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Primary Person

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The Primary Person Model

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Objectives:

Explain the flow and criteria that define an effective academic case conference

Deeply understand the 1-1 conferencing structure as a lever for equity and student self-efficacy

Reflect on effectiveness of your current practices and plan for what’s next!

Practice leading an academic case-conference

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Today we are not covering the broader system...

Competency alignment

Data Management

Scheduling

Continuous Improvement

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“Student Supports”

Related Indicator of School Quality

5b. Primary Person	Each student has a primary person with whom he or she meets to discuss progress to graduation and has a meaningful relationship based on trust and personal connection. This adult has a manageable caseload, understands that his/her primary responsibility is to serve as the student’s academic case manager to ensure that each student is making adequate academic progress, and is available to check-in as frequently as the student needs.

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Agenda

Time	Agenda
20 mins	Introduction & Opening Activity: Zaretta Hammond Reading
30 mins	What is an effective academic “case-conference”?
20 mins	Trying out part of a case-conference
10 mins	Debrief

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Springpoint interviewed ~20 educators and leaders during the spring and early summer of 2020 in response to the pandemic - they all pointed to a strong primary person/advisory model as the structure that engaged students during the remote learning transition period.

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Grounding Philosophy:

Zaretta Hammond

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Breakout Discussion

Goal: To deepen our understanding of the connection between Hammond and the primary person model through discussion

Respect the flow

Build off of each other’s thinking
Use digital or physical cues to enter the conversation
Share the mic
Look to invite others in

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Breakout Room Prep

Take 5...

Discussion Question: Using Hammond as your guide: what is the connection between equity and 1-1 student conferencing?

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Break-out!

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Using Hammond as your guide: what is the connection between equity and 1-1 student conferencing?

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Reflection: Where are we now?

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Reflection

How consistent is our staff as “Warm-Demanders” ?

Explicit focus on building rapport and trust
Show personal regard for students by inquiring about important people and events in their lives
Earns the right to demand engagement and effort
Hold high standards while also offering emotional support and scaffolding
Encourage productive struggle
Viewed by students as caring because of mixture of personal regard and high expectations

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Let’s get fired up...

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Academic Case Conferencing

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Context for the Video

•The primary person is the social worker, the student’s advisor.

•They have been meeting weekly to discuss his academic progress. In addition to his core “brick and mortar” courses, the student is taking a course on an online platform called Odyssey.

•In previous meetings, they have been discussing how to improve his work completion for the Odyssey economics course, because he has not made much progress.

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Zoom In

ZOOM IN on Last Week’s Goal (2-3 mins)	What was last week’s goal and strategy? Did you accomplish the goal? Effusive praise and celebrate progress. Even if this for showing up, getting back in the game and persisting. Why or why not? What is working? What’s getting in your way or what are you stuck on?

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How does the primary person ensure that the student does the thinking, talking and reflecting?

What can you infer about the relationship between the primary person and student?

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Zoom In

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Please add your response in the chat!

How does the primary person ensure that the student does the thinking, talking and reflecting?

What can you infer about the relationship between the primary person and student?

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Key Ideas

Stick to the script to avoid over-talking so the student does the thinking, talking and reflecting.

The student is comfortable being honest and vulnerable. It’s clear that the teacher has worked to build his trust.

There may be times that the teacher needs to celebrate showing up, getting up of the mat, and coming back for another day.

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Zoom out

ZOOM OUT and Examine the Data (2 mins)	What is all the academic data saying? What facet of your academic performance should we be focusing on? Is there anything that’s really outstanding/going well in the data we should celebrate? What in the data are worried about? What should we focus on this week?

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Focus Question(s)

What do you think enables the student to give a comprehensive and data-oriented overview of his performance in his classes?

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Zoom Out

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Please add your response in the chat!

What do you think enables the student to give a comprehensive and data-oriented overview of his performance in his classes?

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Key Ideas

To encourage a data based discussion of the work and progress:

The student has completed a short pre-work template that required him to look-up his current grades and reflect on his performance.

The primary person should be able to check his grades easily as well to confirm the student analysis.

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Zoom Back In

ZOOM BACK IN - Set Next Week’s Goal and Strategy (6 mins)	So this week we are going to focus on ____________. Let’s look at the root cause. What is holding you back? (homework, time management, big assignments that feel intimidating, academic content or skill that you need help with) Let’s get concrete. Let’s look at _____________ together. What’s the specific goal? Can we make sure this is specific, measurable and time-bound? Now let’s develop the strategy. Can we get concrete? Can we look at ___________ together? Or . .. Show me what this type of assignment actually looks like. So what are the steps you need to take to attain the goal?

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Focus Question

What does the primary person do to get specific and concrete? What is the impact?

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Zoom Back In

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Key Ideas

In order to catalyze progress:

The primary person focuses him in on a specific, narrow and concrete action step. His action step is to complete the first part of one assignment.

This sets him up on a cycle of doing something important but doable. This goal should help to catalyze feelings and beliefs of EFFICACY for the student.

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...These are SMART Goals

NON-EXEMPLAR	EXEMPLAR
Goal: Increase Odyssey (online assignment platform) completion. Strategy: Use the time between going home from school and going to work to do the work.	Goal: Focus on the economics course in Odyssey. Complete the graphing activity that is part of the first task by Friday. Strategy: Instead of playing basketball during open gym, use this time to complete the project. Click on the exemplar for the project contained in Odyssey so you can break the project down into discrete steps. Research a topic you are interested in (maybe sneakers) and then follow the exemplar step-by-step. Start by finding the data to complete the graph.

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How is the exemplar goal “SMART”?

Goal:Focus on the economics course in Odyssey. Complete the graphing activity that is part of the first task by Friday.

S = specific	Focuses on one task from one course. (Make a graph.)
M = measurable	The advisory can easily look to confirm if the work is complete. It’s binary - yes/no.
A = achievable	It’s bite-sized in order to fuel a sense of efficacy. It doable and ACTIONABLE.
R = relevant	Completing the graph is a key first step in completing the course. Athania also talks about how to focus on a topic, like sneakers, that Leo is interested in.
T = timebound	Short deadline - this Friday

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Part IV:

Practice Facilitating a Case Conference

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BUT...what if it isn’t my content area or I’m not a “classroom” teacher?

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Context

Focus

We will view 2 minutes of the “Zoom Out” phase of a case conference, where an 11th grade student is discussing some of her specific challenges with her primary person.

Imagine you are the primary person - listen in for what you hear and how you may help this student.

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What do you notice? What’s missing in comparison to the first videos?

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Current Goal: Get to an A

Strategies:

Attend after-school
Be in school (on time)
Use feedback

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But...we know a concrete area to work on based on what she shares:

The student is struggling with connecting evidence to a claim.

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Let’s create an alternate ending...

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Takeaways:

The student can write a claim
She can identify and explain evidence from the text
Her evidence isn’t matching/supporting the claim

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Breakout Room Activity:

Together you will revise the current goal to be SMART using the conference we just watched and the student’s work provided

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Break-out!

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Virtual Gallery Walk

Now, please read the thinking from the other groups.

What trends to you notice emerging?
What SMART goals strike you as strongest? Why?
What ideas might you borrow from other groups?
Where do you see concepts and ideas from the research on student motivation at play?

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Key Ideas

Get concrete. Talking about the work in vague terms will not help students know what to do next and where to start.

Make the SMART goal bite-sized, concrete and attainable. This goal should help to catalyze feelings and beliefs of EFFICACY for the student.

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Part V:

Following Up

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Key Ideas:

To foster virtuous cycles that lead to self-efficacy, every student has one primary person who is…

Consistent - uses the same conference structure and follows up
Has a warm-demanding demeanor
Adjusts and differentiates

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Exit Ticket

What ahas are you having?

What do you think you need to do next?

What questions do you still have?

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Thank you!