Creating Technology to Promote Learning    

9:00 a.m.

Welcome and Introduction

Jeanne Simons, Outside Field Services Coordinator, Assessment Technology, Incorporated

9:15 a.m.

Dynamic Intervention Systems

Presented by: Craig Mayhew, Field Services Director, Assessment Technology, Incorporated

Summary:  Click to show/hide

It is well recognized that the American educational system must increase student learning to remain competitive in the 21st century. The need to increase learning will require dynamic intervention systems comprised of interrelated research and management components. Research components are needed to provide credible evidence of instructional effectiveness. Management components are required to plan, implement, evaluate, and adjust interventions. This presentation outlines a dynamic intervention system integrating research and management to promote student learning.

10:10 a.m.

Experimental Research in Standards-Based Education

Presented by: Charles Brainerd, Ph.D., Professor, College of Human Ecology, Cornell University

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The cornerstone of standards-based education is research that establishes reliable cause-effect links between specific learning practices and desired outcomes. Experimental research with randomized control-group (i.e., standard instruction) designs is necessary to establish those links, but most educational research does not use such designs and, hence, does not provide a firm footing for standards-based education.

In addition to providing a foundation for standards-based education, experimental research has several attractive properties. For example, such research is easy to conduct because it involves relatively small numbers of students (e.g., 25-30 per cell) who participate in brief but carefully controlled sessions. In addition, small-scale experimental research is more efficient and cost-effective than many other types of research (e.g., correlational multi-school studies involving thousands of students who participate over periods of weeks, months, or even years), and yet, it yields the most reliable data. Moreover, the findings of small-scale experiments are easily linked to lessons that quickly deliver effective learning methods because the same computer technology that is used to conduct such experiments can deliver the corresponding lessons.

For these reasons, there is an urgent national need for small-scale experimental studies of learning in elementary and high school students. This research will identify specific methods that are effective in learning particular material (e.g., the types of notation that allow children to understand mathematics), and it will identify the general cognitive principles that make specific methods effective. This research can build on technology that is already in place in schools.

11:05 a.m.

Implementing Intervention through the Local Accountability Professional Development Series (LAPDS)

Presented by: Stephen Hamilton, Director District and School Services, Learning Innovations at WestEd

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WestEd knows from research and decades of experience that a one-size-fits-all approach does not work. That’s why the Local Accountability Professional Development Series (LAPDS) team customizes the training to address individual strengths and needs. While the implementation may differ based on each district’s or school’s unique characteristics, the LAPDS process remains the same.

WestEd’s services are based on the best available research in mastery learning theory and the alignment of curriculum, lesson planning, instruction, and assessment. This alignment provides students with specific, immediate feedback and multiple opportunities to demonstrate proficiency of the academic standards.

WestEd’s focus? To build your capacity to fully implement an accountability system that will rapidly improve student achievement. The LAPDS system uses rigorous standards and assessments fully aligned with the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP) item specifications and the blueprints of the district’s or school’s state assessment.

11:50 a.m.

Lunch

12:30 p.m.

Designing an Intervention

Presented by: Craig Mayhew, Field Services Director, Assessment Technology, Incorporated

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Designing the sort of intervention system being presented in this forum requires the close integration of three fundamental and familiar components. Goal setting, implementation, and evaluation are familiar to everyone in the educational world. This presentation will discuss how each of these components can be designed in order to achieve the degree of integration that will be needed in order to maximize the opportunity to realize meaningful increases in student achievement and instructional efficiency. Methods of organizing content that support easy tracking of both the instructional material that has been delivered and the outcome that has been achieved will be reviewed. Discussion will also be focused on use of the evaluation data to make decisions about subsequent instruction so that approaches that don’t work are addressed in a timely fashion.

1:30 p.m.

Breakout Session:  One of the challenges today’s educators face is that of utilizing technology to support educational interventions. In this breakout session participants will have the opportunity to share their experiences in planning, implementing, and evaluating interventions. They will discuss the kinds of interventions most needed to elevate student achievement in their district, and they will examine the role of assessment in informing intervention initiatives. Participants will explore the application of technology in intervention implementation using a variety of tools, such as Galileo Dialog Resources, Promethean flipbooks, and technology utilizing district- or teacher-created activities and lesson plans. Participants will leave the breakout session with sample implementation plans utilizing intervention technology that may be leveraged for intervention instruction in the current 2008-2009 school year.

3:15 p.m.

Closing Remarks

Presented by: Craig Mayhew, Field Services Director, Assessment Technology, Incorporated