Building a Collaborative Plan: First Steps

Prior to beginning the process of collaboration and curriculum planning, teachers will want to determine the specific needs of their students. This can be accomplished by conducting an informal needs analysis. A needs assessment is an organizational tool to help the teacher identify differences between current performance and desired performance.

It allows the instructor to determine what the students already know and what they are capable of doing. Teachers can then determine what concepts and/or skills students still need to know, or learn, in order to complete necessary tasks. A needs analysis can explore alternate solutions to the problem. It may focus on the gap between current and desired performance.

The teacher will define or identify the problem and identify the students and their background, skills, knowledge, and motivation level. A needs analysis also considers the environment, defines performance gaps and prioritizes needs. Teachers use the information gathered to identify possible solutions. Finally, the teacher needs to consider how the instruction will affect the students and determine the desired results.

Pre-collaboration

In expert groups, ESL and general education teachers gather information on their struggling ELLs. They use information observation, student documentation, and various assessment practices to learn what they need to know to successfully teach these students. Teachers observe their ELLs from the very beginning of the school year to determine their academic needs. They can also talk with prior teachers or read student files to learn about the student’s performance.

1. Teachers assess struggling ELL reading ability using short oral (10 minutes) assessment.

2. Assess ELLs’ reading ability on vocabulary using short oral assessments.

3. Assess ELL reading (words in context) using sentences and read-alouds.

4. Complete charts for fluency, accuracy, rate and retelling abilities

5. Using the fluency and accuracy chart, decide which group the struggling ELL is best suited for.

Next Steps of Collaboration

ESL and general education teachers map or strategically identify various categories of student difficulty. They can use benchmarks and standards of their respective curriculums. Teachers then analyze which particular areas overlap both general education and ESL curriculums. ESL and general education teachers mapping and standards to plan and implement instruction. They decide which critical areas are common to their groups of struggling ELLs and plan accordingly.

During and after a unit or series of lessons, teachers can meet in planning groups and share their observations and experiences. The next step would be to brainstorm ways to address their students’ behavior and learning performances and adapt instruction accordingly.

Then, using the information from the intake and pre-assessments, teachers build a class profile. A class profile is made up of individual student profiles. When combined, these documents create a more comprehensive profile. The class profile consists of primary problem areas in reading, any individual student plans indicating class performance and progress in problematic/struggling areas as well as overall progress and evaluation on assessment. Teachers can begin to compile information from individual student profiles to create a comprehensive class profile.

Monitoring the Collaborative Process

Teachers need to monitor their work as a collaborative team. This will allow them to see how effectively they are using the principles of collaboration. They can see how their collaborative efforts have been applied to both general education and ESL student learning groups.

When teachers monitor their classes, they look for any progress their struggling ELLs have made. They can monitor their work as a collaborative team. Their responses will give them information about how well they are implementing their collaborative plan in various areas of instruction and assessment.

By: Dorit Sasson

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