Nathan Stanley's Digital Portfolio

Ensuring No Student Falls Through the Cracks: Our School’s Improved Intervention Team Strategy

Our school has been working on improving the process for determining interventions for our Tier 2 and Tier 3 students. In the past, it has been a challenge to accurately identify the students who need interventions and provide them with the necessary attention. We have developed a new Intervention Team (I-Team) process to address this issue.

After the third quarter grades are released, we run a report to identify students who meet the following criteria: having two or more D’s and F’s, attending below 85%, and having at least one behavior incident. This initial report typically yields around 80 students. Additionally, we accept referrals from counselors, interventionists, and teachers for students who may need further support.

To ensure we can thoroughly discuss each student’s needs, we have split our monthly I-Team meeting into three separate meetings over three weeks. The students are divided based on the administrators’ alpha case management. This allows us to dedicate more time to each student and make well-informed decisions.

Before the meetings, we color-coded the students based on their current interventions or program support, such as LIFTT, Success Coach Program, SQUAD, and Pathways. If a student is already receiving support through one of these programs, they will not be discussed in the I-Team meeting unless the interventionist for that program requests additional help.

For the remaining students who are not receiving any interventions, we ask the staff members familiar with each student to prioritize them as “highest priority,” “moderate concern,” or “monitoring needed.” The staff member who makes this determination will put their name next to the student, indicating that they will be responsible for speaking about the student during the I-Team meeting.

To facilitate staff participation, we will send the list of students to the entire staff and set up a recurring Google Meet for the I-Team meetings. Staff members can join the meeting whenever they are available, and while their participation is encouraged, it is not mandatory.

By implementing this new I-Team process, we aim to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of our meetings and ensure that our Tier 2 and Tier 3 students receive the interventions they need to succeed.

Enhancing Classroom Observations: Streamlining Teacher Evaluation with ChatGPT

December 20, 2023 / nathangstanley / Comments Off

In the realm of education, refining the process of teacher evaluation is crucial for fostering continuous improvement. As an educator committed to enhancing this process, I’ve integrated ChatGPT into my workflow to streamline classroom observation notes and align them with our district’s teacher evaluation standards. This integration has not only expedited the analysis but has also provided a structured approach to identifying evidence within these observations.

Traditionally, my note-taking process involved two columns, but I’ve evolved to capture observations in a narrative form that’s objective and passive, drawing inspiration from methodologies like Thomas Van Solen’s. This shift allows me to focus solely on what I see, devoid of assumptions or inferences, in an attempt to strip away any attached value or bias.

Upon completing these notes, I leverage ChatGPT to analyze them against our district’s evaluation standards, specifically referencing the University of Washington’s 5D framework. While our district doesn’t utilize every indicator, it aligns selected indicators with our Continuous Improvement Plan (CIP) to cater to our specific needs.

What’s essential to highlight here is that ChatGPT doesn’t dictate conclusions; instead, it serves as a catalyst for thoughtful consideration. It accelerates the breakdown of notes into evidence aligned with teaching standards, minimizing the time spent on analysis. This synthesized output is then incorporated into the original document, expediting the identification of sections aligning with our teaching rubric.

Once I’ve identified relevant evidence, I annotate inaccuracies or areas needing further details. These insights are then cataloged in the rubric alongside the observation date, forming a comprehensive view of a teacher’s progression throughout the year.

At year-end, this collection of evidence becomes instrumental. By collating observations across multiple sessions, we’re equipped to gauge a teacher’s development accurately. It empowers us to determine whether teachers are meeting developmental milestones or require additional support.

However, transparency is key. When sharing the summary generated by ChatGPT, I emphasize that it’s a collaborative effort. While initially generated by AI, it undergoes scrutiny and amendments for accuracy. Teachers are encouraged to provide their perspectives or modifications, fostering a collaborative approach to evaluation.

The integration of ChatGPT has streamlined the process without compromising accuracy. The feedback has been encouraging, with no significant discrepancies identified between AI-generated summaries and the actual observations. Nonetheless, I remain open to refining this process further for continuous improvement.

In essence, this fusion of human expertise with AI assistance has redefined the landscape of teacher evaluation, making it more efficient, collaborative, and conducive to professional growth. The goal remains constant: to provide comprehensive, fair, and accurate evaluations that nurture and support educators in their journey of continual improvement.

Enhancing Communication and Documentation with Loom: A Practical Guide

November 14, 2023 / nathangstanley / Comments Off

For this portfolio post, I have decided to share an example of what you can create using a combination of a transcript from a Loom video and ChatGPT. I recorded a brief Loom, uploaded the transcript into ChatGPT, and then used the result to create the post below. I have made some changes to the text, but by and large, the finished product is a result of several steps using AI. I hope this is a good example of how you can streamline your workflow while improving your communication.

In the screencast posted below, I will walk you through my experience with using Loom for effective communication with staff and teams. Since 2020, I’ve found Loom to be an invaluable tool for conveying information, especially during times of constant change. Let me share how I utilize Loom for clear communication and documentation.

As an athletic director, I initially faced challenges communicating guidance updates and policy changes during the pandemic to coaches via email. The written format often led to confusion and numerous questions. Discovering Loom changed the game for me, as it allowed me to leverage the power of visual and auditory communication.

Loom enables me to articulate information with a personal touch. The ability to convey tone and inflection in my voice significantly reduced the number of follow-up questions. Whether it’s a policy update, workflow demonstration, or a report walkthrough, Loom has proven to be a time-efficient and effective communication tool.

Practical Applications

1. Communication with Staff

During my tenure as an athletic director, I utilized Loom to keep coaches updated on evolving guidance and policy changes. I have continued to use it to communicate with our staff, providing clarifications and additional information that don’t lend themselves to written explanations. The personalized touch in the videos significantly reduced confusion and streamlined communication.

2. Workflow Documentation

Loom isn’t just for communication—it’s also an excellent tool for documenting workflows. Whether it’s a process, a report in our student information system, or spreadsheet formatting, I’ve successfully used Loom to create clear and concise documentation.

3. Creating Newsletter Articles

One standout feature of Loom is its transcript capability. Recently, I used a slide deck to communicate updates to staff. After recording the screencast, I copied the Loom-generated transcript and used it to create a comprehensive newsletter article.

Step-by-Step Process

1. Create a Slide Deck: Summarize the information you want to convey in a visually appealing slide deck. This serves as the basis for your screencast.

2. Record with Loom: Record your screencast, taking advantage of Loom’s features to articulate your message clearly.

3. Transcript Generation: Loom automatically generates a transcript. Copy and paste this transcript into a text editor.

4. Clean Up Transcript: Eliminate filler words and refine the transcript for clarity. I used ChatGPT to further polish the text.

5. Summarize for Newsletter: Request a summary from ChatGPT and use the extracted key points and titles to create a succinct newsletter article.

In conclusion, Loom has proven to be an indispensable tool for effective communication and documentation. From updating coaches on policy changes to creating newsletter articles, its versatility makes it a go-to for streamlining information dissemination. By combining Loom with ChatGPT for transcript cleanup and summarization, I’ve enhanced my ability to convey information clearly and efficiently.

So, the next time you find yourself grappling with complex updates or struggling to document workflows, consider giving Loom a try. It might just revolutionize the way you communicate and document in your professional space.

Enhancing Academic Support: Revamping our Multi-Tiered Systems of Support (MTSS) Process

October 4, 2023 / nathangstanley / Comments Off

In our ongoing pursuit of academic excellence and student success, we constantly reevaluate our systems to identify areas for improvement. This year, we’re making substantial changes to our Multi-Tiered Systems of Support (MTSS) process, specifically concerning academic interventions. The objective is to streamline our approach, reduce inefficiencies, and better target interventions for students who need them the most.

Identifying Past Challenges

Historically, we encountered challenges with inaccuracies in the data, particularly when pulling grade and attendance records. These inaccuracies led to inefficiencies in the MTSS process and unnecessary meeting time. Additionally, we recognized a lack of structured Tier II interventions at the high school level. Unlike elementary and middle schools, high schools often assume that all students possess the necessary skills to succeed in their courses.

Insights from the Ignite Conference

During the Ignite Conference hosted by the National Association of Secondary School Principals (NASSP) in Denver, I had the opportunity to attend Carol Clemmons‘ insightful presentation on MTSS. Subsequently, I engaged in a productive discussion with her regarding our unique situation. Clemons, a school improvement coach for the Alabama State Department of Education, specializes in assisting schools in reorganizing and reinvigorating their MTSS and Response to Intervention Systems (RTI).

New Approaches and Strategies

Refined Tier I Team and Process

We will maintain our Instructional Leader Team (ILT) as our Tier I team, responsible for reviewing data and suggesting system-wide practice changes.

Strengthening Tier II Interventions

For struggling students, we’ll collaborate with classroom teachers to provide Tier II interventions within the classroom. Moreover, we intend to embed Tier II academic interventions into our system, such as support seminars during an extension of the current schedule or tutoring during lunch hours.

Addressing Tier III Challenges

Our primary post-pandemic challenge has been Tier III interventions. With rising absenteeism, we’ve seen an increase in students meeting Tier III trigger numbers, except for behavior data. We plan to narrow our focus and effectively identify students in need by aligning data perspectives and incorporating teacher requests for academic support.

Focusing on the 10th Grade Cohort

To streamline our efforts, we’ve chosen to focus on 10th-grade students this year. We will analyze data for 10th graders who began the year with fewer than six credits and cross-reference their grades, attendance, and behavior data. Subsequently, the Intervention (I) Team will create personalized intervention plans for each identified student.

Engaging and Informing Our Teaching Community

To introduce these changes, we conducted a half-hour long summary of MTSS and its operations within our school. Teachers then participated in small group discussions, sharing successful interventions they have used with struggling students.

By making these modifications to our MTSS process, we aim to provide a more targeted and effective support system for our students. We believe that this revamped approach will enhance student outcomes, minimize inefficiencies, and further promote academic success within our school community. We remain committed to adapting and refining our processes to best serve the needs of our students.

Adaptive Leadership Presentation Resources

April 11, 2023 / nathangstanley / Comments Off

These are the resources that I used to put together my presentation for the 2023 Oregon Athletic Director’s Association’s Annual Conference in Sunriver, Oregon.

Presentation Slide Deck

Qualities of an Adaptive Organization Self Assessment

Padlet Responses:

Adaptive Leadership Reading

The Practice of Adaptive Leadership: Tools and Tactics for Changing Your Organization and the World by Ronald Heifetz and Marty Linsky.
The Work of Leadership by Ronald Heifetz and Marty Linksy in the Harvard Business Review
My School is Facing an Adaptive Challenge by Lindsay Lyons

Distributed Leadership

Design Thinking

YouTube Video: The Design Thinking Process
Design Thinking Guide for Educators from Stanford University
Article: Where Design Thinking Meets Adaptive Leadership

1-2-4 Framework

Recalibrate the Culture by Jimmy Casas (protocol explained in Chapter 2)
Another version of the protocol by Liberating Structures

Consultancy Protocol

Copy of the Consultancy Protocol used by TTSD High School Collective
Modified Consultancy Protocol
Pocket Guide to Probing Questions

Other Discussion Protocols

25 Statements to Positively Reinforce the Classroom Culture

April 11, 2023 / nathangstanley / Comments Off

In a recent post, I shared that we have focused on recognizing our students’ positive behavior and academic growth. Coincidentally, I recently received an email with 25 motivational praise statements from the new book Coaching Women Athletes to Excellence. I thought some of these were good examples that a teacher could use in the classroom.

1) You’re on the right track.
2) You’re really working hard today.
3) Exactly right.
4) I’m proud of the effort level today.
5) Keep working on it. That’s the kind of improvement I want to see.
6) You’re a bunch of fast learners.
7) Keep it up – you’re making my job enjoyable.
8) One more time, and you’ll have it right.
9) You’re getting better every day.
10) Keep up the good work.
11) Nothing can stop you when you bring that kind of intensity.
12) That’s better than the last time.
13) First-class effort, ladies. Keep it up.
14) That’s the best I’ve seen today.
15) Much better than yesterday.
16) That’s how we handle that situation.
17) Right on target!
18) You’re really improving.
19) You did a lot of great work today. I’m proud of the effort.
20) I’ve never seen better execution of ________________ drill.
21) You all outdid yourselves today.
22) Finally, I think you all got it.
23) Good job (insert player name).
24) Finish strong.
25) Championship-level effort.

Not all of these phrases provide as specific and meaningful of feedback as we would like. However, I think there are some good examples of noticing what is going well and recognizing behavior that reinforces the culture we want in our school.

Reinforcing Culture Using Staff Meetings

April 6, 2023 / nathangstanley / Comments Off

I recently finished the book Recalibrate the Culture: Our Why, Our Work, Our Values by Jimmy Casas and connected with the idea that we should use staff meetings as an opportunity to build and reinforce our school culture. In the book, he provides a five-step meeting protocol:

Connections
Purpose
Process
Deliverables
Summarize

We incorporated an idea we used last school year for the connections portion of the meeting, asking all staff members to nominate a “teammate of the month.” The exercise allowed the entire staff to practice gratitude by thinking of a colleague they appreciate and want to honor. It was also an opportunity for the administration to share something we had been incorporating into our meetings for a few months: to recognize those individuals who were modeling the culture we wanted for our school.

I emailed the staff a link to a simple Google Form 30 minutes prior to the meeting, asking only for the nominating staff member’s name and the name of their nominee. Several of our staff nominated multiple people, which was nice to see. While the staff submitted their nominations, we played a short video below, setting a positive and optimistic tone for the meeting.

At the end of the meeting, we used a Google Number Generator to select a number (we counted the number of submissions and entered it into the generator to select our lucky winner). When the winner was selected, her colleague got to say a few words about her, which was a nice end to the meeting.

Strategies to Reinforce Academic Growth and Student Behavior

April 5, 2023 / nathangstanley / Comments Off

In a recent climate survey taken by students during our weekly SEL/school business session (known as Pack Time), we identified classroom practices that reinforce academic growth or recognize positive behavior as an area of growth. This data was shared with our Content Area Leaders (CAL), who discussed it during department and PLC time. The staff asked for clarification from students, and in response, we created a Pack Time activity for students to discuss how they were being recognized already and how we could do a better job. This information was synthesized and shared back with the administration, where we unpacked it for teachers in our staff meeting.

We then had our staff respond to the prompt: How do you recognize your students’ good behavior and/or academic growth? Due to space restrictions, we used a Think/Pair/Share format for teachers to think about what they currently do, share it with a neighbor, then post it on a Padlet we created for the discussion (see below). After folks had time to discuss, we asked them to review the responses (we projected them on a screen for those who didn’t have electronic devices with them) and had them discuss with their neighbor which of their colleagues’ submissions they connected with.

The session brought a lot of positive conversation and helped bring an added dose of positivity to the meeting. This continues previous discussions about building proactive climate and culture in our classrooms. We plan on using these strategies for future discussion about our Tier I climate and culture work.

Strategies to Illuminate a Culture of Learning

March 8, 2023 / nathangstanley / Comments Off

In a recent staff meeting, I led a discussion inspired by Jimmy Casas‘ book, Culturize. We focused on the prompt: “Please share a strategy you use to illuminate a culture of learning in your classroom and share your belief in why it matters.”

To start the discussion, I shared my belief that getting students to examine and understand perspectives they may otherwise oppose is helpful in better defending their own positions. I explained that as a Government teacher, I tried to encourage students to develop informed opinions rather than adopting the talking points of whatever their preferred major media outlet was espousing.

I asked the staff to share their answers with their neighbors as well as on Padlet if they felt comfortable. The conversation was lively, and teachers some of the strategies that were shared included:

Demonstrating how science is relevant in their daily lives.
Sharing the teachers passion for the subject.
Encouraging students to take risks by building a culture that makes it safe to make mistakes.
Using a warm-up where students are randomly paired and answer a question about life, and one about the subject matter.
Celebrating student successes and progress.
Using games as review activities to incorporate a social aspect to learning as well as kinesthetic stimulation.

Overall, the discussion was a great reminder of the importance of creating a culture of learning in the classroom and provided a noticeable injection of enthusiasm in the staff. By sharing strategies and ideas, we were able to gain new insights and inspiration for our own teaching practices. As educators, we have the power to shape the learning experiences of our students, and by prioritizing a culture of learning, we can help them reach their full potential.

The Feedback You Didn’t Want

February 22, 2023 / nathangstanley / Comments Off

Let’s face it, feedback is necessary, but it isn’t always fun or pleasant. There is the feedback we expect, such as a post-observation conference with a supervisor. Sometimes, a well-meaning (or not) individual will provide unsolicited feedback about any aspects of your professional practice that may or may not be pleasant. When I was a coach, we had our athletes take a post-season survey evaluating the coaching staff. As an athletic director, I would perform exit interviews with Senior athletes. As a school and district, we ask teachers, students, and parents to complete climate surveys. Any of these can provide us with feedback that may be hard to handle.

I recently watched a short video about feedback that I thought framed receiving difficult feedback. In the video, Gonzaga Women’s Basketball Head Coach, Lisa Fortier, shared an experience with Brett Ledbetter about some difficult feedback she received from her Athletic Director’s exit interviews with Senior players. She shared that she was upset by what the players had shared, but her Athletic Director responded with what I think is a golden nugget of wisdom: View negative feedback in terms of what they need rather than what you’re doing poorly.

That mindset really resonated with me. We recently had students complete a PBIS climate survey, and they rated our school lower than what we’d like in two areas:

Students are frequently recognized for good behavior.
School is a place at which I feel safe.

It is easy for adults to dismiss this feedback since we are already doing so much as a school and community to address these aspects of our school climate and culture. However, if we view it in terms of what the students need rather than what we are doing, it places our focus on what we can do to get closer to where we want to be. As a side note, we’ve created an SEL activity to provide students with a process to discuss what the above statements mean to them and how we, as adults, can better support them.

Improving our relationship to feedback is a necessary aspect of continual improvement. Something I would like to dig into a little further is improving how I give and receive feedback. I’ve picked up the book Thanks for the Feedback, which was a recommendation by Mark Fogel on Ryan Hawk’s The Learning Leader Podcast. I’m looking forward to digging into that and sharing what I learn.