When I arrived in 2018, it was easy to see that we had outstanding teachers and amazing students. I also noticed that the school had already started some of the foundational work for becoming a true Professional Learning Community (PLC) but there had been little guidance or whole school discussion about the process. Despite the work that needed to take place, I was sure that we could quickly shift from a school that was passionate about the success of every student, to one that guaranteed a viable curriculum for all. 

As we started the journey, I worked hard at developing relationships and fostering leadership to create a guiding coalition for implementation of our PLC.  The next stage of our work focused on a better understanding of this PLC framework and most importantly the four critical questions. As a former principal in a Title I school, I had experienced the amazing results that a school could achieve if we were able to fully embrace the PLC principles. After discussing the topic, reading various publications, and reflecting on our student outcomes in my first year, we worked as a building leadership team to develop an action plan and put in place key components of the PLC model.  

We began by reevaluating our mission, vision, collective commitments, and shared goals. Our mission became empowering students to change the world. Our vision was to enable students to meet their potential.  Our collective commitments helped us to create efficacy among staff. This critical dialogue set the tone for moving the conversation from the school level to the team level. Our staff remained committed to making small changes and being opened to enhancing their current practice, reading various publications that reinforced the key message from  Learning by Doing, and, most importantly, changing their weekly meetings that would now focus on the four critical questions. As teachers saw the benefits of this format and rise in student data, they bought into the process even further. While change is uncomfortable in nature, I felt confident that it was making sense to the staff members.

As the journey continued, teams came to consensus on the importance of developing norms and periodically revisiting their adherence. I continued to visit and offered support to our collaborative teams on a regular basis as they began to gain clarity around standards and identify priorities. We soon realized that providing a targeted learning block, 30 minutes daily,  for  students to receive differentiation was our next step. Then, as we developed formative assessments, this data was utilized to intervene and enrich.  As student results improved, our PLC journey gained even more momentum and the rate of implementation became faster.

As the years progressed and we faced the challenges of COVID, our teams remained committed to our students’ academic progress and our collaborative work because of the foundational (e.g. Mission, vision, values, and collective commitments )work that had taken place over the first two years. Even during the height of COVID, teams met, set SMART goals and started to share student work to ensure consistency across the teams. 

While our work has not ended, we are thrilled that we are one of the highest-performing schools in the district.  NWEA - MAP data consistently shows that our students are not only achieving at high academic levels in both math and reading, but we have increased the percentage of students performing at the 90th percentile over the last five years to 50% in math and 44% in reading! Our collaboration efforts have also resulted in being placed in the top 10% of elementary schools in Illinois by the Illinois School Board of Education and recognized at the National level by the Department of Education as a Blue Ribbon School in 2020. 

1. Monitoring student learning on a timely basis.

Collaborative teams at Elm School use student data as the driving force for instruction. Students in grades 1-5 are given Measures of Academic Progress (MAP), Fountas and Pinnell Benchmark  Assessment System (BAS) and AimsWeb Plus 3 times a year as a benchmark. At Benchmark meetings, grade level teams review the universal data to identify tier one trends and determine which students would benefit from additional academic support. Teams identify priority standards then create, adjust and review formative assessments to monitor student progress. In addition to this, classroom teachers utilize anecdotal notes, exit slips, technology integrated applications and collaborative work assignments to analyze students' understanding on a daily basis. Teams utilize data to set SMART goals to improve student achievement.

The collaborative teams study the district pacing guides, choose necessary resources and review common assessments to identify targeted instruction. We use the results of our common assessments to identify students who need additional time and support to master essential learning. Once students are placed in Tier 2 or Tier 3, the team identifies the intervention, progress monitoring tool and frequency for both.  Six to eight weeks after benchmark meetings and interventions have been implemented, the collaborative teams reconvene for Target Review meetings. At Target Review meetings, teams analyze progress monitoring data for students receiving intervention and determine next steps for programming (continue, fade, drop, intensify). Throughout this process, parents are informed of student interventions and progress.

 At weekly collaborative meetings, the teams agree upon proficiency definitions, create and review formative assessments, and discuss instructional adjustments, to meet the needs of the students in a timely manner. During our meetings we focus on the four questions:

1. What do we want our students to learn?

2. How will we know if each student has learned?

3. How will we respond when some students do not learn?

4. How can we extend and enrich the learning for students who have demonstrated proficiency?

The agendas and established norms clarify how staff members will communicate and work together. Additionally, celebrations of learning are important for our team and school community. 

2. Creating systems of intervention to provide students with additional time and support for learning.

Students are placed in Tier 2 and Tier 3 supports based on our MTSS process, which determines the appropriate level of support based on multiple data points. We want to intervene as soon as students experience difficulty, so making sure that the groups are flexible and fluid, is top of mind.  In general, Tier 1 makes up about 80% of the population, Tier 2 makes up about 15% of the population, and Tier 3 makes up about 5% of the population.

Elm School schedules a 30 minute block of time that is consistent each day for every grade level to ensure that students will receive additional time and support. This time is protected to guarantee timely and systematic enrichment and intervention. Students are seen by staff members in small groups. This can include our reading specialist, reading tutors, English learner teachers, resources teachers and differentiation specialists (enrichment), depending on student need. With an ‘all hands on deck’ approach we ensure a collective responsibility for student learning. 

In addition to the intervention block, our teachers provide daily small group differentiation within the classrooms. Their groups are organized through the conversation surrounding questions #3 and #4 in our weekly meetings, those struggling with, or moving beyond, mastery of priority standards. 

What’s more, Tier 3 students may have an extended day, arriving at 8:00 am four days a week. The general school day begins at 8:40, so this extra time provides an additional opportunity to close learning gaps. 

3. Building teacher capacity to work as members of high performing collaborative teams that focus efforts on improved learning for all students.

A key component to Elm’s success is the desire for continuous improvement. Teachers are constantly looking for new ideas to engage, support, nurture, and inspire students. Our staff respects one another and are generous in helping each other build capacity. Professional development funnels from district level initiatives, to building based school improvement strategies to classrooms that impact student learning. Every fall, the School Improvement Plan (SIP) targets specific strategies for addressing literacy, math and social/emotional learning goals. Our Guiding Coalition identifies areas that support our district initiatives and School Improvement Plan for the year. 

Weekly staff meetings are focused on professional development. Staff members share presentation duties depending on the topic; whether sharing new ideas learned at a conference, research from a recently read book/article, or leading a discussion of rubrics to ensure consistency in scoring and vertical alignment. 

Grade level teachers have collaboration time built into their daily schedules. These meetings provide staff the opportunity to grow and learn from one another, and include support personnel, such as art, music and physical education teachers. To an observer, the participants at these meetings are not recognizable by position; rather everyone is seen as a valued member of the team.  

Achievement Data Files

• k-2-data-5611-3.xlsx
• longitudinal-map-data.pdf
• nwea-data-4327.pdf
• 3-5-3175-1.xlsx
• 4tht2benchmark-2514.pdf

Illinois Report Card Exemplary School Designation: 2020-2023

Department of Education National Blue Ribbon School 2020

IAHPERD Blue Ribbon: 2018-2023, 2024-2029

Files

• trimester-1-3rd-grade--ela-1.pdf
• master-schedule-6391.pdf
• norms-1208.pdf
• plc-i--smart-goal-e5-doc-1.pdf
• benchmark-meeting-agendas-1.pdf
• ccssela.pdf
• collaboration-agenda.pdf
• elm-mission-vision-goals.pdf
• 5th-fall-smart-goal-1.pdf