students present a culturally com­petent lesson plan to representatives from various state agencies and professional organizations. These individuals use a scoring rubric designed with stu­dent input to assess the lesson plan.

Topic: The Environment and Health

Unit Title: Save the Planet; Save Yourself

Essential Question How can we preserve the environment and enhance the quality of life for future generations?

Learning Scenario: Profile of a physician who finds a cure for an environmental illness

Discipline-Specific Formative Assessment Assignments:

• Art—Paint a mural about an environmental issue.

• English and Art—Create a brochure that teaches members of the community about “eco-friendly” habits and their health benefits.

• Mathematics (statistics)—Survey students about their attitudes toward environmental issues; com­pile results and interpret the data.

• History—Evaluate and write about the environ­mental quality of life across historical periods.

• Geography—Research and present findings to the class about environmental standards in develop­ing countries.

• Science and English—Research and write about air and water pollution and acid rain, and their ef­fects.

• Information Technology—Build a website on en­vironmental issues.

• World Language—Research environmental issues in Spanish-speaking countries.

• Health Science—Research technological advances in the medical field and their impact on the envi­ronment.

• Physical Education and Biology—Study pollution in the air and how it affects the respiratory and cardiovascular systems during exercise.

Culminating Project: Create a website that focuses on environmental and health issues.

Integrating Service Learning

The career-themed nature of integrated curricula and PBL offers an opportunity to add relevance to the learner. Another layer can still be included in project design, and that is Service Learning. Service Learning is a District-wide requirement for graduation. The basic concept of service learning is for the students to perform a service to their community, that is tied to the knowledge and skill of a content area. Within the Academies, our career-foci align very well with service learning, PBL, and integrated projects. Academies have been authorized by WCCUSD to manage the service learning requirements of their students.

As your team develops projects and units, consider this question….What Service can our students provide to the community within this project? If the service offered can be tied to classroom instruction, you have the needed elements for service learning credit.

Some examples of service learning integration:

• 
  Technology Project – Students repair PC systems from the community as part of a project on digital literacy.
  
• 
  Health Project – Students perform blood pressure and BMI tests on community members while doing a project on fitness and health levels.
  
• 
  Construction Project – Students design and build furniture to be used in local schools.
  

(From Partnership Guide for Career Academies, CCASN, UC Berkeley, 2010, http://CCASN.berkeley.edu/resources.php)

Here’s a quick list of the roles employer and college representatives (within the context of Advisory Boards) usually play in a California Partnership Academy:

• Advisory Board (aka Steering Committee) member

• Input on technical curriculum

• Donations of equipment, curricular materials

• Teacher externships

• Host for meetings, activities, graduation ceremony

• Speakers, field trips for sophomores

• Job shadowing for sophomores &/or juniors

• Mentors for juniors

• Work internships/ community service for junior grads, seniors

The Advisory Board (aka Steering Committee) is the hub for all these roles. This is generally comprised of at least one district and high school administrator, the Academy Lead Teacher and perhaps the whole teacher team, a counselor, representatives from local companies in the academy career field, representatives from local community/ four-year/ technical colleges, perhaps a community-based organization that plays a role as an intermediary in bringing the high school and community together (e.g., a Chamber of Commerce, service organization, or business-education alliance) and perhaps a parent and/or student or two.

Some Boards have Executive Committees that meet periodically, generally a couple times per year. This Board has corporate leaders, post secondary chancellors or deans, presidents of local community-based organizations, government representatives, and the superintendent or his or her representative. In the fall they review plans for the academy; in the spring they review progress and student achievement.

If there is no Executive Committee, the general Board acts in this role, generally meeting quarterly or so and forming smaller task forces to work on components needing attention between the general meetings. For example, one task force might work on lining up speakers and field trip sites for sophomores, another on finding job shadowing positions and mentors for juniors, another on needed equipment and curricular materials, and so on.

If a high school has more than one academy, there is generally one Advisory Board for each career field, and should there be academies in the same career field in other high schools in the district, it plays this role for them as well. This is so that one academy doesn’t find itself competing with another from the same district for support from employers or colleges. Such competition makes it difficult for these organizations to know where to place their support and can erode their involvement.

If there is more than one Academy/ Advisory Board in the district, there is often a district-wide Board that brings representatives of them together. This allows academies to learn from each other and opportunities for joint support at the district level. Superintendents can often be quite effective if they play a role in these efforts.

Although the first meeting usually takes place on the high school campus, later meetings are often held at the members’ facilities, perhaps rotating through the roster of members. The first meeting may be chaired by the principal or lead teacher, but subsequent meetings are often chaired by one of the partners, with agendas developed jointly by the committee at the conclusion of each meeting. A survey at the first meeting can determine the most convenient time for meetings for the majority of the group.

Although there is a natural inclination for academies to seek financial support from their community, this can be counterproductive and is usually not the greatest need. Rather what is most needed is peoples’ time and expertise. Since 80% of school budgets is generally spent on personnel anyway, even if funds are provided they usually go primarily toward staffing. Volunteers who provide their time as Board members, speakers, field trip hosts, mentors, and internship supervisors, and who share their expertise on needed career field training, equipment, and instructional materials are a gold mine. And many enjoy serving in this role. It can be disarming for a company to be told the academy is not seeking funding from it.

Good communication is essential to forming and maintaining effective advisory boards. Someone at the high school, often an administrator or the lead teacher or a secretary who takes on this role, needs to be made the liaison and consistent point of contact. Likewise it is often possible to establish consistent contacts at companies and colleges. Since there are often differences in cultures and terminology between educators and business people, and related mistrust, establishing dependable communication and allowing learning to go on over time is essential.

It is also important for an academy to find ways to say thank you for the support of its partners. This can be done at academy events, but also via newsletters or other media that recognize the contributions of employers and colleges. Often the most effective form of appreciation is letters written by students themselves. Helping students is something almost everyone identifies with and the core of what motivates partners to become involved in academies.

Here’s a quick summary re. Advisory Boards:

• Committee Membership

• Employers, higher ed., community/ government, parent(s), teachers, administrators, counselor(s)

• Chair: Employer; or co-led, school leader/ partner

• Roles and Responsibilities

• Joint decision-making, with school/ district

• Variety of resources, meeting the 100% match

• People’s volunteer time and expertise

• Meetings

• Frequency—bi-monthly, quarterly

• Where—high school, company, college, rotating

• Agendas—in advance, with outcomes & times

• Between meeting task forces (2-4 members)

• Technical Curriculum

• Teacher Externships

• Facilities/ Equipment/ Materials

• Speakers/ Field Trips

• Additional Resources

• Maintain communication & say thanks

• An established academy liaison

• Thank-you notes (especially from students)

• Academy events

• Newsletter/ other media

15 Steps To Building And Maintaining A Large