By Scott MacKeen
Staff Writer
12/24/09
Teachers are looking for more preparation and planning time, funding for supplies and technology, and common instructional benchmarks that can flow from one grade into the next. Those were the findings of a three-year review-team study of the English curriculum, which was recently presented to the School Committee. The study, led by Elementary Coordinator Martha Sherman and Middle School Humanities Coordinator Stephanie Nephew, was part of a “cyclical” and ongoing review of the curriculum, according to Assistant School Superintendent John Phelan. According to Sherman, the study involved surveying teachers at all grade levels to determine the strengths of the curriculum and what can be improved upon. The focal point of the study was a review of students’ performance on the English portion of the MCAS exam, but it also included observations of how the students learn to develop reading and writing skills, Phelan said.
The study found students are performing better on “factual” material – basic vocabulary, grammar and structure – and are struggling with more subjective material such as open response, inference questions, figurative language and poetry.
What’s more, according to a survey of teachers, there is a common feeling among the majority of instructors that the contractual time allotted for planning and preparing material is not adequate. That came to light in survey results of teachers at the elementary, middle and high school levels, according to Nephew.
Under the current contract, elementary teachers get 30 minutes per day for preparation and 20 minutes for lunch. Middle and high school teachers get 47 minutes per day and 20 minutes for lunch. According to Phelan, they also have one period per day that is called an “administrative duty” period.
Phelan said the middle school and high school students take seven 46-minute classes. The middle school students are on “teams” that result in all the core teachers (math, science, social studies and English) having the same time off to meet during their administrative duty period.
At Milton High, he added, the students are scheduled by department, not by team. As a result, teachers don’t have similar time off during the school week.
Part of the problem has been the recent cutting back of reading coaches and support staff due to budget cuts, according to the review-team presentation. Cutbacks in electives have also impacted how teachers budget their time, Phelan said.
Another challenge, school officials say, is trying to establish uniformity in instructional benchmarks and curriculum planning. Both Sherman and Nephew spoke of the importance of improving “vertical articulation,” a term educators use that reflects their desire to see common curriculum language across grade levels. Nephew said that practice allows teachers to better understand what students have learned in prior grades and what they should expect to know as they move ahead.
“The first step is developing uniform curriculum documentation to create a common language. We need to better document what we do and make sure it works,” Nephew told the School Committee.
She expanded on that point in a follow-up interview with the Times.
“Right now we have curriculum documents for each [grade] level, but in different formats,” Nephew explained.
Phelan said part of the challenge is that curriculum documents are constantly being re-examined and updated based upon continuing administrative assessments. The elementary-level document alone is hundreds of pages, which gets reviewed in depth every three years, according to the assistant superintendent.
“To put it in layman’s terms, people often think of curriculum like it’s a book, like a math book or an English book. But that’s really not the case. It’s a free-flowing document. It’s constantly being re-evaluated,” he said.
The members of the curriculum review team have put plans into action.
“Because this has been a three-year journey, we have been implementing some things already, along the way” Nephew said during the School Committee presentation. “We’re constantly observing and reacting.”
Recent initiatives aimed at improving curriculum have included the scheduling of literary nights geared toward elementary and middle school parents, and instruction toward open-response questions, according to officials. According to Sherman, there is also a goal of creating libraries within classrooms at the lower grades.
Some of the initiatives are being funded outside of the budget. The Milton Foundation for Education, a fund-raising organization, has helped buy books for elementary and middle school classrooms. Thanks to the MFE, all high school classrooms also have SMART Board instruction devices.
In addition, the East Milton Branch Library, which recently shut its doors, has donated books to the growing volume of in-class reading titles, according to Sherman.
Nephew spoke of the value of teachers and parents encouraging reading for pleasure among children, as well as the need for “silent, sustained reading” during class.
She said those methods have proven to show results in the type of figurative and open-ended material with which young students often struggle.
“Having that part of the curriculum is crucial,” Nephew said.
With the English review team completing its work, Phelan said the school administration will review the document internally and decide the next step forward. Phelan said administrators meet monthly with principals.
“We will meet with [School Superintendent] Mary Gormley and the rest of the team and start to prioritize the things teachers are saying they want to see,” Phelan said. “We’ll see how much of it we can bite off this year and what part of it is more long term.”