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Nanakuli Elementary School
Q&A with Wendy Takahashi and Staff
Principal and Staff
In the year since implementing Galileo K-12 Online, Nanakuli Elementary School in the Leeward O'ahu District in Waianae, Hawaii, has seen a dramatic rise in the percent of students passing the statewide assessment. For example, between 2009 and 2010, the percent of fifth grade students passing the state assessment in math decreased three percent. One year later in 2011, with Galileo K-12 Online technology in place and intervention plans implemented, the school saw a 31 percent increase in the percent of fifth grade students passing the statewide assessment in math. This remarkable growth is credited to using Galileo reports and data to help refine instruction and efficiently identify intervention needs, combined with implementing scheduled times for intervention.
What were the main things that the school implemented that you believe were responsible for your success?
Kalaukieleula Hergenrader – Curriculum Coordinator:
"One of the things was that we collaborated with [other schools in the district] and I think that collaboration helped us to see the validity of the correlation between Galileo and the Hawaii state assessment (Hawaii's Content Performance Standards). As a result, we've put a lot more effort into using the data from the reports generated [in Galileo] to drive the intervention and to move the students forward. I think that's the biggest thing. The continuity of the reports … made the biggest impact for all of us."
Wendy Takahashi – Principal:
"What we're doing, say for instance in language arts, is a morning session where the teachers will teach an integrated type of comprehension lesson. And in the afternoon we have specific periods intended for intervention. That's the time when we work with a variety of tools for differentiated instruction on the identified needs of the kids. We use Galileo heavily to identify specific needs."
Jessica Breslin – Grade 6 Teacher and School Coach:
"Also what happened, for the Hawaii state assessment, we took the second Galileo [benchmark] and used it as a predictor. I gave the [state assessment to the] kids who scored 70 percent or higher on the benchmark. Those were the kids who ended up being proficient [on the state assessment]. Then across grade levels I could administer [the benchmark] and have the teachers select the students we thought would be ready for the Hawaii state assessment according to the Galileo data. I think that that helped a lot."
Wendy Takahashi – Principal:
"In Hawaii we give an online test for the state test and the students can take it up to three times. Their highest score is the score that is recorded. We can give the test any time between October and May. We use Galileo to predict which students are ready to take the test and administer it to those students."
How did you identify students needing intervention?
Kalaukieleula Hergenrader – Curriculum Coordinator:
"We use Galileo as a direction for targeted intervention. We take all the reports and we analyze the data. We look at the quizzes that Galileo provides and we target students based on that information … Galileo is a way of refining our instruction to the point of making students successful."
Jessica Breslin – Grade 6 Teacher and School Coach:
"We looked at the benchmark where the whole class was in need. So maybe 20 percent or 30 percent of the class knows [the standard], so that would be a whole class instruction. And then the [students] in the middle that ranged from 54 to 70 percent were more [in need of] intervention instruction. [Galileo K-12 Online showed] this is where certain kids … seem to have a misunderstanding or misconception on either the way the question was presented or they needed to learn the objective completely."
Wendy Takahashi – Principal:
"There were a couple of reports we used [to identify students needing intervention]. One is the Test Monitoring Report with the Test Blueprint to identify the [standards needing mastery]. And then we look at the Item Analysis Report to figure out why they selected the wrong response."
Kalaukieleula Hergenrader – Curriculum Coordinator:
"The [Intervention Report] is really valuable in a couple of ways. One is it tells us how we're doing against the rest of the [users in the district] so we can look at the averages and see if we're doing better than the other schools [in the district] or we're not doing as well. That's one of the values. The other is that it really tells us where the effort needs to be in terms of percentages of student performance. So we really use that particular report."
How did you plan what to teach students needing intervention?
Jessica Breslin – Grade 6 Teacher and School Coach:
"Once we decide which kids need the intervention, the first thing I have to do as a teacher is figure out where the misconception lies. So I usually give a question that is either the same one they took and had the error, or a very similar one and then another one for guided practice. I ask them what they were thinking, how would they answer it, and where did they go wrong. So then I know is it instruction, is it vocabulary, is it process? Before you can get to that part you have to first identify where the misconception was, so that usually happens in a small group and I teach from that point."
Wendy Takahashi – Principal:
"We also look at what we have taught so far and [what is] still to be taught. So we know if there are a lot of kids who have gotten something wrong, but it's not something I have not taught yet, then I still have time to work on that. But the [standards] that I have taught, are there a lot of kids [not understanding]? Or just a few? If there are a lot, I need to go back and teach the whole group a different way, or reteach it."
How are interventions administered?
Wendy Takahashi – Principal:
"What we discovered last year … is [students] really respond to the one-on-one and small group sessions. They looked forward to it … and that was what helped us go over the hump. We'd never been able to do that before. It was the first time we'd broken through the ceiling.
The other thing we did was we extensively used the quizzes that you can make online [in Galileo K-12 Online]. Not every teacher was as proficient in that, but we had enough people who were doing that and I think that's a really big part of it. We used them both for assessment and instruction.
What I mean by that is we use [the online quizzes] as a formative assessment. Not only do you look at the score, but you also watch the kids do it. And then you talk about 'Why did you select that item?' and that gives us insight into what's the problem. With some kids … like in math, they weren't writing it out on paper and working it out, they were trying to figure it out in their brain. Where with others, it was the vocabulary words they didn't know, so we knew we had to teach the vocabulary. With others, it was they didn't know the concept or the [standard], so we knew we needed to teach the [concept and standard]. That helped us refine the instruction and be more focused."
Kalaukieleula Hergenrader - Curriculum Coordinator:
"I think the other piece is that we insist that the students use what is called a 'Work-It-Out Sheet.' So we want them to practice putting their thinking down on paper. When they do digital media, or electronic testing, we can't dismiss the thinking process … They have to do something that is physical and transparent in order to monitor their thinking, to make them responsible, to make a deliberate analysis for answering the test. I think that's a critical piece."
Wendy Takahashi – Principal:
"Even if it's just to write 'A, B, C, D' and cross out the obvious [incorrect choices]. Then figure out, 'Why am I going to choose between the last two?' As simple as just writing those things down helps them to do the thinking as opposed to just selecting one because 'It's sort of like that.'"
What advice would you give to other schools who want to implement an approach like yours?
Wendy Takahashi – Principal:
"What we found is that when we did not discriminate separate periods for intervention, that intervention never occurred. One of the things that helped was to identify a specific period where everyone would do intervention. Another one is the power of the quizzes. What we learned is that it doesn't take 10 questions, if you do four or five, you get a good idea [of student understanding]."
Kalaukieleula Hergenrader - Curriculum Coordinator:
"We do a landscape of data so we do a constant analysis. We have a multi-faceted approach and Galileo is one of the essential pieces … We are very deliberate about using all of the reports and orchestrating and requiring the analysis of those reports to drive instruction. It's a balance of a lot of different tools of which Galileo is an essential piece for us, so thank you."