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SEE YOU AT THE WEBINAR TODAY!
USING CULTURALLY RESPONSIVE-SUSTAINING MBL TO SUPPORT INCLUSIVE INSTRUCTION FOR EVERY STUDENT
TUESDAY, JANUARY 30, 3:45-4:45 p.m. online
REGISTER HERE
For all MBLC member schools (Cohort 1 & Cohort 2)
💟 Friends of MBLC also welcome!
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Volume 2, Issue 3 | Jan./Feb. 2024
Good wishes for the new year, MBLC Community:
We hope all is well with you, and your students and families. Here’s the latest dispatch from the Mastery-based Learning Collaborative. We aim to pack each edition of this community newsletter with useful resources, upcoming events and recaps, and more.
You can register for and get more info about upcoming events at the MBLC Site: bit.ly/MBLCsite.
Thanks for reading, and see you at this week’s webinar!
— Your MBLC “Pit Crew”
Professional Learning Coaches: Clyde, Emily, Joy, Kate, and Katie
WA SBE: Alissa, Seema, and Stephanie
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You can register and get more info at the MBLC Site: bit.ly/MBLCsite or check out our Google Calendar of Events: bit.ly/MBLC_Eventcalendar.
For events open to Friends of MBLC, look for this symbol: 💟
Online events
Tuesday, Jan 30 | 3:45-4:45 p.m.
Webinar 15: Using Culturally Responsive-Sustaining MBL to Support Inclusive Instruction For Every Student
REGISTER NOW!
For all Cohort 1 & 2 MBLC school teams and interested staff
Friends of the MBLC invited, too! 💟
Tuesday, Feb 6 | 9:30-11 a.m.
Leaders Community of Practice Session 3
REGISTER NOW!
For Cohort 1: Principal + 1
Tuesday, Feb 13 | 3:30-5 p.m.
COHORT 1 PLC, Session 3
REGISTER NOW!
- Grading for Accuracy and Equity PLC
- Project-based Unit/Assessment Design for MBL PLC
- CRSE Foundations PLC
For Cohort 1 MBLC school teams
Tuesday, Feb 29 | noon-1:30 p.m.
Youth Advisor/Adult Ally Special Session (optional but encouraged)
REGISTER NOW!
In this just added, opt-in Leap Day session, youth advisors will be invited to offer feedback on resources created by our member schools. MBLC members: Do you have a new set of learning outcomes, grading policies, rubrics, or other resources you’d like to get feedback on from our youth advisors? Contact Joy Nolan: joy@newlearningcollaborative.org to get your resource on our review list.
For 2-3+ youth advisors and one adult ally from participating member schools
In person events: MBLC Members: Please save the dates!
Registration and more info forthcoming at bit.ly/MBLCsite
Wednesday-Thursday, August 7-8 | 10 a.m.-3:30 p.m.
MBLC Summer Institute (Location to be announced soon)
For all Cohort 1 & 2 MBLC school teams and interested staff
MBLC Spring Field Trip to NYC Competency Collaborative Schools!
 On this spring trip specifically for MBLC member schools, we will visit 4 NYC middle and high schools with strong CRSE/MBL practices.
School visits will include interactions with staff, leaders, and students, shared resources, classroom time, and time to reflect and make connections with your own school or classroom’s practice. We will also meet with members of the program team from the Competency Collaborative.
Host schools for this field trip:
All 30 available spots for visitors on this trip are spoken for, and in fact there’s a waitlist! MBLC members, if you would like to learn more and join the waitlist, please see this info flyer: bit.ly/March2024NYCTripInfo.
We will be creating a digital trip booklet to memorialize the visits and our learning—and will share this resource with the community after the trip.
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READ THIS, WATCH THAT
Here are resources for your use. Enjoy, and let us know your wish list for next time!
The latest post on the MBLC community site blog answers the question: What’s a portrait of a learner? This post also features a MBLC profile about the Elma School District, whose Portrait of an Elma Eagle is at the heart of their mission and vision.
Introduction to Culturally Relevant Pedagogy - Learning for Justice
“Culture to me, at its essence, are those filters that help us as human beings to make sense of the most ordinary things,” says Dr. Geneva Gay in this short, invaluable video about the role culture plays in learning.
This graphic offers a distillation of the Competency Collaborative’s guidance on equitable grading. Want to see what this guidance looks like in a school’s grading policy? See this Family Grading Policy and Assessment Plan from CC member A School Without Walls in Manhattan. Can you see the connections? How similar or different are your own school’s grading practices?
Traditional Classroom Management vs. Student-centered Classroom Management - KnowledgeWorks
Basing grades on evidence of learning/proficiency, rather than on factors like seat time, compliance, and effort is one of the cornerstones of a school’s MBL system. This grading shift has seismic implications for classroom management—when we are not using grades as carrots and sticks, how can we “get” students to work productively? It starts with examining our beliefs about what learners want to do, and what they are capable of. So: How do we build a trusting and respectful culture of learning? This KnowledgeWorks piece gathers ideas from the field, including our own NLC coach Joy Nolan.
Check out the MBLC Event archive. Our growing event archive on the MBLC Community Site is a treasure trove of recordings and resources from past events.
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Dear Embee Elsie:
Our staff are deeply involved in all the learning and preparation needed for a full-school shift to mastery-based grading next year. Some of us have a pain point, and we hope you can help!
We are a department of four teachers who have all taught our subject for 12+ years. That is to say, we know our stuff, have developed and perfected units that we love, and etc. With the shift to MBL, pacing will be really different, right?
Some of us (including me, I admit it!) are seeing that with all the yummy “extras” of MBL pedagogy—such as hands-on learning, reflection, unpacking criteria, multiple assessments of each outcome, yikes!—we might not be able to get through all our content. So how can we still cover everything in our curriculum, when we shift to system-wide MBL next year?
Sincerely—Asking for a Friend!
Dear Asking for a Friend:
Thanks for sharing your pain point. You see the merit in MBL shifts—and you want to stay loyal to the units you and your colleagues have lovingly crafted and perfected over time. There’s a tension there, to be sure—but I think we can ease that pain point at least somewhat.
I love a good metaphor or analogy, so here comes one. When you’re teaching, try thinking more about the catch (what learners are getting from the lesson) than about the throw (the teaching you are offering). Zaretta Hammond sagely points out that learning is a process undertaken by the learner. That is to say, because you said or “covered” a given topic or idea does not mean your students have taken it in and integrated it into their mental schema.
Consider what learners are learning, what they are taking away from your class. What really sticks? It’s likely what students have had a chance to apply, practice, reflect on, and discuss in class. All those MBL shifts you referred to as “extra” are not really extra—they follow research on how humans learn best. So if you want to make learning “sticky,” those are practices you will be using.
The good news is that so much of the heart and substance of your well-loved units is a keeper. However, shifting to a deeper, stickier version of learning that honors what students “catch” over what we educators “throw” will require some streamlining and prioritizing. What are the most important skills, knowledge, and concepts students need from that unit? Focus there with more active learning techniques such as you mentioned. As you review your unit and move to a MBL approach, think also about how you might streamline, aka, identify what you will not be covering in the same way anymore. This is a service rather than a disservice to students… because we are moving from a goal of covering everything to a goal of maximizing learning. Maximizing learning is the goal!
Very best—Embie
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RECENT HAPPENINGS
Here’s what we’ve been up to lately! Find recordings and resources from past events at the MBLC Event Archive on the community site: bit.ly/MBLCsite.
Thursday, January 11, 2024 | Winter Community Gathering
This was the biggest-ever MBLC event! Cohorts 1 and 2 came together for mini-electives on high-interest topics aligned to our Implementation Steps, and for role-alike conversations about these topics:
- Specific ways schools are using culturally responsive-sustaining MBL to put students at the center academically
- particular needs/concerns/questions based on their specific role in this work
- Each participant’s own role in supporting equity in their school or district
Monday, January 8, 2024 | Welcome to MBLC! Professional Learning Community (PLC) for Cohort 2 Member Schools, Session 1
The first official professional learning event for MBLC Cohort 2 schools brought together 128 educators and leaders from across WA to meet, learn together, and get an overview of MBLC membership. In coming sessions, we will dig more deeply together into specific aspects of the MBLC work. It was an active and wonderful first session, thanks to our new member schools, who are leaning into the work with curiosity and energy.
 The contents of this resource were developed under a grant from the U.S. Department of Education. However, those contents do not necessarily represent the policy of the U.S. Department of Education, and you should not assume endorsement by the Federal Government.
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About us
The Mastery-based Learning Collaborative is a community of Washington State schools that are using youth-centered, mastery/competency-based, culturally responsive-sustaining practices and approaches. Our program is an initiative of Washington State Board of Education, in collaboration with the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction and Professional Educator Standards Board.
Contact
Mastery Based Learning Collaborative
State Board of Education
Olympia, Washington
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