Culminating Project new

Culminating Project
Michael R. Crouch

Overview of Internship
Activities
 Developing Good Practices for Parent-Teacher Relationships (Required
Activity- Teacher Assessment)
 Exploring Law Associated with Student Rights in Educational Institutions
 Parents Who Support Literacy Program (Required Activity- Special Learning
Needs)
 Action Research and Plan for Student Needs Assessment
 PBSS Program Design and Implementation
 Improving Time Management/Study Skills Through Direct Classroom
Instruction (Required Activity- Program Assessment)
 Using Collaboration to Build a Climate of Trust with Teachers and Staff
 Time Management and Study Skills Community Outreach Program
 Cooperation is Tantamount to School Success (Required Activity- School
Environment)
 Closing the State Assessment Achievement Gap Between Our School’s
African American and White Student Population

Developing Good Practices for
Positive Parent-Teacher Relationships
(Required Activity- Teacher Assessment)
New Teacher Induction Program at Cobb Middle School
I developed this training session to be part of the program based on data
analysis of a survey for allowing new teachers to express their needs for
becoming more effective classroom managers. The training includes
research-based activities and
Best practices for effectively building and maintaining positive relationships
with their student’s parents and guardians.
Learning Objectives
 Understand the importance of involving parents and
guardians for both positive and negative student
performance and behavior.
 Learn advantages and effectiveness of various ways to
communicate based on the individual needs of parents such
as; phone calls, emails, and written notes.
 Gain knowledge and confidence in how to communicate with
parents in a professional manor when using each individual
communication tools, in order to build positive parent-
teacher relationships.

Exploring Law Associated with Student
Rights in Educational Institutions
In order to achieve success in the education profession; you must obtain a
high level of understanding for the laws related to the students, parents,
and staff that you are working with or responsible for as a member of
administration. Failure to do so will greatly increase the chances of
making a mistake that could put your students, your position, and the
reputation as a school at risk.
This PD session will explore the rights of students in connection
with the four sources of law that affect public education institutions in
America. The four sources of law that will be the main focus for this
activity are;
Constitutional Law
Statutory Law
Administrative Law
Judicial/Case Law
Faculty and staff will attend a short presentation and also be
asked to share any personal experiences which required them to know the
appropriate way to address the situation based on their knowledge of the
four sources of law being addressed.

Parents Who Support Literacy Program
(Required Activity- Special Learning Needs)
Overview: This will be a lesson that provides parents/guardians with
information and resources to help improve their ability to effectively
reinforce the literacy skills of their children who are identified as being
bellow average in reading and writing.
Objectives/ Learning Outcomes: Parents will be able to use the skills learned
from this workshop to improve their child’s level of reading and writing
performance if used consistently and appropriately.
Materials, Resources and Technology: Access to the school’s media center
and gymnasium during after hours of operation, with as many chairs as the
number of anticipated participants. Teachers and staff volunteers for
facilitating the lesson, and provide supervision of the participant’s children.
Prior to the evening of the event; make paper copies of all documents for
parents to use during the workshop, and to take home as resources for
continuing practices. The lesson will also require a laptop connected to the
main-room projector and screen.

Action Research and Plan for
Student Needs Assessment
This activity was conducting an Action Research Plan to address the achievement
gap in how well my advanced students perform verses my regular/lower-level
students, with completing their history fair project requirements successful. In
order to validate my hypothesis that there is a need for a change in our existing for
teaching students research skills and ensuring all students are being assessed
fairly based on their cognitive abilities; I conducted an Action Research Project to
answer these two main questions.
 Is there alternative lessons that would be more beneficial than participating in the
NHD history fair as use of instructional time that will provide the opportunity to
teach students skills that relate better to lower-level students and are more
conducive to their learning needs and cognitive abilities?
 Is there alternative ways that you feel would be more beneficial than participating
in the NHD history fair as use of instructional time that will provide the
opportunity to teach students similar skills to those learned through history fair,
though will be a more productive for lower-level student’s needs?

Action Research and Plan for
Student Needs Assessment
Impact on Student Achievement
The three most significant things I learned while conducting this action research
project is;
 All the colleagues who participated in the questionnaire method agreed that there
is an obvious need for change related to the requirements and design for students
in our regular/lower level classes participating in our current history fair projects.
 Students also demonstrated their acceptance of an alternative assignment as being
a more beneficial learning opportunity and better use of time over the current use
of the NHD history fair required projects.
 Through using the steps for creating an action research project can truly be an
effective means of creating positive changes in instructional practices.

PBSS Program Design and
Implementation
At the beginning of this school year I was part of newly formed
committee of teacher leaders given the responsibility of creating an
improved PBIS for our students. Working together we developed
multiple incentive methods to promote positive behavior based on
our existing “Cobb Student Expatiations” that give students who
demonstrate positive behaviors acknowledgement and meaningful
rewards. A couple examples of the new incentives offered to students
are; “Cub Paws (small paper tickets given to students by teachers and
staff when students demonstrate good behavior) that students collect
and use to enter a weekly raffle to win prizes and/or special
privileges, and the opportunity to attend a “field day” celebration at
the end of each semester. We also wanted to improve our student’s
and staff’s level of school pride; so we started “spirit shirt Fridays.”
Each first period class competed by having the highest percentage of
students wearing our school’s colors or a school-related shirt.

Improving Time Management/Study Skills
Through Direct Classroom Instruction
(Required Activity- Program Assessment)
This program will require all social studies teachers to include a minimum of
three instructional days
at the beginning of the school year to teach students effective time
management/study skills interventions to promote academic competence
among students. Teachers will use the framework based on the following four
clusters of study skills;
 repetition- or rehearsal-based strategies
 procedural or organization-based strategies
 cognitive-based strategies
 metacognitive-based strategies (Gettinger & Seibert, 2002).
These strategies will be used as a foundation for teachers to create their own lesson
plans through explicit classroom instruction for students to learn effective and
efficient study skills.

Using Collaboration to Build a Climate of Trust
with Teachers and Staff
Summary of the Activity
A group of teachers with ten or more years of experience met in the
media center after school to develop a guide that would aid our less
experienced teachers in understanding how to manage their classrooms
in order to keep from writing too many referrals or not writing enough
referrals. The goal was to improve the learning environment of all
classrooms. The teachers collaborated ideas of what constituted the
threshold for writing a referral and how best to keep from reaching that
threshold. The purpose of this guide is a means of providing less
experienced teachers a valuable class management resource, because so
often young teachers have no idea how to manage their classroom to
create a good learning environment.
Topics for collaboration were: academic cheating, class procedures,
technology issues, levels of disrespect, restroom policies, and test rules.
These were the areas newer teachers had expressed a need for more
guidance per the Discipline Office. Despite the fact that this need was
not expressed formally, but anecdotally, I felt like it was an opportunity to
clarify procedures and help our faculty.

Time Management and Study Skills
Community Outreach Program
The general description of the activity is our school staff facilitated
time management and study skills workshops for parents who
attended that allowed them to learn effective strategies in the home
environment.
One of the research-based strategies was explained is a framework based
on the following four clusters of study skills; repetition- or rehearsal-
based strategies, procedural or organization-based strategies,
cognitive-based strategies metacognitive-based strategies (Gettinger &
Seibert, 2002).
Another strategy was based on the website ,ucf.edu, which provides a
multitude of evidence-based effective study skills and time
management practices. There was also a presentation, I created and
lead, that reviews these methods and a hand-out for parents to take
home with them as a reference of what was covered.

Time Management and Study Skills
Community Outreach Program
Related Research
Schools using Technology to Improve Parent Involvement
The program “Parent Internet Driving School” used the school facilities to conduct workshops for parents
to attend that taught them computer skills that would improve their understanding of how their
children were using technology in both positive and negative ways. It also allowed teachers to
introduce ways that technology was being integrated into the curriculum.
“Educated Parents, Educated Children: Toward a Multiple Cycles Education
Policy”
Many data sets indicate the strong relationship between parents' education level and
their children's achievement in literacy. In 1983, I argued that research suggests that
highly educated parents transmit literacy intergenerationally via oral language skills and the
modeling of literacy skills. Therefore, if we could find ways to provide education for adults, we might
get double value from education dollars because investing in the education of adults could improve
the educability of their children. I refer to this as "double duty dollars" when investing in adult
education. We pay for the adults' education, and get improved education for both adults and
their children.”
Improving Student Reading Through Parents' Implementation of a
Structured Reading Program
The study found conclusive evidence that when this strategy was used over the course of a school’s
summer break, to be highly effective in improving the student’s reading fluency and comprehension.

Cooperation is Tantamount to School
Success
The School Improvement Committee is comprised of staff and
community members and is responsible for implementing the
annual School Improvement Plan that is submitted to the state for
documentation and approval. Each school also receives funds for
improving student achievement. There are strict guides for using
these funds and team cooperation and communication is necessary
to ensure that monies are properly dispensed. Effective use of these
skills will result in higher student achievement and school
improvement.

Cooperation is Tantamount to School
Success
(Required Activity- School Environment)
SIP Processes
Decisions about how to spend the budget usually are made in the
December - February meetings. This is where it is tantamount to the
success of our school to have good cooperation among the
committee members. At times, teachers are adamant about certain
needs in the school, but have to be flexible, knowing there is a finite
budget to meet many needs of the students. Sometimes parents get
frustrated because there does not seem to be enough money to meet
the needs they feel are most important. Cooperation, collaboration
and communication are very important because this is a very diverse
group in every way. The age of the members ranges from 12 - 60.
There are people of various socioeconomic backgrounds, various
ethnic and cultural backgrounds, and people with educations that
range from 7th grade - Masters Degrees. The one unifying factor is
that we are from the same community and are determined to help
our school become a better school.

Closing the State Assessment Achievement Gap
Between Our School’s African American and White
Student Population
The student group identified as showing a significant achievement gap in their
ability to score at or above proficient on the 2013-14 FSA is the African
American student population at Cobb Middle School. Through analyzing
related data and conducting further research; I identified trends, issues,
evidence-based remediation practices, and preferred learning styles in order to
better understand reasons for this achievement gap and potentially find
solutions for this issue. This achievement gap is not isolated to the student
group at Cobb. The achievement gap in African American students compared
with their White peers is evident on a state and national level as well.
Therefore; the information that will be included in the following table, and
within the analysis of the table’s contents, will address problems and
propose potential solutions for our students and can also have the ability to be
applied on a national level.

Student Population
Supporting Data
Student Group: The African American student population at Cobb Middle School is
52.1% of the total population. The school’s economically disadvantaged population is
52.4%. There is no definitive data available on the percent of our African American
students who classify as economically disadvantaged; the close percentage of African
American students (52.1%) and economically disadvantaged (52.4%) indicates a potential
high percentage of our African American students being economically disadvantaged.
Achievement Gap:
Percentage of Students Scoring Satisfactory and Above
(2013-14 FCAT 2.0 and FAA)
School % State %
Student Group: Race White Black or African
American
White Black or African
American
Reading 80 45 70 39
Mathematics 77 43 70 43
Writing 74 47 62 50

Student Population
Program Proposal
The specific program, that I proposed to be implemented, is providing sufficient
educational resources for our African American students who are not able to
obtain these resources. This will be a lesson plan that needs to extend beyond
the classroom, and include providing resources and evidence-based strategies
to be used in the homes of the students. The program will not be successful
unless parents and guardians of the target student population are willing to
effectively participate in using the resources and strategies provided for
helping their child contribute to closing the achievement gap on state
assessments.

References
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Grades Research Journal, 10(2), 1-16.
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