Across Granite School District, educators are doing outstanding work to bring this commitment to life. We want to take opportunities throughout the year to celebrate teams that demonstrate what meaningful collaboration looks like and, more importantly, how it improves learning for students.
This week, we are recognizing the third-grade team at Stansbury Elementary School.
The Stansbury team exemplifies how teachers can work together to turn student learning evidence into instructional action.
Rather than simply reviewing assessment scores, these teachers use common formative assessments to identify exactly which students have mastered essential standards and which students need additional support. Through their Achievement Teams process, they examine proficiency levels, identify students who are approaching mastery, and establish specific goals for improvement before the next assessment.
What makes their work especially powerful is what happens next.
When students haven’t learned an essential standard, the team doesn’t simply move forward or leave individual teachers to solve the problem alone. Instead, teachers share the instructional strategies that have been successful in their classrooms. They discuss specific approaches, such as small-group instruction, student whiteboards, and other high-leverage practices, and collectively determine how to reteach the standard more effectively.
Their collaboration also ensures that students receive a consistent, high-quality education regardless of which third-grade teacher they have. Through common learning intentions, success criteria, pacing, assessments, and shared instructional resources, these teachers maintain high expectations for every student.
Most importantly, their collaboration is producing results.
The team is demonstrating growth in reading and mathematics, including improvements on Acadience assessments and common formative assessments. Their coordinated instruction and targeted interventions through “Tiger Time” are helping students make progress toward grade-level proficiency while reducing the need for additional interventions.
This is what effective Professional Learning Teams are designed to accomplish. Teachers aren’t collaborating simply to share ideas or complete an agenda. They are working together to answer the four critical PLC questions, strengthen their instructional practice, and ensure that more students learn at high levels.
We congratulate the Stansbury Elementary third-grade team for demonstrating the power of collective teacher efficacy and for keeping student learning at the center of their work.
Throughout the year, we look forward to celebrating additional teams across Granite School District that are making a difference through meaningful collaboration.
Thank you for your continued commitment to improving student achievement by improving instruction.
