Chris++Saip

Wiki Questions: **responded by Chris Saip** Session Four, April 6-7, 2010

Hello Participants: For credit you will need to respond individually to three of the following questions on your team's page (20 points each; please initial your response) prior to the end of Session Four:

1. As you consider the purpose of the English Language Learner Leadership Academy, “//To build your capacity to assist regular education teachers in becoming teachers of language development in order to implement Classroom Instruction That Works with English Language Learners strategies through Shared Leadership//”, to what degree do you believe your team has been able to achieve this purpose? 2. How has your team’s shared leadership approach to the implementation influenced your ELL initiative? 3. As you engaged your colleagues in professional development designed to support them in becoming teachers of language development to implement Classroom Instruction That Works with ELLs strategies, how did you use the leadership responsibilities to manage their personal transitions (of those colleagues who would have responded "yes" to any of the following four questions) and the implications of second order change: ·  a break from the past? ·  inconsistent with organizational norms? ·  incongruent with personal values? ·  requiring new knowledge and skills?  4. As you reflect on the implementation of your ELL initiative, what leadership responsibilities did you find most helpful and how did you apply them in your context?  5. Do you believe the implementation of your ELL initiative influenced student achievement at your school? What evidence to you have to support your response?  6. As you reflect on your experience in the English Language Learner Leadership Academy and the implementation of your ELL initiative, what aspects of the experience were most successful and which would you do differently in the future?  7. Do you have evidence of changes in teacher practices or behaviors that you attribute to the implementation of your ELL initiative or the English Language Learner Leadership Academy?  8. As you reflect upon the four English Language Learner Leadership Academy sessions, what concepts / approaches did you find the most helpful? Which one’s were least helpful?
 * We began this school year with some new ELL team members in place at my building. Our vision was to team with regular education teachers in the instruction of all students. Our team has been fairly successful in communicating with staff, including parents in the educational process, working with teachers in the classroom by providing direct services to students, and incorporating the learnings from this class. I have been very pleased with the change that has occurred with our staff – ELL and regular ed. **
 *  It has been important to me to be visible this school year. I want to understand all that happens in my building. Communication is at the forefront of success with our students. I have encouraged as much communication as possible with all parties – teachers, paras, parents, students, and community. I have also focused on change in ideals/beliefs and have stressed data analysis. It had come to my attention that our ELL students historically did not make adequate progress in our building. So we have focused on a change in service delivery and have paid more attention to progress monitoring. **
 *  As stated in the previous answer, our ELL students have not historically showed adequate growth over the years. So we refocused our service delivery and progress monitored our students more frequently. Discussion with staff has also added to increased strategies and intervention for our ELL students. We have noticed gains in their benchmark assessments and progress monitoring. So we feel that we are on the right path. **