The Yale-New Haven Teachers Institute

University Advisory Council

During 1996 the Executive Committee met in March, April, October, November and December. These meetings concerned priorities and plans for the Institute s work locally and nationally, in particular, the Institute Centers in New Haven schools, and various possibilities for working with other institutions nterested in adapting the Institute s approach to their local conditions. Members of the Steering Committee participated in the April meeting, and in December the Executive Committee held its meeting in the Institute Center at Career High School. The Executive Committee recommended to President Richard C. Levin the appointment of several Yale faculty members as new members of the University Advisory Council, each of whom accepted the President's appointment: Margaret A. Farley, Stark Professor of Christian Ethics; A. Patrick McCaughey, Director of the Center for British Art; and David Pease, Dean of the School of Art. The Executive Committee, acting as the Institute's course of study committee, also approved the Institute's 1996 offerings so that the Institute might certify Fellows' course of study to institutions where they may be pursuing advanced degrees.

National Advisory Committee

As the Teachers Institute plays a leading role in the national movement for university-school collaboration, the National Advisory Committee assists in determining how to make the most effective contribution to institutions and schools in other communities. With respect to evaluation, the Committee provides a variety of perspectives that aid in examining what each constituency for such collaborative programs would regard as the best evidence of their effectiveness. Before the National Advisory Committee met in New Haven on May 8 for a full day of focused discussion, they received a detailed briefing paper providing them background on the Institute s work since their last meeting.

Vivian opened the meeting with remarks about two of the original members of the Committee who died since the Committee last met. Because of their early prominence in advocating partnerships between universities and schools in order to strengthen teaching and learning, Fred M. Hechinger and Ernest L. Boyer were invited by President A. Bartlett Giamatti in 1984 to become members of the Committee. From that time until their deaths in late 1995 they assisted and brought attention to the Institute in numerous ways. Morning sessions then focused on the continuing development of the Institute program in New Haven and the ongoing plans for the further dissemination of the Institute approach across the country. A panel of New Haven participants made brief presentations on, and answered questions about, teams of the Fellows and the seminars, the new Institute Centers, and the summer Academy. Superintendent of New Haven Public Schools Reginald R. Mayo and Associate Superintendent Verdell Roberts also took part. Discussion turned in particular to the involvement of the Institute and its Fellows in the school s systems initiatives in curriculum and staff development, and ways in which that role might be more amply documented.

President Levin joined the Committee for the afternoon session, which Gordon M. Ambach, Executive Director of the Council of Chief State School Officers, opened by summarizing the results of the Committee's meeting thus far. The Committee noted how much progress had been made in developing the Institute s programs in New Haven since the Committee s last meeting. Much of the discussion then concerned what should be the appropriate balance between deepening the Institute's efforts in New Haven and extending its reach to other cities.

Computer Resources and Assistance

During 1996 the Institute made substantial progress in creating an electronic version of its curricular and other material and in promoting and facilitating electronic communication between schools and the University. (Its Internet address, where the resources may be viewed, is http://teachersinstitute.yale.edu.) As the Institute increases resources on-line, these become available nationally to a much greater extent than was possible when its dissemination depended heavily on printed material. To call attention to this growing resource, the Institute s Web location was advertised prominently on the cover of On Common Ground.

By the end of 1996, the Institute s electronic resources included all Numbers of On Common Ground,guides to all the curriculum units written since 1978 which may be searched using key words, the topical Index to these units, and approximately 200 of the individual curriculum units in their entirety. In 1996 the Institute urged Fellows to submit their units on a diskette, as well as in printed form, and three quarters of Fellows did so. This accelerates the process of placing the units on-line in that they do not have to be scanned and proofread first. The curriculum units now on-line include all the units that have ever been submitted on disk, together with a number that have been scanned and processed through optical character recognition software.

Teams of Fellows

Two years ago, I participated in a team effort through the Institute which proved to be highly successful, both in the classroom and for the entire student body of our school. Again, I feel that our team has great potential for offering curriculums that will benefit a large portion of our school s student population in individual classrooms and through collaborative teaching. I am very excited about getting together as a team this fall and beginning our team effort for the coming school year with a final gala in the spring of 1997.

I feel the unit I have written this year is a strong one and a valuable one for my third grade pupils. As part of a school team, I feel my material will help students on other grade levels. I also feel that the units written by other team members will feed into the growth of my classroom. I also hope that the work of our team will positively affect and involve other members of our staff and will draw parents into the curriculum material we have developed.

When a team is involved, there is a better chance for that team to exert influence on the school curricula. In fact, change starts in the classroom when a Fellow is writing a unit. If there is more than one Fellow working on one particular unit, more students are going to be touched by this material and by the communication between the teachers. This is what is happening in our school. As we gain more experience things get more clear and defined. We are also more prepared to take risks.

In my school as a whole, past Institute activities, which other staff members and I have participated in and promoted, have helped to attract seven of sixteen classroom teachers as Fellows this year. We now have a team of five teachers who will present their units in an integrated effort and, once space is available, we will officially apply as a "Center school." In many ways, we are already fuctioning in this capacity.

Institute Centers for Professional and Curricular Development

• Increase the visibility and use of Institute resources within the schools
• Include teachers who have not before been Institute Fellows
• Disseminate Institute-developed curriculum units more widely
• Explore the potential of computing as a means of collaboration
• Apply the Institute s principles in new ways within the school environment itself.

Involvement of Yale Students

As a result, Dwight Hall has engaged student interns to coordinate existing student volunteer activities in three of the schools that are establishing Institute Centers, and to assist those schools with the implementation of their Center Academic Plan. To coordinate volunteer student services for all the schools, and to assist each Center in formulating and implementing its plans, the Institute for its part has engaged a Yale graduate student as Liaison to the Centers. He works directly with the education "pod leader" at Dwight Hall, who is in effect the coordinator of all Yale volunteer services in the schools.

The student coordinators focus the time and energy of Yale students in areas that school teachers themselves identify as those where their assistance can be particularly helpful. In this way, the Institute-Dwight Hall partnership can create greater leverage for accomplishing each school s own academic plans to strengthen teaching and learning. It also provides a valuable experience for the Yale students who are involved. As one intern wrote:

Working at a high school within the boundaries of New Haven has helped me not only to learn more about the city, but to feel better about my own personal experience at Yale...I came to Yale wanting to work in the city and this has allowed me to do that through the schools, which is the main target that I originally wanted.

School District Curriculum Standards and Priorities

After having worked on the curriculum and standards correlation, I am more aware of the resources available that I can use in my classes. I also now can recommend more units to other teachers.

I benefited greatly from taking part in the process. I am now very aware of the material contained in manyof the units. While working, I also noted units I felt would be valuable for use in my classroom.

In short, the curriculum work in July provided a useful pilot activity for developing, on a broad range of topics, the relationship between curriculum standards and Institute resources. The Institute also worked with the school district to place its curriculum standards on the Institute's Web page, thus expediting an electronic version of this material for various other uses throughout the school system.

Academy

The success of the pilot summer Academy also demonstrated the potential of this activity for combining individual curriculum units into larger works of curriculum to be introduced as courses or school themes, and as system-wide curricula. In short, the Academy provided a fruitful opportunity for the Institute and the Schools administration to begin to consider concrete plans that led to the establishment of the new Institute Centers for Professional and Curricular Development.

These units helped the ethnic students to write with precision about themselves, articulate and describe their ethnic background as well as examine others that make up the diverse population of the United States.

All the units used this summer were extremely beneficial in allowing us to teach students how to write positively about themselves and their experiences.

The Institute units chosen were extremely adaptable. Although most units were written to last for longer periods of time than we had, the units themselves worked as guides for our plans and daily lessons with each of the children.

The materials were high-interest materials, motivational for teachers and students and flexible. The curricular focus was on multicultural studies and environmental science using an integrated approach. Teachers focused on basic skills such as writing, reading, math and problem solving. Diversity and multicultural education were strands throughout the curriculum.

I found it to be a valuable opportunity to collaborate with another teacher and to shape a curriculum that utilizes the strengths and particular areas of interest of the instructors. I feel that [we] were able to learn from each other. This is important to personal and professional growth.

The advantages of utilizing units developed by other teachers is that the teachers who developed these units knew our population and chose motivating and hands-on activities to meet specific objectives.

I felt I was more relaxed...perhaps more energetic due to the high motivation level of the students. There was plenty of time, scheduling was more flexible, and the team approach kept things moving. Both students and teachers were very eager. I felt confident and excited about what we were doing. The emphasis was on fun, getting to know one another better, and helping each other to learn cooperatively in a small classroom setting.

My teaching style, which is generally very familiar (while still rigorous), worked well in this type of setting. Also, I thoroughly enjoyed the opportunity to team teach; it kept the teachers fresh and the students engaged.

Were the students engaged more actively? Absolutely. The format planned to involve students as "active learners." No one was exempt from this process. We warmed up each day with brain teasers, puzzles, or games. We mixed fun and facts to te extent that students seemed to enjoy the activities we had planned. We worked at variety, dividing the time up into smaller segments of time. Each week was goaloriented, with a culminating activity each Friday that helped engage students and move them forward. We did a lot of videotaping, which was another valuable incentive to "perform" at a high level.

The Academy was designed to facilitate interdisciplinary learning using handson learning. A strange thing occurred, the student assistants commented that the students were working all the time and did not have time for fun. The younger students were having fun, because they thought they were playing. After a few days some of the assistants came over to me and said, "I understand what you mean, this thing is contagious."

For many of the students that learning was more engaging and active than learning they were accustomed to in their regular classroom settings.

Inform the Superintendent that the program was very worthwhile and should be expanded. Teachers can have summer teaching experiences that are rejuvenating, and this program is certainly going in the right direction, using teacherdeveloped curriculum. Teachers are given freedom within certain parameters to teach creatively, without sacrificing discipline and structure. Remember that students were given no credit or monetary rewards to entice them, only an enriching educational experience!

My overall experience at the YaleNew Haven Teachers Academy greatly exceeded my expectations. The project appealed to me first because it was an opportunity to teamteach with respected colleagues, from whom I acquired a great deal of practical insight into the areas of organization, planning and ways of successfully interacting with students. Being able to interact in a classroom with another teacher is an energizing experience; consequently I plan to invite more teachers and guest speakers into my classroom for more teamteaching experience. Another appeal of the program was the opportunity to utilize and modify lessons from my own Institute units, and to get feedback and suggestions from a colleague and from students. The students proved very responsive to our efforts to combine facts, fun, creativity and structure. From my point of view, the program was energizing. I viewed myself as a participant with students who were giving up valuable summer time to learn valuable things. What could I teach them of value? I forced myself to look at the two weeks from a high school student s perspective; by doing so it made planning much more exciting and fun. What did the experience mean to me? The 1996 summer Academy experience forced me as an educator to rededicate myself to create learning situations for my students that will get them excited about the study of history as it relates to their everyday experience. I owe the Academy a debt of gratitude for giving me the opportunity to reexperience some of what I call my first love teaching students who challenged me to give of myself to the utmost a process which resulted in close personal relationships and mutual respect which I shall cherish for a long time.

The summer Academy was very rewarding for me. I left feeling that my colleagues, particularly at the high school level, are doing an outstanding job with young people. I would love to have the opportunity to work with such a dynamic group of young people on a year round basis.