Communities of Practice Guide

The Transforming Literacy through Content-Area Reading Community of Practice engages educators in leveraging reading skills in all content areas to eliminate discipline literacy gaps. Participants will explore diagnostic teaching opportunities that build students’ content-area reading skills to help minimise the divide that exists between students who read at the expected level and those who do not yet.

Participants will:

• Exercise educator agency by incorporating the AVID Critical Reading Process into instructional design with intentional scaffolds and supports.
• Increase and diversify the types of texts used to more fully engage all students.
• Leverage the power of building background knowledge to increase access to content and unlock comprehension.
• Choose Extending Beyond the Text strategies that align with specific academic thinking skills to scaffold learning so that students can access rigorous content.

Participants will:

• Design and empower AVID Site Teams to use collective educator agency to transform student outcomes

• Align their AVID implementation strategy with their school strategic plan and state education priorities

• Create a school culture that aligns with the AVID Tertiary and Career Readiness Framework

• Understand systems thinking and apply that knowledge to AVID implementation and refinement

• Implement WICOR® as a means for enhancing rigour in their school, with a focus on ensuring consistent high-quality instruction across all classrooms

The Transforming Literacy through Content-Area Reading Community of Practice engages educators in leveraging reading skills in all content areas to eliminate discipline literacy gaps. Participants will explore diagnostic teaching opportunities that build students’ content-area reading skills to help minimise the divide that exists between students who read at the expected level and those who do not yet.

Participants will:

• Exercise educator agency by incorporating the AVID Critical Reading Process into instructional design with intentional scaffolds and supports.
• Increase and diversify the types of texts used to more fully engage all students.
• Leverage the power of building background knowledge to increase access to content and unlock comprehension.
• Choose Extending Beyond the Text strategies that align with specific academic thinking skills to scaffold learning so that students can access rigorous content.

The Creating Engaging and Rigorous Classrooms Community of Practice is designed to engage primary and secondary educators in cultivating a community of learners by preparing teachers and school leaders to scaffold student success with rigorous content. Educators will explore the framework of AVID Digital Learning: The 4 A’s® to meaningfully integrate blended learning strategies with Writing, Inquiry, Collaboration, Organisation, and Reading (WICOR®) student-centred instructional practices to differentiate instruction and increase student agency. Participants will learn strategies to build connected communities through relational capacity activities to foster supportive and equitable learning spaces.

Participants will:
• Model and blend WICOR with digital strategies to provide students with quality instruction and learning opportunities in a 21st-century environment.
• Foster an academic mindset to create supportive and equitable learning spaces through student engagement and relational capacity strategies.
• Design and implement learning opportunities to promote student agency in blended learning environments.
• Empower learners through the use of student-centred instructional practices for differentiated learning spaces.

The Cultivating Writing Schoolwide Community of Practice is designed to engage and empower primary and secondary educators from all learning areas with knowledge and strategies to increase skills and confidence in writing as a powerful tool in a 21st-century learning environments. Educators across all discipline areas will gain strategies for teaching writing processes and building an understanding of the academic modes of writing (argumentative, expository, narrative, and descriptive) relevant to their learning area, as well as writing for a range of academic purposes. Participants will explore the power of metacognitive writing to cultivate both literacy and student agency in their disciplines. This collaborative experience allows educators to explore strategies that help students access rigorous content and write like learning area content experts.

Participants will:
• Build student agency by incorporating the AVID Focused Note-Taking Process to empower students to take charge of their learning in their classrooms.
• Cultivate learning-through-writing essential instructional practices through the critical reading and writing processes.
• Leverage the four modes of writing as tools to build disciplinary literacy schoolwide.
• Exercise educator agency by incorporating the writing process as a learning tool to develop a deeper connection and access to content.
• Integrate metacognition into instructional design with intentional opportunities for reflection and feedback.

The English Community of Practice engages English educators in the intentional integration of speaking and listening, reading and writing to communicate. Participants will explore strategies necessary to provide access to rigorous nonfiction, fiction, and nontraditional texts and to foster a culture of effective communication, and development of voice with clarity and confidence. Participants will explore strategies necessary to critically read a variety of text types and consider how academic thinking skills and W riting, I nquiry, C ollaboration, O rganization, and R eading (WICOR®) can be used to design effective instruction. Participants will engage with the writing process to create and share ideas that will support deeper implementation of writing in the English classroom, impacting students’ ability to create and effectively share knowledge and innovative ideas.

Participants will:
• Cultivate an understanding of disciplinary literacy and AVID’s core processes for implementation supporting both educator and student agency.
• Leverage the power of academic speaking and listening skills necessary for students’ success in tertiary studies and careers.
• Understand the collaborative writing process to leverage meaningful feedback creating multiple opportunities for student engagement and authentic experiences.

This course examines classroom strategies and methodologies that support the AVID Tertiary Career Readiness Framework and AVID Essential Skills schoolwide. Educators will learn the importance of disciplinary literacy, experience WICOR® in action, and understand how to craft learning experiences that support rigorous academic preparedness, student agency, and opportunity knowledge for their specific role at school.

Participants will:
• Explore the importance of relational capacity and classroom culture in building student agency
• Use WICOR strategies to model rigour, accelerate learning and develop student agency
• Create learning plans to incorporate rigorous academic preparedness, student agency, and opportunity knowledge

This Community of Practice is designed to engage educators to develop mathematicians through cultivating a discourse-rich mathematics learning environment. Participants will explore the teacher moves necessary to empower students to engage deeply in mathematics, communicate their ideas, and connect their thinking to that of others. This collaborative experience will allow participants to experience strategies they can implement to create a culture for discourse, utilise a variety of mathematical representations, ask intentional and higher-level questions, and gather evidence of student thinking and learning.

Participants will:
• Foster a culture of academic risk-taking.
• Connect multiple mathematical representations
• Use higher-level questioning routinely
• Centre evidence of student thinking to build and maintain a classroom where students are challenged, engaged, and take greater ownership of their learning

The Science Community of Practice is designed to engage Science educators in the use of AVID instructional practices. Educators will experience learning using collaborative structures to build science literacy through inquiry. They will engage in rigorous instruction using a variety of digital tools and Writing, Inquiry, Collaboration, Organisation, and Reading (WICOR®) strategies. Learning topics include interactive notebooks, focused note-taking, reading and writing for disciplinary literacy, and collaborative structures to enhance inquiry.

Participants will:
• Develop all students’ reading, writing, language, and thinking skills by implementing WICOR-based lessons to increase rigour and positively impact student learning.
• Implement all aspects of the Focused Note-Taking process through the use of a digital Interactive Notebook in order to increase student engagement, comprehension, and retention of science content.
• Advocate for content-specific, rigorous coursework schoolwide to promote a culture of student success, academic achievement, and tertiary readiness.
• Implement successful collaborative structures and digital tools and articulate the tertiary readiness skills to elevate the level of rigour in content-area classes.

The Secondary Implementation Community of Practice will focus on the academic and organisational skills needed to effectively advocate for AVID students and to build AVID schoolwide focus across a school. Participants will explore AVID implementation; Writing, Inquiry, Collaboration, Organisation, and Reading (WICOR®) strategies; the 10 Steps of the Tutorial Process; and student agency and opportunity knowledge using updated AVID resources.

Participants will:
• Apply the components of the AVID Tertiary and Career Readiness Framework to activate agency through the 10 Steps of the Tutorial Process.
• Reflect, plan, and determine resources to apply to the 10-Step AVID Tutorial Process in order to develop student agency and empower students to find success in rigorous coursework and other collaborative environments.
• Deepen their knowledge of how to utilise resources to scaffold relational capacity, collaboration, and strengthen community as a means of building a brave and supportive learning environment.

Primary Implementation will support educators with implementing Writing, Inquiry, Collaboration, Organisation, and Reading (WICOR®) strategies to prepare students with the skills they need to activate their own potential and engage with rigorous content. Participants will gain an understanding of their role in an AVID Schoolwide system to build a culture of student success.

Participants will:

• Foster academic mindsets to create supportive and equitable learning spaces through student engagement and relational capacity strategies
• Apply WICOR strategies schoolwide from emergent to independent learners to scaffold student success with rigorous content
• Provide differentiated instruction for all students to create an environment that promotes a culture of student agency, rigorous academic preparedness, and opportunity knowledge to build tertiary and career readiness
• Deepen their knowledge of how to utilise resources to scaffold relational capacity, collaboration, and strengthen community aligned to the school’s strategic plan