5333+Reflection

Instructional leadership is key to improving instruction. Technology is a tool that we use to achieve that goal, but the leaders vision determines how we use that tool. They tell how effective technology will be through their vision and initiatives. Leaders set the tone on their campus by believing in and supporting their staff and students. media type="custom" key="6456521" Sherman, D. (Artist). (2008). //Dalton sherman//. [Web]. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HAMLOnSNwzA Cut at [|www.tubechop.com]
 * EDLD 5333**

This course was very interesting to me. I have always looked forward to the courses that were focused on curriculum more than technology. The first assignment, analyzing Campus Need and Personal Vision, was about determining the instructional needs of my campus. We located and analyzed the AYP data from the TEA website and used that to identify areas for improvement. I haven't done that before so it was a new experience. I have to say, after a while, my vision started to go fuzzy looking at all those numbers. I believe that technology has very little value on its own. I look at instructional technology the same way that I look at everything else in education. We have to focus on quality teaching. This course helped me to keep technology in that perspective. As I checked the AYP data and the other testing data, I was able to identify ways that technology could help improve education on the campus that I focused on. The second assignment, Mining for Data involved analysis of AEIS data to determine campus strengths and weaknesses. This data was completely new to me. I know that principals used AEIS data before, but I hadn't seen the reports before. I believe that a complete picture of the data is important and the more legitimate data that is available, the better. The third assignment, Targeting and Addressing a Need is something I do frequently concerning technology use rather than campus instructional purposes. The SMART goal concept gave some good guidance for goal setting, but I felt it was too restrictive. The fourth goal, Action Planning and Professional Growth were in line with my normal job. Relating it to the AYP and AEIS data was a new activity for me and I was able to gain greater insight to the needs of the campus through that activity. Again, that was extending my reach beyond the areas I have been able to practice. I also kept in contact with the principals of that campus and a reading specialist that was taking the same course as a part of the principal preparation masters degree program. We shared our notes on the data and all came to the same conclusions. Our solutions were all put together and discussed regularly. These discussions were probably the most beneficial parts of the experience, but I wouldn't have been involved in them if I hadn't been taking the course.

We also discussed ways to get staff to buy into change plans and the principal's vision. Staff are the ultimate factor in a school's improvement and data is the ultimate measure of success. Sometimes an instructional leader needs to make the decisions, but often staff buy-in can be managed better through committee decisions that are generated by the membership of the committee. It is also best to have the committee members share the decisions with their own grade level or subject area teams. My next step in the process would be to determine the success of my efforts to improve. The team would also be asked to look over the data to identify any areas of weakness or potential problems. One thing I would like to do is consider multiple years of data to look for patterns in specific grade levels to determine areas of strength and weakness. Also to consider patterns on the same students from one grade to the next to look for patterns related to specific student groups. This would allow me the opportunity to determine which test score patterns may be related to particular student groups and which could be attributed to the teaching practices of their teachers. One of the problems of a single year snapshot of scores is that it is difficult to determine whether problems are related to a teaching deficiency and which are related to a particular class's weaknesses.