SAISD Secondary R-LA: The 4 + 1

Our passionate pursuit to inspire authentic and meaningful Listening, Speaking, Reading, Writing, and Meta-linguistic Awareness experiences for students.

In May of 2025, Academic Performance Assessments (APAs) will be administered to all students enrolled in English III and IV. The APAs are end of course assessment used for the Master Teacher Initiative.

Teachers of these courses will have the opportunity to vet a portion of the APA on the Monday, March 17 50/50 Day. There will be two three-hour windows, 8:30 AM-11:30 AM and 1:00 PM-4:00 PM, when APA vetting will be available. Please review the attached memo for additional information. If you are interested in vetting, you must complete this Google Form by the end of the day on Wednesday, March 5.

Teachers who sign up to vet will receive additional information regarding the vetting process on Thursday, March 6.

Blueprints for all APAs will be posted to the Curriculum, Instruction, and Assessment website on Friday, March 7.

SAISD Memo

Call for R-LA Teachers!

To ensure the responsible and effective integration of artificial intelligence in SAISD, an AI in Education Tools Review Committee will be established. This committee will serve in an advisory capacity and will support the thorough evaluation of AI-powered educational resources, considering their potential impact on classroom dynamics, teaching methodologies, and student learning outcomes. Their expertise will provide invaluable insights into the practical application of these tools, ensuring alignment with pedagogical best practices, the needs of both teachers and students, and effective cyber and data security protocols.

Principals are asked to nominate a teacher or instructional staff member to serve on the committee by completing the Instructional Materials Committee Nomination Form and submitting via this link by March 3, 2025.

There are up to three meetings and they will be held virtually.

• March 6, 2025 - Introduction and Scope of Work (Virtual)
• March 18-19, 2025 - Product Presentations (Virtual)
• March 31- April 2, 2025 - Product Ranking
• April 3, 2025 - Final Committee Recommendation Meeting (Virtual)

Virtual sessions will be held from 5:00 to 7:00 PM. Attendance is required to fully participate in the ranking.

SAISD Memo

Texas College Bridge wants to ensure the success of your students. We have over 22,000 students that have completed either one or both TCB courses, but have not registered for their GreenLight Locker. Those students received an email with instructions on how to register for a GreenLight Locker and how to share their certificate of completion on Friday, February 14. HERE is the email students received.

Please help us to help your students. If your students need extra assistance with accessing TCB certificates of completion, please have them reach out to us at texascollegebridge@commitpartnership.org.

From Ms. Meyer in Data Operations and Services:

• Campuses have been given a summary for their campus by grade level and a district summary.
• Campuses can schedule PLCs w/ Teachers for their updated STAARList / EOCList to go over the data as well. Request Form
• For interim, students will get a predicted STAAR performance level, which indicates if a student is likely to achieve Masters Grade Level, Meets Grade Level, Approaches Grade Level, or Did Not Meet Grade Level performance on the same spring STAAR summative assessment.

Links to more support from TEA:

• STAAR Interim Assessments- https://tea.texas.gov/student-assessment/test-administration/staar-interim-educator-guide.pdf

• How to use the ISRs - https://txassessmentdocs.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/ODCCM/pages/2793216785/How+to+Use+Individual+Student+Reports+ISRs+Detailed+Student+Report

• How to view Test Results Broken Down by Demographic Subpops - https://txassessmentdocs.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/ODCCM/pages/2793216681/How+to+View+Test+Results+Broken+Down+by+Demographic+Sub-Groups

Please use these tools to enhance your alignment to standards and STAAR assessment.

AI Grading Assistant

Does AI Grading Assistant assess accuracy from the text?

While Grading Assistant has been rigorously tested to ensure a high level of accuracy in scores and comments based on the provided rubrics, it can not currently assess student accuracy according to a text.

Can we use our own prompts with Grading Assistant?

Yes! Keep in mind that prompts that ask a single clear-cut question will receive the most reliable feedback. Here are some examples of prompts that are well and not well suited to Grading Assistant.

Originality Insights!

In a GenAI world that can complicate assessment of student writing, this tool equips teachers to confidently engage in conversations about academic integrity, critical thinking, and original work. Learn more here.

It's here! Please begin using Sirius to get our high school re-testers ready for the December retest administration! Here are some initial start up resources.

Please see below for access information, introduction, and troubleshooting for support for our amazing resources!

Please use the teacher-sourced SAISD novel list to post novels you wish to giveaway or novels you need!

• Use items and passages to see the full context of student responses. Directions here.
• Follow these directions for printing all students' SCR and ECR responses in one document
• In Eduphoria, use Analysis, Single Test, use:
• Learning Standard Summary tab to see performance by standard
• Item Response Analysis tab to see individual item performance (click on a question's bar and scroll down to see the question, correct answer, and answer distribution across students).

More Eduphoria support for teachers here.

We are collecting information about technology used in journalism and yearbook classes. If you teach journalism or yearbook, please complete this form!

Remembering something you saw at Curriculum Day that you would like to reference? Or wanting to check out a session you missed? Take a look at our Curriculum Day Resources and Materials smore. All Curriculum Day content listed here.

Sirius Online EOC Prep resources should now be available in Classlink for all teachers and rostered for all courses. This is what the Sirius Classlink icon looks like the icon on the right.

If teachers do not have access or if there is any issue with rostering, please have them complete a support ticket in the green SAISD Support Folder or the SAISD IT Support Portal in Classlink.

Please be aware that Sirius may not be available to students who have already passed all of their EOCs.

Support and Resources

• Intro to Sirius PD Session from the spring

• Sirius Training Resources

Middle school teachers, please check out these resources to enhance use of SAVVAS Realize, our textbook adoption, and SAVVAS SuccessMaker, its accompanying intervention resource.

Online tutorials on:

• SAVVAS Realize: Explore, What's New, Navigating Content, Assigning Content, etc.
• SAVVAS SuccessMaker: Getting Started, Progress Monitoring, Prescriptive Scheduling Report, etc.
• Directions for adding SuccessMaker to SAVVAS account

College Prep ELA teachers, please see this Texas College Bridge F.A.Q. for a comprehensive list of answers, resources, and important things to know.

Direct link to student registration information here.

Completing the learning pathways in Texas College Bridge (TCB) provides students with a TCB certification, which may be used as a TSI waiver for our local higher ed partners Texas A&M, UTSA, and Alamo Colleges.

***New TSIA2 ELAR Canvas Course available! Direct link here.

Please see this document for updated resources and blueprint of the test. Since so much of the test has remained the same item-wise, we have elected to keep some our resources from the old test, updating as we fully revise to reflect TSIA2.

Infusing literacy practices to teach all content bolsters learning! Find the SAISD Cross-Content Literacy Strategies Toolkit here. Spread the word to your colleagues, and encourage them to contribute content-specific exemplars for some goodies!

​This site contains important curriculum information and documents that are used as tools to guide instruction, monitor pacing and foster the development of all students in SAISD. All curriculum documents are designed to reflect the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills Statements (TEKS).​

It is the district expectation that teachers adhere to the curriculum, as district assessments and professional learning will follow its scope and sequence.

SAISD Reading Language Arts teachers have been incorporating components of reader's and writer's workshop for years. Our document to speak to and refine as we teach in these "unprecedented times." Read here how our district will define and implement workshop.

Janet Hester: Director, jhester1@saisd.net

Becky Anderson: Specialist, randerson4@saisd.net

Emily Aguilar: Specialist, eaguilar3@saisd.net

Lucy Gray: Specialist, lgray3@saisd.net

Michael Cortez: Specialist, mcortez6@saisd.net

Rosie Boblett: Specialist, rboblett1@saisd.net

Website: https://www.saisd.net/page/english-home%20-%20secondary
Location: 514 West Quincy Street, San Antonio, TX, USA
Phone: 2105542530
Twitter: @RLASAISD

Reminder! The district ECR window is open through February 10th. This includes time for scoring!

• Window: January 30-February 10 (all ECRs must be scored within this time frame)

• ECR Memo

• Administration Guide (preparation, student lock-down browser instructions, instructions for scoring)

• New! Scoring Guides:

• Secondary

• ELAR Elementary

• SLAR Elementary

Purpose of District Curated Book Lists:

To curate instructional literary texts to provide a sound list of engaging and grade-appropriate longer texts (i.e., novels, novels in verse, graphic novels) for our students. This curated list does not represent the only books teachers may use in classrooms, but represents the best selections vetted by a committee of educators and community stakeholders, in accordance with our SAISD Board Policy for Instructional Materials: Library, the SAISD Culturally Responsive and Sustaining Framework, and our district values. Criteria and process have been vetted by the SAISD Literacy Advisory Committee in the 23-24 school year.

Action Items ✅:

• Please recommend book titles using this form!
• Please consider joining one of our committees, receive free books, and talk books this summer! Please see this form for more details and to sign up!

We are working to get more information about the implication of automated scoring on ECRs during STAAR administration. TEA has released more clarifying information, emphasizing that scoring is a hybrid system involving humans and automated scoring engines (ASE). More information here: Hybrid Scoring Key Questions and 2023 STAAR Hybrid Scoring Study.

Findings from SAISD Pearson Visit 3/25:

• Biggest takeaway:

• The AI is working as far as we could tell

• Students can no longer expect points for writing anything—they will get a zero even if they have something written

• On the zero’s we saw, the reason why they are zeros:

• Off task:

• Not understanding the writing prompt

• Wrong genre: summary (so many summaries! That didn’t answer the prompt), narrative, description

• Did not understand the question: academic vocabulary/ideas

• Inaccurate response—there’s an answer and the kids are missing it (misreading the passage?, not seeing the importance, right answer)

• Refusal: song lyrics, don’t want to write this, etc.

• Too much copied directly from the passage

• Just a few words

• Duplicated text

• Another language

• Off-topic

Relevant news articles:

• Dallas Morning News Article

• San Antonio Report

We are keeping these materials pinned here for a couple of weeks! At the the September 18 board meeting, Dr. Aquino shared Close Reading as a strategy SAISD schools are using to improve student performance. Many campuses are focusing on implementing Close Reading strategies across contents. Please see the below strategies to support implementation in R-LA and contact your R-LA specialist for support.

• Close Reading Process
• Close Reading and Multiple Reads One-Pager
• Rubric for Close Reading
• Grade-Level Close Reading Prompts by Genre: Grade 6, Grade 7, Grade 8, English I, English II

Reminder! Before reading a text with students, plan for an SCR or ECR question for students to write to. Then, plan close reading prompts so that they align to that question. This will support students' reading and finding evidence for those questions. This purposeful reading will support comprehension for all aspects of the text.

Our SCR and ECR Instructional Supports:

• Support for Writing SCR/ECR Prompts: Grade 6, Grade 7, Grade 8, English I, English II
• Pathways for Instruction: SCR and ECR
• SCR Rubric Template
• ECR Rubrics

We are excited to announce our Secondary RLA Professional Learning Series! We will be offering educators two ways to learn and collaborate on timely topics and strategies:

Canvas Course, complete with videos, collaboration opportunities, and resources

• Sign into Canvas from Classlink and then use this link
• Or use course code 66A449 to join

Videos posted to Twitter and YouTube

• Follow us on Twitter @SAISDRLA and search #SAISDSecRLAPL
• Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

Please plan on using these as points of collaboration in PLCs or to process on your own.

We will be adding Canvas modules and videos this fall! Please use this survey to let us know what topics you would like to see represented.