Teacher's Guide to Standards-Based Learning: (An Instruction Manual for Adopting Standards-Based Grading, Curriculum, and Feedback)

With foreword by Robert J. Marzano

When teachers adopt standards-based learning, students take ownership of their education and achievement soars. Written specifically for K-12 teachers, this resource details a sequential approach for connecting curriculum, instruction, assessment methods, and feedback through standards-based education. The authors provide practical advice, real-world examples, and answers to frequently asked questions designed to support you through this important transition.

Implement standards-based grading, instruction, and curriculum in your classroom and school:

• Explore the theories and benefits of a standards-based curriculum and become familiar with several significant paradigm shifts that will help you make a strong transition to a standards-based classroom.
• Explore ways to shift your thinking about teaching and lesson plans in order to better understand content as a vehicle for the achievement of standards.
• Learn how to develop proficiency scales that will offer guidance in teaching to standards and establishing informative classroom assessment for student learning.
• Discover new styles of instruction, educational assessment, feedback, and curriculum building that are well suited to standards-based education.
• Understand how to develop student ownership through the setting of goals, and access free downloadable reproducibles available with this book.

Contents:
About the Authors
About Marzano Research
Foreword by Robert J. Marzano
Introduction
Chapter 1: Planning Instruction With Proficiency Scales
Chapter 2: Instructing With Proficiency Scales
Chapter 3: Setting Goals and Tracking Progress
Chapter 4: Administering Quality Classroom Assessments and Figuring Grades
Chapter 5: Teaching Exceptional Students
Chapter 6: Communicating Grades
Epilogue
Appendix A: Frequently Asked Questions
Appendix B: Creation of an Elementary Unit Plan
References and Resources
Index

Tammy Heflebower, EdD, is a highly sought-after school leader and consultant with vast experience in urban, rural, and suburban districts throughout the United States, Australia, Canada, Denmark, England, and the Netherlands. Dr. Heflebower has served as an award-winning classroom teacher, building leader, district leader, regional professional development director, and national and international trainer. She has also been an adjunct professor of curriculum, instruction, and assessment at several universities and a prominent member and leader of numerous statewide and national educational organizations. Dr. Heflebower was the vice president and then senior scholar at Marzano Research prior to becoming the CEO of her own company, !nspire Inc: Education and Business Solutions. Tammy also specializes in powerful presentation and facilitation techniques, writing and sharing them worldwide.

Jan K. Hoegh has been an educator for over thirty years and an author and associate for Marzano Research since 2010. Prior to joining the Marzano team, she was a classroom teacher, building-level leader, professional development specialist, assistant high school principal, curriculum coordinator, and, most recently, assistant director of statewide assessment for the Nebraska Department of Education, where her primary focus was Nebraska State Accountability Test development. Ms. Hoegh has served on a variety of statewide and national standards and assessment committees and has presented at numerous conferences around the world.

Philip B. Warrick, EdD, spent the first twenty-five years of his education career as a teacher, assistant principal, principal, and superintendent and has experience in leading schools in the states of Nebraska and Texas. Dr. Warrick was named 1998 Nebraska Outstanding New Principal of the Year and was the 2005 Nebraska State High School Principal of the Year. He is a past regional president for the Nebraska Council of School Administrators (NCSA). He also served on the NCSA legislative committee. In 2003, he was one of the initial participants to attend the Nebraska Educational Leadership Institute, conducted by the Gallup Corporation at Gallup University in Omaha. In 2008, Dr. Warrick was hired as the campus principal at Round Rock High School in Round Rock, Texas. In 2010, he was invited to be an inaugural participant in the Texas Principals' Visioning Institute, where he collaborated with other principals from the state of Texas to develop a vision for effective practices in Texas schools.

Jeff Flygare is a former classroom teacher, English department chair, professional developer, and building-level leader. During his twenty-six-year career teaching high school English, he taught nearly every course in the department. Jeff developed classes in mythology, Shakespeare, philosophy, and comparative religions, and worked with social studies colleagues to create an interdisciplinary class called world studies, which he team taught successfully for seventeen years. He taught advanced placement (AP) English classes for twenty-one years and served as an AP English literature reader and table leader for Educational Testing Service for many years. He adopted standards-based learning in his classroom and successfully taught students at all levels in a standards-based environment for many years.