Type in what the teacher said and what the child said. In about fifteen seconds the Episode Detector tells you whether it was an instructional episode, which ISA growth strand it belongs to, and which ISA indicator it shows. It quotes the transcript back for every call it makes, so you can disagree with it.
Try it now, no sign upYou are standing in the doorway of a four year old classroom. A teacher and a child are going back and forth about a worm. It lasts a while, it is warm, everybody is engaged, and you walk away not quite sure whether what you watched counts as a high quality instructional exchange.
Or maybe you are clear on the quality, and you are still not sure whether the interaction showed growth in the child's language, thinking, or understanding. You have a clean transcript in your hand and you are not one hundred percent sure what your feedback to the teacher should be.
An hour later you are in a meeting with your manager and you show her the same transcript. Her read on the quality of the interaction is different from yours. Neither of you is one hundred percent sure, and there is no way to know whose read is more accurate.
Classrooms that score 5, 6, and 7 on CLASS Instructional Support have one thing that is distinct from classrooms that score in the 2 to 4 range. It is the frequency, intensity, and richness of instructional episodes. An instructional episode is a sustained, back and forth exchange between a teacher and a child where the child's language, thinking, or understanding visibly changes by the end.
The Episode Detector applies that definition the same way every time. Two people, same transcript, same answer.
If CLASS is the language you think in. In ISA, CLASS Language Modeling is most aligned to the Language Growth strand. CLASS Concept Development is most aligned to Thinking Growth. CLASS Quality of Feedback is most aligned to Understanding Growth. When you put a transcript of an interaction between an adult and a child into the Episode Detector, it tells you whether that interaction is an episode, it names the ISA indicator, and it names the CLASS dimension that indicator is most aligned to, so you can start from what you already know.
After a teacher plans an episode, the teacher can type the planned episode into the Episode Detector. The Episode Detector confirms whether the planned interaction is an episode, or tells the teacher that it is not. It also gives feedback on what to change so the planned interaction becomes an episode.
After a ten minute walkthrough, the leader can type the transcript of what the teacher and the child said into the Episode Detector. The Episode Detector confirms whether the interaction is an episode, or tells the leader that it is not. It also names the ISA indicator and gives feedback the leader can bring straight into the coaching conversation.
When a teacher has a back and forth with a child that nobody planned, the teacher can type that interaction into the Episode Detector afterward. The Episode Detector confirms whether the interaction is an episode, or tells the teacher that it is not. The Episode Detector also names the ISA indicator the interaction came closest to, and gives the teacher two or three specific moves that can strengthen the interaction and possibly make it an episode.
The Episode Detector is a thought partner, not a scorer. It is almost always right when an interaction is clearly an episode or clearly not one. The close calls are where your own judgment matters, and disagreeing with it out loud is one of the most useful things a team can do together. Never use it for evaluation, accountability, or CLASS scoring.
Free access to the Episode Detector runs through December 31, 2026. After that the Episode Detector stays open to anyone who owns an ISA product. Your access code comes in the download.
Six ISA products in the library include it through June 30, 2027, starting at $49. If you are already using the walkthrough tools or the episode planners, your code is sitting in your files right now.
Not the one you are proud of. The one you have been arguing with yourself about all week. That is the one that will tell you something.
Open the Episode Detector