Race to the Top: Voices from the Trenches

This post is the next in a lengthy series intended to make the work that I am facilitating relevant to Race to the the Top and specifically, the alignment of curricula to the Common Core Learning Standards, transparent for others. Doing so has enabled me to gain clarity and new perspectives from others who are on the ground and doing this work. They have significant expertise to share.

If you are approaching similar work in your role as a teacher or facilitator, I’m eager to connect with you! Over the last few months, I’ve received invitations to collaborate with others in spaces beyond this blog, and I’m learning a great deal as a result. Please let me know if you’d like to add your voice to this conversation. I hope you’ll add a comment below or email me at stockmanangela@gmail.com. Here’s what I’ve been up to over the last few months:

I began the work of Race to the Top by helping the teachers that I am working with define a vision for the graduate they hope to shape and the teacher they hope to become:

• It was important to me that everyone involved in our work treat Race to the Top as a means to those greater ideals, not an end unto itself.
• We began by Envisioning the Top
• Getting Race Ready involved conceptualizing our personal frameworks for professional practice and considering the positive influence that other frameworks might have on our own.
• We defined HOW we wanted to accomplish this work in addition to WHAT needed to be done. 
• And in doing so, we realized how important it was to reflect, strategically plan, and attend to sustainability.

As each initiative has unfolded inside of the districts I am serving we’ve begun:

• Developing a Fluency with the Common Core Learning Standards
• This involves more than a perfunctory gap-analysis, and while unwrapping the standards can deepen our understanding of them, we’ve found that the timing of this work can have a significant influence on how valuable it becomes to teachers.

As a facilitator, one of my primary objectives is to help teachers work in ways that increase job satisfaction.

• Sharing protocols that enable teachers to align to their vision as well as the CCLS has been a critical part of this process.
• This involves fleecing out indicators of vision and thinking in bigger ways about standards, too.

Last week, I shared the way that I’ve begun approaching curriculum design with the teachers I serve. This week, I’ll blog about the products that are emerging from this work and how I’m using formative assessment to inform my practice and professional development planning.

If there are specific aspects of this work that you’d like me to speak to more or questions you’d like me to address, please feel free to leave them below or drop me an email at stockmanangela@gmail.com. Responding helps me clarify my own thoughts, and the questions that I’ve been receiving challenge me to consider some very different perspectives and approaches. I’m learning a great deal–thanks!