Kentucky Teacher

By Matthew Tungate
matthew.tungate@education.ky.gov

Fifth-grade teacher Ninya Sallee talks about the Revolutionary War with her class at Pilot View Elementary School (Clark County). The students started by first listing the things they already knew about the war and then the things they would like to learn about it. They followed that by examining the painting Washington Crossing the Delaware by Emanuel Gottlieb Leutze. Photo by Amy Wallot, Nov. 15, 2012

Just as all ships rise with the tide, better educating all students will fill the achievement gap, according to teachers and principals at schools that made the most progress in reducing achievement gaps on the latest state achievement test.

Principal Steve Jenkins and teachers at Pilot View Elementary (Clark County) pay little attention to whether students are in a group that has traditionally performed lower on state assessments than their peers.

“They don’t look at a kid and go, ‘These are the barriers,’” he said. “We just look at every kid and try to make sure they’re all getting the same education as best as we can give it.”

Principal David Ward said he and his staff at Auburn Elementary School (Logan County) feel the same way.

“The teachers are pretty much ‘blind’ to the free or reduced-price lunch status. We look at all of our students as they learn,” he said. “It’s a priority here at Auburn that every single student, regardless of whether they’re in the gap or not, be pushed to be their best and learn.” Continue Reading

By Matthew Tungate
matthew.tungate@education.ky.gov

Ken Draut talks about the recent assessment test scores during the Kentucky Board of Education meeting.
Photo by Amy Wallot, Dec. 3, 2012

Results from the first use of Kentucky’s new assessment and accountability model – Unbridled Learning: College/Career Readiness for All – show the system worked the way it was supposed to with few exceptions, according to the system’s main architect.

Ken Draut, associate commissioner of the Kentucky Department of Education’s Office of Assessment and Accountability, said the goal of the new system was to create a continuous improvement model that would give schools and districts incentives to work with all students in more subjects than just mathematics and reading.

“This is a broad view of our schools,” he said.

So after calculating the combined scores for five categories – achievement, gap, growth, college/career readiness and graduation rate – Draut said he was pleased with the distribution on the scale from 0-100. The state has never combined five large areas into one assessment system, he said, and he and his staff weren’t sure if scores would be spread out or clumped together. Continue Reading

The Kentucky Department of Education, along with several partners and more than 50 school districts, is in the third year of a four-year plan to develop the Professional Growth and Effectiveness System (PGES). Schools statewide will pilot the new system in the 2013-14 school year, with full implementation scheduled for 2014-15. This is the first in a series of stories that will examine different aspects of the proposed system.

By Matthew Tungate
matthew.tungate@education.ky.gov

Second-grade teacher Carolyn Noe, left, reviews the peer observation she did in 1st-grade teacher Sharon Clark’s language arts class at Paint Lick Elementary School (Garrard County). Clark said the observation was very helpful and prepared her for her evaluation with her principal.
Photo by Amy Wallot, Nov. 5, 2012

Teachers and principals across Kentucky are developing and testing a system that will provide them individualized feedback and professional growth opportunities that will make them stronger educators and help their students meet the state’s college- and career-readiness goals.

“We, in Kentucky, are focused on every student in every classroom having a highly effective teacher and ensuring that every school is led by a highly effective leader,” said Cathy White, manager of the Teacher and Leader Effectiveness Branch of the Kentucky Department of Education (KDE).

Kentucky’s ultimate goal is that every child is proficient and graduates high school college- and/or career-ready.

“That doesn’t happen magically because you walk through the doors of a school building,” said White, noting that research shows a teacher is the most influential factor for student growth in the classroom. “There have to be adults in that building who purposefully and intentionally plan for and engage students in specific experiences that enable them to learn and grow and achieve at their highest level of ability.” Continue Reading

By Matthew Tungate
matthew.tungate@education.ky.gov

Ron Adkisson discusses the Age of Exploration with his 8th-grade American History class at South Oldham Middle School (Oldham County). Adkisson was named the 2012 Kentucky History Teacher of the Year.
Photo by Amy Wallot, Oct. 2, 2012

South Oldham Middle School’s Ron Adkisson may be the 2012 Kentucky History Teacher of the Year, but he credits his wife with inspiring him to be a better teacher. Before you think Adkisson is just trying to score brownie points with his spouse, realize that he means it literally.

Cheryl Adkisson works at South Oldham as a gifted and talented coordinator, and it was she who encouraged the 8^th-grade American history teacher to start a “living history” program in his classroom similar to what they saw on a trip to Colonial Williamsburg about 10 years ago. The program involves him and his wife dressing as historical figures three or four times a year and asking the students to do the same.

“I don’t want to just teach history – I want the kids to do history,” Ron Adkisson said. “So any time I can get a group of kids dressed up and role playing, acting our parts of history and doing an interpretation of a character, I want them doing it. We bring history to life by teaching it this way.” Continue Reading

First-grade teacher Heidi Dees presents a student’s family glyph at Deer Park Elementary School (Daviess County). First-grade students at the school were studying families and diversity through the IB unit entitled “Who We Are.” Photo by Amy Wallot, Sept. 25, 2012

By Matthew Tungate
matthew.tungate@education.ky.gov

When Melanie Page applied to teach at Young Elementary School (Jefferson County), she wasn’t sure how the school could be using the International Baccalaureate (IB) program. The native Georgian had graduated from an IB high school – so the idea of teachers using inquiry-based instruction, speaking French and encouraging students to think globally at a school where 90 percent of the students are on free or reduced-price meals didn’t fit her concept of IB as a program for the affluent.

Now in her first year as a 4th-grade teacher at the school, Page realizes how wrong she was.

“There is no set IB student. These kids are very able and are doing excellent although this is a Title I school and they have other obstacles that they come in with, but you would not know,” she said.

Young Elementary and Deer Park Elementary School (Daviess County) are the only two Kentucky schools of about 335 in the country using the International Baccalaureate (IB) Primary Years Programme (PYP) for students 3 to 12 years old, according to the International Baccalaureate organization. The primary program focuses on inquiry-based learning and a global world view. Continue Reading

By Matthew Tungate
matthew.tungate@education.ky.gov

Special education instructional assistant Alice Young and special education teacher Beverly Thomas play a word game with 3rd-grade students Gavin Bardin and Kenny Hillman at Lebanon Elementary School (Marion County). Thomas said having an understanding support team is very important.
Photo by Amy Wallot, Oct. 12, 2012

When the Kentucky Board of Education passed a regulation last month outlining the appropriate uses of physical restraint and seclusion, it marked the state’s first formal list of rules on how school staff should use the two behavioral-intervention methods with students.

The regulation requires districts to adopt policies and procedures that encourage positive behavioral supports for students while restricting the use of restraint and seclusion to student actions that would pose a threat to themselves or others.

While the regulation is the first of its kind covering the whole state, other districts have already enacted their own policies. One in particular, the Marion County school district, has become a leader with its restraint and seclusion policy. District administrators spoke to the board in August about the benefits of the policy and their lessons learned.

Kevin Brown, general counsel of the Kentucky Department of Education, said Marion County’s policy agrees with the state regulation in its major concepts. Continue Reading

By Matthew Tungate
matthew.tungate@education.ky.gov

Kim Bowman works with her students Ahmed Hadi and Baw Htoo on improper fractions at Henry F. Moss Middle School (Warren County). Bowman said that even if foreign students’ mathematics skills are at grade level, they sometimes struggle with the language of math.
Photo by Amy Wallot, Oct. 11, 2012

Being the new kid in school can be hard. But being a new student who has limited English skills, little understanding of American culture and possibly no previous school experience can make it downright overwhelming.

That’s where Warren County schools’ intensive English classes can help, providing students with the teaching and support they need to master English and content, and eventually move on and succeed in traditional classrooms.

The district’s intensive language classrooms began in 2008 following an influx of refugees from Burma (Myanmar) and Central Africa, according to Skip Cleavinger, Title III coordinator/director of English learner programs with Warren County. His predecessor started the classrooms so that the academically neediest 15 students at each school level could receive a year of very intense English and basic academic instruction, he said.

Many of the students had come from refugee camps and areas where they had little schooling even in their native language, Cleavinger said. Continue Reading

By Matthew Tungate
matthew.tungate@education.ky.gov

Kentucky Elementary School Teacher of the Year Heidi Givens of Tamarack Elementary (Daviess County), 2013 Kentucky Teacher of the Year Kristal Doolin of Corbin Middle School (Corbin Independent) and Kentucky Middle School Teacher of the Year Allison Hunt of duPont Manual High (Jefferson County) were named during the annual ceremony in Frankfort.
Photo by Amy Wallot, Oct. 17, 2012

Kristal Doolin, a 7th-grade language arts teacher at Corbin Middle School (Corbin Independent),  has loved reading and writing since she was young.

“I just love words,” she said.

It is this love of words that lead her to become a language arts teacher. It was her love of teaching about words that lead her to be named the 2013 Kentucky Teacher of the Year.

Doolin, who also was named Kentucky Middle School Teacher of the Year, received the award Oct. 17 at a ceremony in Frankfort hosted by Ashland Inc. and the Kentucky Department of Education. Heidi Givens, a teacher of deaf and hard-of-hearing students at Tamarack Elementary (Daviess County), was named 2013 Elementary School Teacher of the Year. Allison Hunt, a social studies teacher at duPont Manual High School (Jefferson County), was named 2013 High School Teacher of the Year. Continue Reading

By Matthew Tungate
matthew.tungate@education.ky.gov

Northern Elementary School (Pulaski County) Family Resource Center Coordinator Beth Rowlands talks to 5th-grade students about "walking in someone else's shoes" during the Pulaski Elementary School anti-bullying program. Photo by Amy Wallot, Aug 24, 2012

To 5th graders at Pulaski Elementary School (Pulaski County), trying to put toothpaste back in the tube is a lesson in frustration. To Counselor Sue Stickley, it’s a lesson on bullying.

The activity is one of many that 5th-grade boys and girls participate in as part of a full-day, multi-session program that covers topics like bullying, empathy, tolerance and rumors/gossip – the point of the toothpaste exercise. “The activity does a great job of showing them that once you’ve said something, even if you try to take it back, the damage is done and you can’t ever completely undo that damage,” Stickley said.

It’s also one of the few lessons for both the boys and the girls, who are split into gender-specific programs called VIG (Very Important Girls) and NGA (No Girls Allowed), she said.

“It’s not like we have a huge bullying problem here, but it’s a concern in every school,” Stickley said.

Kentucky Safe Schools Week, Oct. 21-27, is focused on bullying this year, with the theme “Bullying: Be Part of the Cure.” During the week-long campaign students and educators are being asked to do their part to help stop bullying and create safe climates in their schools. Continue Reading

By Matthew Tungate
matthew.tungate@education.ky.gov

Commissioner of Education Terry Holliday and KBE chairman David Karem at the Kentucky Board of Education meeting in Frankfort, Ky. Photo by Susan Riddell, Oct. 9, 2012

The Kentucky Board of Education is moving ahead with a regulation on the seclusion and restraint of students, but only after clarifying and amending several sections that raised concerns among education stakeholders.

However, another proposed regulation, which would limit the help special education students could receive on state mathematics and reading fluency assessments, has been delayed to give Kentucky Department of Education (KDE) staff time to revise it.

KDE General Counsel Kevin Brown updated the board on both proposed regulations at its October meeting.

He said the seclusion and restraint regulation still requires all Kentucky teachers receive annual training on how to reduce the need for physical restraints or seclusion. It also prohibits the use of restraint and seclusion for reasons such as punishment or to prevent property damage and includes requirements for notifying parents when restraint and seclusion are used.

The changes clarify when teachers may restrain a student and remove some reporting requirements that many districts found burdensome. Continue Reading