Littlestown Area SD staff outline curriculum changes, attendance push and expanded assessment training

Littlestown Area School District staff described planned curriculum alignment, new attendance-monitoring steps and teacher training designed to improve student proficiency.

District staff said they are narrowing priority standards so teachers do not spend the first two weeks of the school year reteaching prior-grade material and can instead teach grade-level content. "We shouldn't need to spend, like, 10 or 15 days reviewing curriculum at the beginning of the year," the staff member said, adding that priority standards and eligible content have been identified at each grade and building level.

The move is tied to assessment and instruction concerns. Staff said vocabulary gaps are driving poor performance on some assessments — students who don't know terms such as "expression" or "equation" miss items even if they understand the underlying concepts — and that the district is emphasizing explicit instruction in academic vocabulary.

Staff described steps to identify chronically absent students earlier using an early-warning system and by monitoring tardies and seasonal spikes in absenteeism. They said internal attendance reports show daily attendance around 93% to 94%, but that the state-calculated attendance figure is "in the 80s," a difference staff attributed to the state's calculation method.

To encourage attendance, staff proposed monthly attendance reports for students with chronic absenteeism, regular family check-ins by phone or email and schoolwide recognition or competitions tied to attendance and growth metrics. The district already uses Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS) at two buildings, staff said.

On assessments, the district said it is sending teachers from each grade band to training on writing and scoring open-ended constructed-response items, which staff said account for roughly 36% of PSSA scores. A staff member summarized advice shared by a state presenter: have students write responses on paper first, then type them when testing online, to preserve the thinking process and improve scores.

Staff also reported continued work with the iReady diagnostic and its vendor support team. "They'll hop on a call. They'll explain data. They'll show me where it's in reports," the staff member said, noting vendor assistance with data-driven instruction and in-program instructional tools.

The presenter said the district is exploring an articulation agreement with Harrisburg University to expand math and science course offerings and noted approval earlier in the year of two new courses related to geography and English language arts career exploration.

The update closed with staff saying the district has "work to do," highlighting progress in some areas but stressing continued focus on attendance, explicit instruction, curriculum alignment and assessment practice.