001Yeah, I went to that meeting and I had a three days. >> Okay. I'd like to call this meet regular meeting of the teaching and learning committee to order. Tuesday, June 2nd. We are at Longill Avenue boardroom. Time is 58. Um, roll call please. Koutach >> here. Lorine Rosner is absent. Joey Palagi >> here. Carol Ponazo >> here. >> Also in attendance, Kristen Santelli and Tracy Hussy. >> Oh, pledge of allegiance. >> I pledge allegiance flag, United States of America, public stands, nation, God, liberty, justice for all. Review and approval of the following reports to the committee and motion to approve the meeting minutes from teaching and learning committee meeting on March 10th. I'll make a motion to approve those minutes. >> I'll second it. >> Second by Joey. All in favor? >> I. >>
002Any opposed? Motion carries. Public comment. Anyone of the public wishing to speak? Anyone from public wishing to speak? There's no one in the public to speak. Is that what Oh, she should have just waved at me. Okay. Agenda items. Review of spring data. I'll turn it over to Mrs. Santilly. >> Right. Good afternoon, everyone. >> Now, can you hear me? >> There you go. >> Yes. So, um we today I'm going to walk you through the winter to spring data for the school system for grades um K through 12 and showing you ELA, math, social studies, and science stand. First, I'm going to start out with amplify math and reading um which is our universal assessment. Um so our Dibbles 8th edition which is up here right now shows you our beginning of the year
003um in each grade level to the middle of the year to the end of the year. So districtwide performance improved steadily from the beginning of the year to the end of the year. Students performing well below benchmark decreased from 24% at the beginning of the year to 18 at the end of the year and our above benchmark increased from 22% to 34%. Kindergarten showed consistent improvement across the year with reductions in students performing well below benchmark. An increase in students performing at or above which is exactly what the trend we want to see. Grade one demonstrated the strongest overall growth in the in out of the elementary schools. Uh students performing well below benchmark dropped from 26% at the beginning of the year to 14% at the end of the year. And uh in grade
004two they showed steady gains with modest decreases in well below benchmark performance and an increases performing above benchmark by the end of the year. Grade three experienced substantial improvement by the end of the year particularly in the above benchmark category which increased from 31% at the beginning of the year to 49% at the end of the year. and grade four showed mixed results while performance improved from beginning of the year to the middle of the year. End of year results reflects declines including decreases in some of the student performance. Um specifically we would be focused um on the area of um comprehension. But overall the data suggests that the district literacy initiatives and intervention support are having a positive impact especially in grades K through three. and we will have a continued focus on strengthening
005instruction and intervention practices in the upper elementary grades particularly in grade four uh in the next school year. So as you know we are required by the state of Connecticut to implement specific reading programs and reading assessments. this being the reading assessment. Um, and and the state has been collecting our data from the middle of the year and now the end of the year uh to I'm not really sure what exactly the purpose of collecting that data is going to be for districts. we are waiting uh but I I feel fairly favorable because it's a requirement for grades K through three we're showing um great great gains absolutely so in grades uh kinder in grades K through K1 shouldn't say that K is most mostly at the beginning of the year push in to ID
006because we don't know or they get more push in they only get um we only are able now that we don't have instructional interventionists and academic tutors we have the reading math specialist uh in the building So we we've been reooking at our intervention model for the last couple of years to more of a push-in model so that we are they are able to reach kids. Um and we also felt that the pull out model really wasn't giving up. So um all tier 2 intervention is now provided by classroom teachers. So during the day in the schedule they have a one hour a day for small group instruction reading and math and then they have a 30 minute period of academic support time that no new instruction is being introduced that they can um work
007with two kids as well. Tier one and tier 2 kids. Tier three is um being addressed by the reading consultant and math specialist. So they have a combined model of push in and pull out. In the past when we did have interventionists or we had academic tutors, we were able to pull out and and provide more um explicitly focused instruction um for more children than we currently are or focus on. We would have some sometimes we would have um we would look at the ESPA scores in grades three and four and determine okay we can do some small group instruction on this um for those kids and that's gotten back into the classroom. No, it is going on in grade four, but the state focus that we we are required to um identify is three,
008but we're trying we're keeping the same model for >> and and I just want to observe that the limited intervention was this year after previous budget cuts before anything yet to come. I can share this presentation. This is uh McLass math. Our students in grades K through four take this as see again each grade beginning of the year, middle of the year, end of the year. We've had strong overall growth across grades K through four from beginning of the year to end with increases informing at and above benchmark levels. Students performing in the above benchmark category increased significantly across multiple grade levels, particularly grades 1, three, and four. Rage one again showed the strongest improvement with a substantial decrease in students performing well below benchmark and a large increase in above benchmark. Kindergarten students demonstrated
009strong growth throughout the year, indicating positive early numeracy development and the impact of foundational math instruction. How so important that that is. Grade two and grade three maintain steady progress with more students moving from intervention levels into benchmark and above benchmark performance ranges by the end of the school. A grade four demonstrated notable improvements in the above benchmark category from the beginning of the year to the middle of the year and maintained strong performance overall at the end. The data suggests that targeted intervention supports and core instructional practices are positively impacting student math achievement across the district. Continued focus will be on strengthening tier 1 and tier 2 interventions. um in grades K through four in math. So, here are your literacy and math key takeaways. Um districtwide data in both reading and math showed
010overall positive growth from the beginning of the year to the end of the year with more students meeting or exceeding benchmark expectations by the end of the year. The percentage of students performing well below benchmark decreased across the system, indicating that our intervention supports and instruction instructional adjustments are helping more students access grade level content. Overall, the systemwide trends indicate meaningful academic progress, provide evidence that the district instructional initiatives are continuing to improve student achievement in both reading, math questions on that assessment, ESPA. So they are now the way that you take the assessment scores rather quickly within 10 days. However, they are not finalized and we we were able to look at preliminary from our end, but they're not final. Well, we have really we're not at liberty to discuss them at the moment.
011Yeah, that was under the guidance, but we could use them for planning for next year here in Barcode. So, we were actually advised not to talk about them in a public forum. So, >> I just I don't know. >> I don't know. I don't know if that means >> that could be >> Yeah. >> No, it definitely. >> Sorry. >> All right. So, here are the uh reading grades 5 through 11. So, very different narrative than the last time we met in the winter. one that I'm very excited about because last time we planted all winter we either saw it maintaining or um in some areas going up and in some areas going down with content. Sometimes that can happen mid year because not all the content is taught in in the winter time. Um
012and and and we also were able to identify in 5 through 11 at the winter time when we looked at our usage report that our our literacy math science and platform was not being used fully with fidelity work from Perry Hill SIS and SHS to departments curriculum coordinators and administrators to show them those reports. efforts and figure out how we could best support programs or fidelity. I come to you today with exciting news because the end ofear data shows increases um in all all four content areas. So it shows that usage and and and and following the program with fidelity um does does >> Can you interpret for us the numbers on the side and flex bench 35 those are those are the scores. >> So okay 400 would indicate where they started which would
013be fourth grade. >> Okay. And then so um 550 would indicate fifth grade fifth um so forth. So so so we started not necessarily on grade level but we did make no significant growth. >> And what about what about those items across the bottom flex bench? >> That's just the flex bench flex that's the name of the assessment flex benchmark progress assessment three is just number of the ones. So that would be the fall interrup. So you look at grade five um at you know they made that that fullear growth and I have to say Perry Hill embraced these this platform much earlier than our seven through and across the board we saw like at the beginning of the year with the summer slide the kids didn't start even though they were entering fifth grade
014they didn't start in fifth grade they were because of the summer slide so the scores were considerably lower and this was our first you're using it. So, we were very alarmed. But then when we met with they were like this is actually grade six you could they went from uh fifth grade all the end of sixth grade close to seventh grade seven. Here is an example of where shift and then they revamped and revised the instruction getting students on programs. And what a great. So that's great great gains. >> And typical growth in a year is typically about 100 points. So if you start at 600, then a year's growth would be at 700. >> Here's here's grade eight. We were concerned about this at the winter time dip. But they they were able to
015back up and make absolutely. So they may be a little bit behind but rate of growth and also I think um in some teams where they were implementing with with fidelity if we looked at individual teams you would see significant growth. So this is just an average of the entire grade. blue. There's grade nine again. They went uh they they dipped as well. And now they they really uh shot right back up above above the 800s. I don't know. I mean, I think it's I mean, I'm look looking at Kayla. Usually, if it if there's an attendance issue, it's it's pretty much consistent throughout the year. >> Yeah, our score is always different. for that one. >> No, here's grade 10. And a it kind of went down and then got back up to where
016they >> It looks like they ended lower than they started. >> And here's grade 11. slightly dipped in but the trend is going in the right direction which is to Kristen's point though about the usage um the kids have to use it regularly they should be pinpointing and so if it's not being implemented and this is year one of using this at you know 5 through 11 so I there were definitely