Current Professional Development Courses
Graduate Certificate in Social Emotional Learning
Making Sense of Data Webinar Series
The IEP Game: Implementing the NEW MA IEP Form
Creating Confident and Independent Math Problem Solvers
Multi-Tiered System of Support
Leveled Literacy Intervention, Grades K-2
Leveled Literacy Intervention, Grades 3-5
The Power of Progressions: Untangling the Knotty Areas of Teaching and Learning Mathematics
Essential Strategies for Teaching Students to Think Mathematically
Making Sense of Data Webinar Series
July 25th, 9:30-11:00am
Presented by: Kristin Hunter-Thomson, Dataspire | Earn up to 3 PDPs
Session One: Identifying Data Takeaways | July 25, 2023; 9:30am – 11:00am
During this session, we will unpack different ways that Exploratory Data Analysis can assist in our efforts to make sense of our quantitative assessment data in deeper and more illuminating ways. And we will identify approaches to connect pattern identification and conclusions from quantitative and qualitative assessment data to consider what it could mean for our teaching practices.
Session Two: Communicating with and from Data | August 22, 2023; 9:30am – 11:00am
When we work with data we should be consistently talking to one another to seek and receive feedback about our ideas, our data collection and processing approaches, our data analyses, and our conclusions. We will explore ways to integrate the iterative nature of communication and feedback into our process of making sense of assessment data so that it is not on each of us individually to “go it alone”.
The IEP Game: Implementing the NEW MA IEP Form
July 26th, 9:00am – 12:00pm
Presented by: Dr. Sara Stetson | Earn 3 PDPs
Over the past few years, the MA DESE has developed a structured process to improve the implementation of the IEP. The IEP Improvement project’s goal is to improve outcomes for all students with disabilities by:
- Increasing effective and efficient collaboration
- Supporting teachers to know how to respond to the needs of students with disabilities
- Developing student-centered IEPs driven by data and written to ensure that students will gain knowledge and skills to prepare themselves effectively for postsecondary opportunities, career training options, economically viable careers, and healthy, productive lives.
Supporting families of students with disabilities to understand how their student learns and interacts with the life of the school, as well as what the individualized program and outcomes will be during the course of the school year.
Promoting student voice and engaging students in their own IEP process.
The IEP Game is a workshop about the new Massachusetts IEP. We will explore the above mindsets and history to place the new IEP in context. Participants will understand why the new IEP elements were developed and what this means for practice. Finally, we will explore the contents of the IEP using an interactive role play game and other activities.
Creating Confident and Independent Math
Problem Solvers | August 1st-3rd, 8:00am-4:00pm
Presented by: Amy Lucenta, M.Ed. and Grace Kelemanik | Earn 24 PDPs
Do your students struggle with open-ended math tasks? Does crafting convincing arguments confound them? Are they stymied when asked to apply the mathematics they know to real-world contexts? In this course you will learn how to teach your students to make sense of non-routine word problems, mathematize real world contexts, and craft convincing arguments. You will leave with math activities, routines, and teaching strategies you can apply immediately in the classroom to help your students become confident math thinkers and doers. Student Learning Outcomes: This course will provide participants with understandings, routines, and teaching strategies, to help students develop three practices championed in the Common Core State Standard for Mathematics: Make sense of problems and persevere in solving them (MP1), Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others (MP3) and Model with mathematics (MP4).
Participants will leave:
- Understanding what it looks like when students apply mathematical reasoning to open-ended math problems, critiquing and crafting convincing arguments, and modeling a real-world context.
- Knowing the design and intent and ready to facilitate the Decide and Defend reasoning routine Knowing the design and intent and ready to facilitate the Analyzing Contexts and Models reasoning routine
- Understanding how five and Models reasoning routine o Understanding how five essential strategies woven throughout the reasoning routine engage all students in meaningful math discourse, support their mathematical problem solving, justification, and modeling, and develop independence.
Multi-Tiered System of Support
August 3rd & 14th, 9:00am-12:00pm
Presented by: Kelly Mertens, M.Ed. | Earn 6 PDPs
This workshop series is designed to support staff navigating the MTSS structure. Discussions around struggling students, evidence based practices and strategies will be explored. Specifically, participants will understand the three tiers of support and learn how to implement these supports with fidelity. Progress monitoring, data collection and case studies will be explored. The district DCAP will also be unpacked as another tool for staff and students alike.
Leveled Literacy Intervention K-2
August 9th & 10th & September 26th | 8:30am-3:30pm
Developed by: Irene Fountas and Gay Su Pinnell | Earn 18 PDPs
The groundbreaking Fountas & Pinnell Leveled Literacy Intervention (LLI) is a research-based, supplementary intervention system designed to help teachers provide powerful, daily, small-group instruction for the lowest-achieving students in the early grades.
LLI Professional Development for the Orange, Green, and Blue systems includes three days of training (two days of intensive learning plus one follow-up day) to give participants an in-depth understanding of each of the three primary grade LLI Systems:
Orange, Levels A-C (Kindergarten) 70 lessons with 70 original titles
Green, Levels A-J (Grade 1) 110 lessons with 110 original titles
Blue, Levels C-N (Grade 2) 120 lessons with 120 original titles
Topics covered include an overview of the Lesson Framework, assessing and grouping students, teaching within the LLI lessons, using the Prompting Guide, understanding the demands of texts, and documenting progress. In addition to learning how to implement LLI, participants will deepen their understanding of many research-based techniques to help struggling readers make accelerated progress.
Rethinking Classroom Behavior: Resources and Strategies for Behavior Management Using a Social Emotional Approach
August 17th, 8:30am – 2:30 PM
Presented By: Ben Rogers | Earn 6 PDPs
This workshop will focus on the ownership and expected behaviors of all key staff members and service providers, so that classrooms and small group instruction have the resources to work with and change challenging student behaviors. The professional development will aim to guide the educators through the thicket of social and emotional learning strategies and decide on an approach that works best for them and their students.
Key topics will include:
Proactive and reactive responses to behavior
Creating a concise and clear set of expectations
- Strategies that incentivize expected behavior: Tangibles vs. Abstract Choices
- The importance of tone, cadence, volume and words
- Handling transitions from preferred to non-preferred activities
- The importance of follow through and when to wipe the slate clean
- Understanding the differences among challenging behaviors, problems to be solved, and lagging skills
- The importance of shared language within your team
- Addressing the difference in rules between home and school
- Ensuring that incentives and consequences are agreed upon with all team members
- Treating challenging behavior like a learning disability: teach the lagging skills
- When and why to send a student out of your group
Leveled Literacy Intervention, Grades 3-5
August 14 &15 & September 27, 8:30am – 3:30pm
Developed by: Irene Fountas and Gay Su Pinnell | Earn 18 PDPs
The Leveled Literacy Intervention (LLI) Red and Gold Systems are designed for grade 3 and 4 students who are reading below grade level. The LLI Purple System is designed for grade 5 students reading below level.
Designed to bring children up to grade-level performance in as little as 18-24 weeks, LLI Red, Gold, and Purple systems form a powerful, research-based early intervention program designed specifically for intermediate students who have been struggling and lagging behind their peers for a number of years.
Red, Levels L-Q (Grade 3)
Gold, Levels O-T (Grade 4)
Purple, Levels R-W (Grade 5)
In this session, participants will receive three days of intensive training (these two days of intensive learning plus one follow-up day) on LLI Intermediate Systems and will learn specific strategies to address the needs of struggling readers. In addition to an overview of the components and implementation of the LLI Intermediate Systems, this professional development delves into the advanced routines needed for the intermediate student including a focus on fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension, as well as book discussion times and formats, writing about reading routines, novel units, test-taking study, and silent reading.
The Power of Progressions: Untangling the Knotty
Areas of Teaching and Learning Mathematics
AM Session – August 16th, 8:30 – 11:30am
PM Session – August 16th, 12:00 – 3:00pm
Presented by: Graham Fletcher | Earn 3 PDPs per session
The morning session will focus on addition, subtraction and place value for K – 3 teachers. The afternoon session will focus on fractions for teachers of grades 3 – 6.
As more teachers look to add high-yield tasks to their repertoire, the struggle to make it all work becomes real. Let’s examine how problem-based lessons can be used throughout the scope of a unit and how we can harness their power to move student thinking forward. We’ll identify strategies and explore some tasks that help us find a healthy balance between application, conceptual understanding, and procedural fluency.
- Engage in grade-appropriate 3-act tasks and understand how the implementation of low-entry, high-scalability tasks can be used to reach all students.
- Explore the use of 3-act tasks as a regular practice and identify when these lessons can be used throughout the scope of a unit.
- Understand how 3-act tasks and problem-based lessons can be used within the instructional framework (opening, work session, close), and the purposeful moves to orchestrate an effective closing session.
- Identify ways in which problem-based lessons can be used to monitor student growth.
- Connect 3-Act Tasks to conceptual learning and application, and identify how this approach is instrumental in developing procedural fluency.
Essential Strategies for Teaching Students with Learning Disabilities to Think Mathematically
August 22 & 23, 8:30am – 3:30pm
Presented by: Amy Lucenta, M.Ed. & Grace Kelemanik | Earn 12 PDPs
Participants will develop a deep understanding of how five research-based strategies (ask yourself questions, sentence frames and starters, annotation, the Four R’s, and turn-and-talks) can be used to help students with learning disabilities develop mathematical thinking. They will learn about six accessibility areas (conceptual processing, visual-spatial processing, language, attention, organization, and memory) math learners must use when doing mathematics. They will see how the essential strategies support students as they work in each of the accessibility areas by engaging in two instructional routines designed to develop quantitative reasoning.
This twelve-hour course will provide participants with five research-based strategies to help students with learning disabilities learn how to think and reason mathematically. Participants will leave:
- Understanding what it looks like when students reason mathematically—quantitatively, structurally, and through repetition.
- Knowing five essential strategies to engage students, support their development of mathematical thinking, and develop independence.
- Ready to support each and every learner to develop as mathematicians.
Sheltered English Immersion (SEI) Teacher Endorsement Course
Presented by: David Turo, Elementary EL Teacher and approved SEI Instructor | Earn 67.5 PDP’s
The ACCEPT Collaborative is a Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education approved provider of the SEI Teacher Endorsement course. Participants who successfully complete the course and its requirements will be eligible to receive the SEI Endorsement.
The Sheltered English Immersion (SEI) Teacher Endorsement course is designed to help equip teachers to address the needs of a multilingual and multicultural student population by training teachers in research-proven practices for working with English Learners (ELs). During the course, teachers are expected to practice instructional strategies grounded in SEI research both in the endorsement course and in their classrooms. Teachers will also be encouraged to sustain and develop their SEI practices over time through a variety of professional growth opportunities. This course is designed to promote continuous improvement in educator practice and to build teachers’ confidence and familiarity with instructional methodology for working with English Learners.
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