RSAC 2024

One of the most effective ways to truly see if students are understanding what they are reading is to have them engage with a reader’s notebook. In this session, we are going to discuss different reading response strategies teachers can immediately use in their classrooms with students. These strategies will not only help students cultivate their identity as a reader, but will get them engaged in their reading and will have them engaging with each other.

This session will focus on achievement data collected in a suburban Chicago dual language school. A true Two-Way program, this presentation will show literacy growth in two languages among students coming from English, Spanish and bilingual homes. Data suggests that students learning bilingually demonstrate high levels of literacy in both languages of instruction. Presenters will focus on assessment data through a bilingual lens, strategies for cross-linguistic connections and strategies for effective lesson planning and instruction.

In this session, participants will explore the concept of gender bias, and how identifying it can help to enhance the climate and culture in their classrooms. Participants will learn how understanding gender bias can increase student engagement and success while improving relationships throughout the school.

Executive functioning consists of many different processes that allow individuals to manage their everyday lives. It’s the skills we acquire that allow us to plan and organize our lives while managing ourselves emotionally. Without control of our executive functioning skills, we struggle to activate ourselves to take action, to stay focused and retain information to our long-term memory, to regulate our emotions and manage our frustrations. Our students require intense and explicit instruction in these areas more than ever before. Teachers will learn about each of the key components of executive functioning, the challenges of teaching executive functioning, and strategies to teach executive functioning skills in the classroom.

This session is designed for K-12 leaders who are ready to move beyond the basics of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and explore its practical application as a transformative teaching tool. We'll delve into using the latest AI tools to push technology use past substitution and into the deeper end of the SAMR pool. We’ll demonstrate a few tips on how AI can enhance your leadership role. We’ll explore cutting-edge AI developments on the horizon that will impact students when they enter the workforce. And finally we’ll equip you with the critical considerations for crafting a robust AI policy for your district. Join this session to become a SAMR and AI Samurai!