 by the pre-K through third grade national working group. This is the second in a short series that we're putting together that highlight what pre-K through third grade reforms look like in action, in implementation, in real schools, in real districts around the country. Many of you that have followed our work know that we did another series of webinars last year that really looked at some of the conceptual framing and inherent issues within P3 or pre-K through third grade reforms. And so it's nice to be able to bring those pre-K through third efforts into real life settings. This call is scheduled to be 75 minutes long, an hour and 15 minutes. We will be highlighting some work being done in Chicago. That full introduction will come in a moment. We do hope that you will ask questions of the speakers and the presenters, and that can be accomplished by typing into the questions bar that you should see on your screen. We will be compiling those questions and posing them to the presenters at different times throughout the webinar. And if your question can be answered directly through the system, we will do that as well. Throughout the webinar, we do pose a small number of polling questions. This is to really hear from you, the listeners who are participating in the webinar, to get a sense of who you are and what some of your questions and issues might be. We will show the first polling question right now, so we can walk you through what this process looks like. When the polling question begins, you will see a screen pop-up that asks you to select a choice. All you need to do is click on it and then hit submit. We will leave the poll open for approximately 30 seconds, and then we will close it and display the results so that everybody can see the responses. And as we said, this will happen several times throughout the webinar. So as we begin to transition and Chris, I will kick this off to you. We will leave the poll open for just a few more seconds so that everybody has a chance to answer. And then, Chris, I will let you take it over and introduce the new school project. Terrific. Thanks, Kristi. As we are waiting for the response to the polling question, I'm Chris Maxwell, director of the new school project in Chicago, and it looks as if presenting to a free group is our largest category of people being free. Also, we have kindergarten teachers. There are classrooms and a good set of school workers. Next slide. In our focus today, as Kristi's already said, we're focusing on the new schools project, which is a pre-K-3rd initiative that brings a collaboration between Erickson Institute in Chicago together with very specific partners within Chicago public schools and other public schools in the Chicago community. We can move forward. Next slide. Today, I'm joined by three of our colleagues who are very much engaged in day-to-day, minute-to-minute practice. You'll first hear from Leslie Popchook, who is a primary teacher at Erie Elementary School. Followed by that, you'll hear from Minnie Watson, who is a principal of a school that has recently joined in partnership with the new school's project. She's a former kindergarten teacher, and she is joined by Nellie Lawton, who is a third grade teacher at DePriest Elementary. Next slide. Just to give some grounding before we really hear from the real pre-K-3rd reformers in our group today, the new school's project in supporting and working in collaboration with public schools to bring about pre-K-3rd reforms focuses on what might be called the pre-K-3rd basic equation. In that regard, most of our work, or primarily all of our work, takes place in collaboration with partnerships with specific schools and specific educators within those schools to really support providing higher quality pre-K-3rd grade learning experiences for young children as they enter school and move through the early grades. In this regard, we really focus on ensuring up-back, making sure that teaching practices are effective and really respond to what we know about the development of young children and the ways that young children learn most. We also want to make sure, and again this is the basic pre-K-3rd equation, that high quality practices are present in each classroom in pre-K, kindergarten, first, second and third. This is how we know we'll have the highest possible impact on young children's long-term learning. We also focus on promoting continuity across early experiences. It's not enough just to have high quality in each classroom, but we really work with teachers, collaborate with administrators to grow the amount of continuity and consistency in classrooms within each grade level as well as the continuity across grade levels so that what happens in pre-Kindergarten is then aligned and is a smooth next step for children as they move into kindergarten and similarly up through the grade level. Next slide. Just a quick overview, as we engage in partnerships with schools, we focus on three-year intensive partnerships, joining in collaboration with urban public schools across Chicago. In this regard, we collaborate with administrators like Minnie Watson and we work with teachers, providing professional development in the more formal sense of the word, but most importantly, following professional development forward with teacher coaching in classrooms, modeling practices when that seems important to do, and guiding teachers in engaging in regular and a lot of teacher collaboration teamwork and using evidence from their classrooms to problem solve and keep nudging their pre-Kindergarten practices forward. As we do this, we always keep our eye on promoting teacher leadership. We start with the expertise that we know resides within each teacher and within each school and from there really work to build self-sustaining teacher leadership so that as we transition out of partnerships, the ongoing work on pre-K through third grade continues. Our work within each school, and you'll hear momentarily why we think this is so important, is anchored by a school-based new schools project facilitator or coach. This is someone who spends regular time each week within the school really coming to know teachers, coming to know administrators, coming to know children and to be able to use this information to provide the most sensitive support possible for pre-K through third development. As we focus on advancing practices, our work does focus on supporting the development of the oral language and literacy foundations that we know are important for high levels of learning for children across curricular areas. With this in mind, though, our work is always grounded in concern for the whole child, knowing that social-emotional learning is critical to ensure intellectual and high levels of academic learning. Next slide. Our commitments as we engage in schools, although I earlier mentioned a basic pre-K through third equation, as we begin to look further and join force with teachers and administrators within the schools, it's anything but basic. We have five commitments, which should look familiar, that we think are critical. We know are critical. They're research-based commitments that must be attended to if we truly are to promote meaningful reforms that make a difference for children and families. Within those, we know that relationship-based learning and trust between children, between children and teachers is critical. We also place family culture and context at the forefront in everything we do, ensuring not only that educators come to really know and understand children's family environments and their home culture, but as importantly that they use these understandings to inform what they do daily in the classrooms. Through this cultural lens development, as you'll hear Leslie Popchow particularly talk about, we know that each child has his or her own developmental pathway. Part of the job is to understand where each child is on his or her pathway and use that as a launching point toward nudging children toward high academic achievement and high intellectual development. Always, we use strengths as a starting point, knowing that each and every child comes into our schools with strengths. And finally, we work to ensure that all learning has authentic applied classroom connection. It's not just school learning, but learning that is important for each child because it helps him or her come to understand something of personal value and also a tool for problem solving as they come to learn about the world. As you can see, the column for educators is very much duplicative and runs parallel to our commitments to children. Based on what we know not only from developmental science, but adult learning, we know that high quality professional learning occurs through relationships that we as professional developers have a responsibility to gain the trust of the adult, the teachers, the administrators with whom we work. That our professional development will be meaningless unless it's closely grounded in the context of each classroom, in the context of the work of each educator. The teachers, like children, have their own developmental pathways and as we come to know teachers well through relationships of trust, we're able to be responsive to the pathway of each teacher and help them move forward in ways that are meaningful to them. Strength, we know that expertise relies, as I mentioned, within every teacher and within each school. Our goal is to identify the expertise and build upon it. And finally, authentic applied professional learning. Professional development, as we understand it, must be closely connected with the day-to-day practices of teachers over time in a sustained way, if it is really to make the kind of reform changes we're hoping will happen for pre-K-3rd. Next slide. Our five commitments are not just lofty goals, lofty ideas, but they really are translated into and we work hard to translate them into teaching practices. So for example, the center, we know that our target is really intellectually challenging teaching and learning. As we work in schools that primarily serve children of color, children whose home languages are different than English and children whose families experience economic poverty, we know often that teaching and learning in the early grades and at all grades is often kept at a very low level. We know that can't happen. So intellectually challenging teaching and learning, the place is strong communication at the forefront. Support for children's higher order thinking and inquiry and important content must be there if we really are to create options for children. As we think about intellectual development and high-level learning, however, once again we are grounded in practices that support the whole child that are developmentally supportive. Support, as we talked about, for people to understand what development is like in different areas, that what's drawing, painting, high-level thinking begins with the play. Chris, I'm sorry, you might hold this for a minute. I think that phone ringing might have been on your end and so we couldn't hear you, so you might have to repeat those last three sentences. Oh, okay, thank you. As we take thinking about developmental pathways, I lost a wonderful goal in trying to make sense of that for teachers shifting their classroom practices. We provide support for thinking about the whole child, for understanding what learning looks like from a developmental perspective within the content areas. That within writing, for example, high-level writing begins with painting, drawing, or dictating. That high-level thinking begins for young children in the context of play, whether it's pretend play or constructive play. We help teachers think concretely about what does it mean to use information about cultural connections within the context of literacy, for example, as they begin to use culturally relevant literature in very intentional ways with children, or they learn to be respectful of the home language and the home dialects children bring into school and use those as bridges to more standard English reading and writing within the context. We look at how a caring and inclusive classroom community must be in place if we ever expect to get to intellectually challenging teaching and learning, particularly for young children who need to feel safe and secure to take the kind of risk to make mistakes that really engender learning. We know that within the classroom community, not only do we need strong teacher-child relationships, but really strong peer relationships through which children learn and support each other's higher-level learning. And finally, we know that, and it's become tried to say, that assessments must be used as guides for teaching and learning. But again, as we think about moving toward high-quality pre-pay third and pre-pay third reform, we know that it means looking and trying to figure out how to use alternate forms of assessment within the classroom, such as observing and conferencing one-on-one with children. We also know that, as we think about adult development and the development of teachers, it means really supporting teachers and finding new ways to engage in collaborative problem-solving using data from their own classrooms, such as video tapes or student work samples. Next slide. When this all comes together in new schools, partner schools, such as Erie Charter School or Oscar de Pris Elementary, what it really means is that both young children and teachers find their voice and find a powerful voice to pre-pay third reform. We believe that this is particularly important in today's context for teachers who often face mandates and dictates without an opportunity for true decision-making. We also know that it's true for diverse young children, children of color, children of poverty, children with different home languages, who are often silenced as they come into the school classrooms. Empowerment for us is a bottom-line goal. And here you can see some examples of what teachers tell us as they move through pre-pay third reforms in terms of examples here from literacy. Writing occurs. Of course, I want my children to learn basic skills. I also want them to know that they have a voice and it matters. I want them to come to know that different forms are writing so they can decide how to say what they want to say. I want them to know I can write about anything. I can express myself through writing. I am a writer. Similarly, as we have support teachers in gaining the knowledge about children's development and other dimensions of pre-pay third reforms, we support opportunities for them to share that knowledge with each other. And through that comes the empowerment that what I know matters and actually gives me hope that together we can make education better for young children. Final slide. Now as we move on to the voices in today's presentation that matters most, people from the field, I want to quickly introduce the two schools that will be represented. These are both new schools, projects. Partner schools have worked intensely with us to integrate their own forms of pre-pay third reform. It's important to note that pre-pay third reform, from our perspective, is a process and it's a process that takes time. As our presenters today will show, there are many different entry points for schools and teachers to engage in pre-pay third reform and the reforms can look different in each school. Regardless though, the essentials that I've just given an overview of are critical if we are to ultimately construct pre-pay third reform that really will make a difference for children. Our first presenter, Leslie Popchow, represents Erie Elementary School, which is a very long-term partner school that was started with pre-pay third ideal in mind and has since come to be quite a leader in the world of pre-pay third and above. Oscar de Priest Elementary is a Chicago Public School and a very treasured partner school that came on board with us just one year ago. So they are actually in the initial stages of constructing and implementing their own pre-pay third reformers. So I believe now we have a polling question and then I will introduce our next presenter. Polling question is up. If everyone could just click one answer, we'll leave the poll open for approximately 10 more seconds so that Leslie and her colleagues can get a sense of who has most helped you develop as a pre-pay third educator. And so five more seconds and then we'll close the poll and Leslie will start the slides for you. All right. So this kind of bears out what we just said, which is colleagues are incredibly important in all of our own professional learning. Professors such as those at Erickson make a difference and children themselves. I would like to introduce now Leslie Popchoke, who is a third second grade teacher as she mentioned. And she will talk about how she and Erie Elementary, the school where she now teaches second grade, have grown to be leaders for pre-pay third. Next slide. Hello, everyone. As Chris said, I'm Leslie Popchoke. I teach second grade at Erie Elementary Charter School and am an Erickson Institute alum. And being asked to do this webinar, I was really given the opportunity to reflect on my teaching and my education history. And I was able to come to several different conclusions that, as teachers, we need to constantly remind ourselves about. And I'm going to share some of these with you today. As I was working on my master's degree at Erickson Institute, I decided that I really needed some actual teaching experience. So I became an assistant teacher at an Urban Head Start program in Chicago and was immediately thrown into a classroom of 23 to 5-year-olds with nothing more than a little bit of babysitting experience and zero classroom management, let alone any child development. So as I was learning to teach pre-pay, I realized that I knew very little about teaching, let alone child development and what children needed to learn. I was asking myself constantly why were these three-year-olds being so incredibly unreasonable and was really speaking in the answers through my education. So as my coursework continued at Erickson, I learned about children and I learned about their physical, cognitive, social development for birth to eight years old. As I was learning and reading the background of how children grow and learn, I was able to experience it firsthand in my classroom and things really started to make more sense. I began to see why these three-year-olds needed to feel in control and needed choices. I began to really see and hear all of the changes that my English language learners were making and understanding how they were adjusting to the new language, one word at a time and really noticed all of the accomplishments they were making. For example, one of my little three-year-olds in particular was such a questioner and constantly asked why questions about why we were going to recess, why we were eating lunch, where was the other teacher, and this went on all day. So eventually I learned that developmentally this was his way of continuing the conversation with me and soaking up as much vocabulary and verbal exchange and experience as he could rather than intentionally trying to drive me crazy. He was learning and he was seeking new information in his language development. So through these experiences I now am able to focus my teaching through my child development knowledge. So I like to think that now I'm teaching more on how children learn based on their developmental needs and their capabilities rather than what I think they need. Expecting a three-year-old for the first 20 minutes. Sorry, people. I don't know why that's doing that. Hey, we think it went away. Sorry. So through my education and really learning about child development it made so much more sense to me why these three-year-olds were unable to sit on the carpet for 20 minutes and it was unreasonable to ask them to do so based on their development and attention and their physical needs. Whereas an eight-year-old is much more capable to do that. Now as a result my teaching is sort of broken up into these time chunks which are much more developmentally appropriate and I know that they are able to grasp the new content of material as I teach them. Next slide. So and then came second grade. After spending a couple of years in preschool I was able to start teaching in a second grade classroom and really needed to work on building the social-emotional confidence of my students through our classroom community. In beginning teaching with second graders I knew that these children wanted independence desperately but they really needed my help. So now I was teaching in a classroom where the students were capable of putting on their coats and writing their names and these sort of things but they had a lot of problems in solving issues that arose with each other, with their peers. They so badly wanted to be able to figure everything out by themselves but they really needed my guidance and my modeling. So there was a lot of arguing about friendships and partners and who can play, who can't play. So social-emotionally they were in a very fragile place which I knew from the developmental perspective that they were just in the midst of this five to seven shift where they were starting to see themselves as a piece of a larger puzzle rather than an egocentric three-year-old that just wanted blocks when they wanted them for no other reason. So as they're trying to negotiate these friendships and social circle they really tried to keep these second graders calm and together by providing them with classroom meetings and problem-solving corners. In order for me to do the best teaching that I could I knew that they needed to have this foundation in their social-emotional confidence. So our classroom meetings we used as a form in which we could role-play and read literature. They gave them examples of social situations that they were experiencing. We did team-building activities. We played games where some students lost on purpose so they could go through the loss and be happy for their classmates and come out okay on the other end. Our problem-solving corners consisted of a rug in the corner where students were asked to go and talk about how to solve their problem peacefully. They were given eye statements and choices about how to solve problems on their own using their own words and empowering themselves. Fortunately through the beginning of my teaching career I was given the opportunity to loop with my students. So I began teaching second grade and was given the opportunity then to loop with these students to third grade. Having two years with the same group of students early on in my teaching career really gave me the opportunity to continue working with these beautiful relationships that I helped foster not only with the children but with their families. So looping gave me the benefit of beginning the next year and knowing that all of these little personalities that I was working with who would need more help in solving social situations than others who would be able to start off the year sort of running. Next slide. So through looping I was able to really connect with the families of my students of the school, their culture and their languages and focus on the whole child. So looping also provided me with these opportunities to really get to know and understand my children and their families and their cultures. All of which helped me understand their unique needs and helped me cater to their learning experiences. It wasn't just about what reading level they were on or what areas math they needed assistance with. It was about who were they eating dinner with at night, who lives at home, who's picking him up after school. I really found success in my teaching by opening myself up to learning from my families through relationships. In my few short years I have been working primarily with Latino and African American families. I am young and Caucasian. So in working with these demographics I felt like I really needed to make myself vulnerable and open up to the understanding of these cultures that I was unfamiliar with, their homelines and their extended families. I have always been really honest with my families and have set up front. I am not married. I do not have children of my own. So I have no idea how difficult it is when you get home and have homework to do and get dinner on the table and make sure everyone has their uniforms ready for the next day. And I tell my parents, I don't understand that. However, I do know what they need to be a successful student. They need a family that supports their school efforts and a school that values their family and culture no matter what it looks like. Through these cultural observations, a lot of our families speak Spanish. We are a dual language school and Spanish is either taught as a class once a day or to the general education classroom or all day in our dual language classroom. I speak some Spanish and it is very limited. But again, I think by making myself vulnerable to my families and speaking my broken Spanish to some parents, we have a little laugh, they smile and we begin to build that trust with one another that has really helped in focusing on the academic aspects of students. So in admitting these sort of shortcomings, I think I've earned a lot of respect and trust from my families and they say, it's okay, she's not a mom, she doesn't speak Spanish, but she is a teacher who will understand where my kid comes from and what he needs to learn. Next slide. So after I had spent all of this time and energy learning about child development and really spending a lot of time with the students teaching their social and emotional development, I felt like I was really able to begin the actual teaching. So I sort of know what I'm doing. The groundwork is now laid for intellectual challenge. So they now have the skills to struggle through their social problems. I'm more thoughtful in my planning so that I know that they are developmentally able to handle something. The students are now able to learn in powerful ways through peer interactions and able to work independently. We have taken the time to set up these structures so that they can solve problems on their own. They can work independently while I am working with a small group and the classroom can function as a whole. Now that they have some of this groundwork, they can navigate the content. So it's not just about teaching how to problem solve, but now it's about problem solving within the content areas. They can handle group work. They can ask each other questions about fear or reservation. They can speak their mind freely in the classroom and feel that it is an open and safe place. Language and literacy has been a large focus of my teaching as it is in many early childhood classrooms. Beginning our morning with our morning meeting where we start the classroom as a whole, as a community, as a safe place for everyone to be greeted in the morning and also to hear a story to read their name on the morning message. These are all things that have really helped in the flow of my teaching as well as in the classroom. Part of our literacy that we like to focus on that really incorporates the families and culture through our writing. We often have things like publishing parties where after the students have taken the time to write a story and published it, we are able to invite the families to come in and share cultural snacks and treats and share all of our stories, whether they're written in English and Spanish, with all of our families, and allow the families to become a part of the classroom and then the classroom to then become a part of the home. Last slide. So overall, some of the lessons that I've learned in educating myself in early childhood education and also teaching in pre-case or third grade and through the New Schools Project now as a teacher-leader liaison. Getting to know the children and families has been the biggest, most important lesson I've learned that is such an important foundation to know children developmentally, to know their families, to know their cultures, to know where they come from and then where I am able to take them. Understanding their developmental perspectives. So I know now what they can handle and I can challenge them intellectually and ask myself these questions when I'm planning my lessons more thoughtfully, knowing that developmentally they should not be able to do something. However, intellectually, I can push them a little bit further in other areas. And I think the biggest, most important lesson that I have to keep reminding myself and have been reminded of in doing this webinar is trusting myself and being able to laugh often. In the beginning, I was laughing after class was over. Oh, that was funny when this happened, but now I feel as though I'm able to laugh with the students and alongside them and have fun in teaching and enjoy each other's company. Thank you, Leslie, with your story about growing up through pre-case or third. I think we now have a polling question, if I'm not mistaken. As we look, there it is. As we shift, we're now going to hear from Mrs. Minnie Watson, who, as I mentioned, is the principal of Oxford. But also a former principal. As we prepare to hear from Mrs. Watson about the principal. And maybe you are that principal or director. I'll respond to that now. Thanks. This is our most even vote. Are we part of our participants' leadership or formal leadership? Most third who have mostly committed. And the quarter who are really moving forward in wrapping on to pre-case or pressure of introducing Mrs. Minnie Watson from Oxford. As I mentioned, she's looked at her entire career, but now is on the front door of the school she currently leads. So I'm going to interrupt for a technical. We have this obviously nagging phone ringing. We did everybody's mute. We're not quite sure where the noise disruption is coming from. Can you hear me? All right. Yes, I have my phone on. Don't believe it's coming here. Are you on a phone line right now? Hello. Hello. Oh, this is good. It went away. But we're on the private line. So we took it off speaker grace. I'm sorry. Okay. All right. Well, this is Minnie Watson. Hi. How are you doing? I apologize for the ringing. It's okay. Okay. Next slide. Next slide. So the question is why zoom in on pre-case to third grade at our school? We wanted, first of all, to dispel the negative stereotypes that students and properties could not achieve. But we also saw a need with our teachers. We felt that they were not prepared, a lot of them, to teach early childhood developmentally. They did not understand childhood development. And also they needed coaching in terms of what good early literacy looks like in a classroom. If you look at our numbers, we're 98% poverty, free and reduced lunch. And most of our children, over 50%, were not meeting or achieving on our standardized steps. Next slide. But our children are much more than numbers and they deserve the best. And when we had the opportunity to work with Erickson Institute with this partnership, we knew that we were going to get the best training for our teachers. And through the best training, it would improve not only their teaching, but it would also benefit all of our students. What does that look like? Teachers have collaboration time now embedded in the school day. Next slide. Oh, I'm sorry. They use that time for professional development with their coach from Erickson, learning around balanced literacy practices and how to improve differentiation in the classroom. These teachers are also not only building reading skills, but also developing cognitive skills with their children such as memory, attention and sequencing, all of which will help the students become better learners and will increase achievement. We're building trust with our families through our involvement with the Parent Cafe. At the Parent Cafe, the parents are given an opportunity to discuss not only the academic needs of their students, but also the social and emotional needs with trained staff members who are not only educators, but also licensed behavioral therapists so they work with the whole child and the family. Next slide, please. Where are we now? As we're looking in our classrooms, one year into the partnership, we're seeing classrooms where guided reading is going on. We're seeing groups of students who are having sustained reading time with leveled books, and we're seeing an abundance of different types of literature in our classrooms. We're seeing quality lessons being given, driven by units and collaborative planning. We also are seeing more literacy circles in the classrooms and more confidence in our students. Next slide. Okay. Thank you, Ms. Watson. Now, we have a polling question, and then I will introduce Nellie Lawson, who is a third grade teacher at Oscar de Priest and very much involved in changing her practices. One of the things you'll hear Nellie talk about is she's opening the floor to more child talk, which we know is related to more child thinking in young children and all children. So think about your own practices or your own settings. How actively are children supported in talking with one another during learning activities in your program? All right. So we see that there's a good bit of talk going on. Sometimes there's not as much talk, and we still have a few classes that rarely have children talk. So with that, let me introduce you to Nellie Lawson, who is a long-term teacher, currently teaching third grade with students at Oscar de Priest. And the title of Nellie's talk is Changing My Practices, Giving Children the Chance to Talk and Think. So we want to really appreciate Nellie's willingness one year into really thinking seriously about pre-K through third grade forms to share her experience very much from the heart and soul of a teacher just as Leslie did. Nellie? Yes. Next slide. And looking back and reflecting on my teaching practices before being a part of the new schools project, I can honestly say that I talked during most of the instruction, and the children spent most of their time listening to me, teach. I did most of the reading and even answered many of my own questions. The children mostly listened most of the day. The children relied on me to do everything for them. There wasn't much independent time or collaboration amongst one another. They learned, but most of their learning was achieved through the teacher's guided lessons, where I dominated most of the discussions with the teacher's student responses. Next slide. I'm changing my teaching practices starting with literacy. I am having more of a release of responsibility, which allows the children to reflect and talk to one another, and I'm not doing all of the talking all the time. There's a more balanced and more active learning and time for them to think and talk. There are more uses of book clubs and guided reading groups, more interactive centers where they collaborate and work with one another. They're spending more time being independent readers and doing individual conferences with me, where these discussions are areas where they have shown more growth in their reading comprehension or where they may receive more practice on skills that they are needed for them. Next slide. Because I'm changing my teaching practices, what the children are doing is also changing. They're talking more. They're being more collaborative with one another. They're asking more questions, creating their own questions. They're being more focused. They think more, and they are debating and defending their ideas. Their reading comprehension, their stamina, and their motivation are all being increased. They are considering more issues and reflecting more on their ideas more internally. They are being more engaged in their learning. Because of this, our culture and our classroom community is changing also. Cultural connections through children's literature is very important because the children seem to relate more to the stories if the children are about children like them. Next slide. What children read and think about really matters to them. They want to read and they want to write more when things are more internal to them. These things are not being possible without classroom community and social skills that allow them the opportunity and the example to have literacy as a tool. Next slide. Here I'm going to talk to you about a discussion. This was a discussion about an authentic issue that came up while we were reading a story called Jackie and Me, written by Dan Gutman. The students were discussing the story and how the main character had experienced racism. The character was traveling back in time to do research about the life of Jackie Robinson during the 1940s. As he traveled back, he was turned into a young black male. As he described the events that he was going through, he received negative names. Bottles were thrown at him and he became very outraged at the way that he was being treated. He didn't understand it. One of the students in my class commented about another student in our class. She said that the white girl in our classroom, she didn't have to experience what black kids go through each day. But before I could respond or correct this statement of this student, this young lady, Jay, stated, I am not white, I am Jessica. She went on to explain how she had been called this white girl since preschool here at the preschool. And she didn't like it. She talked about how she never called anyone names, but yet they all called her the white girl. She said, I am no different from any of you. This conversation went on for a while and the students began to discuss back and forth the way that things were going on in the classroom and how they usually talked to one another in disrespect. Everyone began to see how this student was hurt and saw her in a new light. They all began to apologize to her after this. Jay seems to have been relieved and her words were heartfelt throughout the class. This helped create a better classroom community and it built respect within our classroom for differences and acceptances within the class. Next slide. What has mattered for my learning during my set with the new school project? Having our facilitator in our classroom, she knows me and she knows my classroom firsthand. She is there to observe my teaching practices. She provides onsite and quick feedback, which helps me to improve the things that I am doing in the classroom with my teaching. She models ideas for me with my children when I need it. She understands that changes in teaching and learning take time, which most of us need. She helps us to work as a team and she uses assessments and data that helps to guide our teaching and our decisions. She provides feedback and professional development that are meaningful to us because she knows what we need at certain times and when we need it. Without this help, she helps us to help each individual child. Can you go back? Yeah. Sorry. Sorry. That's okay. With all of her help, it helps us to help each individual child within our classroom. Okay. Thanks, Nellie. And before we move on, I think I want to thank particularly Leslie and Nellie for sharing stories that show that all of the elements, the five elements we talked about, cultural connections, developmental perspective, classroom community, using assessment to know children well are all necessary for us to really get to that goal of truly providing intellectually challenging experiences to really support children in making strong intellectual and academic progress. So thanks for that. We hope you also saw threads that what the conditions that need to be in place for the strongest development, the strongest learning of children are very much parallel to the conditions that need to be in place for the strongest sense of satisfaction and the strongest sense of decision making and professional learning for adults, for teachers. So with that, we have a final polling question, and then we'll have a few comments and then open it up to questions. So as you answer the polling question, we hope you'll also take a minute to use the chat box to type in some questions for us, something you might want to learn more about, or other things that you might want to learn about our work through the New Schools Project. So as we know that talking, for most thinking and learning in children, we also know that talking and collaborating with colleagues is a very powerful channel for adult professional learning. How often does that take place within your program? Minnie, if you could please put your phone on mute. That would be great. All right, so it sounds like we're still waiting for our mystery ring to stop. Yes, that's Minnie's phone, so the phone is on crisis, so it's Minnie's line, so whatever they did present, they need to do again. Yeah, if there could be a shift, it would help a lot for working to quiet this. Yeah, Minnie, we need you to take the phone off. There we go. Thanks. So make the stop and not being very close to the poll. I think we might just take her off. I think despite the ringing, we'll proceed forward. What's important, and your rating talked with Pierce. Chris, can you send many a text to hang up, please? We did. As you documented through your polling question, talk and collaboration with Pierce is a large part of your life. And this is what we know is important about formulating pre-K-3rd goals for reform, and that working to achieve them is about building up a community of practice among professionals involved in each school setting. Achieving pre-K-3rd reform goals is not the work of individuals, but comes from the collaborative work of educators at each grade level and across grades to create a school environment that embraces children, families, teachers, and administrators. And as we mentioned, the bottom line for the new schools project as a pre-K-3rd partnership initiative is truly to empower pre-K-3rd grade educators. We do this by building a continuum of professional learning support for pre-service teachers, such as Leslie once was, practicing teachers, including Leslie now in her new life, and Nellie as well as teacher leaders. And you might have heard that Leslie is now transitioning into a teacher leader who works as a liaison between Erie School and Erickson. We partner with schools through a growing circle of pre-K-3rd leaders from alumni partner schools that have transitioned out of intensive partnerships with us. And I think most importantly, we look for and build upon the expertise that resides in early childhood educators and build safe professional learning and leadership spaces to take on the tensions. I actually have some questions I'd like to ask our presenters about these tensions. We know there continues to be strong tension between developmentally appropriate practice, such as some of the practices Leslie talked about, and rigor, rigor in schools. What does that really look like when we define it from a developmental perspective? We always ask the question, do we build up or do we push down? Leslie clearly built up as she took some of what she learned through working with pre-kindergarten children and used it as she grew up into the second grade teaching. Play continues to be a part of classrooms, but yet this is controversial as is inquiry-based learning. So we create a space for that as also looking at the new standards, common core standards, and how they can be applied in classrooms in ways that really enhance and elevate children's learning opportunities. So with that, I'd like to open up the floor to questions and one that has come through, and this is for each of our panelists, a question about the use of time. What have you done as you think about pre-k through third reforms to reconsider your own use of time? Where do you invest your time, as well as your use of time with children? Could we maybe start with Leslie? Sorry to interrupt, Chrissy. Just a quick technical note. With all of that phone ringing, we actually lost the other two panelists. Okay, well, we will take it from there. They have not logged back on, so they may not respond, just so you know. Okay, thanks. Leslie. So as far as where to place my time in my daily teaching, I do spend a lot of time on literacy, but it is sort of interwoven throughout the day. So it's part of our morning meeting. It is part of our math, part of our science or social studies. It really is coming from the ground up with those foundations and learning to read, and now in second grade, they are reading to learn. So we certainly use those literacy skills and reading and writing throughout the whole day. Okay, but how about your own use of time? How have you and Erie as a leader in pre-k third changed how we traditionally might use time toward the end of stronger pre-k through third programs? I think as far as teachers go, we do spend a lot of time in observing each other and collaborating during our prep period. We have a wonderful administration that allows us to go and observe one another and helps us find coverage for classrooms as I think our administration, as well as our early childhood staff, really values that time spent with one another and sharing ideas, critiquing each other, as well as offering suggestions for ways to improve our teaching practices. Thanks, and I hear, I don't know if this is correct, but I hear that Nellie is back on. Is that true? Yes, I'm here. Nellie, I'm wondering if you'd also respond, and I don't know if you heard the question, but as you think about starting to make real changes in your own teaching, and as you talked about working with colleagues, if you've made changes in use of time both in terms of your own time and how you might invest time in planning, but also your use of time in the classroom, what might have changed as you move forward with pre-k third? The things that we've changed, we do a lot of team teaching, where we plan together during our team meetings each week. We observe one another, we talk to one another, we go through the data that we receive from different test scores and sessions, where we use that data to guide what we're doing, and each Friday we have what's called the boot camp, where we gather children who are on the same writ band, and we work with them based off the skills that they are deficient in in order to get those things boosted up. And how about your... Go ahead. How about your time in the classroom in terms of teaching and learning activities? Has your use of time changed as you're opening the floor to children's talk? Oh, yes. They're spending more time collaborating with one another. We're spending more time actively learning, and things are like moving. Sometimes it seems in a past phase, but actually it takes a long time for them to get their thoughts across and they're like debating with one another on and off. Different discussions are popping up over the room, because everyone has a chance to voice what it is that they're thinking. So a lot of time is spent. We spend two hours on literacy alone. We have a literacy block each morning, and those are the types of things that occur, and then they use their reading comprehension skills to help deal their writing as well. Great. Thanks. I'm looking at other questions. One question I have for, and I think we lost lots and to her administrative responsibilities, but perhaps for you, Nellie, I know you teach predominantly African American children and Leslie talked quite a bit about really learning about culture from families. And I'm wondering, other than the story that you shared about Jay and how children's literature really engaged her in sharing a personally meaningful issue, and that really helped construct strong classroom community, if your children's cultural background, or how you factor in children's cultural background, as you think more intentionally about bringing culture into your classroom? It's done more intentionally, because when they're reading literature about themselves, it's more meaningful to them, so it's more intrinsic, and they're learning more because they can actually relate to the characters, they relate to the events that are going on in the story, because these are the things that they see each day, and it helps to build on their comprehension, because now they have the connections that they can add to the story. All right. Thank you. I mean, I'm looking at other questions. A question is, and again, we're focusing at this point on children's language and literacy as a focus within our project that, as I mentioned, is always mindful of the whole curriculum and the whole child, and as you, Leslie and Nellie, at very different points in thinking pre-K through 3rd, there are questions about what about math and other learning, how have you begun to make changes in those areas as you think about higher order thinking, more collaboration among children? Well, Leslie, Nellie with that one, and then Nellie? Okay. Sure. So I think as a school, we are really trying to shift our kids into that really deep problem-solving rather than, as Nellie was saying, us teaching to the kids and them answering our questions, but rather having them ask the questions. So we do, as a school, we have a whole group sort of problem-solving. So each month, our math coordinator gives us different level of problem-solving for each grade level, and we do a big presentation at the end of each month so that each class is really working on a problem that's not from the textbook. It's not from a worksheet. It is a real-life problem where we are drawing pictures. We're making diagrams. We're using models to try to figure out how to solve these problems that we might experience in real life. And through that, of course, we always try to incorporate the literacy. There's so many fantastic children's literature out there that talks about these big ideas and these big math problem-solving skills, rather. But I think overall, the big thing is that we want our kids to be problem-solvers and to persevere through challenging situations, whether it's in literacy or in math. Nellie? Okay. For us, problem-solving is one of our big go-getters. Using literacy, we're trying to incorporate literacy within the math as well with the problem-solving. We want them to adhere to that there's more than just one way to solve a problem. Everyone has a voice. Everyone has a chance to explain as well as critique one another. There are more real-world math problems that they have to solve. They're doing it together. They're doing it in teams. They're coming up with different ways to solve problems than just the traditional ways of solving problems. And they're proving their answers by explaining it to one another and giving one another a chance to debate whether or not okay. Maybe you did something different that I didn't do, explain why. Thanks. And as a part of this question, one of the questions that came through is how our project, the New School Project, links with Erickson's early math collaborative. And I would say we definitely learn from and with each other. Many of our, clearly, the commitments that guide our work for both children and for both teachers are very much the same in terms of knowing about adult learning, knowing about young children's developmental learning, and using that to inform our approach. Obviously, the math project has a very strong focus on children's mathematical thinking in the early grades. What we're currently doing and have just initiated is beginning to look at ways that we might join forces. One of the real challenges we find in supporting reforms within the schools is to really support practices and children's learning and moving forward takes a lot of laser-like focus. Teachers need real focus from us in terms of really honing in deeply on one dimension of their practice and moving that forward. So we're looking at perhaps a cycle through which we can support literacy followed by math or math followed by literacy that show the commonalities just as Leslie and Nellie just talked about while also supporting that depth of content knowledge that we know is very important and often not there quite honestly in traditional practices in the early childhood classrooms. Looks like we have time for about one more question. Let's see, I think maybe we can pull off two. One of the questions takes us back to the importance of children's social-emotional learning, really building that classroom community that is such an essential foundation for pushing practices forward at all age levels, but seemingly particularly so at Pre-K Third. And I'd like both Leslie and Nellie to talk about whether they use a specific curriculum or a specific approach to the classroom community building or what seems to be most important as they push practices in that regard forward. I guess we'll go in the same order, Leslie. So Irie has adopted the responsive classroom approach. So it's something that we really enforce particularly in the early grades and if you're not familiar with responsive classroom, it's very much a you break it, you fix it sort of motto. So as far as problem solving goes, it encourages children to work out problems with each other and to come up with solutions, sorry, isn't good enough, that sort of thing. And just recently this year, we have adopted school-wide K-8 the second step program, which is a really great program all about building social-emotional skills, identifying emotions, how to deal with anger, and then of course those skills get more complicated and more complex as they age. Nellie? Okay, we're here at the Pre-... we have also adopted the second step program and every class is... every class from Pre-Shea on up, we're doing second step lessons each day and every morning. It builds upon social-emotional skills and teaches the children to problem-solve with one another as well as with each other in groups and it allows them to voice how they're feeling and it allows the other students to hear what they're saying and actively listen and then respond accordingly. And I'm going to nudge you a little bit, Nellie, because I know you do more than just deliver a second step lesson. I know you've been really working on classroom meetings and what those are about and why you do them, so I'm wondering if you could just talk about that quickly. Yeah, well the morning meetings in the morning where we discuss different things that are going on. And during our morning meetings, we discuss things that may have happened in their lives or things that are going on each day, so the kids actually discuss with each other and then they go around and they collaborate with one another on how to either make things better or other solutions other than one right answer. And each classroom from Pre-K on up, we're all doing morning meetings as well. I'm looking at the clock. I think we're starting to run out of time. I know we had a question about assessment, so maybe 30 seconds from each teacher about what's been most important about using assessments and what assessments. And then I have a final response to a question about New School's project and then I think we have to end. So Leslie, assessment? So as far as assessment goes at Erie, our big literacy assessment is Fonus and Penel. We do that three times a year for formal assessments. However, all of our classrooms are encouraged to guided reading and we do a lot of informal assessments daily, weekly. Our writer's workshop, we're a lot of conferencing so that we are sort of constantly checking in with our students and assessing our lessons and altering them accordingly. Nellie? As an earlier space in thinking Pre-K, third? Here at Pre-S for assessments, we use the NWEA scores and that data drives our decisions on what it is that we're planning on teaching each day, as well as the ISAC. And the lower grades they're using was called DIBLS at TRC reading and as well as they're doing in-class math where they're assessing the students with the iPad on different math skills as well. And NWEA covers both language skills or literacy as well as math. And that's a good note to end on because I think it points out some of the challenges we face that there are very specific district mandated assessments that we don't replace. So the challenge as we move into Pre-K, third and working with schools is looking at first, how can assessments that are required be used most productively in supporting young children's learning and then also ways that teachers in schools can augment those with more expansive assessments such as observations or conferencing with children, which I know Nellie is, well, I know Leslie does it and Nellie is working very much on it as a way to learn one-on-one from children in very authentic ways to supplement more formal required assessments. Final note, I know one of the questions was about who are these new schools project facilitators. They are people who have a very sort of impressive complex of experiences. I say that because I'm not one. Our facilitators have both extensive classroom teaching experience, which we know is really important for them to work in really authentic ways with teachers, relationships that understand what teaching is like from the inside out, but also experience in supporting adults, either as professional developers, staff developers, coaches, and in some cases a number of our facilitators, such as the one who's sitting next to Nellie right now, I believe, have had administrator experience so that they can kind of grasp the bigger picture of school change, support across the grade levels, and then couple that with that very hands-on teacher knowledge. We found is sort of the equation to use that term again for supporters of teachers and administrators in really working overtime to support strong pre-K3 changes that are meaningful within the context of specific classrooms and specific schools. So with that, I think it's 315. We'd like to thank you. We apologize for the ringing phone. And pose one final polling question at the end for evaluation, but also to let you know that the next webinar, some of you, there's the polling question. As you fill that out, just to remind you that there is one final webinar of the series this year on April 30th that will describe the work of Erickson's early math collaboratives. For those of you who have had strong interest in their phenomenal work, looking specifically within the content area of math, both for the kinds of changes in curriculum and instruction and the processes through which they've promoted pre-K3 changes at the classroom level. So join us for that. Thanks. And I think that is it for today. Thanks again for joining us. And thanks to Nellie, Leslie, and Minnie for sharing their pre-K3 reforms with us. Yes. And thank you to you, Chris, for moderating today. And as a reminder, the slides will be available as will be a recording. Phone ringing and all will be posted on our website, which is on the screen right now. The slides will be up in the next day or two, and the recording might take just a little bit longer. But all of these resources will be available there. And if I might... One more thing, people are still there. One of the questions asked about, is there a great article on developmentally appropriate practice in rigor? Not to my knowledge. If anybody does, I'd love for you to let me know. It's clearly something we think a whole lot about and clearly need to write the article. So we will write that article and get it out to people. Thanks. All right. Thank you, Chris. And thanks to all of you. Have a great afternoon. Thanks again. Thanks, Christy.