Do our report cards serve our learners? Do our reports of progress communicate in ways that leverage the current tools at our disposal? Do we report and celebrate with communication techniques that have design, images, and artifacts of learning? What if we model and practice communication with and for our learners the way the world currently communicates?

What small shift can we make in our current practices to model communication in 2013?

Reflect and dream big while also taking small, or not-so-small steps to plan on how to move a classroom or a school to dynamically describe, document, report, and celebrate learning. How might we honor and leverage current cultural buzzwords and Eduspeak – risk-taking, failure, personalizing learning, design-thinking, grit, and authentically make these concepts part of our learning report for each child?  At the end of this session, you should be able to say

• I can think about and discuss how to report progress, learning, and growth in 2013.
• I can facilitate a conversation at my school about our learning philosophy or our grading philosophy and what is important in our community.

Learning Progression (120 minutes):

15 mins
Quick write and share, see below
10 mins
Snapshots of other feedback options – don’t be constrained by our current norm
25 mins
Using the provided whiteboards, draw, write, design, etc. the ideal progress report considering the child at the center, families needing feedback, and   teacher workflow.
05 mins
Share with another group.  If you’d like to share your ideation digitally, take a photo of your work and email it to walked60son@photos.flickr.com
15 mins
Gallery Walk to view all ideas – feedback and questions (see below)
15 mins
Think, pair, share: In 2013, what should be included in a progress report?
10 mins
Progress Report Ideation – 3 distilled ideas
15 mins
Next steps…

Quick write and Share:

Individually respond to the following prompts – digital copy if you want to share

• Bright spots from current practices in progress reporting:  What are some positives about our current progress reports?
• Wish list for progress reporting:  What changes would make the progress report more personalized and put the child at the center?
• Anything else?  Knowing that progress reports are an important connection between home and school, what would be in a progress report that is a joy to report (for teachers) and read (for families) rather than a stress?

Gallery Walk

• Browse the boards displayed in the media center.  Take notes on the bright spots you find and where you have questions. Record your thoughts on the linked Google doc.

Think, pair, share:

• In 2013, what should be in the next iteration of our progress report?
  Note: Let’s talk about what we should do, not what we are doing. Let’s talk about what will best serve our children and their families, not what we like and don’t like.