School Type: Public	School Setting: Rural
Level: Elementary	School Design: Traditional
Content Presented By:
National Awards Program for Model Professional Development

Results

All but a few of the children score among the lowest in the nation at their grade levels, so our programs are designed to accelerate their learning. An important development in our programs evolved from teachers' observations that the children seemed to prefer spatial and kinesthetic activities over verbal ones, with the exception of storytelling, which engaged virtually all of the children. Ever since the 1993-94 school year, we have administered the Raven CPM to third graders. Typically, 75-80 percent score in the upper two quartiles on this norm-referenced test. Through the CPM, we have identified 7-10 percent of our students as gifted, in the 97-99th percentile range. Based on their observations of students' strength in spatial and non-verbal thinking and verification through the CPM, teachers asked for professional development to find teaching strategies to build on this strength. As a result, we have completed workshops and courses in multiple intelligences, integrated thematic learning, and implemented those strategies in the classrooms.

The Ganado Intermediate School professional development program serves 80 staff members and 515 children. One-third of our professional staff of 35 are Diné, as are all but two of our paraprofessional staff members. Each year, four to nine new professionals join our staff. We continually offer beginning through advanced learning opportunities to meet the needs of professionals at various stages of development. Effectiveness of professional development for individuals may be multiplied through longer experience and participation.

Toward our goal of increasing the number of Diné teachers through support of paraprofessionals in teacher education programs, we offer the following results: three paraprofessionals became teachers this year; two more are completing student teaching now; and two more hope to be certified within two years.

Contributing to our goal of literacy development, teachers and paraprofessionals have facilitated students' voluntary and at-home reading from 14,000 books in 1993-94 to 42,000; 60,000; and 55,000 books in the subsequent years.

In five years our school has progressed toward our goal of positive parent relationships in several ways. As we looked for a positive way to bring parents and community members into the school, we increased from zero to 24 part-time teacher helpers who tutor students in classrooms and participate in site-based management and shared decision-making. We also increased from the sparse parent visitation we had six years ago to the remarkable 100 percent parent involvement we saw in the 1996-97 school year. Halfway through this year, we are already at 70 percent parental involvement.

Each year, all students complete a pre- and post-assessment in reading fiction and in writing personal experience narratives. In school years 1993-94 and 1994-95, third grade reading assessments were administered in third, fourth, and fifth grades. In 1995-96 we began to administer reading assessments at grade level standards. When considering the average scores, it is good to remember the change to more difficult reading selections and skills. In addition, there are differences in some of the pre- and post-score relationships. For example, notice that the third-graders have scored an average of 9.2 or 9.4 in three years, but they have improved from pre-assessment scores ranging from 7.3 in the first year to 5.5 and 5.8 in the last two years. Writing scores typically have met or exceeded the goal score, set 0.5 higher than the district standard for this assessment. The district standard for high school seniors is a score of 5.0 on a 0-8 scale; by fifth grade our students are meeting our school goal of 3.5. All other assessment goals are set at 75 percent scores. The reading and writing tables show student achievement average (mean) scores on ASAP assessments. The mathematics table shows the average scores on math pre- and post-assessment tests.

GRADE 3 READING AND WRITING
	Goal	1993-94	1994-95	Goal	1995-96	1996-97
Grade Level Standard		3	3		3	3
Reading Pre-Assessment		7.3	6.1		5.5	5.8
Reading Proficiency	12	9.2	12.8	12	9.4	9.2
Writing Pre-Assessment		2.1	2.4		2.1	2.1
Writing Proficiency	2.5	2.4	3.0	2.5	2.6	2.5

GRADE 4 READING AND WRITING
	Goal	1993-94	1994-95	Goal	1995-96	1996-97
Grade Level Standard		3	3		4	4
Reading Pre-Assessment		8.6	8.4		10.4	10.7
Reading Proficiency	12	10.1	11.0	13	13.0	12.6
Writing Pre-Assessment		2.4	2.8		2.7	2.7
Writing Proficiency	3.0	2.9	3.2	3.0	3.3	3.0

GRADE 5 READING AND WRITING
	Goal	1993-94	1994-95	Goal	1995-96	1996-97
Grade Level Standard		3	3		5	5
Reading Pre-Assessment		10.4	9.3		10.9	11.2
Reading Proficiency	12	12.1	11.5	13	13.1	12.5
Writing Pre-Assessment		2.9	3.2		3.0	3.1
Writing Proficiency	3.5	3.5	3.6	3.5	3.5	3.6

GRADE 5 MATHEMATICS
	Goal	1993-94	1994-95	Goal	1995-96	1996-97
Grade Level Standard					5	5
Math Patterns Pre-Assessment					13.8	14.1
Math Patterns Proficiency	18	NA	NA		18.0	17.4
Computation Pre-Assessment						9.8
Computation Proficiency	27	NA	NA		NA	20.0

Site Visit Documentation

Ganado Intermediate School's success was recorded based on a site visit conducted by the National Awards Program for Model Professional Development in 1997.

Criteria	Evidence
Expected changes in teaching and student learning that will result from participation in professional development are stated.	The professional development plan stipulates improvement in student achievement on the Arizona Student Assessment Program (ASAP). The goal of achieving at 70% mastery on these 34 state outcomes is stated, and mastery is achieved by 75% of the student body. Teachers also report improvement in instructional practice as a result of their professional development activities. For instance, knowing more about the reading process helps them help students who are struggling with reading. Practicing the writing process themselves helps them understand students' difficulty and helps them demonstrate to students the difference between "draft" or "sloppy copy," and "finished copy." The teachers in the Spencer Foundation action research project have changed the way they look at their students. As one participant said, the school reform process helped identify the strengths and weaknesses of the curriculum, and the professional development program was built; the Spencer process helped her look at herself, and she examined how she affects her students In addition, the Teacher Portfolio, which is part of the Career Ladder program, includes a student achievement section where it is stated, "Teachers completing the student achievement component will improve students' learning" and where the teacher must document that student growth as a result of a submitted lesson plan. (Note: The portfolio process indicates that teacher knowledge can grow even if the submitted lesson plan didn't work as designed. Student growth is desirable, of course, but mistakes can be just as informative as successes, and teachers are encouraged to learn from both their mistakes and their successes.) In addition, the Foundations of Learning curriculum guide lists learning objectives in the areas of communication, thinking, career, social and interpersonal relations, and respect and reverence, with an expectation of proficiency by achieving a list of stated skills.
The professional development goals and outcomes focus on increasing teachers' expertise in teaching to high standards.	The professional development goals and outcomes were developed to increase teachers' expertise and consequently increase student learning. Ganado students are expected to meet or exceed standards set by the state for all students across Arizona. Writing scores, for example, exceed the goal score and are set higher than the district standards. These standards are further supported by the Diné curriculum with its expectations for conduct and critical thinking. The Teacher Portfolio, part of the Career Ladder program, expects the teacher to establish realistic, yet challenging objectives and proficiency levels that reflect learning at an application level or above. And the Bread Loaf connection, with its focus on inquiry and reflection and its expectations for documentation and sharing, raises aspirations for the entire school. It even has a waiting list for participation.
There is a credible rationale for believing that given the attainment of the expected teacher outcomes, student outcomes will be achieved.	Based on the goals identified in the areas of reading, writing, and mathematics, students are improving as documented by the ASAP, informal assessment, teachers' anecdotal records, results of action research, and teacher portfolios which include a record of student achievement. The goal to increase the use of technology as a teaching and learning tool has not only increased, but it has afforded the teachers the opportunity to tap into the strong visual and kinesthetic learning preferences of the students. Where students once labored over paper and pencil, writing only a few words on a page, they have progressed to publishing fluent stories on laser printers accompanied by scanned pictures and graphics. The multimedia technology has begun to deliver on the promise of helping the school meet its literacy goals. The plan to involve more parents with their children's education via the paraprofessional program has not only increased such involvement, but teachers report that the students' self-esteem has been raised because they see their parents in this role. In addition, the children's respect for adults has been positively influenced, and the level of trust and feeling of security on the part of the children has been raised because of their involvement with the paraprofessionals on a one-to-one basis.
There is a continuous process for ensuring that the school community understands how the professional development components fit together and connect to the overall school or district improvement plan.	While the staff as a whole used to be confused about the connection between the professional development plan and the school improvement plan, they are now more aware of the relationship between the two. However, since the faculty see only part of the whole picture ? the part they as grade-level team members work on ? they are at a disadvantage; the paraprofessional staff are even less sure of the connections. The principal wrestles with the whole picture and strives to convey this big picture to the staff. COOL School nights are an excellent example of how community outreach (the CO of COOL) helps inform the community about the opportunities for learning (the OL of COOL) and builds the kind of rapport that is necessary to maintain parent involvement.
The data collected provide evidence that the professional development activities lead to improved teaching and student learning.	Using the ASAP which aligns with the Arizona state standards, the school has collected data that provides evidence that students are improving as a result of improved instruction based on the professional development activities. The fact that students perform above competence range on the reading and writing portions of the test indicates that the professional development activities in reading and writing (the Collaborative Literacy Intervention Program and the Northern Arizona Writing Project) are making a difference in student outcomes. The data from the ASAP scores are examined in conjunction with the teachers' professional development documentation, such as their Career Ladder portfolios. Scores on norm-referenced tests show increases of statistical significance. Even though movement is only from the lowest quartile to the low-average quartile, the trend is in the right direction and says clearly to the principal that the school's professional development plan is making a positive difference.
The data collected provide evidence that the professional development activities lead to a narrowing of existing achievement gaps.	One big goal of the Ganado Intermediate School is to close the achievement gap between their students and more advantaged children across Arizona. The staff understands that their students may not be afforded equitable opportunity in academic, social, and economic systems. This concern about student achievement was the impetus for developing the professional development model they did. The staff do see progress in a number of areas: Achievement gaps in relation to LEP performance and improvements in reading and writing have narrowed based on ASAP scores. These scores also indicate that the disparity between achievement of 4th grade LEP students and 5th grade LEP students (the same group of students tracked in the next school year) has decreased. The same trends are seen with gender differences, where boys' scores are getting more comparable with girls' achievement. Scores on the ITBS and Stanford 9 tests indicate that the students went from the bottom of the lowest quartile to the upper portion of that quartile and into the low average group. While not stunning in comparison to other districts, this increase is indicative of the kind of growth possible and the kind of continued growth that is desired ? when professional development opportunities are focused on making changes in student outcomes.

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