For the past two years, the ESU 10 Teaching and Learning Department has been facilitating the development of an English language arts curriculum scope and sequence, standards based student tasks and engaging scenarios. Teachers from across ESU 10 have worked diligently in grade level teams to produce standards based curriculum components that can be utilized in all school districts.
On June 1, 2016, the Teaching and Learning Department brought the English Language Arts Regional Consortium for Curriculum Development (RCCD) series to a close. Seventeen school districts participated in the final workshop including: Anselmo-Merna, Arcadia, Burwell, Callaway, Central Valley, Elm Creek, Gibbon, Grand Island Central Catholic, Lexington, Litchfield, Loup County, Ord, Pleasanton, Ravenna, Sandhills, Sargent, and Wood River. There were 76 total participants including 8 administrators.
The June 1, 2016 training provided time for participants to finalize their products and place them into folders in Schoology, a learning management system. These 17 school districts now have access to the entire unit products created for grades K-12 through ESU 10 provided Schoology accounts. School districts have the discretion to edit the products to meet the needs of their teachers and students.
Administrators and teachers convened separately under the direction of ESU 10 staff to provide feedback about the RCCD consortium and plan for next steps in the implementation process. The eight administrators in attendance reviewed feedback from the teachers indicating what support they need to move forward in implementing the RCCD products. The small groups also discussed their needs for curriculum alignment assistance in other content areas. After the groups met individually, school teams collaborated to create implementation plans for their districts. At lunch, we took time to celebrate the two years of hard work, dedication, and quality products from our grade level teams by having a picnic and ice cream treats.
The day concluded with ESU 10 staff sharing and explaining access to the K-12 English Language Arts scope and sequence document and standards correlation chart. These resources were the culminating products of the project and can be utilized by the seventeen school districts that completed the two year series.
The ESU 10 Teaching and Learning Staff will be reviewing the feedback from our administrators and teachers to discuss our next steps in assisting school districts with curriculum alignment in other content areas.