The Hop, Skip, Leapfrog project is the result of a four-month research study conducted by the TLA team to identify and codify new strategies that emerged during the pandemic. Developed through interviews with system leaders and experts across the country, the project also seeks to make sense of lessons we can learn about sustaining and scaling new work, building greater resiliency and equity, over time. We hope to help leaders and educators harness the opportunities that emerged during the pandemic to advance more personalized, mastery-focused, and whole-child-developing approaches to ensure equitable, effective, and engaging learning for every child.

• Hop, Skip, Leapfrog
• Hops, Skips, and Leaps in Practice
• Shifting Conditions
• Take It Further in Your Context
• Launching Forward: Launching Forward: Leveraging Pandemic Innovations to Advance School Systems
• Leadership Podcast: What Will We Take With Us?
• What Has Emerged: Introducing the Hop, Skip, Leapfrog Project

The COVID-19 pandemic and its associated school closures accelerated the increases in what some researchers described as “learning loss,” or gaps in knowledge and performance. In contrast, TLA chose to take an asset-based approach to measuring student learning – identifying areas of progress and the associated enabling systems and structures – rather than a deficit stance that focuses primarily on gaps or loss. Through extensive research partnerships with districts, TLA has developed guidance and resources for school and system leaders who seek to extend this work. Explore the reports and insights on “unfinished learning” below to discover how the TLA Research & Measurement team has partnered with districts to pinpoint bright spots in student learning to help districts identify and scale promising practices.

• System Conditions and Strategies to Support Accelerated Learning (Strategy Memo)
• Learning Found, Not Lost: Examining Learner Growth and Supports in LUSD During and Beyond the COVID-19 Crisis (Executive Summary)
• Learning Found, Not Lost: Examining Learner Growth and Supports in LUSD During and Beyond the COVID-19 Crisis (Report)
• Helping Each Learner in the Here and Now: Strategies for Addressing Unfinished Learning (Literature Review)
• Measuring Unfinished Learning: A Guide for Schools and Systems to Understand and Measure Student Progress (Insight)
• Unfinished Learning: Measuring and Supporting Student Progress (Problems of Practice)

All education leaders interested in scaling innovation face choices about how to lead system change in a way that maximizes benefits to teachers and students.

The Learning Accelerator has developed a new framework to help leaders understand and navigate through these types of competing approaches. The framework offers insight into the logic supporting the different choices leaders might make as well as actionable examples of the strategies districts use to enact them. Based on interviews with 35 district and CMO leaders across the country, as well as a national survey of nearly 100 other education leaders, “Look Both Ways” highlights seven common decision-making challenges and presents real-world examples that show how other leaders managed these tensions.

• Look Both Ways: A framework to help education leaders navigate through competing approaches to system-wide change
• Problems of Practice: Leadership Design Choices
• Looking Both Ways to Manage the Change (facilitation deck)

Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, digital equity was a notable obstacle inside and outside of the classroom. Many students across the United States have relied on their schools for access to the Internet, but when they head home, they do not always have the same level of connectivity or device availability. While many communities and organizations have worked to take innovative measures to address the connectivity gap (through community partnerships, the creation of mobile hotspots, and other creative approaches), difficulties persist.

Despite these challenges, leaders and educators can take steps to better serve all students. Identifying challenges to access, securing important resources, and creating intentional assignments that are universally accessible to students can help school systems bridge the divide. Explore the resources below on digital equity to learn more.

• Digital Equity Guide
• From Digital Access to Digital Equity: Critical Challenges that Leaders and Policymakers Must Address to Move Beyond “Boxes & Wires” (Report)
• Strategies for Tackling Digital Equity
• Universal Design for Learning as a Framework for Digital Equity
• Tackling Digital Equity in the Classroom – Strategies for Teachers
• Artificial Intelligence – The New Digital Divide?
• Artificial Intelligence K-12: A New Report and Resource from CoSN (Podcast)
• Meeting the Needs of ALL Students – Addressing the Challenges of Digital Equity (Webinar)

TLA has learned through its work with pioneering educators that leading and sustaining data-driven, personalized approaches to teaching and learning requires coherent, system-wide shifts in strategy and practice. There is no single correct pathway nor timeline for building readiness or action given the different contexts and assets that exist across a school system.

Despite differences, we have found there are common implementation components — “conditions for scale”— that support planning, adoption, and scaling of innovative initiatives. Leaders seeking to implement and scale work in classrooms must align critical supports, systems, and structures, as well as ongoing processes to establish, improve, and scale work over time. TLA’s Innovative Learning Implementation Framework outlines these common conditions components.

There is no one “right” way to use this tool, but we suggest that teams can use it to:

• Develop shared language across critical system and school actors;
• Identify and communicate across these different actors the necessary conditions for change, including often overlooked non-instructional areas;
• Assess current capacity and organize cross-departmental work ahead; and,
• Monitor and reflect on progress and sticking points.

This framework was developed based on TLA’s experience in the field as well as deep research and review of the great work of other organizations nationally.

• Innovative Learning Implementation Framework

TLA has joined forces as a research partner to Lindsay Unified School District (LUSD) in its efforts to develop personalized, competency-based professional learning pathways for its facilitators (i.e., teachers). Through this work, LUSD is seeking to cultivate the same mindset in educators that it spent the past decade fostering in students — that we are all learners — and therefore professional growth for facilitators should be targeted, personalized, and data-driven. LUSD is investigating several strategies centered on instructional practices aligned to its student-centered framework for personalized learning to make this vision a reality.

We explored the link between various professional learning approaches and changes in student experience and achievement. Find links to results from all five years of the grant, below.

• Personalizing Learning for Educators: Measuring What Works (research reports)
• Teacher and School Leader Grant: Impact At-A-Glance
• TLA Blog: Looking Back and Looking Forward: Lessons from Lindsay Unified School District
• TLA Blog: LUSD Personalizes Learning for Educators
• Getting Smart: Defining and Measuring the ‘Personal’ in Personalized Learning
• What Are Instructional Look Fors? (video)
• Instructional Look Fors Research at Lindsay Unified School District (video)
• Instructional Look Fors Guide (website)
• Getting Smart: 5 Research-Based Recommendations for Remote Learning: Lessons from LUSD
• Measuring Personalized Professional Learning: A Three-Year Study of What Works Best, For Whom, Under What Conditions, and Why (webinar)
• Setting up a Residency Program: The What, Where, and How to Make it Work for Your System (report)

Educators — and the coaches and administrators who support them — are increasingly looking for online professional learning that is differentiated to their unique needs and offers the ability to learn when and where they want. But what makes for a quality online learning experience?

TLA, in partnership with EdSurge, conducted a comprehensive review of the scientific literature on adult learning and uncovered six key drivers that make for quality online learning for practitioners. We interviewed platform providers to explore how these drivers are built into the products and had conversations with platform users to understand how they navigate the learning experience. We also developed vignettes to get a glimpse of these drivers in action.

• Are GIFs the Secret Sauce to Working and Learning Remotely? (introductory blog)
• In the Driver’s Seat: Online Professional Learning Design Features in Action (website)
• Research-Based, Online Learning for Teachers (literature review, PDF), accessible version
• District Tool for Assessing Online Professional Learning Platforms (spreadsheet)

Access to high-quality, rigorous instructional materials is a critical resource for educators. TLA has been working to understand how open educational resources (OER), free- to low-cost modifiable materials, can be used to support personalized and innovative instruction to meet the needs of each student. This research is ongoing; the resources below summarize key learnings and offer guidance for educator implementation.

• Research Findings: Open Educational Resources for Personalized and Innovative Teaching and Learning Models
• Problems of Practice: Open Educational Resources
• Open Educational Resources: An Urgent Priority – An OER Blog Series

Educational technology (edtech) in schools can be a critical tool in advancing equity. But digital equity is not just about students and staff having access to devices and tools. How these tools are selected, used, and assessed to measure impact matters. Edtech — when purposefully selected and applied — can make rigorous and relevant instruction more accessible and engaging for all students, particularly those traditionally underserved. Teachers can leverage edtech to provide differentiated scaffolds for students, create multiple pathways for students to demonstrate their learning, and design learning experiences that connect to real-world applications.

School systems need strong processes that center equity when selecting, implementing, and evaluating edtech. TLA partnered with Massachusetts’ Department of Elementary and Secondary Education’s Office of Educational Technology (OET) to support their work to produce the Edtech Systems Guide: Equity-Driven Selection, Implementation, and Evaluation. The guide includes examples of processes from schools across the country, concrete steps for school systems to follow, a throughline example, and an accompanying workbook. Additionally, the guide centers equity with equity pauses throughout that provide school leaders questions to consider as they strengthen their edtech processes as well as special consideration callouts with opportunities to tailor processes to a school or system’s context (e.g., size of school system). The guide intentionally approaches the cycle of edtech selection, implementation, and evaluation broadly to make it applicable across a diverse range of contexts.

TLA continued its partnership with OET by running a cohort of Massachusetts school systems, using the guide to strengthen their edtech processes in a way that centers equity. Through facilitating this networked learning experience, TLA produced case stories to capture the learning from this cohort for other schools and districts.

Find links to the guide, case stories, and articles about work TLA has done to accelerate edtech equitably below.

• Edtech Systems Guide: Equity-Driven Selection, Implementation, and Evaluation (Guide)
• Collecting Student Feedback on Edtech Tools (Case Story)
• Gathering Family Feedback on Edtech Usage (Case Story)
• Conducting an Edtech Inventory (Case Story)
• Evaluating Edtech Tools (Case Story)
• Creating Capacity Using Asynchronous Edtech Supports (Case Story)
• Capturing Teachers’ Thoughts on Technology Usage (Case Story)
• Empowering Teachers to Pilot Edtech Tools (Case Story)
• Engaging English Language Learning Families to Strengthen Implementation (Case Story)
  
• Surveying Teachers to Identify Professional Learning Needs (Case Story)
• Asynchronous Learning Modules for Educators (Case Story)
• Edutopia: 3 Steps to Improve Edtech Implementation (Article)
• Digital Promise: How We Can Reframe Edtech Selection to Promote Equity (Article)
• Digital Promise: Three Questions to Center Equity in Your Edtech Procurement (Article)
• Digital Promise: Putting Guidance to Work: Lessons from the Massachusetts Edtech Peer Learning Cohort (Article)

Resources and Guidance is TLA's main resource collection site. Educators and education leaders can discover free, action-oriented strategies create teaching and learning where every child reaches their full and unique potential. Discover how to:

• Adopt specific teaching practices at the student level.
• Create the conditions for success and scale at the school system level.
• Build human capacity and support the people who are doing the work.
• Measure progress.

Educators can also find expert Insights, Guides, solutions to specific Problems of Practice, and professional learning playlists that connect to a wider world of blended and personalized learning resources.

• TLA Resources and Guidance

Looking for answers to specific problems? TLA's Problem of Practice guides offer concrete ways to address common challenges to innovative learning that we have discovered through our research and networks. Each collection details a specific problem of practice, why it is important, what the research says, and offers actionable solutions, resources, and real-world examples of how others have succeeded. New topics and guides are added regularly and current guides include:

• Station Rotation
• Supporting Students with Learning Disabilities
• Leadership Design Choices
• Research Primer
• Open Educational Resources
• Teacher Onboarding
• Data-Driven Instruction
• Supporting Students who are Learning English
• Strategies for Virtual, Remote, and Hybrid Learning

TLA teamed up with Google for Education to develop an implementation guide and supporting resources to help teachers and school leaders understand and enact Google for Education's four key, research-backed learning principles for improving education:

• Personalized & Measurable: Adapts for each unique learner to meet them where they are
• Project-based & Self-managed: Champions learners taking active ownership of their learning
• Collaborative & Diverse: Forms meaningful connections to spark new and different thinking
• Authentic & Experiential: Applies knowledge plus experience to explore and create a world beyond Googleable questions

TLA and the Google team worked alongside educators who are pioneering the practical implementation of these principles with Google tools in the field and we have made this robust and actionable set of resources available for use across the globe.

• Driving Instructional Change with Google Tools: A Guide for Schools & Districts (website)
• Driving Instructional Change with Google Tools (slide deck)

The Parabola Project is an initiative that aims to rapidly develop free and open evidence-informed tools to help school and system leaders identify options for school reopening during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Parabola Project draws on expertise from both the education and health communities with the goal of minimizing health risks to students, staff, and teachers, while maximizing learning for all students.

• Parabola Project
• School Reopening Readiness Guide
• Ariadne Labs and The Learning Accelerator Launch the Parabola Project to Help Schools Minimize COVID-19 Health Risks While Maximizing Learning

The K-12 learning landscape in the United States has shifted dramatically since March 2020. Educators have mobilized for remote learning, with remarkable efforts. The learning curve has also been steep. TLA is committed to offering educators high-quality, implementable guidance based on where they are and where they need to go next in response to the COVID-19 crisis. Our developing work and resources are designed with resilience in mind to help districts ensure personalized, mastery-based learning can happen anywhere, anytime.

• How can blended learning work in a remote setting?
• Driving Quality in Remote Learning: A framework for research-informed remote experiences for K-12 leaders
  
• Problems of Practice: Implementing Quality Remote Learning
  
• Problems of Practice: Strategies for Remote and Hybrid Learning Contexts
• Leader Power Moves for Remote Learning
• Remote Learning Training Modules for Staff
• Prioritizing Human Connection When Social Distancing Is the New Norm
• What will we do when everyone comes back to school? Five steps toward developing resilient education systems

Advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) within organizations requires a steadfast commitment to ongoing dialogue, learning from missteps, and changing hearts and minds. As workplaces (including those of many education organizations) increasingly adopt and embrace virtual work, it is critical for leaders to consider how remote work dynamics affect DEI across their internal culture and external work.

Yet, this work can be daunting for many remote organizations. Much existing guidance around the intersection of DEI and work focuses on traditional, in-person workplaces, and resources that might exist do so behind paywalls or through costly consulting services, out of reach for small businesses and nonprofits in need of support. There are organizations tackling this issue, but much like the innovation efforts underway to improve teaching and learning in schools, their work is happening in isolation. The field needs open knowledge and communities to do remote DEI well.

To tackle this challenge, TLA launched the Remote DEI Collective (RDC), a research and development community of practitioners aiming to advance DEI specifically within remote environments. Starting with a group of seven virtual, nonprofit and for-profit education organizations in 2019 and growing to 12 member organizations in 2021 alongside a partnership with Promise54, the community is building and openly sharing practices for the field; the Remote DEI Toolkit launched in Spring 2020 to showcase actionable insights, strategies, and resources for remote organizations.

Our partners include:

• 2Revolutions, a fully virtual education design lab that uses the design process to help school communities develop and implement solutions.
• Deans for Impact, a partially virtual nonprofit that works to ensure every child is taught by a well-prepared teacher.
• EdTec, a partially virtual social enterprise committed to improving public education by supporting charter schools with business, operations, and performance services.
• Gradient Learning, a fully virtual nonprofit that creates technology solutions to meet the holistic needs of every child while fostering success for all.
• Highlander Institute, a partially virtual nonprofit that partners with communities to imagine and create more equitable, relevant, and effective schools.
• Illustrative Mathematics, a fully virtual nonprofit committed to creating a world where learners know, use, and enjoy mathematics.
• Next Generation Learning Challenges, a fully virtual nonprofit supporting the educators who are reimagining public education.
• The Leadership Academy, a partially virtual nonprofit that supports and develops school and system leaders to lead equitable schools.
• PowerMyLearning, a fully virtual nonprofit that activates the power of collaboration between teachers, students, and families.
• Transcend, a fully virtual nonprofit that supports communities to create and spread extraordinary, equitable learning environments.
• Transforming Education, a fully virtual nonprofit that partners with school systems to support educators and leaders in fostering whole-child development.
• Promise54 (DEI expert partner), a fully virtual consulting organization that helps adults thrive so that they can do their best work.