Alamogordo Public Schools

Elementary Educational Specification

Executive Summary

Educational Specifications

The purpose of the Educational Specifications document is to provide a written means of communication betweenstakeholders and design professionals. It considers botheducational and community needs, andarticulates thefacilities that will support those needs. This document will also guide the development of facilities that are flexible anddynamic to support evolving programs over time. Educational Specifications will be used to evaluate during the design process, and will also provide a means to achieve consistency in facilities throughout the district.

Process and Timeline

During the spring of 2009, a committeewas convened to develop a vision that will serve as the foundation for future construction and renovations of elementary educational environments in Alamogordo Public Schools. The planning committee consisted of educators, administrators, and school staff. These individuals were chosen to represent their respective fields and to provide a wide range of perspectives. Ideas regarding the future of education and how that relates to the learning environment were generated by the planning committee. This document is a product of the committee’s shared vision for the future of education in Alamogordo.

The first level of information that was gathered was the educational program information. During the first set of workshops (May 5-6), the committee met to confirm and refine educational program concepts for inclusion in the educational specifications. The morning on day 1 began with a discussion of best practices and the evolution of teaching and learning. The workshop continued with a group visioning session, which resulted in a cohesive outlook on the future of education. The committee was then grouped by program area and the groups participated in an activity to identify the spatial relationships that would benefit their educational program. The second day consisted primarily of defining the specific facility needs to support the identified vision.

The next level of information required is the technical details needed to design the facilities. The purpose of the final workshop (May 15) was to give the committee an opportunity to specify the essential aspects of the learning environment. The committee members workedwith their program area to refine the concepts and specific room requirements for each space.

Educational Overview

“You have brains in your head.

You have feet in your shoes

You can steer yourself any direction you choose.”

Oh, the Places You'll Go! by Dr. Seuss

Sometimes it seems as though we lose the real point of elementary education in all the debates about accountability and assessment. There are times that “No Child Left Behind” seems that it should have been named “No Child Left Untested.” However, in the midst of this controversy, effective teaching and learning is happening throughout classrooms every day of the week. The above quote from Dr. Seuss is particularly appropriate because there are many choices available for program delivery at every level. Elementary schools have traditionally been organized in grade level groups that share common resources such as media centers and multipurpose rooms. In addition to this organizational model, school districts are also exploring options for ideas such as creating small schools within a school or looping to provide more personalized learning groups.

Research Says…

There is an emerging body of research that links student performance with school facilities. One leading study makes the following points:

  • Design components and features have a measurable influence on student learning. Deficiencies in thermal comfort, acoustics, and lighting are particularly significant.
  • Overcrowding has a negative impact on learning.
  • There is a strong positive relationship between overall building condition and student achievement.
  • Substandard facilities have a negative impact on teacher effectiveness and performance and consequently impact student performance.

(Earthman, GlenI.School Facility Conditions and Student Academic Achievement. UCLA’s Institute for Democracy, Education, and Access. 2002.)

One of the emerging concepts in education is the philosophy of differentiation. Differentiation calls for students to be taught in the way that is most likely to be effective considering their individual readiness and styles of learning. Standards are “what” is taught. Differentiation can be “how” standards are taught. Howard Gardner’s theories of multiple intelligences have helped us understand the variety of ways in which we all learn. They are illustrated in the following table.


Eight Ways of Learning

Children who are highly: / Think / Love / Need
Linguistic / in words / reading, writing, telling stories, playing word games / books, tapes, writing tools, paper, diaries, dialogue, discussion, debate, stories
Logical-Mathematical / by reasoning / experimenting, questioning, figuring out logical puzzles, calculating / materials to experiment with, science materials, manipulatives, trips to the planetarium and science museum
Spatial / in images and pictures / designing, drawing, visualizing, doodling / art, LEGOs, video, movies, slides, imagination games, mazes, puzzles, illustrated books, trips to art museums
Bodily-Kinesthetic / through somatic sensations / dancing, running, jumping, building, touching, gesturing / role play, drama, movement, things to build, sports and physical games, tactile experiences, hands-on learning
Musical / via rhythms and melodies / singing, whistling, humming, tapping feet and hands, listening / sing-along time, trips to concerts, music playing at home and school, musical instruments
Interpersonal / by bouncing ideas off other people / leading, organizing, relating, manipulating, mediating, partying / friends, group games, social gatherings, community events, clubs, mentors/apprenticeships
Intrapersonal / in relation to their needs, feelings, and goals / setting goals, meditating, dreaming, planning, reflecting / secret places, time alone, self-paced projects, choices
Naturalist / through nature and natural forms / playing with pets, gardening, investigating nature, raising animals, caring for planet earth / access to nature, opportunities for interacting with animals, tools for investigating nature (e.g., magnifying glass, binoculars)

Educational Overview (continued)

What this tells us about the school building is that the facility must be planned to provide a variety of experiences to insure optimal learning opportunities for each child. Preschool and Kindergarten classrooms have traditionally been organized in centers – spaces where students can work on learning tasks individually and in teams. This program delivery approach is increasingly applied at all grade levels. Each classroom should contain a sink for art and science activities. Space and furnishings should be flexible to accommodate a number of centers as well as individual and group space. Connection to the outdoors is important for active learning and science projects.

Technology is an essential tool for learning in today’s schools. Computers are used for instruction in the core subjects as well as word processing, data analysis, and presentation development. Computers and projection devices are found in classrooms as well as computer labs.

Safety and security are primary objectives for all schools. This is best accomplished through incorporating passive security features into the design of the building:

  • Directing visitors to the main entrance that is monitored by the Administrative Offices.
  • Planning corridors with good sight lines for ease of supervision.
  • Planning plantings that don’t allow for concealment.
  • Providing adequate lighting throughout the building.
  • Providing a defibrillator centrally within the building.

Our children have all sorts of “places to go”, and we have a responsibility to give them the best roadmap for their journey and to be sure they know how to read it.

Technology

Technology has become one of the most effective tools used in education. Modern students are technologically engaged at a very young age and are constantly using various forms of technology. A challenge in planning for the future involves the difficulty of predicting where technology will be 10 to 20 years from now. For this reason, planning for flexibility is essential. The primary focus of planning for technology should be the inclusion of sufficient electrical infrastructure and wiring “backbones” to support current and future needs everywhere in the building.

The typical classroom may include the following communications and technology components:

  • Projection system and/or interactive whiteboard
  • Hard-wired and/or wireless data connections
  • Computers/laptops
  • Telephone
  • Intercom with 2-way communication
  • Document camera
  • Sound enhancement
  • Wireless atomic clocks

Shared Areas

In addition to allowing movement throughout the building, corridors are an impromptu gathering and socialization space for students. It is very important to plan corridors and stairwells for ease of supervision and to eliminate crowding during passing times as much as possible, while still allowing students to socialize. Since corridors and lobbies also provide good opportunity to showcase and highlight student work, tackstrips and display cases should be provided throughout the school.

Elementary Curriculum Guidance Overview 2008-09

Alamogordo Comprehensive Literacy Initiative

Student Engagement

Students are engaged when they are

­interested in the work

­challenged by the work,

­satisfied by the work,

­persistent in the work, and

­committed to the work.

The critical result of student engagement is that students learn what is important for them to learn.

Phillip Schlechty (2006)

The Alamogordo Public Schools Literacy initiative has designed a framework of literacy instruction based on a premise that student achievement will result from high levels of literacy and thinking opportunities within a systematic and explicit scope and sequence of reading/literacy skills and benchmarks. In a classroom, engaged readers look, behave, feel and interact wholly with texts and learning opportunities. The child is valued, as a learner and social being, for their desire for understanding and deep comprehension of knowledge.

The effectiveness of a strong literacy framework depends upon objective, reliable, systematic, and refereed (independently reviewed) evidence. Children learn when they are encouraged to engage, explore, and learn within a strong structure of evidence based instruction practices and strategies.

This framework, based upon the “Big Ideas” generated from the National Reading Panel (2000), indicates that Phonemic Awareness, Phonics, Vocabulary, Comprehension, Fluency, and Language Acquisition, are essential to the process of becoming a proficient reader. The International Reading Association (2007) concurs that literacy strategies designed to support the big ideas build the structure for reading success. Most children pass through five development stages of literacy development:

  • Awareness and exploration
  • Experimenting with reading and writing
  • Early reading and writing
  • Transitional reading and writing
  • Conventional reading and writing

Alamogordo Comprehensive Literacy Initiative (continued)

The APS Literacy initiative scaffolds students with a variety of materials and methods through these developmental stages in a gradual release model, fostering each student’s opportunity for proficiency and independence as a reader. APS teachers are involved in ongoing job-imbedded professional learning opportunities that support the best possible instructional literacy model in order to prepare our students for high levels of achievement.

Expectations

  • The Alamogordo Public School system believes that all students can achieve high levels of proficiency in reading, literacy, and thinking.
  • The national recommendations for the development of reading proficiency include 5 Big Ideas. New Mexico recognizes the addition of Language Acquisition as an essential addition.
  1. Phonemic Awareness: The ability to hear and manipulate sounds in words.
  2. Phonics (Alphabetic Principal): The ability to associate sounds with letters and use these sounds to form words.
  3. Fluency with Text: The effortless, automatic ability to read words in connected texts.
  4. Vocabulary: The ability to understand (receptive) and use (expressive) words to acquire and convey meaning.
  5. Comprehension: The complex cognitive process involving the intended interaction between reader and text to convey meaning.
  6. Language Acquisition: Communicative approaches to language acquisition are based on concepts, theories, and hypotheses that converge around the constructivist paradigm. Language acquisition is embedded in function within a meaningful context.
  • Alamogordo Public Schools utilizes evidence (research) based strategies/skills that support the best practices of literacy acquisition:
  1. Word Work/Word Walls
  2. Read Aloud
  3. Shared Reading
  4. Guided Reading
  5. Reader’s Workshop
  6. Writer’s Workshop
  7. Comprehension Strategies/Skills
  • Through authentic and engaged practice, students:
  1. Learn at high levels and have a profound grasp of what they learn
  2. Retain what they learn
  3. Can transfer what they learn to new contexts

Alamogordo Comprehensive Literacy Initiative (continued)

Literate Environment

Physical (The Classroom)

  • Desks/tables are arranged to maximize student learning (i.e., groups, partners, and individuals)
  • Small group instruction area is situated so that all students are visible to teacher.
  • Meeting area is large enough to fit the classroom community of learners (may be designated by an area rug.)
  • Comfortable, inviting spaces that stimulate reading and writing (i.e., Centers, stools, rocking chairs, floor pillows, beanbag chairs, mats, etc.)
  • Walls and bulletin boards are a visual celebration of students’ learning.
  • Rules, signs, procedures, and protocols contribute to the print-rich environment.
  • Word wall is accessible to students.
  • Materials for reading and writing are labeled, organized, and user-friendly (ie. Classroom library, post-its, bookmarks, highlighters, tape, staplers, colored writing utensils, paper, resources, etc.)
  • Classroom is uncluttered, yet alive with literacy choices.

Instructional (The Teacher)

  • Enthusiasm
  • Modeling
  • Scaffolding (Gradual Release Model)
  • Short, focused (1 objective) lessons
  • Standards-based instruction
  • “Big 6” elements of reading instruction
  • Best Practice strategies (read aloud, shared reading, word work, reader’s workshop, comprehension ladder, writers’ workshop, guided reading)
  • Differentiated instruction
  • High level questioning
  • Teaching materials (ie. Easel, overhead, magnetic letters, chart paper, pointers, sentence strips, etc.)
  • Assessment used to inform instruction (DIBELS, unit tests, portfolios, anecdotal notes, etc.)

Learning (The Students)

  • Engagement
  • Respect for individual differences
  • Immersed in authentic literacy activities (i.e., writing for a variety of purposes, projects, graphic organizers, poetry journals, writers’ readers’ notebooks, etc.)
  • Literacy conversations
  • Personal responsibility and accountability
  • Choice
  • High, but achievable goal setting
  • Meta-cognition

Alamogordo Comprehensive Math Initiative

Vision: The Alamogordo Public School District expects all students to be proficient in math. Through vertical and horizontal alignment, students, parents, and teachers are empowered, enthusiastic, and accountable for mathematics understanding. (September 2005)

The Alamogordo Elementary Math Committee worked during the week of July 21-25 to develop a scope of work designed to assist APS teachers in achieving the district vision. Through this work, technical assistance documents have been prepared to serve as guidance for fidelity to the initiative and next-steps for implementation in each elementary school in the Alamogordo Public School district.

Some overarching goals for the work week included:

  • To investigate and learn more about how children learn math; to define and provide guidance regarding the best instructional practices that support mathematics learning in a Standards Based Learning Environment.
  • To establish a 2008-09 Pacing Calendar.
  • To establish agreed upon operational definitions for the APS Elementary Math Initiative.
  • To provide an aligned computational fluency component for all schools.
  • To align Everyday Math unit goals to the New Mexico Standards and Benchmarks
  • To establish clear expectations for the Lesson Cycle.

Expectations

  • All students can and should be proficient in mathematics.
  • The national recommendations for the development of mathematical proficiency involves five intertwined strands as established by the committee on Mathematics Learning (2001). These strands are established based upon a careful review of the research literature on mathematics teaching learning. This document provides research-based recommendations for teaching, teacher education and curriculum for improving student learning.
  1. Understanding Mathematics
  2. Computing fluently
  3. Applying concepts to solve problems
  4. Reasoning logically
  5. Engaging with mathematics, seeing it as sensible, useful and doable

Alamogordo Comprehensive Math Initiative (continued)

  • The New Mexico Standards and Benchmarks are designed to develop mathematical proficiency by identifying the mathematical content strands and the processes to develop proficiency with that content.

Content Standards / Process Standards
Number and Operations / Problem Solving
Algebra / Communication
Geometry / Connections
Measurement / Representation
Data and Probability / Reasoning
  • Standards-Based Curriculum – A scientifically research-based (National Science Foundation (NSF) funded) curriculum that is aligned to national and state standards and is designed to develop students’ mathematical proficiency. The curriculum is designed to address conceptual understand, procedural fluency, strategic competence, adaptive reasoning, and a positive attitude toward mathematics and the importance of mathematics in daily life.
  • Everyday Math – A Standards Based Curriculum chosen through a consensus process by APS staff to provide a scope and sequence for math instruction and to serve as a resource tool to assist each student in becoming mathematically proficient.
  • Instructional Expectation – All students will receive 60 to 75 minutes of core instruction (Everyday Math) each day to assure that students develop mathematical understanding and proficiency. Additionally, students will receive 13 minutes of intervention and/or skill practice through the Success Maker program.
  • Standards Based Learning Environment (SBLE) – A learning environment that is consistent with research from NSF and the recommendations of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM).
  • Measuring Standards-Based Learning Environments (SBLE) Classroom Observations:
  1. The enacted lesson provides opportunities for students to make conjectures about mathematical ideas.
  2. The enacted lesson fosters the development of conceptual understanding.
  3. Students explain their responses or solution strategies.
  4. Multiple perspectives/strategies are encouraged and valued.
  5. Students’ statements about mathematics are valued and used to build discussion or work toward shared understanding for the class.
  • National Math Panel – The National Math Panel released its findings in 2008. According to the findings, New Mexico is one of five states with outstanding standards and benchmarks. The panel’s research confirmed that schools must increase access to algebra and other rigorous coursework. The panel also found that the earlier children learn math, the better their chances of success.

Elementary Curriculum Guidance Overview 2008-09 -Bibliography