Taking Teaching Skills to the Next Level

AUTHOR: ANDY STAUFFER, Region 10 Communications Program Coordinator

DO THE WORDS “data driven instruction”– or the acronym “DDI” - send shivers down your spine?

Donna McAda serves as the Executive Director for Accountability and Assessment at Mesquite ISD, and with a title like that, she often gets pegged as someone who loves numbers. But for McAda, it’s not simply about the numbers.

“People will say to me, ‘Oh, you must love numbers.’ No, I don't love numbers. I love the questions that numbers bring to the table. Those questions usually have to do with what do our teachers need to be better in certain area … and DDI is a big piece of that because our teachers want to be effective; they want to do what they need to do for their students.”

Jaclyn Byrom, Region 10 Administrative Services Program Coordinator, connects the efficacy of DDI with interruptions in learning that students suffered during the pandemic.

“Right now, campuses are seeing huge benefits for students. Principals are able to better support their teachers in addressing the gaps and learning loss that students experienced due to COVID,” Byrom shared.

Byrom is part of the Texas Instructional Leadership (TIL) team at Region 10. TIL is a service offered by the ESCs that works to build teachers’ skills through professional development, implementation support, and coaching so that they can continuously improve instruction for all students.

TIL training is built around intensive face-toface professional development that builds facility with five essential tools: observation and feedback, data-driven instruction, schoolwide culture routines, lesson alignment, and formative assessment.

At Region 10, the TIL team stress-tests their coaching through frequent role-playing exercises.

“We support leaders by training them and coaching them. In training, they see a model of the skill in action, practice how to do it, and then create a plan for implementation,” says Dr. Matt Pierson, TIL Lead at the ESC. “In coaching, we work side-by-side with them to help them grow their ability to lead systems or develop others through coaching. It’s a direct follow-up support to what they learned in training.”

Teachers at Red Oak ISD have worked with the Region 10 TIL team, and are seeing tangible benefits.

“Our students are getting clearer, specific instruction from our teachers through learning objectives,” Lynn Dockery, Red Oak ISD Director of Secondary Curriculum Instruction, explained. “Teachers understand what they're teaching, and they're able to dissect the standards that they must teach the students. Then, they're able to scaffold that instructional piece from day-to-day. In turn, they help students to understand and put together those pieces so they grasp concepts better. That’s the benefit for our students.”

At Vivian Field Middle School in Carrollton- Farmers Branch ISD, faculty have embraced the payoff of the rigorous discipline demanded by TIL. Greg Thrasher, who teaches Eighth Grade Math, affirms, “The bottom line is what are we going to do to facilitate the best things for our kids? Our teachers have that in mind. They know that we're going to meet the needs of the kids, and this process will help you. It'll give you the tools that are necessary to see your students grow.”