Cole Elementary
Using Collaborative Inquiry for the Math BHAG Process

This year, Cole Elementary, has BHAGs (Big Hairy Audacious Goals) for literacy and math.  To create their math BHAG, the collaborative inquiry process was used during grade level team meetings. 

November 16, 2017 Grade Level Team Meetings

After the October 26th grade level team meetings, the leadership team met.  They used the recommendations from the Oct. 16th meeting to establish a math BHAG for Cole Elementary.  The outcome of this meeting, facilitated by Katherine Thrash, Cole's numeracy coach, and Denise Brown, Cole's data coach, was to develop grade level action plans for achieving the math BHAG. 

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Activating and Engaging--Introduction of math BHAG

The math BHAG recommendations from the Oct. 26th meeting were categorized to look for themes.  The leadership team used that data to inform the creation of Cole's schoolwide math BHAG. 

 Exploring and Discovering--MAP and Fast Data Observations

Organizing and Integrating--Grade Level Action Plans

After the data observations,  each grade level team established an action plan for achieving the 2017-2018 math BHAG.  They will check in on these plans periodically to monitor their progress. 

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Meeting Feedback

Plus

Suggestions for Improvement

• meeting was informative
• well organized
• very useful meeting
• good to have time to think and reflect on data
• introducing/revealing goal
• creating action steps (8)
• love that it was up-to-date data
• good conversation
• came away with good idea of BHAG
• useful
• positive
• lots of direction—knew where we were going and what the purpose is
• discussion of ideas
• we have same direction we want to move in
• good ideas were generated
• great meeting
• helpful
• walk away with a plan
• time to discuss strategy plans
• I liked brainstorming action steps in a small group then sharing out
• thinking about action steps was very helpful
• discussing with data with team
• nice to listen to other teachers’ responses on how to use MAP data
• glad to know what I need t continue to work on
• hearing a positive. we rarely hear anything positive anymore
• knowing what we are doing is working
• action plan resources
• suggestions on how to practice and strategies
• thanks for being available to give us resources
• guided math template
• taking a look at grade level info
• information was clear and thorough
• I liked the idea of getting a math template for small groups
• knowing the number of students below 20%
• working in groups to share action steps
• extremely informative meeting about how to incorporate more FAST practice
  

• chocolate
• a plan to complete next step
• explaining why this goal
• I wish we had a growth goal for everyone
• wish everyone had a goal and not just bottom group
• follow-up on the data and action steps
• accountability
• support in making and giving common formative assessments
• more specific data provided
• need more current data (2)
• can we spend time during the meeting creating tasks?
• plan time to dig into the MAP reports (4) (Cole Carosel)
• which reports to best to use to discuss with students
• class date printed to see
• more structure to math small group (guided maths)
• regular
• have resources available—data of students of what the great needs of focus are according to fall assessments
  

October 26, 2017 Grade Level Team Meetings

Activating and Engaging--Visual Synectic

On October 26, 2017, Dr. Margie Johnson facilitated the grade level team meetings where the collaborative inquiry process was used to leverage teacher expertise and voice in developing a school-wide BHAG.

The session began with an activating and engaging activity called visual synectic.  This strategy asks teachers to compare two things that seem to not have anything in common.

The premise of the activating and engaging part of the collaborative inquiry process is twofold--focus the conversation and establish psychological safety for deeper conversations.

Exploring and Discovering--Data Dive Observations

The purpose of the exploring and discovering phase is to suspend inferences, explanations, and conclusions while making data observations.  While it seems like an easy task, we always start this part with a quick calibrating activity because it's easy to not stick to the facts....

For Cole Elementary's data dive, we looked at grade level and school wide MAP and Fast Bridge data.

Check our their observations....

Organizing and Integrating--Math BHAG Recommendations

After discussing the data observations, each person created a math BHAG recommendation to be reviewed by the leadership team in developing the school-wide math BHAG.  Check out their recommendations in the meeting minutes.

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Next Steps

• Margie will compile data
• The leadership team will convene to establish a school-wide math BHAG. 
  
• On Nov. 16, grade level teams will meet to develop action steps for achieving the math BHAG.

Exit Slip Reflection
What actions might you take as a result of our time together today?

• going to data warehouse and analyze data
• I will be more objective when looking at data.
• be more mindful and detailed when reading and interpreting data
• small group learning based on ability level
• breakdown step by step and allow time for students to process
• continue to be intentional on small group teaching in math to help close the gap
• use data to be aware of where my students stand now and how they are progressing to inform instruction
• unpack (continue) math standards, planning for math using results from CFAs
• diving deeper into class data to pinpoint specific students
• I need to check the math map scores of my students in order to see where my students are struggling
• be more intentional on setting math SMART goals within my classroom with students
• accept the scores without the BMW
• teach, teach, teach
• identify which quintile my students are in
• identify my super subgroup kids
• number talks is something new I’m trying…maybe this will improve scores
• print individual MAP scores and class to see how each student did
• find out how MAP makes the goals and what would an 18 month growth goal look like
• analyze my students MAP data and address deficiencies
• read more about MAP quintiles
• set individual goals with students regarding their MAP math data
• I can set individual BHAGs for my students
• I will dig deeper and analyze my students’ math MAP goals and areas of weakness.
  
• meet with EE teacher to better support EE math students in small group
  

• The majority of students are in the high risk category.  More foundational skills need to be practiced.
  
• I did not realize Cole had such a large % of Q1 math scores across the board.
• Taking a more observant and reflective mindset when looking at data.  Knowing that data is not the end-all, be-all.
• I will look at data and make observations rather than inferences.
• look at data very closely and make groups accordingly
  
• look at data and having more conversations with co-workers
  
• Where are the gaps?  I will design lessons during guided reading that will target gap areas.
• observe data more to use it for best practice
• take more notice and use more intentionality when looking at students’ math data
• One reflection I would use as a take away would be to pay more attention to specific data.
• It was an excellent look at data from younger grades to see what the students need to work on once they get to upper grades.
• Look at strands on MAP test
• Who is in which subgroup?
• I thought it was vital and interesting to think about data without inferences.
• Look at the sections of MAP and see where the weaknesses and discrepancy lie.
• Data is important to use and understand for growth.
• Look at the EL students for 4th grade MAP and especially for my small groups.
• This meeting was able to show me a way of looking at data and use this data to create an achievable goal.
• To make a structured effort to reach African American children.
• We need to dig deeper into the data and see which areas were strengths and weaknesses from the assessment data.
  

Meeting Feedback

Plus

• quick, to the point
• great info about data
• knowing and going over the data
• excellent knowledge on data
• get to see how students performed schoolwide (7)
• loved hearing about your kids
• looking at data was beneficial
• loved using post-it notes
• allowing partners
• lovely presenter
• gaining insight to data
• informative
• good meeting
• engaging, active
• very knowledgeable instructor
• loved having the data in front of us
• identifying trends in data
• collaborative inquiry J
• pacing and product
• liked the pictures in the PPT
• paced well
• I liked looking at the data and feel like it was helpful.
• review about observation vs inferences
• generated questions more than answers
• generated in-depth thinking
• use of visuals
• positive attitude
• BMW ban
• discussion oriented
• data driven
• thank you for leading great discussions
• loved looking at data in a new way.  Thank you!
• well planned
• well prepared
• I love the attitude and the personality of the presenter.  Thank you for being real with us.
• good presentation
• real stories help…keep sharing
• synectic activity
• inference vs. observation
• personal connection
• positive attitude toward us instead of tearing us down
• enjoyed presenter/presentation
• Data meeting was great.  Appreciate that we were told we were the experts in our fields.  Thank you. 
  
• I think it was important and great to get teacher input in setting schoolwide goals
• wonderful job being able to dive into data and discuss scores as a team
• Collaborative inquiry process seems like a valuable process for our team.  Thanks!
• nice to see the data
• This is a start to discovery

Suggestions for Improvement

• more info about MAP data and what it represents (7)
• more time (4)
• what is psychological safety?
• feel like we can reduce the time it took
• have posted what ED, SWD means
• look at our grade level or class data (2)
• I don’t have a product to take back to use
• correlate data to whole school
• I don’t feel like I had enough information to make a BHAG goal.  I wanted to understand the whole school picture more.
• more help writing BHAG
• I wish you’d talked about your family at the beginning. It would have helped me connect more with you initially.  J
• separate goals as we take different tests
• Why does data need to be divided by race?
• need individual data and subtest strands
• yes, let us plan and work more minutes in the week
• but it was difficult to come up with a good SMART goal with limited information
• How could I use the data to know exactly what my students need to work on?
• explain more who is in which subgroup
• By breaking up the MAP and FAST data in groups, it was heard to understand what we were looking at and talking about.
• need subgroup data for specific math skills