Welcome to the second in a series of tutorials on the use of the LSSS.
In this tutorial, we will show you how to document the study phase of your team's lesson study cycle.
Because this app was designed to facilitate a broad array of activities that can be
incorporated into a lesson study cycle, this tutorial is not intended to serve as an
exhaustive introduction to each task displayed on the dashboard. Instead, we will focus on
introducing you to the use of the key steps and tasks that are essential to lesson study.
We encourage you to explore other tasks at your leisure. You will find each of them share
similar features and functions with the tasks that we will focus on in this tutorial.
On your iCPALMS homepage, go to the lesson study support system app and open up the cycle of lesson
study you started in the previous tutorial.
Note that the first task of Step 1, "Establish Your Lesson Study Team," appears with a blue task
indicator to the left of the task name. This indicates that this task is currently under way.
If you have completed this task, and your team has been invited, you can check the box to the
right of the task to mark it complete. You can do this once you have completed each task in the app.
Next, locate the "Develop Group Norms" task on the navigation pane, and click on it to take
you to the group norms tool. You can use the "Group Norm" text box to document the group
norms that you and your team established in your first team meeting.
In order to do this, enter a group norm into the text box, and click the "Add" button for
each individual group norm that you add. These norms are intended to serve as communications
guidelines for your team throughout the cycle. Once you have completed documentation of your
team's group norms, scroll over to the navigation pane and select the first task in
Step 2, "Develop a Research Theme." The research theme task involves your team in the formulation
of long-term academic and social goals for your students. The "Mission Statement" textbox
provides your team with a place to document your school's mission statement.
Many teams find it helpful to connect their own long-term student goals with the overall
mission of the school. Scroll down to the "Bridging the Gap" section.
This space is provided so that you can document the itemized lists of current and desired
student qualities that your team agreed upon, in one of your early team meetings.
To enter your team's desired student qualities, click the radio button to the left of the
"Desired Student Quality" header. You will need to type each individual student quality
into the text box, and click "Add" for each. This will generate the list of
desired student qualities. Repeat this procedure for the current student quality list.
Be sure to click "Add" after entering each individual student quality. You can use the
"Bridging the Gap" text box below the student qualities workspace to include any notes that
your team generated in coming up with your research theme. The "Research Theme" text box
is reserved for you to type in, or attach your team's final research theme for this cycle of
lesson study. The text boxes below the "Research Theme" text box are for including
your justification for this theme, and the implications for collecting student data.
Although they are not mandatory fields, it is a good idea to consider these questions early.
Once you have entered your team's research theme, scroll over to the navigation pane, and
select the second task of Step 2, "Choose a Curriculum Focus." This is the task where you
will indicate the content and Florida Standards that are applicable to this cycle of lesson study.
At the top of the "Choose a Curriculum Focus" task page, you will see two mandatory
fields for "Subject Area" and "Grade" that must be completed. Clicking on the dropdown
window for "Subject Area" displays the different categories for Florida academic
standards that apply to each particular subject. Select the subject or subjects that apply to
your team's current lesson study cycle by clicking the box next to each one that applies.
After selecting the desired subject, use the dropdown below it to enter the grade level or
levels of student that your team will be working with in this lesson study cycle. Below the
subjects & grades dropdowns you will see a list of questions for helping your team
brainstorm about specific topics within the subject & grade that are of concern for your team.
If your team hasn't yet settled on a specific topic at this point, these questions can be
useful in helping you narrow the focus. Once you have a focus, you can enter it in the
"Select a Curriculum Focus" text box. Next your team will need to locate relevant
Florida Standards that apply to your team's selected topic. Scroll down to the
"Select Standards" workspace and use the dropdown for "Related Domains", to select the
domain that applies to your team's topic. Once you have selected the relevant domain or
domains that your topic aligns with, it is time to indicate which Big Ideas, standards,
or clusters within each domain your team will be exploring. Once you've entered the
relevant Big Ideas, standards, or clusters that apply to your topic, a new dropdown will
appear below it, that allows you to select the individual benchmarks or standards that your
team will focus on in this cycle. Upon selecting the benchmark or benchmarks that
apply to your team's topic, you will be prompted to add any relevant access points
that may apply. It is important to remember that access points are only intended for
students with profound learning disabilities. So this category will most likely not apply
to your team. Below the "Select Standards" workspace you will notice an option for
selecting "Published Lesson Study Resource Kits" to guide your team. You can click the
"Search" button to use this option to explore existing resource kits in CPALMS. Clicking on
the title of the resource kit will allow you to review the kit to see if it is compatible
with your team's goals. Do not click the "Select" button to the right of the resource
kit, unless you intend to replace the standards that you've previously selected with
those that are part of this kit. In the event that you do select a resource kit, you will be
greeted with a warning that the Lesson Study Support System will populate the remaining
tasks in your cycle with the resources from that kit. The use of Lesson Study Resource
Kits within the Lesson Study Support System is the subject of a separate tutorial.
Once you have completed your selection of topics and standards that your team has chosen
to focus on, click the "Save" button on the bottom right-hand corner of the task page.
Now scroll to the navigation panel and select the "Explore Research and Resources on
Teaching and Learning" task from the Step 3 menu. This task allows your team to document
any research on the teaching and learning of the content it has selected for this cycle of
lesson study. Simply select the resource type from the dropdown menu to document each resource;
or use the "Upload File Attachment" option to upload a resource from your own files.
Once you've selected a resource type, you will be directed to a workspace that prompts you
for the bibliographical information relevant to that source. In addition to providing a means
of storing important information relevant to each resource, this task also provides you
with a space for summarizing the source, as well as including guiding questions that you
would like for your team to consider in their study. Once you have completed the
bibliographical information sections, and the summary and guiding questions, be sure
to click the "Add" button so that it is included among your team's lesson study
documents for this cycle. Once you have completed this task for all of the resources
you have selected for your team's study, move on to the next task in Step 3, "Develop a
Thorough Understanding of Related Benchmarks and Standards." This task is for documenting
your team's work and unpacking the standards that are associated with its curriculum focus.
Note the radio button to the left of each standard. The app automatically selects the
top standard on the list for documentation, but you can select any one standard at a time,
by clicking on the button next to it. Text boxes are provided for entering documentation
associated with your analysis of each standard.
Each text box provides you with the flexibility to write text, link to web
resources, and attach documents from your own computer. In addition to the attachment options
in the individual text boxes, an upload file attachment feature is included at the bottom
of each task page, in the event that your team would prefer to share one global document
related to your standards unpacking for this cycle. In addition to these essential tasks
in Step 3 of the Lesson Study Support System, a quick scan of the dashboard reveals optional
tasks for documenting and exploring Formative Assessments, Exemplary Assessment Items, and
Informational Texts. The features and functions of these tasks are similar to the
tasks that we've explored previously. Take some time to examine any of these that apply
to you team's cycle. The final important task in Step 3, "Study Curriculum," relates to the
documentation of curriculum materials that relate to your team's selected topic.
These may include curriculum mandated by your school, district, or the state, as well as any
materials that your team judges exemplary. It is likely that any unit or lesson plans
developed by your team in this cycle will draw from the materials documented in this
task, as well as any that may have been documented in previous tasks.
As you can see, the task page for "Study Curriculum" is very similar to that of the
first task in Step 3. One important distinction is an optional text box
included for identifying a learning progression. Within the context of Lesson
Study, we can think of a learning progression in very broad terms. As a map of key ideas and
standards that locates your team's targeted learning goals along the span of related
content standards for the topic across K through 12. Once you have finished entering
your documentation for this task, click "Save."
This completes this tutorial on documenting your team study in the LSSS.