Feature Story

PS69: A Community of Learners

- by Robin J. Heyden

When you ask Principal Alan Cohen to describe his school, PS 69, he doesn’t pull any punches.  “PS 69 is located in the Bronx, in a very poor section of New York City.  Our students live in the wrong zip code, their poverty level is high, they are children of color, and according to all national statistics, these children should fail.”  When Walter Wrendon describes his 4th grade classroom at PS 69, he calls it “a very busy place”.  The best way to understand PS 69’s journey over the last two years is to hear the stories of these two educators.

When Alan Cohen took over as the PS 69 principal in 2003, it was a failing elementary school. With abysmal Math and English New York test scores, the school was about to be taken over by the state. What’s worse, the PS 69 faculty weren’t convinced that anything needed to change.  As a result, Principal Cohen’s first task on his new job was to shine a spotlight on the problems and prepare the school for the changes ahead.  He hung six-foot high posters on the school walls, displaying their state exam results, and asked his teachers – “Is this a school to which you would want to send your children? Your nieces and nephews?”

Alan’s next step was to identify a way for the PS 69 staff to develop a common vision for change and a common language with which to talk about it. In particular, Alan’s priority for this school year was to “meet the needs of all our learners” and to strengthen a vertical alignment of instructors across K-5 grade levels. Based on his experience as a participant in Harvard Graduate School of Education’s Principal Center, he knew about the Teaching for Understanding and Differentiated Instruction online courses and felt that they would address PS 69’s needs. A generous grant that the Harvard Club of New York (HCNY) awarded to WIDE World helped to partially defray the costs of the courses for PS 69.

The first year with the WIDE program didn’t go as Alan had hoped.  Some of the instructional team required to take the professional development courses had low participation rates and did not make the connections between what they were learning in the courses and the action in their classroom. So Alan adjusted his approach and, in the second year, he announced the courses to all teachers and waited for volunteers. The resulting cohort of 15 teachers and administrators surprised him. “I didn’t even think that those people would be interested,” explained Alan.

For Walter Rendon, a 4th grade teacher in this second year group, it was the Differentiated Instruction course that drew him in. Walter explains, “I have a huge range of students in my class and I knew that I needed to do more to differentiate instruction for them.” 

That second cohort of PS 69 educators worked together in the 2008 – 2009 academic year. They took the Differentiated Instruction (DI) course in the fall of 2008 and the Teaching for Understanding (TFU) course in the spring of 2009, as one team. They met once a week to discuss what they were learning and how to apply it.  Alan Cohen refers to those meetings as “WIDE Mondays”.  “We would all meet at 3:05 on Mondays after school.  We’d have a snack and then start talking. The idea was to deepen our understanding, analyze student work, examine student writing across the curriculum, and build a fully-functioning team.”

As Walter worked his way through the WIDE course content he started experimenting with the new ideas in his classroom.  He used tools from the courses to evaluate how his students think and learn and then talked with each student about their results. He learned to articulate the macro level ideas and goals for a given lesson at the beginning and then regularly revisit them as guideposts for learning.  He found that this method provided students who get off course with a way to “renegotiate” a path to the subject matter. He devised a system whereby students could produce a variety of products as the outcome for a lesson, depending on their interests and their strengths.

During that experimental year, one third of Walter’s students had come to his classroom from other schools in NYC.  Many of them were below grade level and came from rote learning environments where the emphasis was on sitting still and listening.  Once Walter introduced the notion of group work and collaboration, he witnessed big changes in his students’ behavior. His classroom became a very busy place and he could see an improvement in the students’ attitude toward their work.

As they made their way through the academic year, Walter came up with an idea for a culminating project. He knew that the environment was a hot topic for his students and he wanted to tap into their interest and enthusiasm. He recognized an environmental unit would make it possible to weave science, math, and writing together. As part of his WIDE course work, he planned a four-week Environmental Science project for his fourth graders.

Walter started the project with a group exercise where students used post-it notes to capture ideas for helping the environment. They put all their notes up on a big poster out in the hallway.

These Understanding Goals (UGs), proposed to the students at the beginning of the unit, helped to define the scope and direction of the learning to come.  They served as guideposts for everyone (including the teacher!) and they allowed for a wide variety of entry points for student projects. 

With these UG’s in mind, the fourth graders then came up with a series of questions that interested them, things they wanted to learn.  From there, the students began a phase of research and reading, looking for information to help answer their questions. 

Soon they began to identify projects that would extend and demonstrate what they had learned. Walter coached individuals and groups as they decided on their projects and their approach to be sure they would promote learning about the target goals.  For some it would be a skit, for others an educational pamphlet, some opted to start a recycling center for the class – and hopefully – for the entire school. One group decided to design and build children’s toys from recycled products. Regardless of the project, Walter made certain that the students were writing, reading, and evaluating their own work. For instance, the toy builders kept detailed notes on what recycled items they used to make their toys and where those items would have ended up if not used in the hand-built toys.  He also checked that all of the projects had a practical purpose and that they addressed those overarching Understanding Goals from the beginning of the unit.

During the “WIDE Monday” sessions, Walter and his colleagues began to glimpse a way to vertically align the new directions they were taking.  By talking with each other about their class projects, the teachers were able to see opportunities for cross-grade collaboration. Walter’s fourth graders took their hand-crafted, recycled toys to their reading buddies in kindergarten and then to the first graders, to road test them. Mini skateboards, bongos, and dollhouses were carefully placed in the center of the room and the younger kids were invited to play with them. The fourth graders took notes on which toys their young testers played with and for how long.  The first graders wrote reviews of the toys and everyone talked, shared, and learned from each other.

Walter knew his fourth graders had come a long way with this environmental science project but he wanted to prove what they’d learned by administering a standardized content test. The class did well but Walter also noted something very interesting.  For a few of the students there was a difference between what they reported in their skits or pamphlets and what appeared on the test.  While Walter recognizes that some students will still need to improve their standardized exam scores, he now knows that some of them simply need to work on expressing existing understanding rather than building their knowledge from scratch.

What Walter did with this environmental science project was to provide his students with the opportunity to learn the best way they can and demonstrate their mastery with a range of projects.  His students found the channels for their greatest strengths to grow and produce.  They were no longer consumers or containers to be filled; they were now producers, fully engaged with the subject and with each other.

When asked how the WIDE program differed from past professional development experiences, Walter explains that there are three important differences:

First, the continuity. “By taking the WIDE courses right along with your teaching, you have an opportunity to apply what you’re learning every day.” 

Second, the collaboration. “The opportunity to work with other teachers who are all just as committed as I was, really motivated me to try harder. I didn’t feel so isolated. Teaching became something that is shared and it makes you feel like you’re doing something really important.” 

Third, when you are finished, you have a working product.  As Walter puts it, “By the end of the WIDE program I had specific tools, curriculum plans, and methods that I could use with my kids.”

And what about the results? Principal Cohen sums it up by saying, “Quality professional development equals quality instruction equals quality student outcomes.” He explains that PS 69 has gone from a failing school to one of the top 100 schools in the city of New York.  Their literacy and math scores improved by over 50 points each. 

Walter reports that all of his students are now at or above grade level, 100% of them passed the NY State math exam, and 78% of his class passed the English exam (up from 46% the previous year). But even more telling than the exam scores, Alan explains that, at PS 69, the agenda is no longer about “instruction”; they are now a community of learners.  “I think of myself as the lead learner of the school,” he explains, “and these teachers are the lead learners in their classrooms.”