Knowledge enables Success

Having settled into my new classroom and gained an understanding of my children I have noticed that there are two large areas of need that require focus.  These are their maths knowledge and their writing - a large number of students are working below and well below the standard.  I have been thinking carefully about how I can address both of these and which one of these is most pressing to address.  

I have completed a mini inquiry around developing maths knowledge during the time when we are doing statistics.  In order to develop my own professional knowledge around this I have read the following research amongst others: 

Using music to increase maths retention

Maths Teaching Knowledge

Making it count - strategies for improving mathematics

As a result of this mini inquiry my knowledge sessions are now varied for the students and include a range of interactive websites that offer explanations, teaching hot spots around certain knowledge areas, interactive games for students, games that students are able to share in with a partner, the development of sheets that allow students to see where their knowledge gaps are and to choose how these can be filled using a variety of different texts and materials and the opportunity for students to use songs and music to help them retain their knowledge.  This seems to have worked so far and is proving successful.  Within the last week of term I will retest these students using summative assessments and be able to use evidence to confirm my observations and formative assessments.

The inquiry that I have decided needs to be largest focus is around writing and develop within these students knowledge around where they are at and knowledge around what tools that they can use to help them progress and achieve their ultimate end goal of working at/above the standard by the end of the year so that they are ready for high school.  Within my class I have students working from between a 2a level and a 4b level with the majority of them sitting around a 3b level.  I have decided to focus this inquiry on these students that are classed as sitting well below as they need to make hugely accelerated progress in order to be where they need to be by the end of the year.

Key findings that I have noticed so far from the students who are working well below:

 - Students are not planning their work

 - Students are not confident editing their work

 - Students are not comfortable knowing when to use basic or complex punctuation

 - Students are still developing the ability to recognise grammatical errors

 - Students do not know what they do not know, and therefore are unsure how to improve.

The one that stands out to me the most is that these children do not know what they do not know - they are not aware of how they can improve and they are not aware of what their errors are.  In order to help students with this, they have been provided with requirements that have them working towards the national standard at each sub-level of the curriculum. They have now identified within their sub-levels the goals that they wish to work on and we have co-constructed success criteria for these goals.  The other findings will be discussed and explicitly taught over the next term across a range of contexts so that they can be understood and applied within a range of contexts - however through having developed goals, students are already far more motivated and are already noticing areas in which they can improve and are wanting to learn.

The challenges around student centered learning - and overcoming them

Inquiry, curriculum integration, thematic units - these words were tossed around interchangeably when I first took up my new role at this school nearly nine weeks ago - however throughout this term we have begun to make changes around what our school curriculum looks like and how it is played out in action.  This was due in part, to the leaving of both the previous principal and deputy principal within a short time period.  As a result of this, lots of questioning is happening regarding the terminology that is used and what it actually represents.  Through discussions and readings around inquiry and curriculum integration we have decided that as a school what we are currently doing is a thematic approach to learning, rather than true curriculum integration - and that true inquiry where it is led by the students is something quite rare within our classrooms and something that has not traditionally happened.  This has aligned with the minimal focus that has been placed around student voice and student led learning that is future orientated due to other huge factors that have influenced the staff at the school.  The students that I am working with came to me with quite a fixed mindset about what they could and could not achieve and it has taken eight weeks for them to begin to be at a stage where they are able to talk about their individual goals and their progressions towards these.

As year 7 and year 8 students, I think it is highly important that these students are introduced to, and confident working within, an inquiry style of learning both within the "core"/national standards subjects and all other subjects that make up the New Zealand Curriculum.

In order for me to provide my students with this opportunity I have done research over a wide variety of areas - regarding what inquiry is, best practice for student centered learning in areas such as maths, reading and writing and the benefits and challenges of true student centered learning.  A lot of this has overlapped with reading that I did last year around the POGIL styled programme that I was teaching and so this has been most helpful to make comparisons with.

I know that as these students do not have a student centered learning background it is important for me to give them appropriate tools so that they are able to understand and talk about their learning in order to be able to have more guidance over the direction of it.  An interesting reading that I stumbled across today The Benefits and Challenges of Student-Designed Learning talks about true inquiry learning (within a high school context) and letting students have complete control about the direction that they take with their learning and how they present their learning.  It emphasises that from a student point of view, whilst it was exciting to have control over their learning at first it became difficult when they did not have any guidelines.  It also discusses the importance of students having goals when directing their own learning and how this was helpful to them.

This has helped me to have confidence that I am on the right track with these students and developing them to be students who can work within an inquiry style of learning.  At the moment there is both clear guidelines about what skills and knowledge they need to be developing, they are presented with a range of ways to do this which is helping to allow them freedom over the style of learning that works best for them and they are consistently setting and achieving mini goals whilst working towards their bigger goal which is allowing them to achieve success along the way.

Communication is Key

This year I have set up a new blog for my class.  Again I have done it on weebly, however I have made a new address so that it aligns with the other weebly addresses at my new school.  A further reason that I have kept them separate is that I think it is lovely for students to be able to look back on and reflect on the learning that they did last year, and so I have left that one open for the students to access - which will be especially helpful for the students who are now in BYOD classrooms.

This year in addition to having the normal features of learning, sharing. go to etc I have included my planning on my weebly so that students and parents are able to access it from home.  The amount of positive feedback that I have received from parents regarding this already is astounding.  They have commented both directly to me and to the principal that having the planning their really opens up the conversations that they can have with their 11 or 12 years old about their learning.  In their words, they have gone from receiving a grunt/very minimal reply when asking about their child's day to having a proper conversation regarding the learning rather than the doing.  I have also shared google docs with the students that have all of their upcoming WALTS based on pre-assessment tasks and games/interactive websites that they know they are expected to look at before they see me for these WALTS.  This has been very successful as it is allowing the conversations to be focused on the learning of the day in depth rather than staying at the lower end of Blooms Taxonomy.

Below is the link to my new weebly:

Room 7 Weebly

New School, New Adventure!

The beginning of a new year brings with it a new school year, which is always exciting - however even more so when it also comes with a new school.  The school that I have moved to this year is a complete contrast to the school that I have worked at as a PRT.  Where my last school was a large, urban school - my new school is a full primary country school with only 120 children!  I was, and am, very excited about working in a small school that has such a tight knit community surrounding it but what I was not prepared for was driving to work this morning and having to drive for a kilometre through the middle of cows!  This was the image I was confronted with this morning.

Nevertheless, cows included I have loved my start to the year.  The students that I am working with are very receptive to learning and have the potential to make accelerated progress throughout the year so that they are where they need to be by the end of the year.  

However, with a new class comes a new set of challenges.  With my old class we had defined what learning looked like, sounded like, felt like - they understood the learning pit and that if they struggled it was normal and a key part of reaching success with their learning rather than meaning that they were on the road to failure. With my new class, I am unsure of where they stand in regards to what they have been taught learning looks like, sounds like, and feels like.  This morning I am doing an activity with them where they will do a bus stop activity, brainstorming in groups what great learners do, what active learners do, what previous messages they have received about learning from their teachers and what is important to reach success in their learning.  I am really excited to find this information out from these students as this will form the basis of how our classroom will run over the next few weeks and how our HPE unit on Culture and Community will progress.  I think the following quotes quite nicely state how as a class we are unpacking the year together and all bringing our learning experiences to create our own expectations for each other.

Self and Leader Review - Appraisal Connector

This year as part of the Appraisal process at our school, we have been using Interlead Appraisal System. As teachers we are required to self review our Teaching Practice and then our Team Leader appraises us within the same time deadline. 

We have completed this appraisal once in March and once in September - below are aspects of my reports that I think highlight key aspects of the reports.

March: This is where I self assessed myself against the Registered teacher criteria and Tataiako in March

 The following areas were areas that I felt I needed to put specific work into.
 - Using curriculum knowledge in ways that honour students with different languages and from different backgrounds
 - Using student achievement data as a basis for reflecting on and making modifications to how curriculum is covered and students are engaged.
 - Students knowing the criteria for both summative and formative assessments.
 - Blending Maori culture into planning and teaching programmes.

Based on feedback from my students and leaders I believe that I have had success with the last three of these areas that I chose to work on.  The first areas is one that I am continually working on and adapting my programme to help honour these students.

September:
The September appraisal was slightly different as it made comparisons between both appraisals.  I have uploaded my data from the second appraisal here also. These first two are judging positive behaviour management (this was cut off) and the rest have titles that explain the picture.

I am please with how these appraisals have come out and believe that they do a good job of representing my growth in my journey towards gaining full registration. 

Students... A few of my favourite things

I am sure that we all know the song 'My Favourite Things' from The Sound of Music.  If you are 
unfamiliar with it it goes like this... 

Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens

Bright copper kettles and warm woollen mittens

Brown paper packages tied up with strings

These are a few of my favorite things

Cream colored ponies and crisp apple strudels

Doorbells and sleigh bells and schnitzel with noodles

Wild geese that fly with the moon on their wings

These are a few of my favorite things.

Girls in white dresses with blue satin sashes

Snowflakes that stay on my nose and eyelashes

Silver white winters that melt into springs

These are a few of my favorite things

When the dog bites, when the bee stings

When I'm feeling sad

I simply remember my favorite things

And then I don't feel so bad.

I was walking along the beach in the holidays looking out over the sea and marvelling at how lucky I am to be working in a job where I am able to take holidays in order to rejuvenate and regain my spark back for the following term when I realised that as much as I love the beach and the holidays I only have one more term left with my class before they move onto intermediate and that they truly are my favourite things.  These children are the reason that I became a teacher and they bring joy, laughter and brightness into my life everyday.  I decided to write my own lyrics to favourite things...

Bright eager eyes and a passion for learning

Telling their stories and playing with yearning

Watching young children frolic and swing

These are a few of my favorite things

Duty with kiddies holding my hand

Listening to my students play in the band

Helping my students to grow their own wings

These are a few of my favorite things.

Students in leotards doing forward rolls

Young students singing with all of their souls

Those 'aha' moments that make kids go 'ping'

These are a few of my favorite things

When reports are due, when markings not done,

When I'm feeling sad

I simply remember my favorite things

And then I don't feel quite so bad.

Recently I was talking to a teacher who is trained in high school physical education.  She noted that the amount of work that we have to do as primary teachers is phenomenal compared to what she had to do at her old school and queried how we manage to get through it all.  At the time I just shrugged my shoulders and was not sure how to answer, but when reflecting back on this conversation I realised that I do it because I love the children I work with and I know in the bottom of my heart that if I did anything less than the best I could for them then I would not be worthy of being their teacher.

At the moment that workload is growing even more - we have normal school life, summative assessments needing to be done, reports that are due in and camp that we are needing to prepare for - however students still deserve to see the best of us every single day and not have teachers who are worn out, stressed or tired.  I know that I can be talking to other teachers in the morning and be feeling stressed out about what I have not yet done as the to do list in teaching is never ending, however the second I see my students those feelings of stress dissolve and smiles and laughter fill their place.

Part of what makes working with children so special and so rewarding is finding out what makes them tick and what helps them learn.  This year I have a number of Maori/Pasifika students and so this has influenced the way that my classroom has been run, from our greetings, to commands, to the way that the students are able to work in groups and support each other.

I feel blessed to be working in a job where each day the relationships that I have with my students and their families makes a difference - whether this is due to a child achieving something special and their parent knowing, helping a young child who is hurt on the playground or looks as though they need a smile, encouraging a student who has lost all motivation or cheering a student on as they achieve a goal that they have been persevering with.

Assessment - For and of learning.

With term four comes reports, and with reports comes up to date summative assessments.

As a result, summative assessments have already begun being carried out in my classroom - so far students have all sat an IKAN test and some students have completed running records.  The great thing about summative assessment is it shows visible growth that students have made as they have sat the same standardised test earlier on this year.   It also shows me as a teacher where I need to place more focus and which students continue to/or are starting to need specific help or extension and as a result I am able to make changes to my programme.  I was especially pleased with the IKAN results of my students as it demonstrates that our math warm ups and number knowledge revision games have been effective in helping children to grow and maintain their number recall.  The running record results of the students who have sat it so far have all been positive as all students have moved up a reading level and the students have all made progress in their comprehension also.  The moment that inspired me the most with my running record data however was when a student took the ability to transfer her summative assessment and make it into a formative assessment for herself - she said to me - I know that I need to work on inferencing now - I am going to make that part of my self directed learning programme for the rest of the term.

However, the one thing that frustrates me is about summative assessment is that all students are required to sit the same/similar tests - and this is where assessment for learning becomes a real positive - this is no longer the case with assessment for learning.

Each child is provided with feedback and feed forward based on where they are at and the assessment becomes real for them - it becomes a tool that they can utulise - whether in the form of feedback and feedforward from me as a teacher or whether via self/peer assessment and feedback/feedforward.

When I came back on Monday of term 4 I was unsure how much of the work around success criteria influencing assessment for learning that my students would retain as Term 3 had left them all very tired and they had just had two weeks break.  However, within the first block of learning time I overheard a number of students referring back to their success criteria both individually and to help others achieve their WALTs.  This was a real positive for me as it showed that the work that my students had been doing on having clarity about their learning was transferring through all curriculum areas for all students - making assessment something that they then began to see as something that helped them learn rather than something that was there to judge what they had learnt.