We're Not Making This Stuff Up!

As we close Teacher Appreciation Week, I'd like to extend my thanks to all Ansonia teachers for their daily efforts on behalf of the community's children.  We know and understand the fact that teaching here can be more challenging and provides less monetary reward when compared with some other Connecticut school districts.  Your talents and dedication are recognized by all of us.  In my short time here, I've seen teachers continue to grow in their ability to collaborate and make effective, data-informed decisions about teaching and learning.

I wanted to use this post to help re-ground myself (and perhaps you as well) in the fact that our system-wide initiatives and methodologies are not flights of fancy or any one person's opinion on what schools should be doing.  Thanks to CALI, we have gotten training in some of the most up-to-date and solidly supported methods for improving curriculum, instruction, assessment, and collaboration.  The research done by the Leadership and Learning Center is international in its scope and outlines what works best for schools of all types.

I'd encourage you to view some of the videos found at the link below.  You will see that, while we continue to grow and improve, we are working toward the faithful implementation of practices that have been scientifically shown to improve learning for all students...making the professional work of teachers more rewarding in the process.

Again, I thank you for your work and hope that you enjoy some of these short video clips from Dr. Doug Reeves.

Tony.

Click the link to see the menu of videos.  VIDEO LIBRARY LINK:
In particular I recommend these topics:

• "Transforming a System:  The Norfolk Story" - near the bottom of the page, School Improvement Category
• All of the videos in the 90-90-90 Schools category
• "Getting Accountability Right"
• Both videos in the Assessment category
• All of the Instruction category