BHRSD progresses in adopting Common Core

GREAT BARRINGTON – Teachers in the Berkshire Hills Regional School District are moving forward in aligning with the Common Core State Standards, which will become more strictly enforced in the 2013-14 school year.

At a recent meeting of the BHRSD School Committee, teachers from Muddy Brook Elementary, Monument Valley Middle and Monument Mountain High schools highlighted how they are working together to adapt the standards, which provide a consistent, clear understanding of what students are expected to learn.

Under the guidance of Mary Berle, the BHRSD director of learning and teaching, the teachers are using the “Understanding by Design” (UbD) program, which helps them get a handle on standards and align programs to assessments.

According to Ms. Berle, this intensive curriculum planning began over the summer, with teachers working in teams.

At Monument Mountain, physical education teacher Luke Bloom and school adjustment counselor Pamela J. Morehouse worked together to develop a “Science of Addiction” presentation to be taught to all gym classes.

Instead of relying on the “just say no” tactics used for years, the curriculum developed by Mr. Bloom and Ms. Morehouse focuses more on the science behind using drugs and alcohol and the physical effects they can have on the body.

“The [student] response to this was very positive,” Mr. Bloom said.

They have also used this curriculum to train members of the new student “Above the Influence” group and are planning on presenting it during a February parent forum.

Science development at Monument Valley

At the middle school, all four science teachers (across grades five through eight) worked together to develop a clear understanding of where students should be at each grade level in regards to lab report writing.

Eighth grade science teacher Scott Farrell and seventh grade science teacher Randy Koldys presented information about their curriculum to the school committee.

“It makes it a lot easier to understand where kids should be,” Mr. Koldys said.

“Hopefully we’ll launch students off into high school with the idea of what a formal lab [report] looks like,” Mr. Farrell added.

Mr. Farrell said he also hopes to use this as a basis to get more students involved in participating in the regional science fair at Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts (MCLA) in April.

“We have four groups interested in going so far,” he said.

Team teaching at Muddy Brook

The second grade team, consisting of five teachers at the elementary school, is working together to develop an aligned curriculum for both writing and math. If a certain section comes along and a significant number of students are off-track, students from all of the second grade classes are divided into groups to work on certain skills.

Recently, the second grade team led a four-day math reteaching session due to approximately 30 percent of the students needing more time to retain the information being taught.

“I’m really proud of that work,” said Muddy Brook Principal Thad Dingman.

“I think this is a model for the rest of the district,” added BHRSD Superintendent Peter W. Dillon.

Other business

Also at the Dec. 6 school committee meeting, the Adams-Budz Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) Post 8183 of Housatonic announced the student winners of its Voice of Democracy and Patriot’s Pen contests. Monument Mountain sophomore Joseph Grochmal and Monument Valley sixth-grader Lauren Kinne finished first in the local level of the contests, respectively.

Posted by Catherine M. Krummey on December 13, 2012. Filed under Education News,News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry