The real world is rich, fascinating and compelling. As teachers we nurture students' curiosity and encourage them to explore the world through reading and writing. To support this endeavor, nationally recognized Accelerated Literacy Learning has developed a week long summer institute to draw together administrators, coaches and teachers. In this way, we can build a high functioning team to create sustainable capacity and foster the growth and development of literacy at each school site. Dallas ISD has set schools on a course to provide rigorous, standards-based education for all students. We will invest our main energy into developing a coherent model of instruction that is consistent throughout the district.
Teachers and coaches will spend half a day in one of two large group sections (Grades K-2 or Grades 3-5). For the other half of the day, they will meet in small writing workshops. In the large group section, the work will center on the instructional core: planning and implementing launching the year in Writer's Workshop. Participants will learn how to construct mini lessons, ways to confer with students about their writing and how to assess student work to inform instruction. This focus has been shown to improve teaching practice which, in turn, increases student achievement. In the small writing workshop, participants will nourish their own writing lives in order to become better teachers of writing. They will generate ideas, write and then share their writing in order to deepen their knowledge of the writing process.
It is essential for administrators to plan strategically for school wide coherence, in order to create and sustain a long range professional development vision The participants will meet with a Principal Coach for three days to explore balancing time management with instructional leadership, building capacity and effective leadership for shared accountability and how to include parents and the community to strengthen the school and raise student learning.
We welcome all participants to join us to experience learning as a rewarding, fulfilling part of what it means to be an educator.