COLLABORATIVE PACING CONFERENCES:   THE GOLDEN KEY FOR TEAM BASED READING IMPROVEMENT

Thommie DePinto Piercy

Carroll County Public Schools

Nestled in the fastest growing area of the county, Mount Airy Elementary has experienced an unexpected burst of growth. Enrollment currently exceeds 850, increasing team sizes up to 7 teachers per grade, with 15 non-tenured and newly tenured teachers.   This, occurring in a 68 yr. old facility having serious leakage problems, a building capacity of 625, and a playground filled with trailers, could have easily captivated our attention from the critical concern: students with no identified learning problems were far behind in reading.  

To reach that goal, one essential question needed to be shouted from the (leaky) roof top: “Why are there students receiving reading instruction two years below their enrolled grade level?”

Working backward from the expected result that all students need to be reading on their enrolled grade level, the first goal was to understand the source of decision making which results in students not making yearly progress.   I began with our fifth grade teachers, “Why are you teaching reading to some of your students which is two years below their enrolled grade level?”   A response?   “That was the level they were reading on when they entered school this year.”  

So, I proceeded to third grade and asked teachers, “Why are you teaching reading 1 ½ years below students' enrolled grade level?”   The response?   “This is the reading level they were grouped in by last year's teachers.”   To my first grade teachers, I inquired, “Why are some students leaving 1 st grade already reading one year below their enrolled grade level?   The reply was consistent.    The actual source of decision-making in response to these questions remained invisible behind doors inadvertently locked from years of norms.

No analysis of external standardized scores could not have provided clearer data: without an intervention, students would continue to become lost from moving between separate grade levels having different assessments and interpretations.   Success in the five Reading First Initiatives and achievement of the reading content standards would remain unobtainable until all members of our learning community became accountable.   The implications of our essential question were now glaring at us!   We needed a process for unlocking the doors behind which children were becoming lost.

Our direction was clear: all staff needed to know and expect specific adequate yearly progress for each and every child.   First, however, we needed to acquire a concrete picture of how school-wide decisions related to the Reading First Initiatives are made and the norms that existed in the school.  

The resolution gradually became apparent: The role of the principal needed to expand to include regularly scheduled conversations with each classroom teacher about every child's progress. The principal would be the natural resource for converging data about students' progress and whole school resources. Immediately, the enormous barrier of time would need to be addressed.   Teachers and the principal would need time scheduled during at least five workdays throughout the year to have conversations about students' pacing.

Collaborative Pacing Conferences: The Golden Key

Once each marking period, one day for Collaborative Pacing Conferences is scheduled.   At first, we conferenced each month but found that quarterly conferences were most effective.   Only one substitute for the day is needed to float to each classroom for Collaborative Pacing Conference time, which does not interfere with planning time.   The Assistant Principal and I meet with each teacher individually for about 20 minutes.    Usually, teachers in grades 4 and 5 are met with as teams after the students leave, but before the end of the school day. This “team” Pacing Conference format is most effective with smaller teams and when most students are reading on their enrolled grade level. The size of our teams in grades 4 and 5 eventually required the individualized Pacing Conference format also.  

There are two objectives for Collaborative Pacing Conferences: first, to record and review the expected end-of-year progress and backward map the expectation for each month for every child, and, then to develop intervention plans for students who are not achieving expected progress.   

To move toward objective 1, the current reading level on which students are receiving instruction and the projected reading level that will be attained by the end of the current year are determined by the teacher and recorded. The end of year projection is based on two criteria: the beginning reading level for the current year and the expectation of a year's progress in a year.    More than one year's progress is planned for students who are already behind their enrolled grade level.

Then, using the backward design process, the teacher establishes specific instructional outcomes for each student.   Monthly reading expectations are established as manageable monthly goals.   These expectations for students' reading levels are recorded during the conference on the Class Reading Group and Student Pacing Charts.

The Collaborative Pacing Conference is The Golden Key for teacher and principal collaboration because it unlocks the doors of   “how we do things here,” or, in Peter Senge's words, our mental models.    Individual conversations that are scheduled for each teacher lead to awareness and increased trust and created a direct, shared form of accountability.   Answers to previously unasked questions and the invisible forces that hold students back are recognized, discussed, and challenged, as shown in the following examples:

Example 1:  

I noticed during our Pacing Conference that one reading group of students began the year reading 6 months below their recommended instructional level.   Our conversation during the Pacing Conference provided the opportunity   for us to discuss different options for students who need additional reinforcement of specific skills such as reading fluently.              

Example 2:

While doing a walk-through after our Collaborative Pacing Conferences, I noticed an entire class receiving reading instruction on exactly the same reading level. I knew that there was still a two-year span of readers in this class. It was a natural extension of our conversation from our Pacing Conference to informally talk about ways the class could enjoy a literature book together while continuing to receive small group instruction at appropriate levels.  

Example 3:  

The first columns of the Group and Students Pacing Chart indicate the fall instructional level for each student.   I noticed that a teacher dropped one group of students back to last year's reading level!     The teacher explained, “Last year's teacher did not assess accurately.”   I explained that if she believed that, she needed to discuss her concerns with last year's teacher.   With tears, she replied, “But, we've been friends a long time.” With encouragement and our support, the teachers resolved a significant concern.

Example 4:

In another classroom, I observed a teacher providing instruction to all 25 students from the same reading text, despite the Pacing Conference which had indicated the students were reading at three distinct reading levels. This teacher explained that she was integrating the curriculum by teaching the Electricity unit during reading. The Golden Key of awareness facilitated a natural conversation about integrating science themes with reading while maintaining appropriate, leveled, reading instruction.

Example 5:

During a Collaborative Reading Conference, a teacher did not establish goals for a full year's growth for several students.   When I asked the teacher why certain students were not indicated to make a year's growth in her class, she replied that she doubted they could achieve a year's growth in one year. We continued our conversation, which included the significance of us believing that students can achieve.   This teacher increased her expectations for her students and helped them establish their own goals for comprehension and fluency.   Students graphed their progress. Achievement increased as students saw the importance of independently   incorporating their comprehension strategies.  

These examples of conversations during our Pacing Conferences released Golden Keys of awareness for everyone.   Invisible doors of mental models were unlocked as our conversations extended beyond our scheduled Pacing Conference. The baton of student progress was not dropped over the summer vacation or during the year.   Conversations with and among teachers held student progress steady.  

As Regie Routman explains in her book Conversations (2000), although all learning involves conversations, there are too few conversations in too few places that take seriously the feedback from teachers. Collaborative Pacing Conversations begin by my asking, “ Is it possible for this student to gain more than one school year's growth this year?   What would you need to make that happen?”

Meanwhile, while posing these questions, I am thinking to myself, what am I going to do to help this teacher and her students?   So we push further, “Would you need more time to teach?   How about another teacher to team teach with?”   What would be the effect of a smaller class size?”  

We talk about the good readers too who need to be excited and challenged by expanding the curriculum for their needs.   Hope enters the futures of these children as we share responsibilities.   Accountability becomes as collaborative as our conversations.   This is only the beginning.  

To meet the needs of students not achieving adequate yearly progress, an Action Plan is developed and recorded on the Action Plan Chart.   Interventions provided by members of our faculty may include:

•  Our school counselor working with students on homework issues, notebook organization, and distracting emotional concerns related to friendships, divorce, and other family issues

•  Our reading resource teacher providing books, resources, and classroom demonstrations of instruction for specific strategies

•  Our media specialist scheduling time to engage the student in high interest lessons using technology

•  My teaming with our reading specialist and special education teacher to team-    teach a special unit as an incentive for a struggling group

•  Our assistant principal acquiring resources outside our building, scheduling a parent conference, or even planning time to shoot some hoops to initiate dialogue with a student experiencing difficulties

•  My calling parents personally to express my concern over their child's limited progress and encouraging them to come in for a conference   

At the end of our Collaborative Pacing Conference, the faculty members responsible for enacting each student's Action Plan are highlighted, and copies are given to everyone involved.   At the end of the day, each teacher has a copy of the Action Plan Chart and a Data Pie Chart depicting his or her students' progress towards the goals.    These are reviewed and updated at the each conference.

Shared Accountability: Using Pacing Data to Address Root Causes

Snapshots of data for each class, grade level team, and the whole school were assembled in a photo album of Data Pie Charts.   This was a natural next step since, in the Collaborative Pacing Conferences, teachers discuss the number of students reading on/above and below grade level. Pie charts condense the progress of our 800+ students, 150 grade level students, and separate classes of 24 students in one glance.   These are internal data, discussed directly with the principal by teachers.   Nameless numbers and percentages to misinterpret are not used.   Just real kids color coded in one of two colors: green for students who are receiving instruction on or above their enrolled grade level and red for students who are receiving instruction below their enrolled grade level.

  That's it!   Dramatic in its simplicity, this photo album tells a story.   By linking to a certain graphing websites, such as http://nces.ed.gov/nceskids/ , and entering the number of on/above readers and the number of below grade level readers for each teacher, pie charts roll out in only minutes.   While certainly not a whole story, the Data Pie Charts do provide individual photos of each teacher's class progress and whole grade progress.    When I open the photo album for the entire team to view, conversations about the “pictures” begin: “Oh, Judy, your children look like they're doing great!”   “Let's talk about how we can help the kids in Mark's class!”   

Attention is like a beam of light. Scheduling time to talk with every teacher enlightens root causes.   Pacing Conversations transfer into hard data -- timely, authentic, and job-embedded data.   Equally important are the changes teachers regularly make when dependable attention and support are focused on their students.   These included teams sending Literacy Night invitations to parents for training and supplying take-home reading materials.   Also, some teachers wrote letters to their parents explaining exactly how far below grade level their child was reading and including suggestions on how parents can help students make progress.   In other classes, students wrote letters to their parents requesting to be read to in the evening. The conversational nature of Collaborative Pacing Conferences nudges teachers to use informal assessments frequently that have an immediate impact on teachers' daily instructional decisions.     

Shared Team Accountability: Interfacing Pacing Conference Data with Bi-monthly Team Huddles

              With the recent Federal Government shift impacting state standards and assessments, school improvement initiatives must recognize that the experts are among us-our students' teachers.   At Mount Airy Elementary, this potential is tapped into by bi-monthly Team Huddles, (Schmoker, 2002).   Teams meet to integrate their job-embedded data of individual student work samples with the data pie charts to evaluate each class's progress towards the team's monthly goal.   Students' work is evaluated for evidence of the state's reading content standards.   Such evidence- based decision making requires questions be asked like these, “What do we know?   What do we suspect?   What do we need to know?”  

              Curriculum calibrations are included in the next month's Team Learning Log Goal , to assure that the area of greatest need is equated with area of greatest potential growth. As one team described it, “Our Team Huddles require lots of talking.   Talking together is more valuable than the goal alone.”  

           Team time can created by the administrator or other faculty members freeing teachers during cultural events, creating lunch ‘hours' by backing lunch with a storyteller, and dedicating time or team work during every monthly staff meeting.

                Teachers' voices depict more doors being unlocked:

•  “Our team members do not say anymore, ‘This is what I do!'   We say, ‘How can we solve this problem?'”

•  “At first we thought, “What are we supposed to do during a Team Huddle?   Now these are the best meetings we have ever had.”

•  “During our teamwork, teachers generate lots of ideas to help with the team goal! We are sharing ideas with other teams.”

•  “Teachers bring three samples of work to our team meetings: a sample of work before the goal was established, a sample from the middle of the month, and a sample from the end of the month.”

•  “Now we call our team meetings, ‘Team Cuddles.'   We actually made headbands to wear.”

Continuous Analysis for School Improvement

            This process is not about data collection.   Instead, increased student proficiency instead stems from the Golden Keys as well as teachers and administrators sharing in the responsibility and accountability for students' growth by scheduling time for Collaborative Pacing Conferences; collecting teacher, grade, and school specific data; providing leadership for targeted teamwork; and implementing appropriate interventions.

About the Author

Dr. Thommie DePinto Piercy is principal of Mount Airy Elementary School in Carroll County, Maryland.   She may be reached at Tdpiercy@k12.carr.org .   Space did not permit including the Group and Student Pacing Chart, Action Plan Chart, Team Pacing Chart, and Team Learning Logs mentioned in the article.   Please contact Dr. Piercy for copies of these documents.