A. Focus on Collaborative Work Environment: The school executive understands and acts on the understanding of the positive role that a collaborative environment can play in the school’s culture.
Collaborative Teaching Teams
At the start of the school year, I had each teacher share their story and their "why" for teaching at Henderson Collegiate. After learning each others' stories, our team reflected on our shared mission and vision in this work and the power our team would hold if we were able to collaborate to best meet the needs of the students on our grade level. I had the team complete a True Colors personality assessment and we reflected on each of our individual working styles and the power of having all colors represented on the team. We were not always successful in our pursuit to be constantly on the same page, but we always reflected on our performance and worked together to address any gaps that occurred. The artifacts included show the beginning of year grade level meeting where we reflected on our true colors, and our mid year reflection meeting notes where the team decided our biggest area of growth was consistency across teachers and our commitment to hold each other accountable if gaps arise.
At the start of the school year, I had each teacher share their story and their "why" for teaching at Henderson Collegiate. After learning each others' stories, our team reflected on our shared mission and vision in this work and the power our team would hold if we were able to collaborate to best meet the needs of the students on our grade level. I had the team complete a True Colors personality assessment and we reflected on each of our individual working styles and the power of having all colors represented on the team. We were not always successful in our pursuit to be constantly on the same page, but we always reflected on our performance and worked together to address any gaps that occurred. The artifacts included show the beginning of year grade level meeting where we reflected on our true colors, and our mid year reflection meeting notes where the team decided our biggest area of growth was consistency across teachers and our commitment to hold each other accountable if gaps arise.
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Collaborative Student Environment
One to two times a week, I had the opportunity to lead the entire seventh grade through a Pride Time character lesson. At several different junctures throughout the year, we discussed the power of teamwork and the benefits of being an inclusive student. Samples from two of these lessons are attached.
One to two times a week, I had the opportunity to lead the entire seventh grade through a Pride Time character lesson. At several different junctures throughout the year, we discussed the power of teamwork and the benefits of being an inclusive student. Samples from two of these lessons are attached.
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B. School Culture and Identity: The school executive develops and uses shared vision, values and goals to define the identity and culture of the school.
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Co-Creating the Vision with Teachers: As the grade level chair for the seventh grade, I had many opportunities throughout the year to set the vision for the seventh grade team and determine strategies that would work best for our team and our students to solve gaps that arose throughout the year. The attached document is a beginning of the year grade level agenda I created where I worked with our team to develop our shared vision for ourselves as a team for the school year. We set team norms and goals based off of this vision. Throughout the year we reflected on our ability to live our team norms and strategized ways to improve if our goals were not met. |
C. Acknowledges Failures; Celebrates Accomplishments and Rewards: The school executive acknowledges failures and celebrates accomplishments of the school in order to define the identity, culture and performance of the school
Acknowledge Failures with Teaching Team: As a leader of the seventh grade, I was able to directly work with my team to celebrate accomplishments and also acknowledge and address areas for growth. Throughout the year, I primarily used our weekly meeting agendas as a way to acknowledge and communicate areas for growth for our team, as well as strategize ways to improve. In the grade level agenda attached, I worked with my team to identify a communication gap connected to a grade level wide bathroom system and tutoring system and worked with the team to problem solve next steps for improvement. |
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Celebrating Accomplishments:
In my various roles this year, I was able to create mechanisms to frequently and consistently celebrate accomplishments with teachers and students. Every coaching meeting I held started off with me sharing the successes I observed either though data or classroom observations within the last week. I included a weekly shout out in my weekly team email, highlighting teachers and students for their hard work over the past week. I celebrated success weekly with students related to both their behavior and academic goals. I also used informal mechanisms to celebrate accomplishments such as through team texts and student spotlights on our grade level hallway bulletin board.
In my various roles this year, I was able to create mechanisms to frequently and consistently celebrate accomplishments with teachers and students. Every coaching meeting I held started off with me sharing the successes I observed either though data or classroom observations within the last week. I included a weekly shout out in my weekly team email, highlighting teachers and students for their hard work over the past week. I celebrated success weekly with students related to both their behavior and academic goals. I also used informal mechanisms to celebrate accomplishments such as through team texts and student spotlights on our grade level hallway bulletin board.
D. Efficacy and Empowerment: The school executive develops a sense of efficacy and empowerment among staff which influences the school’s identity, culture and performance.
Empowering Teachers in the Classroom:
In my role as the seventh grade level chair, I got to work with the seventh grade team frequently to address the range of typical middle school behaviors. Our group of students experienced a large shift about two months into the school year from compliance and investment to apathy and rebellion. I lead a team of largely rookie teachers, who were not used to, nor equipped to handle this sudden culture shift. As a way to empower teachers to learn the skills they needed to address this type of student culture, but still allow them to feel supported, I worked with the leadership team to develop a culture loop plan to address the concerns. The culture loop outlined expectations and skills teachers needed to learn, listed a plan to help teachers with these skills, named the concern with students, planned a way to investment and reward students who met the expectations, and outlined a follow up plan for students that continued to struggle even after the new supports were put in place. The attached artifacts include the outline of this plan, as well as a student facing Pride Time character lesson where we tagged the behaviors we were seeing and set the vision for how developing skills to improve the behaviors would serve them in their future.
In my role as the seventh grade level chair, I got to work with the seventh grade team frequently to address the range of typical middle school behaviors. Our group of students experienced a large shift about two months into the school year from compliance and investment to apathy and rebellion. I lead a team of largely rookie teachers, who were not used to, nor equipped to handle this sudden culture shift. As a way to empower teachers to learn the skills they needed to address this type of student culture, but still allow them to feel supported, I worked with the leadership team to develop a culture loop plan to address the concerns. The culture loop outlined expectations and skills teachers needed to learn, listed a plan to help teachers with these skills, named the concern with students, planned a way to investment and reward students who met the expectations, and outlined a follow up plan for students that continued to struggle even after the new supports were put in place. The attached artifacts include the outline of this plan, as well as a student facing Pride Time character lesson where we tagged the behaviors we were seeing and set the vision for how developing skills to improve the behaviors would serve them in their future.
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Efficacy and Empowerment of Students and Staff:
In my coaching role, I was able to build efficacy and empowerment with the teachers I coached to learn how to best meet the needs of students in their classrooms through both a classroom management lens and an academic rigor lens. I was fortunate to have the opportunity to further build teacher and student efficacy and empowerment through a series of professional development experiences (teacher) and Pride Time lessons (students) around the impact of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) on brain development. As a school whose mission is to provide an equitable education to students from predominantly low income communities, many of the students at Henderson Collegiate displays tendencies common to children who experience ACEs growing up. I was able to provide a series of professional development sessions, along with our school's counselor, to teachers to teach them the impacts of ACEs on brain development and help them understand how that impact shows up in their classroom. In this PD we also taught teachers small strategies they could use to help themselves and help students who need additional support. This knowledge, along with the strategies, allowed teachers to better understand their students and provided teachers with knowledge and tools to better equip them to work with impacted students. Additionally, I was able to teach the brain science to students as well, which empowered students to understand their own physiological responses and recognize strategies they could use to reset themselves.
In my coaching role, I was able to build efficacy and empowerment with the teachers I coached to learn how to best meet the needs of students in their classrooms through both a classroom management lens and an academic rigor lens. I was fortunate to have the opportunity to further build teacher and student efficacy and empowerment through a series of professional development experiences (teacher) and Pride Time lessons (students) around the impact of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) on brain development. As a school whose mission is to provide an equitable education to students from predominantly low income communities, many of the students at Henderson Collegiate displays tendencies common to children who experience ACEs growing up. I was able to provide a series of professional development sessions, along with our school's counselor, to teachers to teach them the impacts of ACEs on brain development and help them understand how that impact shows up in their classroom. In this PD we also taught teachers small strategies they could use to help themselves and help students who need additional support. This knowledge, along with the strategies, allowed teachers to better understand their students and provided teachers with knowledge and tools to better equip them to work with impacted students. Additionally, I was able to teach the brain science to students as well, which empowered students to understand their own physiological responses and recognize strategies they could use to reset themselves.
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