RTC 9 - Diversity

When thinking about diversity in the classroom it is very easy to get caught up with a narrow vision of the cultural diversity when RTC9 actually talks about the "varied strengths, interests and needs of individuals."

With this in mind, what do I do to ensure I meet RTC9?




Here is CS talking about Maths

During Tinkering Time some students talked about the mechanisms we built last year and wanted to make a seesaw.


Also during Tinkering Time some students started using the Jenga blocks as Dominos - the thinking about how to get round a corner and off a bench was amazing!

Joining the dots

After further mentoring from Claire when she shared an epiphany she had with me I can see more clearly what I need to do to support the team on the journey we need to go on together.

• The team need to link the ideas about the practise of Learning Through Play to what they know.
• This discussion led me to create the BPP below as one of the reasons I value LTP so much is that it gives choice. 
• This led me back to the beliefs the II team developed last year - in particular the Interest and Motivation one.
• I need to go back to where they are so we can travel together on this journey - rather than trying to pull them along
• This might mean going back along the same path we took in Kimi Akau with learning stations, rotations, structured groups, use of lanyards

• The team need to be more involved, whilst I can do lots of the thinking I shouldn't be doing all the doing!
• This will also be great for me to develop more leadership skills as to get buy in from everyone I need to have a clear vision (which leads nicely into another blog post on Kaizen 2017!)
• To have a clear vision I am going to have to "Do my own thinking" - a phrase from last years thoughts from Ben (that is on our t-shirts from Christmas!)
• Part of this thinking is going to be around the how of LTP and linking really explicitly to the NZC - levels 1 and 2. This should also give real clarity and purpose which is important for the team.

A note to self - I had these thoughts whilst riding part of the rail trail over the weekend. I had time to think through my ideas and synthesise what it means and the actions I need to take. Need to do more of this!! 

Teaming and Learning Through Play

Claire came to a team meeting when we were discussing LTP and heard the conflict in the team about the traditional curriculum and practices versus LTP which I believe helps develop the whole child.

The meeting was a positive one in that we are all transparent about our views and I am proud of myself for speaking up about a teaching and learning practice that I am beginning to value more and more.

Part of the frustration is about the perception of “Play” - that it is a free for all with no planning or structure. At the moment I’m still unclear on the “best practice” (if there is one!) on the how of LTP but I know the thinking that goes on behind my Tinkering Time plan and I’m trying to make it clear in terms of Why, How and What for each learning area / station.

So what? What can I do?

Slow down for a start, I have to remember that the team have not been on the same journey as I have and that this is an ideal time for me to practise my 3Ps and lead.

Communicate the thinking and planning behind Tinkering Time, to get buy in and understanding from the team, and just as importantly, their ideas.

Do the thinking, then collectively put the plan into action

Have been thinking about other names and one thought I had was to start calling it “Developmentally Appropriate Learning” but then it occurred to me that all learning should be developmentally appropriate!! Back to the drawing board.

Command and Control

Something I said during the professional development we had in January came to mind the other day - Command and control; If we don’t want to be treated like that, why should we expect it of the kids?

This also applies to me trying to lead the team down the LTP path, they need to be involved to see the scope, potential and benefits and so that they feel involved too. We all (humans) respond much better if we are involved in the decisions rather than having them thrust upon us (although at this stage in my teaching career if someone said “xx is a good idea” and sold it to me I would probably run with it to find out for myself!)

This has sparked some deeper thinking over this past weekend - and the development of why I value Learning through Play.

Watch this space!!

My Yellow Side

In a brief chat with Claire about the Maths Whizz cards I suggested that we make a website / blog that teaches students / mentors / families how to use the cards. Each team could create a series of videos and then the learning will become much more powerful!

I then wanted to get started straight away!!

Maths Observation

During my release in week 2 I observed Maths for 15 minutes. My takeouts are;

Where	Observations	Next step
Time Station	Needs explicit teaching	As I want to be free to check in with children I need to flip the learning and record the “lesson” for children to watch
	Children aren’t reading the instructions on the worksheets	As above, make it really clear
	All worksheet based	Put in some games
Star Wars	All seem to be engaged	Great!
	Not actually doing the learning tasks	Needs explicit teaching
	Add  / Sub too hard for Red Squares (although I have said take numbers between 1 and 10!)	Limit the activities and model how to do them
Tote-trays	Lots of time taken to choose a sheet	Limit the choice - give 2 to do
	No-one choosing the games	Need to teach them how to play
General	Folders are good for storing learning but easily lost	Clearly label folders on both sides and label / colour boxes so easily distinguishable

There are also some children who need a lot of support, either learning or behaviour, so my aim is to set something in place for these children.

This was done very quickly but clearly there are things I need to do to enable me to be able to take a step back as an eagle.

Term 3, 2016 Reflection

Going into term 3 I was very apprehensive about the number of students Eve and I would have between us and I was below the line, blaming and thinking dark thoughts! Had a 1 to 1 scheduled with Ben for the end of term which actually happened at the beginning of term 3 which was just as well!

The 2 week break gave me a chance to put things into perspective and bring myself to be back above the line - accepting of the situation and thinking creatively on how to manage things.

One of my biggest concerns was managing NW between the 2 of us and supporting Eve as much as I could. I still feel he needs extra support which we simply can’t give given the fact that there are 53 other children who need us.

Working my way through CL comments was another area of concern - just the sheer numbers, and to start with it was a daunting task - 108 comments to write in 9 weeks! Getting to know what 27 children could do, what their next steps were and how I could best support them was (and still is) a challenge.

Highlights and lowlights from term 3;

• 5 weeks of teaching maths and eagling writing then swapping
• This worked and we are carrying on this term. 5 weeks is a good length of time to start and finish some learning
• Amount of time teaching maths has been great but being an Eagle has been hard - felt like I was pulled in too many directions
• After a chat with Claire we decided to use the environment more wisely so Owling of Maths has moved to the more closed in Theatre and the Eagling is now in one area - the bay and gallery.
• 2 weeks in to term 4 and it is working much better
• As a team we have 2 weeks of teaching reading then 2 weeks of town time
• This also works will as it means you need on put your energy into one thing which should result in a better outcome!
• At concept time Eve and I worked together
• Working with just one other was great
• Our planning wasn’t great though so our outcomes weren’t always clear
• I took over towards the end when I had the “brilliant” idea of role plays to demonstrate understandings and then filming on the green screen (far more work than anticipated!)
• While the structure of reading was great had some high needs (DL) which meant I always felt rushed and under pressure when doing guided reading. I don’t think I did the best I could have for the children.
• Taking this into account for term 4 we are in a much better place as Jill is taking our able readers and so I feel comfortable that their needs are being met
• Have also tried reading a new book every-other day which I am really enjoying as reading can now be fun again as we talk about the story and words and meaning and can have more emphasis on strategies
• At the end of the term there was a frantic rush to JAM the children
• I didn’t get all children done as I ran out of time
• Having talked to Claire since she has pointed out that JAM is just a snapshot in time of what a child can do and will have changed already so to not stress about doing the others!
• Instead I will focus on making sure pebbles are upto date
• CL comments were as hard as I thought they would be! This was partially caused by my desire to including everything in the comment.
• I’ve learnt not to do this, and focus on one highlight!

Something I read over the holidays was a book by Biz Stone one of the founders of Twitter and in it he says that constraints make you more creative. So my (and Eve’s) challenge is to use the constraints we have and be creative in our solutions.

PD with Julia on our Learning Environments

A couple of the key things Julia said;

• Looking at the spaces we work in - 16% impact on learning comes from the space so it’s important we get it right.
• Need to link spaces to a purpose and then explicitly teach this - we did this at the start of the year and then haven’t really gone back to it - i.e. the Gallery was a quiet space, the Newsroom was a space for collaborating etc.
• Need to think about the effectiveness of the space for the children, not for us.
• Universal design of learning to cater for noise and needs
• 3 areas to evaluate
• Sufficiency - enough  “stuff”
• Efficiency - do you have what you need when you need it
• Effectiveness - does the physical environment support and enhance learning
• Learning v Teaching Centres;
• Knowing why, knowing how, knowing how to find out

More Maths thoughts!

Following on from the post I did recently about my beliefs around learning maths Muireann commented that she'd like to unpack the comment I made about worksheets! So I have given this more thought!

Worksheets have a place BUT only if certain things are happening.

That they (the worksheets) are; 

• purposeful - not just used for happy, busy, good (although we might need that at times!)
• checked over - no point asking children to do something unless it is looked at it and the children are given feedback or feedforward
• taught - again, if a child doesn't know what to do with a worksheet they may be re-enforcing bad habits
• linked to goals - so the children know what they are learning and can see the why of it

21st Century Learning Design Workshop

Another great day of thinking what skills our learners need to have to equip them for their futures.

Microsoft did some research and found that there are 6 capabilities that our children need to have in order for them to be successful in the 21st Century.

These are;

Knowledge Construction
which is all about learning knowledge and understandings you can apply later, learning skills to enable you to do new things

Use of ICT for learning 

This overlays knowledge construction - use ICT to construct knowledge and then use the skills developed above, need to analyse, compare and contrast, and then create an ICT product - create for an authentic audience (i.e. an email). Thoughts from the group where that the rubric could be changed so it is less "pass/fail". Overlaps all others but can go back to it. Juniors to share their learning - rubric misses lots of steps as building knowledge hard, but can share successfully using ICT.

Self regulation

This is more about group than self, give time, not just the finished product, more about the learning process and giving the skills to enable success and reflect in the middle to look at the rubric. Peer feedback - teach the skill.

Real World Problem Solving and Innovation

No given solution, use of actual data, authentic - has to matter to them, innovate - must carry out solution or communicate so someone else can. Link to SOLO from identify - what we need to know, what we do know, how can we solve it, what tools are needed to generate, up to apply, imagine and reflect.

Skilled Communication

Multi-modal - using a range of different ways to communicate - from writing to oral, performing etc. Look at the info and the audience and make sure they are related - content and method.

Collaboration is the 6th one and in pairs we had to unpack that a bit more. 

What does collaboration mean to you? 
Interdependent with/on each other (to rely on each other) 
Communication  
Understanding, trust and empathy 
Helping each other getting out of pit- helping solve problems 
Building each others capacity 
Flexible to each others styles / needs 
Questioning 

How will students need to collaborate in the future? 
COMMUNICATION- What , How, Why 
Digitally 
Verbally & orally 
Creatively  
Honestly

Use of Maori in the Habitat

A very proud moment for me - Eve gave me a chocolate fish (real, not virtual) as a thank you for using Maori everyday, whenever I can, in the habitat. Ka pai me!!

Pipeline Leadership

Ben talked to us this week about Pipeline leadership which I found fascinating. Ben quoted someone as saying “if an organisation is well led, it will be effective”. We are a very well led team (just like the ABs) and so our school should be a highly effective one.

Traditionally teachers are in Pipeline 1 – they just have to be concerned about themselves and their role.

Traditionally team leaders are in Pipeline 1 and 2 – where pipeline 2 is all about the team and growing others with a bigger picture lense.

Pipeline 3 is where the APs sit and they are focused on building capacity with the team of adults and Pipeline 4 is the Principal who has to be thinking and planning strategically.

In our environment Pipeline 1 and 2 overlap. As a team member I have to be in Pipeline 2 sometimes, as we all have to hold each other accountable for our actions, we have to grow each other, we work collaboratively so have to have an eye on the bigger picture, and we have to ensure that our teaming BPP is being valued. This isn’t just Muireann’s job, we all need to step up and do this.

I have to say that this is one of the reasons SPS is such a great place to work – the expectations are high and so when we meet those expectations, so is our performance.

Ben also introduced 2 new terms - FAE (Fundamental Attribution Error) and  Naive Realism.

FAE is something that everyone does - we attribute a consequence of an action to that person's personality - we blame them, rather than look at the context of the error and find out why. We need to do more questioning and less "jumping the gun".

Naive Realism is the belief that your view is right and that if only everyone else was as rational as you are then they would understand it too. This struck a chord for me! Thinking about the Herrmann HBDI model where I am predominately blue, this logical and analytical side of me can cloud my judgement when I reach conclusions faster than others or my logic leads me down a path where no-one else is willing to follow.
The great thing about this is that I am aware of this side of me and one goal I have is to slow down . If i'm trying to convince someone of something the burden is on me to explain it better rather than them to "get it".
Naive Realism will stop teams growing, so it is essential that I keep this awareness and question the why.

Linking with the "Slow down" theme here are some quotes Muireann found;

The Environment

As part of the II team’s work we had to read about the environment and the part it plays in learning. This was to help build our belief statement.

One thing that struck me is just how lucky we are at Shotover; we don’t have to be concerned about acoustics, peeling old paint, or any of the dilemmas facing schools who are moving towards teaching an learning in an Innovative Learning Environment without the physical structure to support them. One discussion we had was that the actual building is the “hard” stuff and what goes on inside is the “soft” stuff.

Most of what I took out of the readings is to do with the soft stuff – the environment is far more about people than it is about structure (especially when learning is occurring in buildings like ours).

Core Education White Paper (2016) states that;

So when we think about our space we need to ensure that we consider the social context and the pedagogical one – we need to look closely at our practise and think about the how and where learning occurs – “soft” stuff.

What the paper made me think most about is how we use our spaces, why we do it this way and what can we change to improve our practise and therefore outcomes for our learners. We started the year defining spaces in terms of the kinds of learning that could occur based on noise level – a noisy space we could block off, a creating space that is actually very close to our quiet space (the gallery). The quiet space where direct acts of teaching could occur, a meeting space for the whole habitat, a space for collaboration and another space for quiet reading (or reflection).

The white paper talks about 3 essential zones; reflective/creative, creative/interactive and interactive and I think this could be a good place for us to start looking at our environment and how we can better use the space we have.  However, I do believe that we adapt to needs and are flexible and willing to try using spaces in different ways, so re-thinking this as a team might bring about some great changes that our learners will love.

Whilst the “soft” stuff is paramount I think that elements of our “hard” stuff could be improved with the number one thing being shelving – in order to increase out student’s agency and help their learning, an easily accessible way for them to access the resources they need would be advantageous, and as Ben says “from structure comes freedom” (Ben Witherford 2015).

In another paper by the OECD motivation and the part that the environment plays was highlighted;

• again, giving students agency,
• creating a space that is emotionally positive,
• having space to allow for learning through exploration,
• having learning occur in a social context,
• connecting “formal” learning with learning happening elsewhere
• knowing the why of the learning in the space
• enabling learners to become self-directed

As is mentioned in the media, as we try and re-define education we need to make sure that the learning experiences and the environment in which they occur support the development of the life-long, soft skills that our learners will need.

Double loop inquiry

Whilst preparing to present to the staff about my desired reality and my big steps with regards to my writing inquiry it struck me that I very easily slip into the “tick, done” mentality. Having to look at my writing inquiry was a good sanity check to ensure that I walk the talk – I firmly believe in a cyclical approach to my learning – plan, do, review and repeat, but it is sometimes nice to have closure.

A conversation with Claire about a double looped inquiry that doesn’t stop actually made me realise that I do really build on the learning and so the inquiry loop becomes many layered and almost gathers it’s own momentum. My job is to now build on this momentum so I keep learning and my students keep benefiting.

Roll time reformed

I put together a practice pack for Nate for those times when we're waiting. This worked really and others asked for the same thing so now this is what greets me at roll time;

Finished Desired Realities

Found it quite hard to go back to my realities a week later - learning for me, I should have carried on whilst my thoughts were fresh! Despite this my image is finished as are my 3 Great Steps.

Step 1;
Go on a "Personal Writing Inquiry" I need to learn how to help my learners;

• Asking for internal support from experts
• Make the progressions portable
• Read, read and read!
• Follow my chosen 3 on their writing journey and use the learnings to help all

Step 2;

Be "an Architect of Opportunities";

• Differentiate the learning
• Use the environment
• Be adaptable to needs
• Observe and ask
• Let it go (accept and become more comfortable with adaptations)

Step 3:

Relationships - build, maintain and grow through;

• Respecting all (children, mentors, students)
• Listening and asking
• Getting and giving feedback
• Observing
• Read, read and read!

Current and desired realities

The whole staff PL meeting was all about using our goals from last year and developing our current and desired realities using the Patti Dobrowolski visual goal setting.
As with last year I found it hard to start but Patti's point that by starting to visualise things, you can see more clearly, worked for me. I started writing a list of where I am with regards to my goals and then from that came my metaphor and image.
It's still a work in progress but it links with my FA2 goal about behaviour management, and my growing understanding of whole brain thinking.