Developing Collective Efficacy in Data Teams for School Improvement

Center for Model Schools Leading Data Teams: Developing individual capacity and collective efficacy Dr. Robert Thornell Dr. Heather Davis Schmidt Instruction and Leadership Coaches Center for Model Schools 1 / Center for Model Schools

Making Connections At your Table: Tell the story of your penny. 2 / Center for Model Schools

Teaching and Learning Monitor key indicators of success and well-being to continually refine systems of teaching & learning. Generate buy-in to prioritize teaching and learning using data Use holistic approaches for data analysis Plan ways to sustain data work over time by engaging in continuous improvement cycles 3 / Center for Model Schools

Table Talk: What would you do? Data Team Scenario #2: You walk into a collaborative data use meeting and find teachers discussing the various behaviors (e.g., attitude, disengagement) of their students as justification for why their achievement data is not what they would like and they start making excuses: This test is assessing things that we haven t covered yet; These kids are so low--the test is too hard; and The kids don t care about the test. How would you handle the situation? How do you respond to bring the group toward determining an action plan? Data Team Scenario #1 The majority of one grade level has worked at your school for 10+ years. Morale is high, but scores on assessments are average to low. The team isn t accustomed to outside assistance and the majority of teaching is a traditional approach. How do you work to establish yourself as an instructional partner in this situation? OR 4

VISION "...the single strongest lever for improving schools the quality of school leadership," (p. 108, Bryk et al, How a City Learned to Improve Its Schools) 5

Reflection What is your vision for data work in your schools and in what ways have you communicated this vision in your school? 6 / Center for Model Schools

Table Talk What data would your staff say is the most important on your campus and why? <<2:00->> 7

Vision and Strategy Create and communicate a bold and compelling vision to drive system-wide coherence. Collaborate to transparently enact a shared vision, core values, and the strategic plan. Leverage continuous improvement methods to measure progress and accelerate the vision. 1. For each leadership priority, select the description that is consistently true for your district/school. 2. Does your vision match what you staff thinks the vision is? If not, what steps will you take to intentionally move toward alignment? 8 / Center for Model Schools

STRATEGIES "All too often, teachers use data to discover where their students are weak or to identify skills or concepts their student have not mastered, and then stop there. In these instances, teachers are seeing only half of the issue. Unless and until teachers link these student weaknesses to teacher practice, that is instructional weaknesses, they cannot move forward in fixing the problem." -The Practice of Authentic PLCs Dan Venables 9

Data Audit - Examples School Data Academic Data Demographic Data Non-Academic Data Enrollment Grades Special education needs Attendance Graduation rates Tests English Language Learners Behavior Courses offered Assessments Race Family surveys Extracurricular activities Homework Economic status 10

Teaching and Learning Is this consistently true for your school? What is your process? Does your your staff think this is consistently true for your school? If not, what steps will you take to intentionally move toward alignment? Monitor key indicators of success and well-being to continually refine systems of teaching & learning. 11 / Center for Model Schools

"Part of being the instructional leader in the building or at the system level is initiating these important conversations," (p. 103, Patrick and Peery, PLC-Powered Data Teams) 12 / Center for Model Schools

Collaborate Four Steps to a Data Dive Gather Data Analyze Trends Share Insights Determine Next Steps Consider opportunities for gathering formative and summative data throughout learning. Get curious about the data you gathered: What trends do you notice within the data you gathered? What do you notice about the data gathered over time? What might be causing the trends you observe? Discuss trends with colleagues. Plan next instructional steps that might include: conferring with students providing scaffolds grouping students identifying the appropriate next lesson or task structuring class (whole group, small group) Incorporate others perspectives into your analysis to inform your instructional next-steps. 27 Easy Formative Assessment Strategies for Gathering Evidence of Student Learning Sample Data Collection Tools 13 / Center for Model Schools

Collaborate Four Steps to a Data Dive Gather Data Analyze Trends Share Insights Determine Next Steps 27 Easy Formative Assessment Strategies for Gathering Evidence of Student Learning Sample Data Collection Tools 14 / Center for Model Schools

Step 1: Gather Data What data do your teachers gather on a consistent basis? What do the do with it? Who looks at it? 15

Step 2: Analyze Trends Get curious about the data you gathered: What trends do you notice within the data you gathered? What do you notice about the data gathered over time? What might be causing the trends you observe? 16

Step 3: Share Insights Discuss trends with colleagues. What do we do well? What challenges do we observe? Incorporate others perspectives into your analysis to inform your instructional next-steps. Is one member of the team seeing different results than the others? Why? 17

Step 4: Determine Next Step for Instruction Plan next instructional steps that might include: conferring with students providing scaffolds grouping students identifying the appropriate next lesson or task structuring class (whole group, small group) 18

Continue the Work What did the data you collected, analyzed, and discussed indicate about your next steps for instruction? How can this protocol support you gathering and using data in a meaningful way that impacts student learning? Consider possible instructional next-steps based on our data analysis. Using a program on Ed? Be sure to check out the Teacher Success Pathway and Teacher s Corner resources for support with interpreting your program reports. 19 / Center for Model Schools

Continue the Work Create an Action Plan 20-Day Action Plan: What are ways to start making an adjustment to your existing processes? https://rebrand.ly/planningguide Identify goals and actions to put this into motion. 20 / Center for Model Schools

COLLECTIVE EFFICACY "...the relational trust among the school principal, teachers, students, and parents operates as both a lubricant for organizational change and a moral resource for sustaining the hard work of local improvement," (p. 108, Bryk et al, How a City Learned to Improve Its Schools) 21

Build collective teacher efficacy to sustain data work over time Collective Efficacy Defined A shared belief among educators that their behaviors can directly influence student outcomes and achievement. 22 / Center for Model Schools

If. .educators do not believe in all children s capacity to reach challenging standards, THEN they react with complacency when they see achievement gaps .educators do not know how to interpret data accurately, THEN they jump to flawed and erroneous conclusions .educators do not have a systematic improvement process in place, THEN the school will continue to experience chronic underperformance 23

The Impact of Collective Efficacy 0.4 (statistical significance) 0.92 1.57 1.29 0.29 0.52 Self-Efficacy Homework Socioeconomic Status Teacher Estimates of Achievement Collective Teacher Efficacy Impact on Student Achievement 24 / Center for Model Schools

Table Talk In what ways are these variables apparent within your organization? 1. High expectations around student growth 2. Routine teacher collaboration 3. Evidence of teacher impact 25 / Center for Model Schools

Leaders with Strong Self-Efficacy positively influence motivations of direct reports. positively affect organizational goals. promote a sense of collective efficacy to improve teaching and learning.. are more likely to persevere through school improvement challenges. are driven to exert positive influence on staff. 26 / Center for Model Schools

Things to Remember as a School Leader Data alone have no meaning. Meaning is imposed through interpretation. Frames of reference affect our view of the world and influence the meaning we draw from data. Effective data users become aware of and critically examine their frames of reference and assumptions. Data can become a catalyst for questioning assumptions and changing practices based on new ways of thinking. 27

Table Talk 1. What is something you learned today? 2. What is a question or wondering you have from today s learning? 28 / Center for Model Schools

Significant and stable changes in student performance require not only changes in classroom practice but also changes in the working culture of teachers. All cultural change requires leaders to recognize patterns and determine which patterns of interaction are productive and which are not. All groups, both large and small, develop norms around the distribution and uses of influence, authority, and power. How these norms play out in a given group forms the baseline from which any change will emerge. ~ Schein Source: Edgar H. Schein, Organizational Culture and Leadership, 5th ed. (San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2016), 113. 29

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Dr. Robert Thornell robert.thornell@hmhco.com Dr. Heather Davis Schmidt heather.schmidt1@hmhco.com 31 / Center for Model Schools

Resources Bryk, A., Greenberg, S., Bertani, A., Sebring, P, Tozer, S, Knowles, T. (2023). How a city learned to improve its schools. Harvard Education Press. & Patrick, P., & Peery, A. (2021). PLC-powered data teams: A guide to effective collaboration and learning. International Center for Leadership in Education, Inc. 32 / Center for Model Schools

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