ARKANSAS  COMMUNICATION  BOARD

This website is full of free content designed to help educators understand and implement the Common Core State Standards. It includes practical tools designed to help students and teachers see their hard work deliver results. achievethecore.org was created in the spirit of collaboration. Please steal these tools and share them with others.

The Arkansas Department of Education is pleased to offer many techology-based resources to assist educators. This document contains links that are live, meaning that you can click on them and they will take you directly to the resource/site.

The Response-to-Instruction and Intervention (RtI2) process is used when students are underachieving, unsuccessful, or unresponsive in the classroom—academically and/or relative to their social, emotional, or behavioral functioning.  Grounded in the state’s Closing the Achievement Gap (CTAG) initiative, this Model Implementation Guidebook provides a step-by-step RtI2 implementation approach that is practical, field-tested, effective, and student-centered.  Organized along a prevention to intensive need continuum, it includes sample forms and problem solving tools to support implementation. Two primary components included in the guidebook are: (a) a process for data-based functional assessment to determine why a student is not responding to effective instruction and classroom management; and (b) a teaming process that involves a multi-tiered Problem Solving, Consultation, and Intervention service delivery approach. 

The primary goal of the Arkansas State Personnel Development Grant is to work with schools, districts, communities, and regional partners to maximize all students’ academic and social, emotional, and behavioral skills and success, including students with disabilities.  This is done through professional development and technical assistance in the areas of:  (a) Leadership; (b) Literacy and Math instruction and intervention; (c) School-wide Positive Behavior Support Systems, social skills/self-management instruction, and strategic or intensive cognitive-behavioral interventions, (d) Closing the Achievement Gap (CTAG), multi-tiered Response-to-Instruction and Intervention (RtI) and Data-based Problem Solving; (e) Parent and Community Involvement and Outreach; and (f) Personnel preparation, and special education teacher Recruitment and Retention.

This collection of files is the documents and forms that have been created and used during the pilot year (2013-2014) and initial year (2014-2015) of implementation of the Arkansas Teacher Evaluation System, Teacher Excellence and Support System (TESS), and the Leader Evaluation System, Leader Excellence and Development System (LEADS).  During the statewide pilot, educators used paper and electronic copies for training and evaluation forms. During the initial implementation year, educators are using an online data management platform, BloomBoard.  For easy access, the table of contents has been created in user-friendly language. Please note that the title of the file listed in the Table of Contents may not be the title on the document. In addition, all files have been bookmarked in this publication. Once opened in Adobe Reader, clicking on the ribbon in the left-hand icon menu will open links to every file included.  For all those times when a hard copy will serve to enhance or promote effective implementation of instruction for Arkansas students, these documents are provided in this format.

This website provides access to all ADE Education Commissioner's Memos, including those generated by the Special Education Unit.

The strategic plan, videos, documents, and resources will be updated as needed. Please note the posting/revision date for the most current information.

This translated and linguistically augmented version establishes a guide for equitable assessment and curriculum development, resulting in high levels of biliteracy.   The Spanish Language version of the Common Core State Standards recognize biliteracy as a precious personal and national resource that should be encouraged and nurtured as students achieve their highest potential towards college and career readiness in the 21st Century.    

This graphic illustrates the sequence and timeline for providing special education services in Arkansas.

The Glossary of Education Reform was created to help journalists, parents, and community members—anyone with an interest or investment in our public schools—understand some of the major reform concepts being discussed by educators, researchers, and policy makers.  It describes widely used school-improvement terms, concepts, and strategies. It currently features more than 500 terms and 150 in-depth entries on K–12 public education and education reform in the United States. Each entry includes a general definition of the term, a discussion about how the concept or strategy intersects with efforts to improve school performance or student achievement, and an overview of related debates, including the major arguments for or against particular reforms. The glossary is designed to be a neutral observer, and the writers and editors worked to create entries that are factual, objective, and impartial.

The National Center and State Collaborative (NCSC) is a project led by five centers and 24 states (13 core states and 11 Tier II states) to build an alternate assessment based on alternate achievement standards (AA-AAS) for students with the most significant cognitive disabilities. The goal of the NCSC project is to ensure that students with the most significant cognitive disabilities achieve increasingly higher academic outcomes and leave high school ready for post-secondary options.

The Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) is a group of states working together to develop a set of assessments that measure whether students are on track to be successful in college and their careers. These high quality, computer-based K–12 assessments in Mathematics and English Language Arts/Literacy give teachers, schools, students, and parents better information whether students are on track in their learning and for success after high school, and tools to help teachers customize learning to meet student needs. The PARCC assessments will be ready for states to administer during the 2014-15 school year.

Developed by the PARCC states, the second edition of the PARCC Accessibility Features and Accommodations Manual is a comprehensive policy document that provides guidance to districts and decision-making teams to ensure that the PARCC Mid-Year, Performance-Based, and End-of-Year Assessments provide valid results for all participating students.  Click here to view/download this document.

Response to Intervention (RTI) is a multi-component, general education model, designed to identify students who may be at risk for learning or behavior challenges, offer support, and monitor progress.

IEPs developed on or after April 1, 2013 are required to be in standards-based format. Prior to that date districts had the option of using the new standards-based forms when developing IEPs to be implemented after the deadline.  State-level guidance includes standards-based IEP forms, Q&A, training materials and more.

The Arkansas Department of Education (ADE) supports the Center on Instruction definition of Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) education as, "an interdisciplinary approach to learning where rigorous academic concepts are coupled with real-world lessons as students apply science, technology, engineering, and mathematics in contexts that make connections between school, community, work, and the global enterprise enabling the development of STEM literacy and with the ability to compete in the new economy."

ADE, in partnership with Teacher Created Materials and AETN and ArkansasIDEAS, has developed an evidence-based classroom STEM education resource program to support educators in K-12 classrooms. These resources specifically focus on classroom-level instructional strategies, materials, and assessments. This program will directly assist teachers in learning practical, standards-based strategies that support the seven STEM Foundations.

Each STEM foundation provides a full-length, studio session video that includes selections from the educator's classroom footage. There is also the option to view each classroom lesson in its entirety. The associated materials needed to carry out the lessons, including detailed lesson plans, have also been provided for download.