NSBA 2012 Annual Conference Presentation
We were honored to share our experiences with the attendees at the National School Boards Association’s Annual Conference on April 21. A summary of the planning process we carried out during the 2010-2011 school year and the materials we used are available here.
Meridian 6th Graders Travel the Globe Without Leaving Classroom
Lori Wisnauski’s sixth grade classroom is located in suburban Chicago, but, for a few days this year, her social studies students transformed it into Africa. The project began as a solo research paper about a single African country, but Wisnauski wanted to push her students further. “That’s an individual project,” she says, “Where’s the collaboration? [...]
Digital Tools Enhance Art at AJHS
District 102’s art students can work in more media than ever before, creating projects using paper, paint, iPads, cameras and computers. Junior high art teacher Christina Lovering spends one quarter with each group of students, encouraging them to express themselves in as many ways as possible. Google SketchUp gives students an interactive way to express [...]
Tripp 2nd Graders Take Over Valentine’s Day Planning
Second grade teacher Becky Labbe was brainstorming ideas for a Valentine’s Day party, when she had a thought. Why not let the students plan the celebration? Students had to propose activities that were Valentine’s-themed, with an educational component. At first, she was concerned that the students wouldn’t have enough ideas to fill a full day. [...]
Podcasts Let Parents Share in 1st Graders’ Learning
The week of January 30th, Katie Cardella’s first-graders studied liquids, then raced those liquids in their pajamas. They also took language arts quizzes, made Groundhog Day predictions, played math games and created a class recipe book. And now, thanks to Cardella’s introduction of weekly classroom podcasts, parents and community members can get an insider’s look [...]
Class Wiki Provides Home-School Connection for Tripp 2nd Graders
Every Friday for years, Barb Novak would stand in front of her class and write five sentences on the chalkboard. Her students would copy down these sentences–each of which recounted a different activity from the week–and bring them home to share with their parents. It gave family members a glimpse into the classroom, but there [...]
AJHS Social Studies Students Take Civil War Lessons On-Line
After Drew Herrera’s class finished a recent quiz on the Civil War, they spent rest of the class discussing the conflict’s origins. They talked about Lincoln’s “a house divided speech,” slavery and state’s rights, making over 100 comments in about 20 minutes. And no one said a word. The 7th graders were using Schoology, a [...]
Students Share iPad Experience with Board Members
Last September, Meridian teachers began piloting iPads in the classroom and recently shared these experiences. Students from Mrs. Cummins’ and Mrs. Curtis’ classes presented to the D102 Board of Education using the technology expertise they developed from collaborating with peers, exploring new apps, and daily integration of this flexible communication, learning tool. In January, Meridian’s Instructional [...]
Small Group Discussions Make D102 Community Event Meaningful
On March 21, D102 hosted the last of its four community events for this school year. The District rolled out the second-year action plan by breaking into four groups to allow for informal discussion and individual questions. Next year, D102 will roll out three new district initiatives: a new gifted model, a more extensive iPad [...]
Aptakisic Math Teacher Screencasts, Students Benefit
When Amy Leibach’s junior high school students need help preparing for tests, they no longer have to rely on textbooks or scribbled pages of notes. Instead, they can review concepts using their own teacher’s lectures, thanks to Leibach’s new practice of screencasting. Using a “smart” tablet, Leibach draws out math problems and records corresponding voiceover [...]
About Our Process:
We encourage you to take a look around the whole site, but here are the specific details about our 2010 planning process.
Welcome!
Every day, every student will come to school and be met with learning opportunities at his or her personal developmental level in all subject areas. He or she will leave school having been challenged, feeling successful, and looking forward to tomorrow.
Developed by a Strategic Design Committee more than 12 years ago, this is a powerful statement that continues to be timely and relevant. Unlike a business, a public institution cannot measure success by counting profits earned or widgets produced. Instead, progress must constantly be measured against the vision. The first session was dedicated to developing a solid understanding of the district’s vision and identifying observable traits and indicators that will provide D102 with the framework and measurements to assess current realty in relationship to our vision.
The second meeting built upon the first by confronting the brutal facts of our school system, as reflected in varied data, including several measures of academic performance and survey responses gathered from multiple sources. Four broad themes emerged from the group’s analysis of this data: “Life and Learning Skills,” “Writing in 21st Century Contexts,” “Personalized Learning and Academic Rigor,” “Human Capital: Recruit, Develop and Support Highly Effective Teachers”.
At the third meeting, the group broke into smaller teams, each one taking one of the broad themes and writing a specific goal statement—which you can read in the pages of this site. Following this meeting, District staff took the goals and worked through the winter to create action steps and strategies for the coming year, as well as a roadmap for the following years.
We are extremely proud of the work done by all of our participants. This site represents both the culmination of that work and beginning of the process of bringing it to life. We invite you to explore the 2010-2011 Future Planning Process, but be sure to check back in as we share our stories from the road.