Anchor Pages Update: Editable Pages & Introducing Middle School and Alternative Assessment
A few months back, we introduced a product feature that we hoped would become a critical component of our partners’ instructional design process–Anchor Pages. With the help of our school and district partners, we were able to identify a common challenge in the special education community.
Oftentimes, educators make well-intentioned learning targets that are rigorous and specific to their students’ needs; however, the challenge is creating actionable instructional plans and monitoring progress toward long-term goals.
Anchor Pages are specifically designed to address that challenge. They include incremental learning targets that build toward one complex goal by providing learning objectives that naturally scaffold learning. Additionally, every Anchor Page includes assessments and instructional resources that teachers can use to help them deliver rigorous instruction and monitor progress.
Anchor Pages prioritize the most foundational standards that students need to develop if they are to succeed in college and beyond. At the beginning of this school year, we released reading and math standards in kindergarten through fifth grade. We received feedback from our partners that the Anchor Pages in those subject areas were so helpful that we should consider broadening the scope of our work by adding more grade levels and making Anchor Pages editable.
“The most useful information I learned at today’s training was that Toolkit has Anchor Pages for elementary that have learning objectives! However, I pray that grade 6–8 will be implemented soon.”
-Goalbook Professional Learning Participant
We listened to the voice of the teachers and have expanded our content offering to include new Anchor Pages for 6–8 reading and math and K — 5 alt math. We’ve also made Annual Targets and Quarterly Objectives Editable.
We took the same approach to writing these Anchor Pages as we did for the initial release by prioritizing the most foundational standards and incorporating learning objectives and instructional resources. Our content managers were also deliberate about prioritizing key skills and knowledge specific to each grade band and content offering.
K-5 Alternative Assessment Math
For elementary alternative assessment math Anchor Pages we focused on fundamental concepts that set students up for future learning. The objectives, assessments, and instructional resources included with these pages prioritize developing a conceptual understanding of same/different, time, order, and relationships which lays foundations for mathematical thinking.
If students have the skills to demonstrate an understanding of chronological terms and are equipped with language that connotes foundational computation they are developing more than academic math skills; they are building skills to understand and engage in the world around them. That is why these pages are particularly important, they help teachers look at the longview in terms of a student’s present levels of performance and connect it to a broader long-term outcome where students can independently exercise critical thinking skills.
Each standard in this release will primarily target students at the “Initial Precursor” linkage level as outlined by Dynamic Learning Maps Alternate Assessment System. The core of the standards will focus on Applied Problem Solving and Objective Problem Solving.
Check out some of the new Anchor Pages for K-5 Alt. Assessment:
- Match Objects that are the “Same”: Standard K.CC.6 Compare Groups of Objects
- Understand “First,” “Next,” “Last”: Standard 1.MD.3 Tell and Write Time
- Identify Scheduled Activities Using Time: Standard 3.MD.1 Time Word Problems
6–8 Math
There are certain skills within the standards that require greater emphasis than others simply because of the intrinsic complexity of the ideas. The challenge is making sure those skills and their ancillary components are presented to students in way that allows them to internalize them so that they know how and when to use them.
This is especially true with middle school math because grades six through eight are when math standards transition from concrete arithmetic to more complex abstract mathematical concepts that assume students have certain foundational skills to help them grasp the new concepts. The newly released middle school Anchor Pages help teachers take a very direct approach to focusing on and building these skills.
Each standard will be focused on supporting students with solving one-step, two-step and linear equations. Additionally, they’ll focus on building skills that students need to read and identify key information from word problems in order to write one-step, two-step and linear equations. The overarching focus with this release is on breaking away from simple procedural knowledge by prioritizing the conceptual understanding of how these types of equations work.
Check out some of the new Anchor Pages for grades 6–8 Math:
- Solve One-Step Word Problems: Standard 6.EE.7 Word Problems using Equations
- Solve Two-Step Equations: Standard 7.EE.4a Solve Equations
- Solve Linear Equations in One Variable: Standard 8.EE.7 Solve Linear Equations
6–8 Reading
One of the greatest challenges teachers at the middle school level face is supporting students with identifying, connecting, and elaborating upon text evidence. Teachers expressed to us a need for specialized instruction and scaffolded support that help students think about and explain the evidence they’ve identified. These Anchor Pages help teachers make student thinking visible by including graphic organizers that remind students how and when to think in a particular way and capture it so they can organize their thoughts in writing.
The standards we’ve prioritized for middle school reading focus on explaining how evidence supports claims as well as supporting two or more main ideas with key details. These pages include graphic organizers, assessments, learning objectives, and texts that are engaging, short and focus on a student’s independent reading level.
By zooming in on specific aspects of the standards, teachers have the ability to help students build reading habits that are transferrable across content. The Anchor Pages that are focused on supporting claims with evidence explicitly require students to know the difference between inferential and concrete evidence when they are supporting their claims. This is helpful because students develop the ability to read closely and make decisions based on the quality of their evidence as opposed to arbitrarily selecting evidence that refers to their claim but may not actually support it.
Check out some of the new Anchor Pages for grades 6–8 Reading:
- Explain How Evidence Supports a Claim: Standard RI.6.1 Evidence in Informational Text
- Explain How Multiple Pieces of Textual Evidence Support a Claim: Standard RI.7.1 Evidence in Informational Text
- Analyze an Author’s Claim and Cite Textual Evidence: Standard RI.8.1 Evidence in Informational Text
Delivering rigorous instruction and progress monitoring will help ALL students reach their long-term goals.
Designing specialized instruction that helps students progress toward long-term learning targets is challenging because it requires intermittent progress monitoring, targeted scaffolding, and rigorous objectives. The beauty of Anchor Pages is that they provide all of that and so much more. They include assessments to mark progress, supports like graphic organizers, learning objectives that gradually increase in rigor, and teaching strategies to help teachers deliver instruction that is tailored for their students’ individual needs. By bringing together all of the essential instructional elements onto one resource, teachers have the ability to ensure that students are developing the foundational knowledge and skills that will allow them to succeed.
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