Implementing Personalized Learning Using the Summit Model to Deepen Student Learning in the U.S. History Class: Blog Post 2

Joanna Murray, NBCT

  

I am piloting a Summit Model approach to teaching and learning in an attempt to learn how to infuse deeper, innovative, next generation learning. To this end, I chose to implement one of the Summit Personalized Learning (PL) projects to use as curriculum for my 8th Grade U.S. History students.

To back up, over the summer, along with several colleagues and our school administration team, I was able to participate in a Summit Base-Camp training in the Bay Area of Northern California. There, I learned The 4 Elements that make up the course structure of their PL program including Project-based and Experiential Learning, Competency-based Learning, College Readiness and Success. After completing the base-camp training, I was excited to start using some of the elements in my own instruction. I decided to implement one of the PL learning projects for my 8th grade history students.

Fortunately, after the base-camp training, Summit made some of the project components available. While I could not use their platform because of it being a live resource for their students, I was able to load the components of the project to Hapara, an online learning workspace.

At the moment, the project my students are engaged in is called “American Myth Busters.” The work begins with students creating stories about their own lives. Students spend time learning key concepts related to myth, and also physically map out Revere's ride. It continues with comparing Longfellow’s great poem “Paul Revere’s Ride” to a factual account of what happened on that historic night. The project will culminate with students choosing an historical event, topic, or character and researching and creating  a project of their own to explore a mythical account, versus an historical account centered around that exploration.

The projects used in the Summit PL model are assessed using a Cognitive Skills Rubric, therefore, learning is assessed based on level of specific skills.

As Summit describes it, Cognitive Skills are practices identified as necessary for success in college and career. Summit culminated these skills by researching and synthesizing nationally accepted standards. The cognitive skills are broad in order to be used in all content areas, but customized to assess course-specific skills as well.

At this point, most students have finished dissecting the Revere poem, and are examining the factual account of the event. When they are done, they will create a compare and contrast essay exploring the similarities and differences between these two texts. Their work will be scored based on the rubric connected to the cognitive skill dimension Compare and Contrast which states that students will be: Identifying similarities and differences and using them to support, refine, or sharpen an argument or exploration. The  domain associated with comparing/contrasting is categorized as analysis and synthesis. The language of a level 6 (the highest rubric indicator) reads: Analyzes or evaluates similarities and differences relevant to a specific claim/main idea/thesis. Thoroughly explains why the similarities/differences are meaningful with the frame of reference. Organizes comparison in a logical order. It is easy to see that the cognitive skills Dimension is one that students will need across the curriculum and in college and careers. But the Myth Busters unit will include five other Dimensions including: Contextualizing Sources, Explanation of Evidence, Multimedia in Oral Presentation, Point of View, and Selection of Evidence, and therefore, this unit supports students in building deeper cognitive skills as linked to the Summit Cognitive Skills Rubric. While teaching students to write compare and contrast essays are nothing new, using the Summit approach to project-based learning is a measure construct I am anxious to explore.

Challenges, thus far, in implementing the Summit PL curriculum include maintaining a balance of using that curriculum to build cognitive skills, and content delivery. A true Summit approach, in the humanities classroom, includes a blend of the two. A second of The 4 Elements of the Summit Schools Model focuses on Content Knowledge. This element is designed to engage students using a personalized approach to, ideally, fill learning gaps and move student toward competency in each subject area. Using an online learning system, with an expanse of learning resources, in a true Summit classroom, students can learn history, and their other core content in a self-delivered system and at a pace right for them. When a given set of curricula is mastered, the student can move on. It is the goal that, by the end of the school year, each student will have mastered the grade level content, even those who may have started the year with knowledge gaps. Unfortunately, the Content Knowledge platform is not available to non-Summit schools. Therefore, to ensure that students in my course are given a balance of both Cognitive Skill development, and Content Knowledge in the U.S History curriculum, we have Me Days and T Days. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, Me Days, students engage on the Hapara platform to work on the American Myth Busters project. On T Days, (Teacher Days) on Tuesdays and Thursdays, I work through the course content using resources more closely aligned to traditional instruction.  

There are two other pieces of The Four Elements of the Summit Schools Model: also Expeditions, and Habits of Success. The later, Habits of Mind, is designed to empower students to self-direct their learning and develop habits of mind that will help them toward success in college and career. At Base-Camp, we learned that this is done through a mentor model wherein teachers are paired with students that they mentor through the course of their middle school education. Expeditions are immersions in real-world experiences to discover and explore passions and careers, and apply learning in authentic ways. While other projects I am involved in begin to explore these last two of The 4 Elements, I am still working to better implement those into the U.S. History classroom in a way that more closely mirrors the Summit approach, but one step at a time!

Resource:

Summit Academics. Cog skills: the rubric and look for’s. Retrieved from: https://goo.gl/xg9NIA