Visual+&+Multimedia+Supports-+IB+units+of+inquiry

Team members/ School
Margaret Preston, Christine Canard/Bancroft

Brief description of Learning Circle plan:
Developing Visual and multimedia supports for content area vocabulary essential to promote full participation in 5th grade International Baccalaureate Units of Inquiry, especially as it relates to the research and the performance assessment tasks. The team assessments of the effectiveness of our IB units throughout the year reflect a common theme; The students are almost invariably engaged and excited about participating in the units of inquiry, however, they struggle greatly with the vocabulary that is required to fully understand the key concepts and successfully participate in completing the summative assessment tasks that will become a part of their IB portfolios

Plan to measure results:
We will focus on the competencies outlined in the 5th grade English Language Arts Standards in Reading: Informational Text (RI.5.4), and in Writing (W.5.2).Data will be collected from: pre and post assessments of content and target vocabulary; Quick writes and video recordings of mini-presentations will be assessed for the use of targeted content and vocabulary. Finally, students will participate in a multi-step performance assessment piece to demonstrate the extent to which they can integrate the targeted language in their written work and presentations. Timeline: s and other data collection tools to support student and project assessments || Submit final report to Multilingual Department. The materials created will be implemented during the 2012-2013 school year in accordance with the IB calendar. ||
 * March || April || May || June ||
 * Examine Common Core standards and identify Units of Inquiry to be adapted for additional language Support. || identify text-based resources; Multimedia and other visual supports for the selected units. || Develop rubric

Work & Progress:

 * March notes:** our initial meeting was intended to allow us to identify a specific IB unit that, because of the complexity of the concepts and/or language, posed extensive difficulties to students that served to limit their participation in the unit.

We have chosen to focus on the How We Organize Ourselves (HWWO) at the 5th grade level. This unit addresses the form and function of governmental and organizational systems that in our society that have an impact on our daily lives. The final assessments reflected generally low levels of target language use among students and some confusion about the interrelated nature of the different agencies and organizations.

After reviewing samples of student work, we discussed the different concepts and language that the students need to be exposed to prior to the IB launch, and we will be putting together a template that can be used to organize our work and a list of focus vocabulary that will be integrated in a unit of pre-teaching prior to the launch of the unit.


 * April notes:** The list of focus vocabulary that we have initially identified as essential for all students to participate fully in the unit consist primarily of common Tier III vocabulary for all levels. This vocabulary must be included in presentations to allow for full descriptions and comparisons of governmental systems. Tier II vocabulary will differ based on the guided reading levels of each of our groups. The vocabulary that we will focus on was pulled from an extensive review of individual texts used in our guided reading groups. We have also reviewed numerous online resources for both classroom and independent student use and we are including links to those that we feel provide succinct examples of governmental processes.

-Steve Dunn -rubric revision -cooperative learning strategies -plan for implementation -PLC strategy sessions (vocab and CALLA) -working with teacher resources -MPI's -sentence frames
 * May notes:**


 * UNIT RESOURCES**
 * 5th Grade unit-How We Organize Ourselves:**


 * 5th Grade unit-instructional outline:**


 * 5th Grade unit-Government matrix:**


 * 5th GradeUnit-Presentation frame (sentence frame structure):**


 * 5th Grade unit-Presentation rubric:**


 * Target Tier II and Tier III vocabulary:**


 * PLC strategy sessions (vocab and CALLA)**

[|Bringing Words to Life - Tier l, ll, and lll words]
 * Teacher resources:**

[|Why Language Instruction Matters]

[|Steve Dunn Dirty Dozen]


 * Links to classroom resources:**
 * [|Kids in the House lesson plans and resources]**

[|How to become president (classroom poster)]

[|This is our: Government (video)]

[|Cultures, similarities and differences-Government (video)]

[]
 * Links to online resources for independent student learning:**

[]

[]

[]

[]

[]


 * 2011 baseline sample student work (Summative assessment presentations):**

[[file:Juan_Alex_Cindy.ppt]]