Resources
Common Core State Standards official website
This link leads to the official Common Core State Standards website. According to this site, the Common Core State Standards provide a consistent, clear understanding of what students are expected to learn, so teachers and parents know what they need to do to help them. The standards are designed to be robust and relevant to the real world, reflecting the knowledge and skills that our young people need for success in college and careers. With American students fully prepared for the future, our communities will be best positioned to compete successfully in the global economy.
Criticisms of the Common Core State Standards
This link leads to veteran educator Susan Ohanian's website where she has posted criticisms about the Common Core State Standards.
Publication: Caslon Community
Topic: Policy, Leadership, and Advocacy
Specialty:
Object(s): website
Dual Language Showcase
The group is committed to forging a stronger home-school connection. We believe that reading in any language, develops reading ability. We want to engage parents in reading with their children at home and to encourage discussion and the sharing of their experiences and realities. As a result, the group decided to create dual-language book bags, comprising of dual language books and multilingual audio tapes, for use at school and at home. Non-English speaking parents could enjoy reading the stories to their children in their own language and elaborating on the ideas, values, skills, and concepts introduced in this "expanded" home literacy program. Student/parent/community volunteers would record the multilingual stories on audio cassettes.
Publication: Caslon Community
Topic: Policy, Leadership, and Advocacy
Specialty:
Object(s): website
Exemplar middle school ELA unit for ELLs - Understanding Language
This link leads to a middle school English language arts unit titled Persuasion across Time and Space that was developed by Understanding Language and is posted on their website. The unit shows instructional approaches that are likely to help ELLs meet new standards in English Language Arts. The lessons address potent literacy goals and build on students’ background knowledge and linguistic resources. Built around a set of famous persuasive speeches, the unit supports students in reading a range of complex texts. It invites them to write and speak in a variety of ways and for different audiences and purposes. The Understanding Language site includes examples of lessons, Guidelines for ELA Instructional Materials Development, and Frequently Asked Questions.
Publication: Caslon Community
Topic: Curriculum, Instruction, and Assessment
Specialty:
Object(s): website
Guiding Questions for Leadership Teams
Leadership teams can use these Guiding Questions to structure their collaborative work as they plan, monitor, evaluate, and restructure the support systems they provide to ELLs/bilingual learners. By support systems, Field means policies and accountability requirements, instructional programs (bilingual, English-medium, world language), curriculum, instruction, and assessments.
Teams are encouraged to use the Notemaking Guide and the Action Planning Guide to support their work planning, monitoring, evaluating, and restructuring their instructional programs and other supports for ELLs/bilingual learners in their districts and schools.
Publication: Caslon Community
Topic: Professional Development
Specialty:
Object(s): reference
Investing in Innovation Fund (i3)
The Investing in Innovation Fund, established under section 14007 of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), provides funding to support (1) local educational agencies (LEAs) and (2) nonprofit organizations in partnership with (a) one or more LEAs or (b) a consortium of schools. The purpose of this program is to provide competitive grants to applicants with a record of improving student achievement and attainment in order to expand the implementation of, and investment in, innovative practices that are demonstrated to have an impact on improving student achievement or student growth, closing achievement gaps, decreasing dropout rates, increasing high school graduation rates, or increasing college enrollment and completion rates.
Publication: Caslon Community
Topic: Policy, Leadership, and Advocacy
Specialty:
Object(s): website
Johnson, Adrienne - Special Education Considerations for ELLs, 1st Ed. Review (2008).
This pdf is the book review that Adrienne Johnson, Adrienne wrote about Special Education Considerations for English Language Learners: Delivering a Continuum of Services by Else Hamayan, Barbara Marler, Cristina Sanchez-Lopez, and Jack Damico. Retrieved from www.mabemi.org/eresources.html
Publication: Caslon Community
Topic: Curriculum, Instruction, and Assessment
Specialty:
Object(s): review
La Cosecha 2021 Presentations
Transforming Sanchez School: Shared Leadership, Equity and Evidence
Friday, November 12, 11:10 AM-12:30 PM EST
This workshop describes the innovative structures of shared leadership, community engagement, and biliteracy instruction at both preschool and elementary school levels that transformed Sanchez Elementary School in San Francisco’s Mission District from a failing dysfunctional school to one that significantly outperformed a large majority of schools with similar demographic characteristics.
Publication: Caslon Community
Topic: Professional Development
Specialty: