Welcome to the
Dr. Bernard Harris, Sr. Elementary
School # 250
Instructional Web Site

Baltimore City Public School System
1400 North Caroline Street
Baltimore, MD 21213
Telephone: 410.396.1452 - Fax: 410.396.3019

Message:

CORE Team:

Janie Ahmed

Tanya Clark

Mae Williams

Janet Smith

Barbara Johnson

Dear Colleagues:

Welcome to the instructional web site of Dr. Bernard Harris, Sr. Elementary School -- where we "Strive Not to Equal, But to Excel." Our CORE Team of teachers has developed several performance tasks that will maximize academic achievement. Please feel free to adopt or adapt our performance tasks to meet your needs. We welcome your feedback as you incorporate the tasks within your instructional program.

Sincerely,

Lucretia Coates
Principal

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Mission: "Strive Not to Equal, But to Excel"

The mission of Dr. Bernard Harris, Sr. Elementary School is to:

Set high standards and accountability for learning;
Facilitate and implement an instructional program that maximizes student achievement;
Create a positive school culture that is conducive to learning;
Comprehensively engage parents and community in support of the school's goals; and
Provide a staff who are reflective facilitators of learning

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Action:

Who do we serve and where? We are a Schoolwide Model Title I School that serves approximately 470 students in pre-kindergarten through grade five. This includes approximately 70 students who receive special education services. We are located at 1400 North Caroline Street in Baltimore, Maryland.

Who delivers our services? Our prekindergarten program is supported by two teachers and our kindergarten program by one full-day teacher and one half- day teacher while fifteen classroom teachers provide the academic program for grades 1-5. A half-time Art Teacher joined the staff in the 1999-2000 school year. Special education services are delivered by three self-contained special educators, one special education resource teacher, and one full-time speech/language teacher. Instructional support is provided by a Master Teacher, two Supplemental Teachers, one Consulting Teacher, and one Instructional Support Teacher. Seven paraeducators provide computer lab services and reinforce classroom instruction. Eighty percent of our "seasoned" teachers have more than 10 years teaching experience. A full time librarian provides service to the students and staff. And psychological and social work services are provided by a part-time psychologist and social worker.

What do we deliver to our students? We deliver to all of our students the Baltimore City Public School System Elementary Curriculum and Maryland content standards for reading, writing, language usage, mathematics, science, and social studies. Results of our students' performance on MSPAP assessments have shown improvements in writing, language usage, mathematics, science, and social studies. In 1998-99 we implemented the Open Court (Grades Kindergarten - 2) and Invitations to Literacy (Houghton-Mifflin, Grades 3 - 5) Reading Programs. Both of these programs are continuing in the 1999-2000 school year. Teachers use cross-grade grouping for Language Arts to maximize instruction. One of our Pre-K classes links with the neighboring Head Start Program, providing a full day Pre-K experience for these students. In addition, one citywide program, the Early Learning Environment (ELE) provides a developmental language curriculum to 3-5 year old students with language learning disabilities. This class has teamed with one of the regular Pre-K classes to form an inclusion model -- The Together At Four Program. We will continue to implement the new Baltimore City Public School System Mathematics Program. Our extended day program helps to reinforce classroom instruction.

How do we involve parents? Click here to see our Parent Report Card.

What are our school improvement priorities? Our goals for school improvement reflect our priorities for reaching high national, state, and local standards. They include:

Improving student performance on the knowledge, skills, and processes expected in reading, writing, language usage, mathematics, science, and social studies;
Improving student performance on basic skills in reading, writing, and mathematics;
Increasing student attendance rates;
Increasing parent and community involvement in the education of our students;
Increasing student and parent satisfaction with our overall school climate.

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Performance Tasks:

We are part of the Baltimore City Public School System 1999-2000 Title I Staff Development Program "Improving Student Achievement Through Quality Teaching." The program offers 75 teachers and 15 administrators from 15 Title I schools monthly opportunities to plan, teach, check, and act on the results of performance-based lessons and assessments conducted in their schools. The program will help us to improve student performance on both basic skills tests and Maryland School Performance Assessment Program performance assessments. Participating teachers are using interactive software -- TaskBuilder™ -- to develop performance instruction and assessment tasks for basic skills, academic excellence, and real world applications. TaskBuilder helps teachers to develop engaging lessons for basic skills, higher order thinking skills and content standards, and integrated curricula. It helps teachers to develop performance instruction and assessment tasks supported by technology which, in turn, help students to prepare for classroom, state, and national selected response and constructed response assessments. Each task represents growth from our current levels of school performance to our vision of high performance on basic skills, rigorous content, and higher order thinking skills. Please consider them as "works in progress" and adopt or adapt them to your classroom. And please send us your comments for making our tasks better.

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A Sample of our Performance Tasks

Grade K

Performance Instruction Tasks