Topical Team 2'2 Academic Content and Content Best Practices

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Topical Team 2.2Academic Content and Content
Best Practices

• Association of College Educators
• Deaf and Hard of Hearing Annual Conference
• Banff, Alberta, Canada 2005

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Topical Team Leaders

• Brenda Simmons, University of Tennessee
• Science/Math Focus
• Susan Easterbrooks, Georgia State University
• Literacy Focus

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Team Experts

• Harry Lang, National Technical Institute for the
  Deaf
• Science/math
• Gay Su Pinnell, Ohio State University
• Literacy

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Overall Outcomes Expected for Grant Period

• Research supporting increased academic
  achievement as a result of using the most
  effective standards-based content resources and
  content-specific strategies for teaching academic
  content to PK-12 students who are d/hh, improving
  d/hh teacher preparation program designs and
  increasing d/hh preservice teachers abilities to
  demonstrate content best practices competence.

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Activities proposed in the grant

• Activity 1
• Conduct needs assessment of the content best
  practices (standards-based content resources and
  content-specific strategies) that have been
  empirically demonstrated to increase student
  academic (i.e., literacy, mathematics and
  science) achievement for ALL PK-12 students.
• Outcome baseline empirical data

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Response to Activity 1

• Team of deaf educators evaluated states core
  curriculum websites and conducted interviews with
  state level representatives from departments of
  education to determine what states are expecting
  TOD to know and be able to do.
• Participants Susan Easterbrooks, Kathleena
  Whitesell, Elaine Gale, Marcia Virts, Len
  Roberson, David Smith

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• Literature Reviews (posted on deafed.net)
• Harry Lang- Science
• completed
• Brenda Simmons- Math
• completed
• Susan Easterbrooks,Kathleena Whitesell, Elaine
  Gale- Literacy
• completed

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• Literature reviews were organized by the
  reviewers surrounding concepts identified in the
  literature
• Each review provides information regarding best
  practices with DHH students in that area

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Date collection process for Activity 1
State-by-state review

• Team members were assigned states in regions of
  the country identified by the Regional Resource
  Centers
• http//www.dssc.org/frc/rrfc.htm

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Posed following questions to Department of Ed
officials

• How does the state require teachers of the
  deaf/hard of hearing to respond to the general
  education curriculum?
• Are teachers of the deaf/hard of hearing required
  to address these standards or are alternative
  curricula permissible?
• Do you have any standards that are differentiated
  for exceptional learners, specifically are there
  any designed for learners who are deaf/hard of
  hearing?

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• What resources are available on the website to
  assist teacher?
• Regarding students who are deaf/hard of hearing,
  how does your state recommend that teachers
  bridge the gap between the childs present levels
  of performance and mandated standards for that
  age?
• Is there any specific guidance for teachers of
  the deaf/hard of hearing?

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• Do deaf/hard of hearing students need to pass
  exit exams to get a regular diploma? If yes, what
  happens if deaf/hard of hearing students do not
  pass the exam?
• Are there specific data on graduation rates of
  deaf/hard of hearing students?
• What else can you tell us about the states
  response to performance or outcomes that will be
  evaluated via high stakes assessments?

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• Team members looked at the core curriculum for
  each state and identified
• Name of the curriculum
• Url
• Structure of the standards
• Resources

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• Were able to get data on 33 of the 50 states.
• Kathleena Whitesell is writing up an executive
  summary of the data, to be published on deafed.net

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• General findings
• Most states require their TODs to teach from the
  general ed curriculum
• Most (but not all) states have highly specified
  core curricula some identify mandated test
  objectives, and it is the responsibility of the
  local schools to identify appropriate curricula
  to meet these objectives

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• Few states give TODs any specific guidance on how
  to make appropriate modifications to the general
  ed curriculum
• Few, if any, states have any graduation data on
  DHH students that are disaggregated from all of
  special education
• Very little is being done to address the problems
  surrounding high school exit exams

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How can this information be applied and used?

• Teacher prep programs need to make sure that TOD
  have had experience in navigating the states
  curriculum and curriculum website.
• Teacher prep programs need to give teachers in
  training experience in identifying general ed
  curriculum objectives and relating these to IEP
  objectives to identify how to bridge the gap.
• Deaf education professionals need to support
  dis-aggregation of deaf ed data from special ed
  data

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• Teacher prep programs need to infuse information
  from the literature reviews into their courses
• Your ideas?

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Activity 2

• Conducted research concerning the use of the
  content best practices (content resources and
  content-specific strategies) that have been
  empirically demonstrated to increase academic
  (i.e., literacy, math, science) achievement by
  Master Teachers of students who are DHH and
  within DHH teacher preparation programs.
• Outcome Increase the knowledge base

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Literacy

• Practices Identified in literacy (N37)
• 1L. Provide and monitor level-appropriate reading
  materials for independent reading activities as
  well as time to read.
• 2L. Use technology such as CDs, captioned
  materials, and interest-based Internet sites that
  are known to be motivating.

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• 3L. Teach phonemic awareness and phonics either
  through structured, auditory-based programs with
  appropriate modifications for oral students OR
  through specialized materials and techniques that
  provide visual support (e.g., Lindamood Bell,
  Visual Phonics, Cued Speech, teacher-developed
  visual materials) to students who sign or need
  additional visual support.

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• 4L. Teach metacognitive skills such as reading
  strategies (e.g., re-reading, looking at
  pictures, predicting, visualizing, etc.) prior
  to, during, and after reading through Guided
  Reading, activities to promote text
  comprehension.
• 5L. Promote reading skill development through
  written language applications such as dialogue
  journals, research reading and writing, language
  experience stories, writing to read, or other
  language-based programs.

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• 6L. Use content area reading materials to promote
  reading comprehension through scaffolding and
  other content area techniques.
• 7L. Have students collaborate with others on
  activities that promote literacy development
  through such activities as shared reading and
  writing.

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• 8L. Teach vocabulary meaning through
  semantic-based activities that enhance knowledge
  of multiple meanings of words, idiomatic
  expressions, and denotation (concrete) and
  connotation (abstract) meanings of words.

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• 9L.Teach vocabulary meaning through
  morphographemic-based activities that enhance
  knowledge of word meaning through understanding
  of root/base words, prefixes, suffixes, including
  Latin and Greek derivatives.

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• 10L. Incorporate specific activities and
  strategies to promote either spoken reading
  fluency in oral students or signed reading
  fluency in signing students.

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Science/Math

• Practices identified in science/math (N 36 or
  37. One person chose not to respond to 3 of the
  questions.)
• 1M. Be a skilled communicator in ASL, spoken
  language, English-based sign systems or other
  languages and modes used by students.

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• 2M. Provide science and math concepts using the
  students first language before competence is
  assessed in English.
• 3M. Possess specific training, experience, and
  certification in content area knowledge of the
  subject being taught.

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• 4M. Enhance concept mastery through the use of
  minds-on activities and materials that focus on
  active learning principles that cognitively
  engage students.
• 5M. Enhance concept mastery through the use of
  visual organizers such as graphs, charts, visual
  maps, etc.

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• 6M. Teach science concepts through incorporating
  a collaborative, case-based problem-solving
  approach to real-world problems allowing
  sufficient discussion time.
• 7M. Use technology such as CDs, captioned
  materials, and interest-based Internet sites that
  are known to be motivating.

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• 8M. Teach specialized content vocabulary to
  increase content comprehension and promote group
  discussions about academic topics. Collaborate
  with interpreter when used in content area
  classes.
• 9M. Extend math and science skills to processes
  that require higher order critical thinking and
  problem solving skills.

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• 10M. Scaffold between student's language
  abilities and the language demands of the
  textbook or instructor as a means of enhancing
  concept attainment and literacy skills.

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• Brenda and Susan developed a survey that was sent
  to Master Teachers based on the Maximum
  Benefit/Maximum Likelihood research model.
• Best practices will be identified from activity
  1.
• MT were asked to provide 3 ratings

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• How beneficial is this practice to your students
  achievement? (least beneficial to most beneficial
  on a scale of 1 to 5)
• How likely is it that you will use this practice?
• If you are not likely to use this practice, why
  not?

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• Donna Mertens placed the survey on the Gallaudet
  website using Perseus Software
• Results are in and are presently being analyzed
  regarding what works and what teachers will in
  reality do.

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• Preliminary Results
• Literature Review
• Need a committee to clarify for ACE-DHH what
  constitutes rigorous research to guide future
  efforts. Should consider existing efforts of AERA
  and CEC.
• Need to target areas of long-held belief and
  focus on evidence-based outcomes (the term
  preferred to research-based, as research is a
  debatable subject)

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• State Curriculum Reviews
• Most states have mandated curriculums
• Few states have specific guidance to schools on
  how to meet the curriculum needs of DHH students
• Several typical models
• place in grade and hold student to same
  standards place in grade and show link between
  their program and the curriculum, no matter the
  stretch pick and choose among grades.
• ACEDHH could provide guidance on this

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• Master Teachers outcomes
• Are doing many of the practices identified with
  the exception of phonemic awareness and phonics.
• Are restricted primarily by time and resources

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Activity 3

• Disseminate resulting research and offer
  professional development support for the use of
  the research information to DHH preservice
  teachers, their faculty, MT and the entire CoP.
• Outcome Increase in knowledge base and use of
  content best practices by DHH preservice
  teachers, their faculty and MT.

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• Dissemination
• Via deafed.net
• Professional Development
• Our next step will be to develop teams of
  individuals to create instructional modules for
  use in teacher prep programs.
• Teams Master Teacher, Technology Specialist,
  University Personnel

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• What can you do?
• Volunteer to coordinate one of the module teams
• Receive a choice for coordination and a choice
  for participation

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Activity 4

• Conduct follow-up research on the impact of the
  disseminated information on DHH teacher
  preparation programs and their preservice
  teachers demonstrations of content best
  practices competence gather data on pupil
  outcomes during student teaching experiences.
• Outcome Empirical evidence.

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• Team leaders will identify team members to assist
  in developing a data collection process.
• Team members will work with individual teacher
  prep programs to implement use of the PowerPoints
• Team members will work with teachers in training
  to gather data about application of the practices.

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• Critical Problem
• We KNOW what to do, either through experience or
  from evidence, but we do not have the
  administrative structures within which we can do
  it, so how do we prepare TODs to provide what
  their pupils truly need in an environment where
  their needs do not drive the curriculum?

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• Brenda Simmons
• bsimmon1_at_utk.edu
• Susan Easterbrooks
• seasterbrooks_at_gsu.edu
• STAY TUNED to deafed.net for additional results!