Calgary Regional ASCD
Calgary Regional ASCD Celebrating Innovative Practice Awards Evening Award Recipients
2008
1. Jaime Beck – Teacher as Leader & Differentiation of Instruction
“In Other Words” Project
Jaime Beck teaches students who are striving to meet curricular objective against often formidable odds. Jaime has played a strong leadership role in the school’s new 20-1/20-2 core assignment in English Language Arts: “In Other Words…”. The project is a week-long assignment focused on communication. It is differentiated according to learning profile, product, content and interest.
Contact: Jaime Beck (jlbeck@cbe.ab.ca)
2. St. Bede School Staff – Collaborative Practice
Literacy & Math Grouping for Successful Learning
Silvia Allan, Grace Biernacki, Nancy Belanger, Addie Corah, Christine Doering, Ray Gauthier, Denyse Fair, Bonnie Litzenberger, Collette MacDonald, Ron Paquette, Anna Novello, Dianne Penny, Leanne Pierce, Kim Robertson, Gail Pott, Len Roche, Geraldine Wilkins, June Minnis, Paula Helm, LoraLee Madsen, Barb Batty, Colleen Chrapko, Aileen Mulangu, Nancy Sobchuk, Coleen Drolet, Alice Hajj
St. Bede School has initiated a project that qualifies as a “successful innovative practice”. Both projects are part of our Fundamental Option of Success plan for all St. Bede students.
Literacy Grouping for Successful Learning: Students in grades 1, 2 and 3 are grouped based on reading levels, and GLA, at the beginning of the year. Literacy Success time is blocked for 45 minutes on days 1 to 5 across Div I. The teachers use a variety of teaching strategies, including but not limited to, guided reading, shared/paired reading, literature circles, etc to further develop the reading and comprehension skills of the students. As well, the groups are shuffled on a regular basis as reading levels improve and the children move to a new teacher. As the year progresses, emphasis within the group may expand to include writing response and to include Kindergarten students who are showing strong literacy skills.
Math Grouping for Successful Learning: Students in grade 4, 5 and 6 are grouped based on math levels, and GLA, at the beginning of the year. Math Success time is blocked for 60 minutes per day on days 1 to 5. The “high” groups tend to be larger and move quickly. Enrichment is readily provided. The students who find math challenging and too fast paced tend to be in smaller groups with more adult support, such as the teacher assistant, available. Students are working on outcomes at their Grade Level of Achievement. Teachers collaborate to move students from group to group as required and to provide assessment for students.
Contact: Lindy Arndt (lindy.arndt@cssd.ab.ca)
3. Christin McKay – Teacher as Leader
Exploration of Film Program
Cristin has played a large role at John Ware into transforming their practice in the 21st century. Teaching in the areas of math and Exploration of Film complementary subject she has provided learning opportunities and experiences for students and staff that infuse technology to where the students are creating meaningful and relevant learning.
Cristin’s contribution cannot be measured by one activity or project, it’s her innovative practice, the use of Smart Technologies, video, interactive tools in creating a framework for students to demonstrate their understanding through film, and her collaboration and willingness to work cross-curricular and support others in their learning.
Contact: Christin McKay (camckay@cbe.ab.ca)
4. Mountain Park School Grade 7 Team – Educating the Whole Child
The Think Project
Brad Emery, Linsey Koch, Mike Minuk, Craig Barabash, John Cameron, Lori Cooper, Oliver Gallery
This project engages the passion and imagination of 156 Grade 7 students and 14 small group advisors. Students are empowered to investigate a self-generated topic of study that integrated core curriculum units and are supported through the inquiry process. They are encouraged to make their learning experiences authentic by engaging in relevant research and by going into the community to meet with and dialogue with experts in their chosen field.
Contact: Brad Emery (bremery@cbe.ab.ca)
5. Susan Inhaber – Teacher as Leader
Literacy Projects
Susan Inhaber is a leader in the promotion of Literacy projects within her school and community of Terrace Road. Teachers and Parents identified the significant needs of her school community in the area of literacy. Over a period of three years Susan has been a teacher leader. She has been a significant player in the revitalization of our school library spending many hours and days in ordering recommended genres. Susan identified the need and initiated a short term project which allowed for the restructuring of our Division I students in order that students could be group on the basis of their literacy needs. Pre and Post tests were conducted and the results clearly showed an improvement for all students.
In addition, Susan acts as a mentor to many new and existing teachers in the implementation of an extremely effective Reading Program. In the past couple of years she has been involved in the creation and implementation of a very successful home reading program in our community. As a result, our school has collected data which shows a significant growth in students’ reading scores. This year Susan organized the Calgary Reads Program at Terrace Road, increasing our volunteer readers by 50%.
Contact: Susan Inhaber (sjinhaber@cbe.ab.ca)
6. Patricio Inostroza & Danielle Boltres – Collaborative Practice & Educating the Whole Child
Global Connect Project
These teachers have collaborated to produce a film with their students on the life of Christopher Columbus. Grade two and four students worked together to complete a film entirely in Spanish. This film has been presented internationally and is featured on CBE’s Global Connect website: www.cbeglobalconnect.ca/cbe_global_citizenship_projects.html
The high quality of this production has inspired more teachers to use technology as a means of promoting global citizenship.
Contact: Patricio Inostoza (peinostroza@cbe.ab.ca) & Danielle Boltres (nmoboltres@cbe.ab.ca)
7. Veronica Saretsky – Teacher as Leader
Dr. E.P. Scarlett High School
Excellent teaching makes a difference in the lives of students. Magnificent teachers can also make a difference in the culture of a school. This is the case for Veronica Saretsky. Through her work on the Teen Wellness Centre, as a Learning Leader of the school-wide Mentorship Program, and by creating a collegial atmosphere, Veronica has successfully organized curriculum and resources to move students and staff along their personal path.
Contact: Veronica Saretsky (vrsaretsky@cbe.ab.ca)
8. Canyon Meadows School Staff – Collaborative Practice
Canyon Meadows School International Spanish Academy
Eirlys Binding, Patricia Carcamo, Berta Castillo, Giorgio Cattabeni, Sali Galvez, Holly Gray, Cecilia Gitierrez, Teresa Herperger, Carolina Kahlert, Valerie Kim, Marlene Krickhan, Aaron Mason, Karen Mejia, Amanda Murphy, Karla Pineda-Preece, Andrea Riquelme, Adrianna Rodriguez, Andrew Traxel, Linda Vargas
Canyon Meadows School is the southwest campus of the International Spanish Academy for the Calgary Board of Education’s Spanish bilingual program. This year, to meet our school development goal of improving student’s Spanish oral literacy, they engaged in leading edge job embedded professional development.
In partnership with the Calgary Regional Consortium, Canyon Meadows School worked with Dr. Olenka Bilash to provide workshop experiences followed by in class support through expert coaching from Dr. Bilash. The teaching culture shift for teachers: Bilingual means teacher and students speaking Spanish 50% of the time.
Contact: Janice Kyllo, Principal (jmkyllo@cbe.ab.ca)
9. Resource Team and Teachers Calgary Catholic – Collaborative Practice
Building Speech and Language Capacity- Resource Binder
Patti Bairstow, Catherine Carpenter, Marilyn Maguire, Joanne Quinlan, Lisa Dorin, Rosanna Taylor, Mary Peterson, Rhonda Smithson, Karen Cartier-Aries, Betty-Lou Elofson, Dorothy Hlady, Anne Konicki, Marie Pinsent, Karen Smithers, Tara Rossiter-Exall
The Early Intervention Consultants along with a Speech- Language Pathologist and teams consisting of Special Needs Coordinating Teachers and Grade 1 teachers from the same school came together to develop a resource which would support Grade 1 teachers in meeting the needs of their students who have communication delays and disabilities.
The Building Speech and Language Capacity resource binder provides a combination of more than 40 literacy–based speech and language focused lessons. The teacher created lesson plans are based on common speech and language difficulties and are complimented by explanations of each difficulty, sample IPP goals, black line masters and identified resources available to target speech and language in the classroom.
Contact: Patti Bairstow (patti.bairstow@cssd.ab.ca)
10. In School Support Team and St. Monica School Staff- Educating the Whole Child
In-School Settlement Project
Maria Steinborn, Deanna Helton, Dr. Rita Ortiz, Suzie Bisson, Richard Campbell, Leah Moore, Getsey Chan and the staff of St. Monica School
This project focuses on immigrants to the Calgary Catholic school district, and recognizes the unique needs of the immigrant child, in the school, family, and community setting. Not only are there English as Second Language issues, but the entire family may have needs relative to proper housing, healthcare provisions, accessing food and clothing, and servicing educational needs. Some of these families are refugees, and all members of the family have experienced the fear of being uprooted from their homes and the trauma associated with this.At times, immigrant children come to our schools afraid of the past and fearing the future. This project works to provide for the family resources to function within the whole community. This project provides for the child in many dimensions; giving a child safety at home will allow the child to learn and to be successful at school, thus providing a future for success.
Contact: Richard Campbell, Principal St Monica (richard.campbell@cssd.ab.ca)
For More Information on Calgary Regional ASCD, Contact:
Janice O'Neil , Calgary Regional ASCD Chair: jconeil@cbe.ab.ca
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