Washington State Essential Academic Learning Requirements assignment

(formated for word)

 

Purposes:

·      To become familiar with what the state has identified as minimum important skills and knowledge all students should have.

·      To develop an action plan for how to learn the content that you do not already know but need to understand, and name how you do know those things that you already know.

·      To identify the relationships among content areas for curriculum integration and thoughtful teaching

·      To identify key aspects of school learning to prepare students for citizenship.

·      To begin to develop familiarity with issues of bias and fairness associated with the GLEs.

 

Tasks:

As part of your portfolio to be submitted for Advancement to Candidacy, you need to closely examine the EALRs in four ways.

 

I.  Self-assessment and planning for professional development: 

·      Download the word version of the EALRs using the link below for each of the following content areas: math, reading, science, writing, social studies, communication, the arts & health and fitness.

http://192.211.16.13/curricular/mit2002/ealrdownloads.html

·      Each week you need to assess yourself in one of those areas as noted on the syllabus. (Order is as stated above, and written in the syllabus.) If you are working toward an elementary certificate, you may do benchmarks 1 and 2. If you are working toward a secondary certificate, you may do benchmarks 2 and 3. You will use the empty spaces on the charts to type responses to assignment questions. We will review your work at the beginning of each Tuesday afternoon seminar and collect it in your portfolio at the end of the quarter.

 

Assess what you know and what you need to learn

Everyone, regardless of the level and content of your endorsement area(s), will self-assess each linked EALR and GLE.

·      Examine the GLE and component. Learn what they expect students to know and be able to do. (This can be very vague at times, so discuss ideas with your colleagues.)

·      For each component, write whether or not you have the knowledge necessary to teach students (use the blank column in the downloaded document).

·      For those things you are prepared to teach, state where you developed your knowledge. This does not have to be from a college course (use the blank column in the downloaded document).

·      For those things that you have yet to learn, describe how you plan to learn it. It is important that you be honest with yourself in your self-evaluation (use the blank column in the downloaded document).

A large amount of skills and knowledge are required of teachers, particularly elementary teachers. By developing a learning plan over the first few years of teaching, you will become more competent in your weaker content areas.

 

II.   Identify key relationships among content areas

In addition to self-assessing, everyone needs to write a paragraph or two to answer the following questions.  If you are endorsing in K-8, consider how the area you are self-assessing will relate to other areas of your curriculum.  If you are endorsing in a content area, consider the relationship of your endorsement area(s) to the component being self-assessed:

 

·      What connections do you notice between them and your area of endorsement?

·      Where do students apply knowledge gained in your content area?

·      Where do they learn content that gets applied in your area?

·      What other ways might you connect what they are learning in other content areas within your classroom?

 

Purpose for this work: It is important that teachers learn the connections among subject areas for two key reasons. One, you may be asking students to do something in one subject area that assumes they have knowledge from another subject area. For example, a social studies teacher may ask students to use the scale on a map to determine the approximate area of a land mass. However, they may not know the complexity of the mathematics involved, the degree to which students understand proportional reasoning or the concept of area, and how students know how to approximate area of odd-shaped land masses. By becoming knowledgeable of other content, you can better predict what students are learning in other classes as well as what is reasonable for you to assume. The second key reason for understanding what students are learning in other content areas is to help you make connections among subject areas. If a reading teacher is working on non-fiction reading, they might draw on appropriate grade-level science content to develop an understanding of non-fiction reading.

 

III.  Learning for citizenship

This pertains to everyone in all areas of endorsement and content areas.

As a tertiary examination to the EALRS, we would like you to also note when you encounter things that are important for students to know and be able to do in order to become an active citizen in a pluralistic and democratic society.

 

 

IV. Bias and Fairness review

Reading, math, and science GLEs have been reviewed by a Bias and Fairness review committee. Their reports are published on the following website: http://www.k12.wa.us/CurriculumInstruct/resources.aspx

For at least one of the three areas listed above, spend 1 hour examining the report that most interests or puzzles you. Write a couple of paragraphs about what insights you get from the Bias and Fairness report, and include it in your portfolio.

 

Your analyses of the EALRs will be shared briefly at the beginning of each seminar. It should also be included in your portfolio for the end of fall quarter.