Getting Entry Four Right: A Process Guide (National Board)

Getting Entry Four Right: A Process Guide (copyright Stanford Jumpstart 2009)

posted for educational purposes only:

1. Before you begin entry 4, read the section of your portfolio instructions that explains all the features of the entry that you must include.  Do not proceed until you know what the task is.  If you are not sure you understand it, ask someone in your support group or your support provider to help you.

2. Use the templates for organizing the entry that are attached. Outline the accomplishments you have using the template.  You will not necessarily use all of these, but this is a first step to seeing what you have.

3. Make a selection of the accomplishments you will feature making sure that you have at least one from each of the three required areas.  Collect or solicit the documentation you need for each accomplishment.

4. Outline the commentaries for each accomplishment.   Unless you are using one accomplishment to showcase two areas, try to create an outline that will result in three good paragraphs.

¶ 1: Describe the accomplishment.  You need to do two things.  First, let the reader understand what you did and the background circumstance that led you to do it.  Try using a sentence frame such as this to get started:

“Because  tell the need you addressed, I  chose to say what you did.”  Then describe what this accomplishment was about and what the work was that you did, 

Example: “Because my students’ parents told me that they did not understand the standards-based report card, even though there was an insert in the report they received, I decided to hold report card nights in my classroom at the end of each grading period at which I helped parents understand the reports their students received.”

¶ 2: Tell why this was significant.  You can envision it this way.

This activity did tell what it accomplished and why that matters. This is a change …

Example: “Report card night helped parents understand where their students were in relation to the standards they are expected to achieve and enabled them to ask questions of me and one another about why their students were achieving at the level indicated and what they might be able to do to support the children in the future. This is very different than in previous years when….”

¶ 3: Tell what the impact of the accomplishment has been on student outcomes.

You could frame it this way:

“As a result of this activity the which students have tell what changes have occurred in the students learning.”

Example: “ As a result of getting help understanding what the report card tells them, parents are more involved in asking questions of their students about their work in school, checking with me about ways to help, and following through with homework.  They also share with one another what they know about what their children should be doing.  “In the two years I have been doing this, the number of students who are proficient in the major learning goals for their grade has increased by 30% and the progress along the continuum toward the goals has increased by 60%. More importantly, the parents of my students are coming to me with questions more often and helping me better understand the challenges their children encounter with respect to mastering learning goals. Many of them are able to request specific kinds of help for their children and to present concerns about the standards to school administrators and school board.”

Reflective Summary

1.  Before you begin look at your selected accomplishments and the outcomes for all of them and the ways that they have been effective.  You might want to write a summary of these ways. 

Example: “ All of my accomplishments had an impact on student learning in different ways.  Accomplishments 1, 2, and 3, helped me form better partnerships with parents in ways that helped them become an integral part of the classroom community.  Accomplishment 4 …” Do not restate all the accomplishments!  Just allow the reader to see the relationships between the outcomes.

Summarize the results very briefly and discuss what you think has had the most powerful impact. 

Example:  “ Almost all of my accomplishments enabled me to become a more trusted and integral part of this community and this has created a real team approach in my classroom to the way students are supported.  The most powerful impact in this respect has been my work with the Open Classroom Program because allowing parents to drop in and observe, participate, and share has created a true community of parents, teacher and students learning together.”  …

Discuss how you will expand on the work you have begun in the future.  This can be building on the same approaches or addressing some need you still see and want to do something about.