Blended Learning and MIZ Texas

Background

Education Elements is thrilled to partner with the Texas Education Agency (TEA) to provide support for school districts across Texas in their blended learning implementation. Education Elements has worked with more schools and districts to implement blended learning than any other organization, serving more than 950 schools, 200 districts, and 780,000 students nationally and has supported three previous cohorts of BLPG grantees. We will support you to design blended learning instructional models, lead teacher professional development, develop district strategy for scale and sustainability, and effectively implement blended learning in a variety of environments and contexts. We have experience working with and supporting diverse groups of students, teachers, and leaders from small rural districts to suburban and large urban communities.

Out Current and Past Texas District Partners

Texas BLGP MIZ Map Nov 2020

Why Partner with Education Elements

The Education Elements team can support your goals for BLGP

We have deep experience in student-centered learning, school design, leadership development, strategic planning, and change management.
We are expert facilitators, who engage diverse groups and bring in processes and protocols that drive collaboration, alignment, and action.
We are a responsive organization who is committed to planning for change nor perfection to ensure sustainability and impact despite changing conditions.
We customize our approach based on your unique needs, taking time to learn your context. We never bring in a one-size-fits-all solution.
We get results. We are one of the few education consulting companies that publishes an annual impact report showing how visions and plans translated into results at the district, school, and community level.

Education Elements has supported our work with MIZ with a deep understanding of our needs. In addition, EE has been able to adapt such support to encompass a clear alignment to the vision and mission of our district.

Director of Mathematics, El Paso ISD

Education Elements provided a thoughtful approach to blended learning implementation for stakeholders at all levels. Check-ins and calls provided a strong framework for our project and kept progress on-track. Professional development sessions and planning meetings modeled strong and effective practices and procedures

MIZ Project Manager, Edcouch-Elsa ISD

Ed Elements was critical in supporting a greater understanding, timeline, and perspective for our district staff to navigate the design phase, as well as bringing a systematic approach.

District Director, Brooks Academies of Texas

Our Support for Blended Learning Grant Program Districts

Education Elements has two developed foundational frameworks that we will use to guide our blended learning work with BLGP districts and schools. We will use these frameworks as a starting point, but will adapt and evolve them to ensure our approach aligns with your district’s specific context and vision for blended learning. Using these frameworks, we help districts to design for rigor, collaboration, equity, and choice

Our blended learning implementation framework helps your school and district teams focus on the 25 key elements they need to develop in order to launch, sustain, and scale blended learning. Read more in our framework white paper.

Our core four of blended learning provides the “how” teachers often ask for when seeking the best way to implement high- quality blended learning. Read more in our core four white paper.

Blended Learning Implementation Framework

Core Four Elements of Blended Learning

We will guide your team through four phases of work to ensure that you meet the BLPG fidelity of planning grant requirements and that your work provides the foundation for scaling and sustaining blended learning.

methodology

Based on our successful BLPG partnerships with almost 20 grantees over the past three years, we have created a recommended Planning Grant Package that provides the support you need to inspire change, prepare teachers to launch blended learning, and create district strategy that supports long-term success and meets TEA reporting requirements. When we connect 1:1 with you, we will confirm your specific needs and goals and adjust this package as appropriate to ensure it is customized to your specific context.

Ways Education Elements Can Support You

Readiness Assessment: What are our school’s current strengths and need areas for implementing blended learning?

We will engage in empathy work including surveys, focus groups, and virtual learning walks to include the voices of key stakeholders and collect data for teachers and leaders to design and prototype for. This step helps our partners understand where schools are as a starting point for blended learning and the impact we are hoping to achieve.

District Strategy: What is our vision for blended learning? What are our design expectations for schools? How will we train and support teachers and students?

We help you develop a District Blended Learning Council and lead them through a series of four strategy sessions to make decisions across schools and classrooms. This creates a coherent vision and support plan for all teachers. We ensure that there is alignment between what is happening at the school and district level.

Teacher Professional Development: How will we prepare teachers to launch blended learning? What will our instructional models look like? How will we support students in this new model of learning?

We believe the best way to train teachers is by modeling best practices through hands-on workshops. We typically lead a series of five blended learning workshops: Foundations, Design, Prototyping and Reflection using the core four of blended learning, or yours own customized strategies. The planning grant support includes the series of workshops to set a strong foundation for implementation with several iterations of design and prototyping.

Measuring Impact: How will we measure the impact and effectiveness of our blended learning implementation?

We provide surveys and classroom observation tools that can be customized to your schools and districts and are used to help measure the impact and effectiveness of blended learning.

How to Partner with Education Elements

The TEA Blended Learning Planning Grant provides a unique opportunity for you to shift instruction and impact student outcomes in your schools. We know that you have a choice in the technical assistance provider you partner with for the planning grant phase this spring and are honored that you are considering Education Elements as a professional development partner.We look forward to meeting you at the BLGP Summit in November and learning more about your goals and aspirations for blended learning,

Learn more about the work of Education Elements across the country and reach out to Shelby McIntosh for more information.

Supporting Blended Learning in Texas