Efforts to Improve Instruction

A key aspect of Massillon’s improvement process has been a focus on efforts to increase the use of effective instructional practices. Teachers and administrators in the district recognize the need to learn about and use strategies with strong research support and high impact.

Instructional Conversations

Instructional conversations take place during team meetings as well as during informal interactions among educators and administrators. These conversations have increased educators’ understanding and use of highly effective strategies. They have enhanced collegiality and helped create a positive climate in Massillon’s schools. The positive climate has propagated an open learning community in which teachers can share their instructional successes and failures with peers and administrators, and receive helpful, non-threatening feedback.

High-Impact Instructional Strategies

Teachers use what they learn in instructional conversations to implement targeted, high-impact instructional strategies in their classrooms. These strategies include formative assessment (which has become an integral part of instructional planning and has led to increased differentiation of instruction), reciprocal teaching, direct instruction, graphic organizers, and guided reading. Instructional conversations, as well as professional development and support materials, help teachers evaluate and refine their use of the targeted instructional strategies.

Reflective Questions

Instructional conversations have played an important role in Massillon’s efforts to improve instruction. They have furthered teachers’ knowledge of instructional strategies and contributed to collegiality and a positive school climate.

What role, if any, do instructional conversations play in your work as an educator?
How might a school promote or expand the use of instructional conversations among teachers and between teachers and administrators?

Structural Supports

Massillon has implemented other structural supports for effective instruction, including scheduling a daily period of individualization for remediation and enrichment, constructing a more rigorous and better aligned curriculum, and initiating a project in which teachers focus deeply on the learning needs of 10 students in their classes.