Like being a star athlete, a great singer, or a super-effective classroom teacher, there are very important fundamentals that must be followed in order for one to be successful in any of these fields. Often times, these fundamentals are completely transparent to observers, except for the most expert. The same is actually true of the use of spreadsheets. While PC Mag has acknowledged that mastering Microsoft Excel can take years, some very basic fundamentals make an enormous difference in what can be accomplished with a spreadsheet.

Some important rules for successful spreadsheet use include:

Working Environment

• Spreadsheets on Screen--Spreadsheets are designed to be used on a computer. It’s not to say that we never print spreadsheets because we do at times, but 99% of the time, we work with a spreadsheet in the most efficient manner on the computer rather than for how it will look for printing.
• Normal View--Always use Normal View (View > Normal) for data entry and manipulation.
• Toolbars--Select View > Toolbars > Standard & View > Toolbars > Formatting. Most importantly, also select View > Formula Bar, which will show you exactly what is really in each cell as you select it.
• Workbooks & Worksheets--Don’t be afraid to use multiple worksheets within a single workbook. Label them carefully.

Layout

• Columns & Rows--Columns are for data fields/variables. Rows are for records.
• Header Row--Row 1 should always be used as a header row. Headers should be short and descriptive. Each column should have a header.Depending on the spreadsheet’s purpose and audience, headers may be free of spaces.
• Align Data within Columns--Whether it is left-aligned, centered, or right-aligned, depends on the data in the column, but all data within a column should be aligned.
• Separate Distinct Data--It’s not difficult to split data in to separate columns from a single column (i.e., split “last, first” to two columns--“last name” and “first name”), but it’s even easier to push data together from separate columns in to a single column (i.e., from “last name” and “first name” to “last, first”.) So, keep separate data separate from the start.

Content

• Grab Starting Data from Elsewhere--Teachers, support staff, and administrators all have the ability to export data from PowerSchool. Get your IDs, Names, etc. from there!
• Student IDs--ALWAYS use student id numbers for each student when collecting data on students. Typically ID numbers will fill Column A or Column B.
• Use Columns/Fields for Categorizing, Not Colors--People like to organize their spreadsheets by color. This is fine. Do not only organize by color. Rather than represent a category within a spreadsheet by color-coding cells, use a new column, create the proper field, and categorize that. Data can then be sorted, counted, analyzed using that.

Tips

• Use a Mouse and/or Tab and/or Return--When doing significant and/or extended work in Excel use a wired mouse plugged in to your laptop to make work more efficient. Better yet, for data entry, use the Tab key to move to the next cell to the right in a row and the Return key to move the next cell down in a column.
• Right-Click--When you “right-click” in Excel a contextual menu will pop up with a number of options that you can apply to the selected cell, column, or row.
• Plan Ahead--Before beginning to work in your spreadsheet, consider what fields you are going to use, how your records are going to be used, etc. This will help you visualize how your schedule ought to be laid out and will make your organization of rows and columns much easier.

Tags: Excel

Even with great tools, such as the PowerTeacher Gradebook and Inform, spreadsheets remain the most critical of tools for success in collecting and analyzing student data. Whether we are collecting data before uploading it to Inform or we are exporting it from the Gradebook to graph, spreadsheets are used to systematically collect, sort, manipulate, and analyze data. Currently, School District 21 does utilize Microsoft Office. Staff members who are using Windows PCs are typically using Office 2007 as we begin our transition to the new Office 2010. Staff members who are using Macs are using Office 2008.

AtomicLearning.com (which requires a username and password) features great tutorials on Excel 2008. These tutorials are broken up in to three different sections of tutorials:

• Intro (76 tutorials)
• Intermediate (86 tutorials)
• Advanced (85 tutorials)

That’s right! There are a total of 247 tutorials on AtomicLearning.com about Microsoft Excel 2008 alone!

In addition to all of the resources in AtomicLearning.com, there is also built-in support available right in the application itself. Microsoft, like Apple, has included a lot of information to provide help and support to end users right on the desktop from within the application itself. Simply select Help from the Menu Bar at the top of the screen as pictured below.



Either enter your search terms in the Search text field or select Excel Help from the menu and then search for more information.

“But wait, there’s more!” The Microsoft Office for Mac website also has great resources for learning more about how to use Office products, include Excel 2008.
Microsoft.com/Mac Office 2008 How-To Courses

Tags: Excel, AtomicLearning

One of the most powerful, easy-to-use tools for newcomers and advanced users to Microsoft Excel is the AutoFilter. The AutoFilter allows you to quickly and easily sort and or select certain data from either a pull-down menu or by custom defining your search criteria. Enabling the AutoFilter is as simple as clicking on AutoFilter in the Data > Filter > AutoFilter menu command from the Menu Bar as pictured above. Once the AutoFilter is enabled, you will see arrows in the header row of each column on the right side of the column as pictured below.



By simply clicking on the arrow, it will open up a new menu as pictured below.



Choosing from this menu, will allow you to only see the rows, or records, that you have selected. Choosing the Custom Filter option will allow you to specify exactly what data you would like to see. For example, you could choose to see all students who scored a 90 or higher on a particular assessment. While your other data will appear missing, it will really still be there. It is just hidden--or filtered out.

When you have filtered a column, the arrows in that columns header will appear blue. To unfilter, simply choose the Select All option from the pull-down at the top of that column, and all of your data will re-appear.

Simply by following our steps for entering data using Excel best practices and by using the AutoFilter, you can uncover all kinds of very important information about your students!

Tags: Excel

While instruction and assessment should continue through the last day of school, the reality of sending report cards home with students on June 7th, the final day of school, requires that we “close our gradebooks” prior to the last day of the trimester at the end of the school year.

Beginning with Trimester 3 of the 2009-2010 school year, students in grades 3-5 will receive their report card, which includes Academic Grades, Learner Qualities, and Comments, and a separate Power Standards Summary Report. Students in grades 6-8 will receive both documents beginning at the end of the 2010-2011 school year. While the parent/student documents have changed, teacher entry in the PowerTeacher Gradebook has not changed at this time! (Though, Power Standards data collection may look very different next year with this summer’s major PowerSchool upgrade!)

For more information on how to use the PowerTeacher Gradebook, please visit the CCSD21 PowerSchool Support Site. (You will be prompted for your Active Directory username and password to enter this site.) Specifically, elementary teachers will want to review the Elementary School Report Card Learner Quality, Comments, and Power Standards Entry document if you have questions about this process.

For the close of the 2009-2010 school year, the final grade timeline for Grades 3-8 looks like:

May 27, 2010--9 AM
All grades (Academic, LQ, Power Standard) and comments must be entered and completed in the PowerTeacher Web Gradebook by teachers throughout District 21. Then, Technology Office staff members will store grades district-wide, and following that, school secretaries will print verification sheets and distribute those to teachers.

June 2, 2010--9 AM
Teachers will have finished reviewing Academic Grades, Learner Qualities, Power Standards, and Comments. Any corrections that need to be made are made by the teacher or team directly in to the PowerTeacher Web Gradebook by the 9 AM deadline on June 2nd. At this point, Technology Office staff members will store grades district-wide, once again, and following that, school secretaries will begin printing report cards in an order determined by the Technology Office. Report card printing will continue through June 3rd.

June 7, 2010
All students leave school (and the 2009-2010 school year!) with their Trimester 3 Report Card and Power Standards Summary Report.

Tags: Report Cards, PowerSchool, PowerTeacher, Web Gradebook, Grades

Dr. Heidi Hayes Jacobs appeared in Lisle, Illinois, today in a workshop sponsored by Midwest Principals' Center. A number of District 21 Central Office administrators attended, and throughout the day, I (Jason) am "live blogging" my notes on her presentation through The Modern Pen. Approximately, every sixty minutes, I will publish an update to what we're learning here.

9.25 AM--The School Calendar
Already this morning, Dr. Hayes Jacobs has made the connection between how a doctor does and should do his or her job and how a teacher does or should do his or her job. She has repeatedly commented on how the current traditional school calendar has nothing to do with learning. She did correctly point out that the current school calendar is rooted in the industrial revolution of the late 19th Century in the U.S. She did not go on to state that it is not an agrarian calendar. (If it were based on an agricultural society, the kids would be off in September and October to help with the harvest and in school during the summer when there's not much to do except hope you have the right mix of rain and sun for your crops!)

While Heidi did not talk about this, here it is... Why is there no school in the summer as a result of the Industrial Revolution? It was too hot for the machines in the factories to operate during the summer, so factories were closed. Employees (parents) were home, and the children of working class parents could be home with them. Heidi's suggestion--There should be a "summer semester", not summer school. According to her, students in Canada have 195 days of school. Students in Western Europe typically have 205 days of school. Students in Japan have 220 days of school. Students in the U.S. typically have about 175 days of school. Who is going to learn more?

Our curriculum is really written for a 300-day school year. We have to pick what is really important. We need to use Power Standards.


9.35 AM--The Role of Technology
"When I picked up the NY Times this morning, it was already out-of-date. If I want up-to-date information, I go to the Internet--on my computer or on my phone. Teachers say, 'I don't really use technology.' What if I went to a doctor and he said, 'Yea. I've heard of the X-ray.'" (Everyone laughed nervously at this point!)

"Kids go out in to the 21st Century, and then, they go to school." Our schools are not designed for our kids' futures, looking out five or ten years. "If we want kids engaged, let's at least be in the 21st Century. We're almost 10% of the way through it."


9.35 AM--The Definition of Curriculum Mapping
Curriculum Maps have three basic elements:
- Content
- Skills
- Assessment

Curriculum mapping is:
- Calendar-based
- Focused on the operational curriculum
- Housed and revised electronically to provide direction (like an online map)

Curriculum maps are framed by essential questions that are based on key concepts, enduring understandings, and big ideas--like District 21's concept-based curriculum. Why? People retain more when they have these deep understandings.

9.50 AM--The Role of Technology in Curriculum Mapping
The move from Professional Learning Communities to a Global Learning Community--Curriculum mapping software and online collaborative tools allow people to work together and share expertise and units across time and space.


9.55 AM--Why map?
To solve specific problems in a school or district to:
- Gain information
- Avoid repetition
- Identify gaps
- Locate potential areas for integration
- Match with learner standards
- Examine for timeliness
- Edit for coherence


10.05 AM--How do we map curriculum?
The information below will be published in the new book that Dr. Hayes Jacobs is working on...

Short-term upgrades--"Revision and replacement" of dated curriculum and assessment types with more vital contemporary forms. Every teacher should upgrade at least one thing each year. For example, we replace a paper with the development of a documentary or a podcast. Begin using e-mail or Skype to collect information. These replacements should be technology-based for our current and future students!

Long-term upgrades--"Versioning" is the creation of new versions of the programs and structures within our schools as institutions. This is like coming out with an entirely new operating system for a computer. We should do this every few years.


10.40 AM--Electronic Portfolios
In Rhode Island, students are responsible for completing an electronic portfolio to prove their knowledge and skills in the standards areas prior to graduating from high school. This was implemented six years ago, so students graduating from high school now will have work from middle school and high school in their electronic portfolios. Today, kids begin collecting this work in the primary grades. There are between 15 and 18 school districts currently participating in the Rhode Island Electronic Portfolio System based on the quick glance that I just completed with a Google search. With a web-based electronic portfolio, it is very easy to "see" and "hear" student growth within a particular standard over time. We saw a demonstration of a particular student from a Rhode Island elementary school. You do not need to be a reading specialist to see her growth from year-to-year. You do need to be a reading specialist and use other assessment tools, too, in order to determine if she is "where we want her to be" with her reading and if she has shown "as much growth as she should have shown".


10.50 AM--Curriculum Mapping
Curriculum maps should allow us to "zoom in" and see actual lessons and "zoom out" and see the big picture of what we're teaching more generally with fewer specifics. This should work just like an online map, such as Mapquest, which allows you to very quickly and easily see more-or-less detailed.

What are the questions that we have at our table about curriculum mapping? (Rosemarie and I are sitting with five other people...)
- Do we need to purchase some version of software to do curriculum mapping? (Two individuals at our table use Atlas Curriculum Mapping Software.)
- What type of school culture do you have? Does it promote these type of deep conversations that focus on curriculum and learning?
- We need to think about the difference between what teachers teach and what students need to learn and have learned?


11.00 AM--Questions from the Crowd
- What is the role of homework? "Students need to be doing the work, and families need to learn how to provide the right environment for this (time and space and student responsibility). In sports and music, you do drill and practice when it is necessary and where it is diagnosed. You only do drill and practice when someone does know how to do this differently. If you do have the skill and do drill and practice, it's called busy work. Prior to drill and practice, there should always be a diagnosis of our need for drill and practice. When a teacher marks up student work, who is getting better at the work? When we do the work for the student, we are not teaching."

"How do schools combat an anti-intellectual element that exists in American society? Parents say that they do not want their children to be too smart, to be nerds. This is different than how culture surrounds students and schools in other countries."

"We should set-up student/parent homework centers rather than use study hall. Parents and students come together and get support in helping students with their homework at school, after school."

How do we target the needs of individual students?
- The students' ages
- The students' stages of development
- The students' learning characteristics
- The students' communities
- The students' aspirations
- The students' needs (background knowledge, skills, social/emotional)


- Our District is embarking on a PLC initiative, and we're going to devote lots of time to analyzing data. How do we also have time for curriculum work? "I believe that they are not at all exclusive, but mutually dependent. You need to be doing both of these together. Your data may show you that your map needs to be re-drawn. The map always need to be revised. Analyzing student assessment data should be a major time saver when done in conjunction with instruction. Likewise, if we just look at curriculum mapping without ever paying attention to student data how do we know if the map is taking us where it should be. The Latin root of the word curriculum is curricula, which means course. What is the course that each child will travel to learn the articulated skills and content (knowledge/concepts)?"

- How do you get started with introducing curriculum mapping with your staff? "Mapping occurs at the building-level because that's where you improve performance. It cannot occur at the District-level. The District may coordinate communication and provide resources and support, but it is a building-based problem. So, what should happen within a building? First, we need leadership teams in each building. Structure conditions that will make a difference in planning for and initiating the curriculum mapping process. These conditions will need to be based on the specific needs of the students and teachers in a particular school. This will vary from school-to-school. Then, the school needs to create meaningful opportunities for participants to be involved. Finally, long-term professional development plans must be put in place to support the process of curriculum mapping and the technology needs of the teachers with mapping and instructionally moving forward."


***
Gail Forshall just posted a really interesting comment. One of the powerful facets of online curriculum mapping would be how people in building-wide roles can integrate instruction in a meaningful and effective way. Additionally, in that setting, core academic teachers and other educators can shift the focus of meeting from what we are doing to how we are doing it and how we are differentiating instruction for individual students. This is where the real action is in creating new opportunities for kids to learn more.
***


11.35 AM--What is a concept? Why are they so important for curriculum mapping?
Given that we have a concept-based curriculum in place in District 21. This part ought to be good for District 21...

Currently, Heidi is describing how we would teach SYSTEMS across traditional subject-based academic disciplines. For the concepts, we write guiding questions, which she calls essential questions. Regardless of terminology, at the end of the unit, students will develop their essential understandings in response to their ongoing study of these questions throughout the unit. In planning the unit, we identify the content and skills that will be taught. Some choices do need to be made at this point. Of course, we should identify our assessments prior to beginning the unit.

***All assessments should have a noun. The students should be asked to create a product or do a performance. Good assessment is:
- A demonstration of knowledge/skill
- Observable
- Evidence of student knowledge/skills
- Clearly defined for students with rubrics, checklists, and/or right and wrong answers

A short side rant from Heidi just ended. Bottom line:
"Kids need to be talking to learn--vocabulary and content. Our classrooms are too quiet!" (She's right about this! - JK)


12.50 PM--Back from lunch & learning again
We're back underway. About 50% of the people in the room work in schools and school districts that are using electronic mapping software. Dr. Heidi Hayes Jacobs is going to log in to one teacher's map from one of these actual schools, and we're going to improve her map this afternoon while we work on our own maps. Now, we're reading pages from Coaching Protocols for Developing Quality Curriculum Maps. We are reading more about:

- Content-Content begins with a concept, such as systems, patterns, or interdependence. "If we do not use a concept to initiate our content entries, then what we have are random facts..."

- Essential Questions-Essential questions are engaging for the students, include the concept, aligned with standards, and tied to the assessment(s).

- Precise Skills-Desired or targeted proficiencies that are defined with the use of an action verb.

- Targeted Assessments-Targeted assessments always take the "form of a tangible product or a temporal performance. As assessment is something we can observe, so our entries must take the form of a noun."

Now, we are back to Dr. Hayes Jacobs at the front of the room. She is showing us the curriculum maps of a school in Westchester, New York that she has accessed via Internet Explorer. She has made the blanket statement that these pieces of software all have quality behind them. Clearly, she is not selling a particular piece of software. She believes in the idea that underlies the use of such software. These pieces of software include State Standards from around the country, so a teacher can pull a standard directly in to the curriculum map.

Instructional Aside from Dr. Hayes Jacobs
"We need to teach math as a language. Look at this curriculum map. Do you see these action verbs? Translate, translate, translate. The kids have to define their math vocabulary if they are going to understand the math."

1.22 PM--Master Class
We are now going to participate in a Master Class. We are going to look at Emily's class. (Emily is a teacher who is here today from some Chicago-area school who uses curriculum mapping software.) What is going to happen in the Master Class? Heidi is going to interact with Emily on improving her Curriculum Map. Our job, as audience members to the Master Class, is to take notes on Heidi and Emily's interactions--as they apply to us and our situations! Then, we are going to be able to transition back to our own map and revise it based on our notes of what we've learned from them.


My notes for me based on their interactions--

Emily wants to focus on her assessments. I think that most of our teachers would pick out assessment as the area that they would also pick first from among the choices of content, guiding questions, skills, and assessments.

They are focusing on the level of specificity that she has used in writing completing her curriculum map. This reminds me of when we look at an assignment as teachers and someone (usually not the person who wrote it) says, "What does this mean?" Often times, as teachers, we don't know what we are looking for in kids' work. If that's the case, how do the students know what we are looking for? As Heidi just said, "Teaching cannot just be in the heads of teachers." For teachers to implement really profound classroom instruction, they need to be able to articulate exactly what they are doing and why with different students. Once again, Heidi just said, "I don't know what you mean. I don't understand what you are thinking and doing from seeing this." This is an underlying premise of the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards process, too. Teachers have to write detailed entries because if they cannot articulate what they have done and why, then, so the thinking goes, they are not going to be able to communicate it to students either.

Heidi felt that the soft-spot in this Curriculum Map actually proved to be her content. Heidi believes that the development of guiding questions, what she calls essential questions, will significantly help this. How many classrooms in District 21 are effectively using guiding questions today? What's more--we even have the advantage of having concepts built right in to our curriculum.

1.45 PM--Mapping Software
***Want to know more about what software is available? Curriculum Designers: Mapping Software


2.00 PM--How do we begin working with mapping?
Consider a range of different types of professional development venues, including different strategies for different people. Keep in mind that curriculum mapping is easy for teachers to be resistant to... Mapping requires teachers to share their actual units and assessments. You need to consider individuals' readiness for curriculum mapping and with technology in how you create your professional development. These various groups may include:
- Hands-on labs
- Small workshops
- Work sessions
- Online courses
- Focus on data; Use of "Mapping Mentors"


2.25 PM--How do you make decisions about curriculum and teaching?
Who decides what gets taught? When do they make these decisions? How? Heidi recommends that these decisions are made by a single, site-based council. Agendas focus on short-term upgrades and long-term upgrades. To help with long-term upgrades, you may very well implement task forces that oversee the long-term upgrade. Once it is created and implemented, that task force disbands.


2.35 PM--Two Types of Curriculum Mapping
Diary Mapping--Like a doctor's chart or an athlete's training log, you record exactly what you have done. This will give you a record that you can use when you analyze student assessment data to determine which strategies did and which did not.

Projected Mapping--This is like a coach's training plan in that you articulate out what you intend to do in your units and lessons.


2.40 PM--Mapping Benchmark Assessments
Benchmarks can be designed on multiple levels: State tests, District assessments, and classroom assessments. Schools identify the skills that need to be developed and assessed. The most powerful benchmark assessments are developed locally by teachers. Benchmarks should occur when it makes sense within the scope of instruction. Benchmark data should be used to guide further differentiated instruction. As a result, benchmarks are necessarily different for different students.


Conclusion
The day just finished with a very funny YouTube video that Alan November shows, too. It is about the movement of technology from the scroll to the book. It is in Norwegian, but there are English sub-titles. (Remember, you can only watch this from outside District 21.)

As the hours count down until we begin to print the new intermediate report cards, one of the consistent questions that has arisen among teachers is, "What prints from PowerGrade and PowerSchool as a student's academic grade on the report card?" The answer is that the letter grade from the letter grade scale is what prints. Percentages do not print. This traditional "90, 80, 70, 60" scale is depicted in another post with an indication of the pluses and minuses that also exist in the scale. For Learner Qualities in the elementary schools, the "X" will simply appear when a teacher wants to express a specific concern. Comments will appear as they are entered. Also, the absence and tardy information does appear on the front page of the report card. This information is drawn from that which is entered on a daily basis in PowerSchool Teacher.

Extra credit is a very interesting assessment topic that, while part of the "unquestioned" fabric of education culture and history in the United States, ought to be re-explored within the framework of assessment for learning. Let's say, for example, that a teacher gives a weekly ten question geography quiz based on what the students have studied relating to geography from social science, science, and/or reading and literature. In addition, the teacher always includes 2 extra credit questions.

Upon nearing the end of a trimester marking period, the teacher begins to realize the significance of the "extra credit" in the grades of various students. Unsure how to handle this, the following reflective questions may help the teacher determine what role, if any, extra credit ought to play in classroom assessment.

Questions to Consider

• Why are you giving extra credit?
• For example, why is it “extra”?
• If it is for additional challenge, should different students simply be receiving different questions on the weekly quiz?
• Do all students receive the same questions? If so, is that appropriate based on their needs and previous performance?
• As a teacher, are you giving extra credit to see how many more items a student knows beyond what you expect?
• Are the extra credit questions more important or less important than other questions?

• Are you giving extra credit to see how motivated, or Self-Directed, a student is?
• Are you giving extra credit to see how much attention to detail is paid by the student (ie, Quality Producer)?

Points to Consider

• Two questions is 20% of the total number of questions if all questions count equally. So, simply based on the math, this can have a significant impact on the grade of the assignment.

• More importantly, is the nature of these quizzes simply fact-based recall?
• How do these quizzes fit in to a wider assessment plan for Social Science within your team?
• How are other more high-level, application-oriented assignments weighted?

• Finally, if the “extra” stuff is important enough to be assessed, it should be included as a "regular" part of the assessment. If it is a description of high levels of self-direction or quality work, it ought to be captured within those Learner Qualities. If it is not so important, it should not be included in the assessment at all because it detracts from what is important. This then muddies the communication to the student and his or her parents of what important skills and concepts the student actually knows and understands.

Unlike third through fifth grades, which have a new report card and have made the switch to PowerGrade and PowerSchool, no changes were in store for Kindergarten through second grade report cards. Nevertheless, it has become apparent that many primary teachers feel as if they require help in order to set-up their report card databases in Appleworks. It has also become apparent that District 21 Technology staff are going to be unable to meet this need this year. So, schools continue to have the same range of options for Primary Grade report cards that they have had in the past and that everyone had assumed that they would have for the 2007-2008 school year. To support them, though, in addition to the Appleworks databases in existence at the buildings, we have also created generic Microsoft Word report card templates. These may be easier for people to modify and use due to teachers' increased comfort with word processing programs. View the Kindergarten Word template and the 1st and 2nd Grade Word template. Again, these can be modified, and this is not intended to be a permanent Primary Grade Report Card solution for District 21. Rather, that will come from a process being put in place by the Department of Curriculum and Learning.

In addition to creating these templates to provide K-2 teachers within increased technological flexibility, we have made two quick little videos that provide additional insight. The first is about the Microsoft Word templates, and the second is designed to show people who are using the existing Appleworks databases how to update them for this year.

- Tour of Microsoft Word Report Card templates

*** Taking last year's AppleWorks Report Card database and updating it for this year