Soul Searching

 

 

I love appraisal time as it is pretty much a time of 'Soul Searching'.

This year I have reflected a lot on the way I teach, who I am (as a teacher) and where I want to go.

I haven't answered them all and I am still searching and wondering about a lot of things.

 

What I do know is that last year was a very steep learning curve for me and opened my eyes up to how I saw things. I will admit I am stubborn, passionate and somewhat opinionated. Sometimes this isn't always a great combination. And near the end of last year, I let my ego get the better of me.

 

A recent trip to Wellington along with my professional readings and comments on Twitter made me realise I needed to stop and take a step back in regards to how I was approaching all the changes that were occurring in our school. One of the highlights of the trip was listening to the principal of Amesbury School talking about how new teachers entered their school. Teaching them that it was 'sacred' ground and to tread lightly in regards to their ideas, thoughts and opinions of how they thought the school should be operating. I happened to attend this trip with my principal and at that moment I wanted the ground to swallow me up. Everything she said resonated with me and what I had done wrong!

 

 I let my enthusiasm get the better of me. Now there is nothing wrong with this but I pushed too hard and voiced (loudly) my opinions. As much as I was keen to start changing my pedagogy and take on all the great ideas off Twitter I had to realise that not everyone else was ready. Things take time, and sometimes I am not the right person to be promoting this. Yes, it's wonderful to be trying new things in your own class and feel a sense of success but not everyone sees what you are seeing. I started only looking at myself and my own ideas rather than the vision of the school and what was best for our students.

 

This is the great thing about reflecting on your own learning. You will make mistakes and get it wrong but you can move forward and make changes.

 

Ideas for Term Three

It’s only week 9? I am finding this term has gone incredibly slow. Term two has been interesting. Having taken over the ‘team leader’ role, I feel I have only caught up with everything that I had to do. I am lucky to get half a day a week release time but it does make my week feel very disjointed.

 Last week I spent most of the week assessing reading. This week it is writing and maths so I can complete all the reports due out in week 11. I find it interesting in the first 3 years of schooling we test more than we do in the last 2 years at primary. The crucial years where we want them to develop a love for learning we are constantly testing them over and over again (that no doubt will be another blog for the future).

This is the time where I start reflecting about term 3 and what I want to do. To be honest, I have no idea. My head is full of ideas but reality is I am not sure if any of them will work.

We have another new teacher joining us which means so far every term someone new has joined the school. This is great but does mean re thinking how we group individual students. I know what it is like joining a school half way through so I want the transition to be smooth and somewhat less daunting.

Ideas that are milling in my head are;

·         I want to get away from grouping in maths

·         I want to integrate reading, writing and topic into our morning block. Begin to take small groups rather than whole class teaching.

Problem there is we don’t all take our own homeroom students and whatever we planned would need to flow back into the afternoon without any issues.

·         I want everyone to team teach this term

Only two of us do this as their classroom is big enough to cater for this. Idea would be to do this for writing and maths as some of us are still in single cells.

Do MLE actually raise the academic achievement of students?

Edchatnz is a great Thursday night twitter conversation that is fast paced and really gets you thinking. Last week’s conversation was no different - MLE Modern Learning Environments.

Lately I have distanced myself from this term as since beginning my journey into this area, I have realised how much my opinion and ideas have changed. I have realized and seen that although some schools use the term MLE they still teaching like a single cell classroom just in a bigger space.

I began to question what was really changing. Had we misinterpreted what MLE were supposed to be? Should we have never introduced the ‘bean bag’ catch phrase? Had we run with one idea and forgotten to look at all the other parts of a MLE? Is ‘modern’ the best word to use at all?

A lot of educators have been throwing out the term MLP- Modern Learning Practices. To sum it up teachers are creating a personalised, collaborative and reflective classroom. This is where I am. I teach in a single cell classroom in a school where the buildings are older than me! But I am changing the way I teach and think students should learn. My pedagogy is changing and becoming more in line with what students of today need.

One of the questions raised by the devil’s advocate aka @BeccaSweeney was Do MLE actually raise the academic achievement of students? This is what others thought.

I have been questioning this as a parent and a teacher. To be honest, I don’t think they do. It’s more about the MLP that is happening inside these buildings rather than the building itself. And this can happen in a brand new  building or  a 40 year old prefabs. The only bonus of a MLE is that you can easily fit more than 30 students into a room and it allows for more collaboration among teachers.

I made a hard decision last term to pull my son out of a MLE. I began to realize some MLE schools believed that by letting students move from class to class to be taught by different they were  ‘modern’. Yet they were still streaming their reading, writing and maths groups.  I wrote about this and my own personal battle about how we were trying to develop a more MLP and what I felt wasn’t working. The more I reflected on my own teaching and learning practices with my own class the more I became aware this was not happening in my sons own school. Therefore I made the decision to move him. I realized by putting him into a school that worked more on MLP rather than focused on the MLE his own mindset about school and learning had completely changed. I suddenly had a child who was learning and wanted to learn!

So no, MLE don’t raise the academic achievements of students it is more about the teaching and learning and how inline it is with MLP’s. This is only my own personal experience and I also think a lot also come down to the teacher/ student relationship as well as how dedicated a teacher is to wanting her students to succeed. But then if they’re dedicated, they are probably a teacher who is always reflecting, changing and looking at ways to improve themselves to meet the needs of their students.

This has got me thinking a lot about where I want to head with my journey. So far we still stream for maths and reading. This is something I want to try and change next term but and still unsure how. Mainly because this term we had two new teachers start with us and next term I will have another new teacher starting. I have to think about what is best for my students but also what is best for a teaching coming in half way through the year.

With 112 students and five classrooms where 3 are still single cell it does face me with a lot of challenges. I know where I want to head, but it is the getting there that is causing me headaches!

Part of me still feels I am only halfway there with my MLP’s and I have areas I still need to work on and change.  Where we are focusing more on MLP I can see the benefits. In those areas I can see that students have succeeded and are enjoying their learning. My job now is to work out how to continue and develop my MLP’s so that the whole day is like this.

So simple yet so effective

Term Two started with a change in teacher, change in classrooms and a slight accident. Because of changes that occurred at the end of term two, one of our team members moved up to the senior school therefore we employed a new teacher. This meant that we had to switch two classrooms around (and teachers) to support the changes we had made. Then our team leader had a slight accident that (at the moment) will see her out for four weeks.

So it has been a busy two weeks for me!

When I last posted I wasn’t sure how I would feel about term 2 and doing exactly the same as we had in term one. However, slightly small changes have seen me feel a little more comfortable.

With is being 100 years since Gallipoli, we decided to start term two with a mini Anzac Day unit. What came out of this was we ALL decided to do the same planning throughout the team rather than the spilt planning of two ‘power’ teams. That meant we ALL used the same big book (Dawn Parade), taught the same writing and completed the same art ideas. Now before you think-  exactly the same? We structured it so that we used the same resources but we still had the freedom to teach it in a way we liked rather than feeling like synchronised  swimmers.

What this meant was when I got my own class back, I could refer back to resources like the big book, or the clip we used for writing and they knew what I was talking about. To me it flowed more and I felt more connected with my own class. We also were ALL talking about the same things throughout the team and no matter if we were in homerooms or literacy we were ALL on the same page.

As a team, we all enjoyed this and therefore decided to continue this for the next two weeks. Our Topic this term is ‘Fizz, Bang, Pop’ with a science focus (which I love as I personally feel we do not teach enough of it in the primary sector).  Therefore we found a book that would tie into our topic and are also uses this as the basis of our Topic work in the afternoon. We will also been incorporating our maths into this as well.

It doesn’t answer all my concerns but we are making changes that I personally feel are positive ones. Because we mix and change the students throughout the team rather than just between two classes, us ALL teaching the same things makes more sense.

We will see what the next two weeks bring but I am feeling a lot more positive about how term two is shaping out.

Why hello February 28th

#28 days of writing has been a great challenge for me. I’ll admit, I didn’t quite achieve 28 full days of writing. Time (which is my nemesis) and a rather embarrassing incident with a mandolin slicer type gadget saw me with a great ‘hitchhikers thumb and trying to explain to students that ‘no my arm wasn’t broken but yes I did need a sling’.

I have to admit, I am more comfortable with writing all my jumbled thoughts up. I say jumbled as like other fellow bloggers, I feel totally inadequate comparing my writings to others. It’s something that I lack confidence in and know I have a fixed mind set in (which I know I need to change). It was one of the main reasons I avoided doing my masters – thesis!

What this little challenged did allow me to do was connect with other blogs. To read and reflect what their lives were about. How they saw the world and what they saw as important, interesting or even infuriating. It was another glimpse into how different we all are.

It also gave me the courage to reply more to other peoples posts which I thoroughly enjoyed doing. I write my blog as more of a reflection of how our school is changing and how I felt about it. But like anyone I do enjoy the fact that someone may read it and comment. Secretly I am getting excited that I have had nearly 1000 views. Small and insufficient to some but a little highlight for me.

I will continue to try and blog weekly and want to do a ‘Mum Sunday’ blog where I talk about being a mum/teacher and insights I have gained now having a school aged child. I never thought that being a mum would give me a whole new insight into how I view education!

I want to continue to read other blogs and must compile a list to read but also comment on them even if it is just a ‘thanks, loved reading this’ comment. And maybe write my own blog reflection.

Have to admit this was easier to do that Feb Fast which I would have totally failed in the first week!

Having Initiative- Yes, they can do it!

 

 

So this was todays question from  @kerriaattamatea for the #BFC630NZ. As a teacher and a mum this is something I work to instil in the students I teach and in my own children. But are we doing enough?

I watched my maths group come into my room yesterday and noticed straight away those who have initiative and those who didn’t. They were the ones still standing, looking around and I ‘m guessing waiting for something. As I sat their watching I couldn’t understand why they just didn’t find a seat and sit down.

My two reasoning’s were;

Friends have yet to arrive or all the seats by their friends are full

They may have to sit next to the opposite sex

It’s like the children who are at the bottom of a page and ask you what they do next!

This is something I am struggling to understand with this year group. Do we mollycoddle them to much in year 1/2? Am I just so used to older students I have forgotten how this age acts? Do parents play a role in this?

Looking around at school today I began to wonder whether as teachers we take some of this away from them by wanting the classroom to work for us rather than the students. My class last year didn’t line up. End of each break, they just went inside and carried on with their work. They didn’t need to be told what to do yet this year new teachers new rules. They have to line up and wait for the teacher to tell them what they have to do. Have we stolen their initiative?

Do we make excuses for them also? I have the same expectations for my new class that I did last year although now and then I am told they won’t be able to this or that. Why? Have we suddenly decided that students can only start to do things at a certain age? Do we have a fixed mind set when it comes to what we think students can do?

I will admit I do think parents play a role in this. I am seeing parents doing more for their children than in the past. Not allowing their children to fail, to think, or even try. Maybe as parents we need to realise that we are doing more harm than good by not letting them think for themselves.

We don’t have bossy, opinionated students we have ones using their initiative and trying. I like these types of students. The ones, who will give it a go, take a risk and do things without the need of me.

If we don’t foster an environment where students use their initiative how will they cope in the real world?

So I guess the question is what are you doing to encourage this in your classroom?

 

Taking it slow

Twenty-eight days of writing hasn’t quite panned out how I would have liked it to. While trying to be creative and show off my culinary skills in the kitchen, I succeeded in taking quite a large portion of skin off my thumb when slicing carrots. Hence for the last week or so I have had my hand in a sling and thumb bandaged up making me look like a great advertisement for hitchhiking.

Although still very tender, my doctor has allowed me to forgo the meaty bandages for a slim lined model. Thumb is still out of action but I am able to do a lot more than before and typing isn’t quite as hard.

Besides feeling rather silly about the whole thing, the hardest part about this ‘little’ accident was how frustrated I got not being able to do my everyday things. While dressing my wound, the nurse actually commented on the fact that until we can’t use a body part we don’t realise how vital that part is. I have been learning the hard way how often I use my right hand thumb!

Sheer frustration is all I can say. I had to rely on others to help me, simple things became quite hard to do and for someone who is quite stubborn and independent it drove me mad.

I had no idea how limiting my everyday life could be without one thumb. All those who have broken legs, arm wrist, etc will also understand this.  Obviously I am going to casually link my thumb incident into reflections on how we teach students. We all know students can find things challenging and hard and as teachers we are all aware of this. Or are we?

I could still do things, just not the way I would normally do them. I had to find alternative ways to tackle the everyday things, even writing (where I still can’t hold my pen the correct way). This really got me thinking. I see myself as a teacher who is aware that all students learn differently. I look at my lessons and try to see alternative ways some of my students may want to learn this. I am aware of students who may find certain subjects a challenge and try to find ways to engage. I am very aware having a child of my own who struggles to learn the ‘traditional’ way that we can’t ‘box’ a class into one way of learning or method of learning.

But was I truly making the most of this? I knew how frustrated and annoyed I was that I just couldn’t do it even though I knew how to do it or it was going to longer than I was used to. It got me wondering how often students feel like this. How often we rush them through reading or a maths task because we want to get finished. But for them it may take a little longer to get there. How often do we read the visual clues from students that might show they are trying to get there but it might take a little longer than we are happy to wait? How often are we dictated by the clock or day to get things done?

I guess I am just wondering why we have to rush through the day, plan our life’s for the week and term and squeeze everything in. Would it really matter is a lesson or topic took more than the allocated ‘set’ time?

My own two cents

Reading through everyone's #28daysofwriting has been wonderful. Keeping me up way to late in the night mind you. One of the reasons I wanted to attempt this writing is to feel more comfortable blogging. I am not the best blogger and I always feel a little embarrassed about what I write when I read others. But I also wanted to read other blogs, reflect on them and try and express my ideas, thoughts, opinions in my own blog.

+Bridget ComptonMoen wrote a blog the other day that I could relate well to - allocated seats and desks! As schools all move to MLE/MLP we are told/shown about all the different ways we can set up a open plan classroom. Getting away with the single cell rooms and creating all these different spaces where students can place themselves. Modern learning environments support strengths-based teaching and can offer students and teachers flexibility, openness and access to resources. Providing teachers with an open, flexible learning environment can lead to the development of a robust, continuously improving community of practice (Core Education).

But the desks have always been something some teachers can't get their head around. Even the idea of not having their own teachers desk! I don't have a teachers desk and I love it. I work on one of the student tables and tend to mark with my students rather than at the end of the day. This was an easy choice for me but I know other teachers battle with this.

Like Bridget she to was finding the issue I had with my girls- the need for desks. My classroom is slightly different to Bridget's in that we have tables rather than desks but we were also a single cell room and not officially a MLE. In previous post I have spoken about all the changes I had made in my old classroom and what my students felt about this. Most of my students went from having to sit in allocated seats to suddenly being taught by me and having an option of where to sit. Most coped with this fine and enjoyed the idea that they didn't have to sit in the same place everyday. I was lucky enough that I had 'acquired' a couple of the old school wooden flip top desks which I was using for my 'quiet' area.

I don't have an answer but I do know my girls didn't like working on the ground. The big cushions that I had sourced were only ever used by the boys. They also weren't keen on lower tables either and voted against them. The norm isn't always for everyone.  Mornings were always interesting because you began to see how they 'allocated' their seat by placing enough items on a table to show everyone else that was where they wanted to sit. Like Bridget, I did have students find this hard as sometimes they did feel left out. I guess we forget at this age where you sit and who you sit by is a big thing.

I will admit that sometimes I felt I was pushing them into something they didn't like. I had moved away from listening to their feelings and was trying hard to develop this MLE with all the different break out spaces. The last thing I wanted to do was make them feel uncomfortable when they entered the room. I spoke a lot to my students about the changes and they were very honest with me. In the end I think we found that balance between enough tables and where they wanted them.

But I do wonder how far one way do we go? I don't want to see students sitting in the same chair on the same table with the same people all year. But I also don't want them to feel uncomfortable or worried about where they might sit. There has to be that balance and sometimes what other classes/ schools do may not be right for your class.

As we move to our new school and incorporate more MLP, our principal does remind us a lot that what we do has to work for OUR students and community. That we don't do things just because that is what other schools do or what the recent research says. In the end is having or not having a desk the biggest issue of MLE? I really enjoyed Arnika @BrownArnika commented she left on Bridget's blog and thinks she sums it up well. In the end students can learn any where sitting on anything but they can't learn if the teaching is boring, unengaging and unrelated to them.

#day6

A day late

Apologise I am a day late but Mr 6 had a birthday, first week back at work and my parents are visiting so somewhat chaotic.

Working in a team we have decided to do a Thursday rotation. We are lucky enough that the year 3 and 4’s at our school get a 30 minutes sports programmed taught by an outside agency every week. So instead of a day where everything would be chaotic with children coming in and out, we decided to plan this day as our rotation day.

 We looked at what we still had to cover in the curriculum and how this would tie in with us and the subject areas we all had strengths in. Being only 30 minutes long we had to be realistic with what we could teach in that time. We didn’t want children having to rush work to get it finished or come back to it later. We wanted to teach activities that would relate to our Values and our Spirit of Spreydon therefore we could incorporate this into our learning as well.

In the end we decided on 30 minute rotations of Music, Dance/Drama, Maori and Maths and Sports (one teacher had to be present with the outside PE activities). We decided that it was easier if the children stayed in their homeroom groups rather than mixing them up.

So yesterday, we began this and I have to admit it worked well. We all enjoy teaching subjects we know well and enjoy. I take the Maths and have envisaged using a lot of games and team activities. At the moment I am just looking at number activities and this was the one I taught yesterday ' Strike it out for Two'.

I have to admit it was great fun. Easy enough to do but I also had the ability to make it even easier or harder for those who needed it. Having only met this year group it can be quite hard planning activities this early on that cater for all abilities but I am glad with this one I could. It is also a very new experience for me teaching lower down. I have spent the last year teaching year 5 and 6 students who have been working at Stage 7/8 so going back to children who still needed the basics and been great and I have enjoyed the challenge.

I have to admit at the start I thought I may get a little bored teaching the same game to 5 different classes but to be honest this never happened. Every class I had, I saw ways to adapt and make my teaching even better.  From past experiences, I know when you plan together you take into account your own class maybe different and you would adapt it to suit them. But most primary school teachers only teach that one class and that one lesson. So this was slightly different. I was planning the one lesson for five classes and having to quickly adjust as I was teaching depending on the class I was taking. This will get easier as I get to know the classes though.

I am really looking forward to the rotation day although having to learn 120 children’s name maybe a challenge in itself!

Communication- How well are you doing?

Reading @Stephen Lethbridge  really touch me as a mum. His post on communication and connecting with parents especially new parents to the school just showed how much he realised parents matter but also it’s the small things.

As teachers we all know communication is important but I sometimes think we forget how vital it is. I am guilty of this and it wasn’t until my own son started to attend school, I realised how little communication we as teacher can sometimes give. Yes, I understand we need to get our own children to be more self-reliant and learn to share information but it doesn’t always work that way.

My son is your typical boy when it comes to communicating. Unless he had art or pe all I hear about is what he and his friends did on the playground. Yet my daughter would give you a rundown of the complete day, who said what, who got into trouble, what the teachers said and everything in-between!

I work fulltime and therefore can’t do the drop off or pick up like other mums can. It wasn’t until my son started school that I realised how much ‘informal’ conversation I missed out on. It’s those informal, spur of the moment chats that can tell a parent a lot more sometimes than a three way conference can because it is very personal.

I have been lucky that my child minders daughter has also been in the same class, so I have allowed her to talk on my behalf. Check-up, show interest and basically become his second mum. It made me feel connected.

Yes, the school does email and three way conferences but they are not the same. Emails can be read in a completely different way to how they were intended, three way conferences although I like them, squeeze in too much of the ‘formal’ information and not enough of the ‘informal’ . And even though I could email his teacher I felt I was the one emailing asking for updates more than the teacher was.

Obviously this got me thinking. As a parent if this is how I felt, what do my parents think of me as a teacher? When you teach year 5/6 you tend not to see the parents at all. Our school opts not to do teacher emails for various reason therefore I had to think of alternative ways to communicate informally.

Luckily the students had diaries which became more line of communication. I had working mums and dads who I rarely saw and I wanted to make sure that they kept up to date about their child. The success they were having. So every Friday, I would write a comment in everyone diary. No diary a piece of paper. I wanted them to know how much I valued them as parents but also how much I enjoyed their child in my class. Just one little thing they had done that week that as their teacher I was proud of and could share with their parents.

I also made sure that the first time I meet them or communicated to them was on a positive rather than a negative. I didn’t want parents to feel that every time they meet me, received a note or phone call it was a negative rather than a positive.

Having moved to year 3/4, I am learning even more how important it is to communicate. Mums just need it (I am sure dads do to). This year I have no diaries, so I need to think of other ways to communicate to every parent. Share with them how wonderful their child is and all the success they are having. As I said at the beginning it’s the little things that matter.

I am still thinking about how I can keep that ‘informal’ communication regular so that parents feel connected and have that connection. Ideas are floating about but at least I know tomorrow all my students will take home a little note just to let parents know something special I have noticed about their child.

Communication

Bit late with day 3 of writing as Tuesday turned out to be a very busy day! Second day into work and already it seems that the mountain of work that is needed doing has escalated. It’s all in a good way but I do begin to wonder how I will fit it all in.

Yesterday we spent two hours in a team meeting planning for next week and discussing how we were going to work as a team, move towards more MLP’s, ensure the students came first and what we were planning to do benefited OUR children in OUR school.

It was a great meeting but boy did I feel that my head was about to explode with ideas, questions, queries, wonderings among many things. I have to admit, I work with a great team of teachers. We are very fortunate that we seem to be all on the same path and when ideas are expressed or suggestions made, they are valued even if they don’t work.

This is important as without this open communication and respect working in a team could be very difficult. Personality wise we are very different and we need to respect that. We have worked hard to ensure that we know and understand how everyone operates. I know this is something I have to be aware of as I can get over zealous about ideas and can sometimes forget that I am not the only one that may have idea.

I have already been aware of myself in these situations and have been mindful of how I respond and react to suggestions and ideas. I actually have caught myself stopping and taking a step back. Reassessing what I normally would think and asking myself whether this is the best solution.

Although it was a long meeting with ideas flying left, right and centre I left feeling positive that we had made all the right decisions for OUR students and what would be best for them.

#day3

Growth Mind Set- A question I can't answer

When I started to write this I was thinking along the lines of explaining what both meant and how it related to me. As this was also a challenge as part of #edchatNZ to blog about Mind Set a few other teachers have already given great definitions and explanations that I felt I would just be repeating (here. and here) Then it got me thinking. Why is it in some situations we can easily move from a fixed to a growth mind set, even when the challenge or situation could be beyond our expertise or comfort?

And is frustration, stubbornness, annoyance (a lot of those negative words which to be honest are also positives) a fixed mind set or is it important to have to develop your growth mind set?

I use my son for example. For Mr 6 loves the skate board park. We have spent most of the holidays down their ‘hanging’ out. He watches with awe as the teenage boys do trick after trick on their scooters or skateboards and spends hours later reminiscing how wonderful they were. This set off his determination to be able to do what they can do.

So he spends time watching and then gives it a go. Of course many of the moves they can do are beyond him and this is where frustration set in. The scooter is flung onto the ground with the usual chorus of ‘I can’t do it’. Yet, as much as he is frustrated and annoyed, he still gets back up and tries again and again and again. At one point he spent over an hour just trying to perfect one move.

People talk about Growth Mind set as reflecting and looking at different ways to approach the task. While fixed Mind Set will only see it one way and not make any changes or decide that they can’t do it.

What got me was how determined he was to succeed with this task. Even though it took him ages and there were the occasional tears, a few grazes and a lot of sweat he would not give up. Once he achieved the first ‘trick’ he didn’t give in but moved onto the next challenge. To the point in the space of three weeks he had achieved everything he hadn’t been able to do at the start.

Now if you gave him the task of writing a story it would be a whole different ball game. He would give up straight away. So why does Mr 6 have such a different mind-set to this?

Yes, I know everyone has fixed and growth mind sets but even at the start Mr 6 struggled and found all the tricks extremely hard. But what was it about that particular task that made him persevere? He was as stubborn, annoyed and frustrated at the skateboard park as he is with writing. Yet, he never stopped trying and wouldn’t give up.

 What changes in him where he thinks he can achieve it that doesn’t when it comes to writing? And I wonder how many other children are like this?

Day 2 of 28 days of writing.

What does 2015 hold for me?

You can tell when teachers are back working while on holiday as Twitter once again is filled with their blogs. A lot have been reflecting about 2014 and what they want to see in 2015.

A lot happened for me in 2014 and I have tried to get onto the ‘blog train’ and reflect about all the changes that have been taking place. But for me it is all about 2015!

I am moving away from my comfort zone completely. Yes, I am making a change which I am excited about and at the same time terrified. Not only that, but the school is also making a lot of changes which I am super excited to be part of.

So what am I going to be doing?

I am going to be teaching year 3/4 students. The last time I did this was over 12 years ago and in the UK. For me this change is important. I need to be able to confidently say I can teach a range of year groups and have a solid understanding of them as individuals and how they fit into the New Zealand curriculum. I love teaching older children and enjoy the banter and conversations you can have with them. They are also a lot more independent! So I am slightly worried about how I will cope with younger students. Moving from year 5/6 is a big leap but I'm sticking with the idea of ‘what my year 5/6 students could do, so can these 3/4 students’ (It just may take a little more scaffolding and time).

The other change is that we are going to be working in teams rather than having our own individual class that we would teach throughout the day in our single cell rooms. I’ll still have a group of about 25 students that I will over sea for pastoral care but it won’t be like last year where I only taught those children and they were ‘my class’.

Our year 3/4 intake is big (over 100 students) therefore we have four classrooms but 5 home-bases (we have yet to work out a name for this) as two classes are going to be in one room. My concern is the odd number and how this might work. Collaboration between 5 teachers could be interesting as well as movement of over 100 students around the classes and school.

 Part of me wonders if we will break off into two groups and have 2 teachers together and the other 3 as a team.  I also wonder if we should have made a separate year 4 class with two teachers while the other 3 taught year 3. At the moment we are still trying to work this all out.

We have a tentative timetable and what we might see happening each day. Thursday seems to be the day where we will see every single student in our team (that we have called Arohanui) through the rotation of subjects we are doing. I am excited about whom I am working with and having worked this way before, I know that communication is the key. We all have expertise in different subject areas which is great but we also have our own ideas as to how a MLE could be run so we are going to have to tread carefully.

Still I have a few concerns. Maths is one of them. At the moment we are grouping students by ability and each teaching a group of students in a classroom. To me this is still what we have always done. I am not a big fan of ability setting and while in the UK we moved away from this and I enjoyed teaching mixed ability. We are trialling mixed ability lesson on Thursday which is what I will be taking (all classes during our rotation day) so hopefully we can branch out if this is successful. Also how will we work this? I guess this is when I jump onto Twitter and get help from my PLN to come up with ideas.

I like change. I have always taught different topics and chopped and changed the way I teach things every year. I am looking forward to this and I know there will be a lot of hurdles we are going to have to overcome. Questions will be raised and hopefully solutions will be found.

 As we are still set up as single cell classes (some walls will be cut through but not for a while) it will be interesting to see how this work. We are lucky that two of our classrooms are big; hence we can fit up to 50 (maybe) into the one room. So I hope that we utilise this as much as we can.

The biggest thing for me is how will we teach the students so that we are moving away from the traditional way of teaching?

This year, I hope to try and blog about what is happening to me as a teacher as I grapple with year 3 and 4 students and the changes taking place in our school.

Reflection TIme

As we embrace 2015 I want to reflect on 2014 and how it went for me. Term Three, 2014 signified a whole year of teaching in NZ which also meant I could apply to become fully registered again!

I have to admit, I had a wonderful class of year 5/6 and having taught for a while now, I have to admit they are up there as one of the best classes I have ever had.

When I look back at the first day and how they were I would have never expected by the end of term 4 the majority of them would have grown in confidence and develop skills to become independent learners. They were a fantastic class to ‘experiment’ all my new ideas with as they seemed to enjoy taking on a challenge as much as I did.

What I learnt the most is things take time and one big change can be better than a million of small ones.

 I started in Term 2 with a lot of the ideas I had gathered from other teachers off Twitter, through their blogs or from my own readings and research. I will admit I was so excited to be able to ‘change’ a lot of what I was doing, I probably went in a little too fast. I had to remind myself that most of these students were used to a very different way of teaching and learning but I also had parents to contend with. Boy, did it take a while. I have to admit I had my doubts at times. I’m impatient and I have high expectations of myself so I thought by Term 3 it would be perfect!

Looking back now, there were a lot of very small changes happening to each individual student. It wasn’t until I had relief teachers in the room and through their comments I began to see this. From then on, I sat back (now and then), watched and listened to the students during lesson time and this really did inform me a lot!

Communication was the key.

Whatever I changed or did differently in class it was important to also keep my parents informed and explain my reasoning. This worked ok. I would send a letter home, write in certain student’s diaries and also communicate via our class page so they could access information at home. We are yet to trial allowing parents to email us personally and there were times I wish I had been able to do this. Also, I wish I had ‘opened’ up the classroom each term so parents could have had the chance to visit and ask questions. One idea could have been having an open evening in week two of every term so parents could come and find out about what was happening.

Also communication with my class was important. Each term we reflected on what worked and what didn’t. As well as what did they want to do differently? They articulated their thoughts and ideas so well even to the point they would talk to each other to find answers or solutions.

What I found interesting was how sometimes what I thought they would like, they didn’t. Two things that really surprised me were; they didn’t like sitting on the floor even with cushions and they were not a fan of low tables.

Realisation

I had to accept and realise that not all my students would get there- ‘yet’. There were still those who needed more of a structured timetable and others who were able to plan their whole week independently. To be honest that was ok with me as I had seen the small changes in them and knew they would get there just it would take a little longer.

The best moments were seeing the changes in my students who relied on mum and dad a lot in the first term. Some were now even planning their whole day independently and had made huge leaps and bounds academically.

Term 3 Reflections.

Last week the class reflected on what Term 3 was like in our classroom.

We used three criteria's:

• What worked in Term ?
• What didn't work?
• What did we want to see in Term 4?

Students opted to work on their own or in groups of their own choice. The conservations I over heard were amazing. My students were really reflecting about the three questions and the language they were using made me feel so proud. Words like, self manager, independent, options, student voice could be heard throughout their conversations.

I wanted to punch the air as it finally seemed to all be working.

One BIG issue I have had with all of this change is how long it 'seems' to take. It wasn't a 'quick' fix and there were times I wondered if it was all going to work. I guess I thought all children by now should be 'self managers' and it has taken me a while to realise that this isn't always going to be the case.  There are still some students in my class who are 'directed' learners. I would say 2 definitely and another 3 now and them. So I guess out of a class of 26 that is pretty good. I think until I did this Term 3 reflection. It wasn't until I heard them discussing and talking about the questions did I realise how far they had come.  Rather than just say 'this didn't work"   they were trying hard to find alternative solutions and working with other groups to gather ideas.

Althletics

With the onset of Athletics day looming, our syndicate goes out together so children get the opportunity to practice the track and field events every day. I like that the children have this opportunity to work on their skills, participate and have some friendly competition. Yet how it used to be taught in the past even bored me. Therefore if I’m bored surely the students are as well? Don’t get me wrong, I am not anti PE and do love being outside, but to me it just wasn’t working. We tended to move around in our classes and spend up to 30 minutes on one chosen item. Trying to engage a whole class, teach them skills and then let them work on this always felt rushed and disorganised. I never felt like I was making most of the opportunity or able to really teach them the proper techniques. I also had students who found certain track and field areas quite tough and a challenge. Each day they dreaded this hour with one actually avoiding school in order not to do it. Notes slowly would come in as well and athletics training felt more like a chore rather than a pleasure.

This year we decided to try and teach it in a way that was more like a MLE style that some of us have been trailing in the classrooms. We gave the students options! The first day we did this we allowed them the opportunity to visit any station they like. They had to spend at least 15 minutes there and had to do at least 3 stations. It worked ok but as teachers we still felt we didn’t really have the opportunity to teach the skills without new students coming over and some were still overcrowded.

Day two we decided to group the children into their age groups and designated two stations that were the MUST activities. Each day, two groups would go to the MUST activities and then carry on with their CAN choices. The rest of the groups had CAN activities but had to complete a certain amount in the allocated time. This worked so much better as groups were smaller and as a teacher, I felt that I had the time to teach new skills and techniques. It also meant that students had ample time to practise and work on their technique.

Feedback from my students showed that they enjoyed being given the opportunities’ to decide themselves what activities they wanted to do. My students who found athletics challenging also enjoyed it as well. Even my usual ‘absent’ one only missed one day out of the two weeks we did this! They also turned up to Athletics Day as they had realised that they had a pretty good throw on them!

 

Poetry Slam

I enjoy poetry and love sharing this with the students I teach. Unfortunately, the minute you utter the words ‘poetry’ you can hear the groans and look of boredom spreading over their faces. I find it a little upsetting that children these days have no idea about well-known poets or poems. In the past I have taught my year 5/ 6’s ‘The Highway Man’ and the ‘Lady of Shallot’ with great success. With The Lady of Shallot we created a whole cross curriculum unit on it and even performed the poem to other classes using mix media to tell the story.

I try to immerse my classes with a range of poetry. Whether it be through guided reading, handwriting, word study activity or even as a class read. I think it is important for them to experience and learn how important poetry is. I am much the same when it comes to Shakespeare and believe that there is a place for him in primary education. Probably why I loved this Ted talk and why I wanted to do something like a rap or poetry slam unit.

 I loved the idea of linking music and writing and being able to describe the characteristics of poetry in jazz, rap and hip hop music. There were so many wonderful ideas swirling around in my head and it also made me realise how easy it was to create a cross curriculum topic on this that could also incorporate, history, geography, art, values etc.

As a class this is what we wanted to achieve by the end of the unit.

• Introduce students to spoken word poetry: Slam Poetry
• Give them the opportunity to create and perform poetry
• Practice working in a group and speaking in front of the class
• Learn and understand some poetry terms and techniques

In groups students identified basic poetry and literacy elements. They looked at Eminem, Notorious BIG, 50 cent, Andre 3000, Tupac, Snoop Dog and many more. For most of these raps/songs, I gave them snippets of the words rather than the whole thing. We also looked at poems and did the same-  Robert Frost, ‘Road less taken’, Langston Hughes,’ I dream a world’, Mya Angelo, and others I felt that they should know of.

From that I introduced poetry slam. I showed them EliseWilson

To This Day Project - Shane Koyczan

If I should have a daughter -Sarah Kay

My students really surprised me at how well they could articulate the message in these three slams.

I spent a lot of time discussing the techniques (as well as I could) of a poetry slam and looking at how rhythm and rhyme were important. We looked at how certain words were ‘stress’ ‘speed up or slow down etc.

After this, students were given 3 things they could slam about in their groups. In the end most decided to slam about ‘bullying’ as Relationships was our Value and we had taken part in “Pink Shirt’ day. I also think Shane Koycan’s slam left a huge impact on them.

It was a fantastic unit and I know the class and myself thoroughly enjoyed it.

 I did record them but somehow lost all of them! As I did this last term and only blogging about it now, I have tried to get one group to record their slam but we have had a few illnesses in the class! Here is what they wrote though.

Standing with a friend who is being bullied doesn't mean you have to take a punch for them.

We feel alone- small and weak.

Scared to go out and speak.

Every day the pain keeps increasing.

All of their pain they keep releasing.

The kids need help but who’s gonna give it?

All day every day we sit and wonder why somebody doesn’t stop it?

Then I realised I am somebody.

Calling someone ugly won’t make you prettier.

Calling someone stupid won’t make you smarter.

Calling someone a loner won’t make you popular.

Calling someone fat won’t make you skinnier.

Why do you do it?

There’s no reason.

Shadows leapt up behind me.

I never know who it is?

Was it a Friend?

Was it a teacher?

Before I could think I was 6 feet in the air.

The sun blocked my eyes but a few features could be noticed.

Long hair

Pierced ears

Big nose

Big mouth

Yellow teeth

I felt a dribble of spit flickering at me.

The eyes…

I couldn’t see something was covering me.

Across the distance 3 shadows became smaller.

I felt the wind sweeping through my right ear but nothing on the left.

I was let go

I felt great

I felt alive

I was free

Free from pain

We walk into the darkness hardly to see, they punch me they kick me they through me to the ground.

Every time someone calls my name the harsh words jumbling in my brain.

Our bodies crumple into the ground being deteriorated into little pieces.

When things don't go to plan.

End of term and I have spent some time reflecting about the classroom.

What I have noticed is that most of the class are very independent in their learning. They know what to do, when they need to do and where they like to learn/work. The only frustration I had were a small group of students that still couldn’t complete all the week’s task in the allocated time span. To be honest it was driving me mad. When I started this ‘independent working hour’ I set the week’s task pretty much the same, so routines were set and then expanded on that. I explained orally and in written form so they heard and could visually see what they needed to do. Each day I reminded them as well, yet I still have this issue.

I felt like I was hitting a brick wall and began to question what I was doing wrong. Why couldn’t this small group of students complete their set tasks? The tasks themselves were not difficult and were set for them as individuals. They had over 5 hours in the week to complete them therefore time allocation and the amount of tasks were not an issue. So where was I going wrong?

It was in a staff meeting where we were learning about another school and how they approached this that it finally hit me. I naturally assumed by the end of term 3 everyone would be independent learners. Not once had I thought that I should still be directing some of them still.

The next day I decided to experiment with this idea. I had started to think about next term and how I was going to approach the idea of allowing individual students the freedom to work inside or outside. This was a great opportunity to introduce this and discuss again what an independent learner was. We talked about what the word independent meant and how this related to the classroom and their learning. We discussed how we could’ see’ and ‘hear’ an independent worker and what ‘self-managing’ their own time was about. I then asked them to reflect and decide if they felt they were independent learners. As I expected most agreed that they were and a few felt they were not yet there.

Looking back now, I should have spent more time teaching this phase at the beginning of term 3 but as I was taking time off work I rushed through this part and assumed those in question would soon ‘get it’. Although I knew everyone was going to become ‘independent learners’ in their own time, I guess I never assumed that it might take a few students a lot longer than the rest. This small group have now become my ‘directed’ learners where I tell them what they have to do in the allocated time slot. They understand that until they can self-manage their own time they will stay on this level. And it is working!

My ‘independent learners’ are now working on their next level of being given the opportunity to prove they can self-manage their time in a responsible manner to be allowed the choice where they can work which will included outside the classroom. I have decided to create lanyards for them so they are easily identifiable to other members of stuff. I am thinking that on the back of them it will outline what they should be doing therefore teachers can see this straight away.

So what have I learnt about myself?  I need to remember to give my students time and to realise that they all won’t get there together.

How do I want to teach?

How do I want to teach?

When I heard this I thought straight away of all the wonderful ideas and in my mind it seemed like a simple answer. Now I am not so sure. How do I articulate my ideas well enough so a complete stranger will feel my passion?

The next step as part of our MLE is to work out how we teach and what we want for our students. This has nothing to do with us designing a building but it helps them design it for us. So if I wanted an outside area where students could collaborate and work without the glare of the sun, they would design something to cater for that.

So many ideas and thoughts!

To me some characteristics of 21st century learning:

It is collaboration.

It is creativity.
It is critical thinking, risk taking and problem-solving.
It is research and information literacy.
It is digital citizenship.
It is responsible use.





So how would you articulate your ideas and thoughts to show what you wanted in a classroom?