Spring Learning Series
Preparing New Teachers and Paraprofessionals for the Upcoming School Year
Led by Industry Experts
Dr. Michael McDowell
Published Author and Superintendent of the Ross School District
Dr. Trudy Arriaga
Stefani Morrow
Daniel Guerrero
Kent Maslin
Jenna Keaney
Romain Bertrand
Monica Washington
Explore Each Session
Inspiring New Teachers to Align with District Goals
As leaders, we crave more authentic ways to inspire teachers’ creativity and engagement. Simultaneously, leaders must ensure educators are facilitating maximal academic learning gains for every student. How can we enable our educators to thrive in both testing new approaches to learning and refining current practices?
Michael McDowell, Ed.D. published author and Superintendent of the Ross School District, discusses several processes for developing classrooms, departments, schools and systems that focus on extensively enhancing student learning over time. Using the latest research in school and executive leadership, cognitive and improvement science, and curriculum and instruction, this session presents leaders with practical approaches and tools to move their organization forward.
Key Learning Outcomes & Resources
- Explore a school system development process designed to enhance student learning over time
- Balance innovative approaches and traditional best practices for substantial staff and student learning
- Identify strategies that enable students to develop ownership over their own learning
- See the slides
- Get the Workbook
Opening Doors to Equity and Access
Do the actions of your educational institution truly reflect the stated values of the organization? Dr. Trudy T. Arriaga has held leadership roles at all levels to include assistant principal, principal, director and superintendent. She is a Corwin author, national consultant and the Associate Dean of Equity and Outreach in the Graduate School of Education at Cal Lutheran University.
Dr. Trudy Arriaga discusses the critical role of the educator in shaping an organization where the success of each and every student is realized through culturally responsive and inclusive practices. Trudy offers a counter-narrative and strategies to overcome the barriers that exist in our educational organizations to ensure open doors for every student and their communities.
Key Learning Outcomes
- Articulate the language, beliefs, policies, and practices that support all learners
- Promote a values-based, inside-out approach for embracing cultural differences within an organization or district
- Understand the tools and strategies needed to embed Cultural Proficiency into organizational culture
Strategic Planning Now for the Success of New Teachers in the Fall
The back to school season seems far away but helping your new teachers be off to a strong start should begin now to allow you to create a strategic plan for their professional learning and support.
This process can seem daunting without guidance, Romain Bertrand and Monica Washington, Solution Designers at BetterLesson, and Kent D. Maslin, Groton Elementary Principal, host an impactful learning session providing simple steps and strategies to design and implement a better professional learning strategy for your new teachers next school year.
Key Learning Outcomes & Resources
- Define the key phases of implementation of a strategic plan for professional learning
- Explore specific strategies to help you this Spring create your vision, set goals, assess strengths and areas of growth, and build early ideas of professional learning strategies for your new teachers next school year
- Build an understanding of what a strategic approach to professional learning can look like with shared insight from Groton Elementary
- Get the New Teacher Support Strategic Planning Template
- Case Study: Groton's early career teachers see gains in student achievement
- 5 things to know about todays teaching force
Re-imagining New Teacher Support with Self-Directed Learning
The past two years have finally brought to light that teachers need high quality, immediately applicable self-directed learning experiences that they can access at their own pace when they need it the most.
As our schools get ready to welcome an unprecedented wave of new educators, it is time to think strategically about how we design and make available impactful learning experiences to teachers who are just starting in our profession.
Learn from Daniel Guerrero, Vice President of Learning Design at BetterLesson, and one of the minds behind BL Connect, our self-directed learning courses. In an application-packed 30-minute session, Daniel will discuss actionable and accessible methods leaders can use to effectively support the growth of new educators without adding to educator overwhelm.
Key Learning Outcomes
- Why is self-directed learning essential to new teachers
- What do educators want out of self-directed learning and what they do not want
- How BL Connect was designed with teachers' needs in mind
- How you can make BL Connect accessible to all your teachers
- See the slides
Getting Your New Teachers Up to Speed with Curriculum
The learning curve is steep at the beginning of a teaching career. The newest members of your learning community have a lot to learn in a short period of time - creating a positive classroom culture, building strong relationships, designing and delivering impactful instruction, and leveraging formative assessment data.
Having a high-quality curriculum can help new teachers move through this learning curve more successfully. We must make thoughtful professional development and support available to our new educators as they take on a curriculum that is brand new to them.
Jenna Keaney, Vice President of Professional Learning at BetterLesson, leads a session focused on tested and connected strategies designed to support new teachers with the understanding and application of a new curriculum.
Key Learning Outcomes & Resources
- Support new teachers to understand the why and how of curriculum
- How to differentiate professional learning for new teachers
- Prepare new teachers to identify and learn from best practices of curriculum implementation when already in use
- Get the Backwards Planning from Assessment Template
- Learning Catalog & Workshops:
Principalship: Supporting New and Experienced Principals With Differentiated Solutions
Strong Instructional Leadership is second only to classroom instructions as one of the leading factors to successful students (Louis, Leithwood, Wahlstrom, and Anderson (2010)) and there is no evidence of successful schools without a strong leader (Leadership Matters Report, 2013) and yet the road to becoming a principal, and an effective one does not offer enough differentiated options to meet school leaders where they are on this journey.
Join Stefani Morrow, Instructional Leadership Learning Designer at BetterLesson and award-winning author, for a short actionable learning session on ways BetterLesson is transforming how Professional Learning is done for principals by introducing the principalship learning pathway, a differentiated learning experience for school leaders leveraging and connecting self-directed learning, small group workshops, and 1:1 coaching in an unprecedented way.
Key Learning Outcomes
- Examine the key functions of effective Instructional Leadership
- Learn the critical attributes of effective Principals' PD and support
- What is Principalship at BetterLesson and how it aligns with research
- How to give access to Principalship
- Supporting School Principals: What do the experts say?
- The Principal Effect: How school leaders affect students and schools
- See the slides
Dr. Michael McDowell
Published Author and Superintendent of the Ross School District
Michael McDowell, EdD, serves as the superintendent of the Ross School District in California. Dr. McDowell has authored bestselling books, presented keynotes and workshops, and provided practical tools and resources for thousands of teachers and leaders on almost every continent around the world. He is the author of Rigorous PBL by Design, The Lead Learner, Developing Student Expertise, Teaching for Transfer, and forthcoming, The Busy Teacher.
Dr. Trudy Arriaga
Published Author and First Female Superintendent of the Ventura Unified School District
Dr. Trudy T. Arriaga served the Ventura Unified School District for 14 years as the first female superintendent. She began her career as a bilingual para-educator and enjoyed 40 years of service in education as a teacher, assistant principal, principal, director, superintendent and university instructor at all levels.
Stefani Morrow
Award-winning Author, Educational Trainer, Professional Learning Designer at BetterLesson and Former Educator
Stefani Morrow is an educational leader with over 20 years in public education. During that time she served in various roles ranging from classroom teacher to leading school improvement work in districts across the state of Texas. Stefani joined BetterLesson in May 2022 as the Manager of Learning Design for Instructional Design responsible for curating professional learning for campus and district level leaders.
Daniel Guerrero
VP of Professional Learning Design at BetterLesson and Former Teacher
Daniel Guerrero was a classroom teacher and coach in Miami, FL committed to addressing educations many inequities. He has devoted almost a decade to trying to reimagine professional learning for educators through innovation and alignment to learning research.
Jenna Keaney
VP of Professional Solution Design at BetterLesson and Former Educator
Jenna Keaney has over twenty years of experience in the education field and now serves as the VP of Professional Learning at BetterLesson. In this role, she leads a team of instructional experts to utilize their expertise to design professional learning solutions that address a district’s most pressing needs. She strongly believes in the important work of educators and is passionate about equipping all teachers and leaders with the best resources to help them succeed in ensuring equitable outcomes for all students.
Romain Bertrand
Innovative Professional Solution Designer at BetterLesson and Former Teacher
Romain Bertrand is a personalized learning leader, blogger, consultant, coach, and practitioner. During his 20 years in education, he has led numerous education innovations including coaching and blended and personalized learning programs, supporting hundreds of teachers and in-school coaches across the US to use personalized learning as a tool for equity.
Monica Washington
Innovative Professional Solution Designer at BetterLesson and State Teacher of the Year
Monica Washington is the Director of Inclusive and Responsive Educational Practices and an instructional coach for BetterLesson. A decorated educator of twenty-three years, Monica has received honors and awards from a wide variety of organizations for her leadership, advocacy, and classroom instruction. She serves on the Board of Directors for the National Education Association Foundation and The National Network of State Teachers of the Year. Monica is the 2014 Texas Teacher of the Year.