Connect

Digital Fluency Day 5

Connect was the next link of our Manaiakalani journey. It is the digital world, that our children are so comfortable in, that enables us to connect with each other. The Manaiakalani outreach is growing rapidly and we now have such a great wealth of knowledge at our finger tips by just connecting with other schools within this huge community of learners. I loved the session the "Trail Blazers" gave us. Lots of great ideas to teach computational thinking. It was nice to find out how computers think. I am going to some of these ideas in my teaching like breaking down instructions into steps for someone else to solve- this is a great skill for writing as well. And I loved the idea of learning binary code- It took me a while to grasp some of the aspects, but with the code that was given I could at least work out some of the pictures- I can see this working in my class as extension work for fast finishers. And I loved the chance to play with a 3-d pen.

Share

Digital Fluency Day 4 Share was the name of today's learning, and probably the one I did least in the past. It is quite thought provoking when we think that in 2005 social media was born and the children we teach are born in a world where public sharing is second nature.It is our job to encourage children to share there learning in a safe environment hence we are blogging. As blogging is new to my kids they are very enthusiastic in sharing their learning. Once again I have been reminded that sharing is not the end product- children can share to carry on learning- in order for this to happen, I would like my children to respond to their comments. This way we will embed further learning and not see blogging at the end product.

I thoroughly enjoyed the multi-modal part of our learning today. Knowing we are on the right track always feels good, but extending our practice is even better.I will endeavour to make my window of learning a place where my students want to engage in learning. Here is a start to to my window dressing of Matariki

Create

Digital Fluency Day 3

Our day in one word = create.

It is so good when ideas come together. Not only is Create embedded in our Manaiakalani/Ako Hiko mantra, it is also one of May Road School's learning powers.   

           
Key learning ideas form today

• Creativity empowers learning
• Creativity helps children become problem solvers, communicators and collaborators 
• Children love creating 
• Children are born to create
• In our Early Childhood Education Centres children are encouraged to create

And then they come to school where content has become all important and creativity seems to come a distant second or third. Content based learning was needed 10+ years ago for the factory geared work force. Yet we know that factory work force is becoming more and more automated so now we need creators. Yes I know I am preaching to the converted but I often struggle with the how. The idea that keeps reoccurring in my learning so far is that our Learn Create Share model is not linear. We don't have to go from Learn to Create to Share. 

Here is something to shake my practice:

Digital Fluency Intensive Day 2 As always the Manaiakalani journey is fascinating, and I am learning and understanding more about the learn create share model that we are using. The word intensive sure lived up to its name today. I thought I knew about today's topics, but I knew less than the tip of the iceberg. The deep dive we did today was very informative- now how do I incorporate this knowledge into my planning. Kauri teacher's watch out I am going to bombard you with great ideas. I am buzzing with the new deeper knowledge about google forms- why have I stopped using them this year.... They are a great way to embed comprehension skills that I am teaching in Reading. And who knew Google Sheets could be so captivating. This was not one of my preferred option. But I can really see how to present data using Google sheets.

The process not the end product

Learn, Create, Share - Easy you say - you learn, you create something, you share it. Easy for some.
In the past, we as students spent all our time learning, we didn't really get the chance to create and we hardly ever shared our work - other than with our teacher. Then some of us become  enthusiastic teachers.  Over time, gone were the old ways of teaching - inquiry is the new buzz word with the children creating  the end product out of their learning. Let the children become the the agents of their own learning. Some teachers couldn't make that change - couldn't relinquish the power, some saw the ideology and muddled on through and some  soared like eagles. I was one of those teachers who struggled with the creating part. I saw the power in letting the students become agents of their own learning, but I am just not a creative person, how does one  enthuse creativity when that is so foreign.
Then came the digital age now it seems easier to create and to share, but as with "publishing" some children never seem to get there. I now see that I have been stuck at the polished end product phase and not celebrating the process the children go through to get their end product.  The discussion of removing the barriers that developed from a conversation is what struck a cord with me. I am going to spend more time developing my students  confidence in their ability and not be hung up on the end product as much. Now don't think I am going to can the end product, just differentiate it to meet the students needs - now where have I heard that before. 

Changes in my practice

The point of reflection is to recapture the experiences, mull them over critically in order to gain a new understanding and so improve future practice. This is all part of being lifelong learners. (SkillsTeamHullUniversity). Looking back at my MindLab experience I can honestly say  "What a journey this has been". I have learnt so much about myself, my practice, my students and  my future. So much has fallen into place, now. I wish someone would have told me at the beginning of  my MindLab journey that I would come out thinking more about my teaching practise. The first few weeks I spent dreading the thought what I would have to come up with at the end of each session to put on the portal to show my learning. It was only through my assignments that I realised the wealth of information I was gaining. 

Is that how our students feel? 

I would say my journey started, dare I say, ten years ago. I was one of the teachers using the new catch phrase "preparing our students for the 21st century and for their jobs that don't yet exist". I blindly went where the future was taking us- into inquiry based learning where we, the teachers chose the  inquiry topic, the process and the the all important question. We, the inquiry lead team, made an amazing model and we lead the teachers and students through this model. The only problem was we never seemed to get past the knowledge stage, we felt our students needed more front loading. I, and many other teachers, never got to the presenting and reflecting part of the model. A few years later we re- developed the model-put more information into it and relaunched it. Same result. A few years later we designed a new model, now much more simplified. It lives on as a token in our planning. 

It was while attending the first 16 weeks of MindLab, where I was learning about 21st century skills, like collaboration, knowledge construction, communication and real world problem solving and innovation that I realised: I really didn't know very much about the 21st century learner. Then another revelation dawned on me while discussing Inquiry based learning models with a fellow MindLab colleague- that I actually didn't know as much about inquiry based learning as I thought I did. In fact I was missing a few important aspects- namely the 21st century skills needed for the inquiry to work and the fact that the actual inquiry should be student driven, based from the student's questions. This was not entirely new information, as somewhere in our model there was a student question part, but we just never got there or if we did the question was not deemed rich enough. Oh boy did I get it wrong. Another problem with our inquiry based learning was we only allocated time for it as a topic, not as an interdisciplinary unit across multiple curriculum areas.

Armed with this new understanding I would like to introduce real inquiry based learning, not with a model, as I feel we get too hung up in the steps or phases, but real inquiry based on a broad topic that students could enjoy investigating and really immerse  all our curriculum areas in this topic. I have already discussed this concept with my syndicate and we will explore this further at our next planning day. 

There are many other things I have learnt this year, but inquiry based learning when done right can really make a difference to the way my students learn and it will bring the enjoyment of learning back.

References

University of Hull SkillsTeamHullUni. (2014) Reflective writing. [video file]. Retrieved from  

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QoI67VeE3ds

Interdisciplinary Connections

My Interdisciplinary map

The interdisciplinary connection I selected is my students as, after all, they are my priority.

I think we need to remember what Daniel Pink states - we need to prepare our students for their future not our past. I believe most teachers will agree with that statement, but with the constraints of curriculum subjects and National Standards, we get bogged down with must cover rather than the creative flare that would allow children to blossom.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading the article Themes or motives? Aiming for coherence through interdisciplinary outlines by K. Barton and L. Smith. They state that "Instruction should focus on integrated, interdisciplinary activities that revolve around a set of important ideas." They go on to say that "in order to be effective, thematic units typically must be broad enough to provide authentic experiences in more than one content area, offer a range of learning experiences for students and give students choices in the projects they pursue and the ways they demonstrate their learning."  This is not new- we as a school have been battling with authentic inquiry learning. We have had PD, and have created two inquiry models, but yet we still miss the mark and most of us- including me have gone back to teaching the same old same old, concentrating on getting our children to "achieve the National Standard." Don't get me wrong that is important, but there has got to be a better way.
Barton and Smith talk about a teacher, Leslie, who was successful with this idea of interdisciplinary outlines. She does not force integration but looks for broad topics- "big ideas" that authentically tie materials together from different subject areas. 

I really liked her Roots unit and would love to start our new year off with a similar type of theme. This could include the students heritage and history, their lives, their school, the history of Mt. Roskill, what is important to them. Just think of how well we will know our students. Together the teachers within my syndicate will plan for authentic learning around our students life, refining Our Learning Community unit to include experiences across most if not all our curriculum subjects. We as a syndicate work very well together sharing our planning. 

Interdisciplinary units  should encompass reading, writing, topic, maths and the arts. I work with a fellow teacher who embraces this in her teaching. She is a teacher of one of our Samoan bilingual classes and this year she has totally immersed her students in the story of Easter. Her students read about Easter, wrote about Easter and had to solve maths problems about Easter celebrations. She has done the same with Samoan language week and White Sunday. Of course these are very important festivals in the Samoan culture so this was authentic learning. If one teacher at our school can do it, we have an expert and we can all give it a try. We must just remember what Leslie said- "units like bears and apples are very preplanned and they aren't related to the students or what they are doing. A thematic unit will be different every year with different students; it has to be broad enough to expand and contract with the students needs." I am ready to give this approach another go- armed with more information and understanding this time. True inquiry is about moving to where the children want to go with their learning.

References

Barton, K. and Smith, L. (2000) Themes or motives? Aiming for coherence through 
         interdisciplinary outlines, The Reading Teacher. Vol.5 No.1 Retrieved from
         https://app.themindlab.com/media/32978/view

ThomasMcDonaghGroup. (2011). Interdisciplinary and Innovation Education. [video file].
         Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDdNzftkIpA

Using Social Media in the Classroom

Using Social Media in the Classroom

So what's the  buzz about? And do I let my seven and eight year olds use this Social Media in my Classroom?

My role, at school, this year is to get our Year Three students ready for the digital classes next year. To a large extent I have succeeded, the one thing that still needs to be addressed  is the social media aspect. Here I feel I need to tread carefully. 

Vicki Davis states, in her blog- A guidebook for social media in the classroom (2014), 

      Social media is here. It's just another resource and doesn't have to be a distraction from 

      learning objectives. Social media is just another tool that  you can use to make your 

      classroom engaging, relevant and culturally diverse.  

 I fully understand and agree with the the above statement. And my students are very keen to share their work, so we share it with other students within the school, teachers and the student's parents. 

Kathy Cassidy (2013) talks about the importance of students being connected and growing up to  a future where they will be communicating with people in other countries. This statement reminds me of the vision in our own curriculum document which states that we want our young people to be confident, connected, actively involved, life long learners. 

Daniel Wilczak (2013) states that  through blogs  students can learn how to express their thoughts and ideas and reflect on real world problems. He also states it gives the quiet student a voice. He further states that blogs could be used for collaborative knowledge building. I have seen evidence of this on our students blogs when they blog about: books they have read, sports activities they have enjoyed and skills they have learnt. Our seniors have also advertised  our school production on their blogs. I have also seen the excitement of my own students when someone has left a comment on our class blog. 

But with all this exposure in the global community, how safe is it for our little seven year olds.  James Hopkins (2016) blogged about how important it is to educate our students around interactions on line. Our students need to understand why we need to keep personal details out of the public domain. At our school we spend a great deal of time educating our students about cyber safety before they are allowed on the digital equipment. We also keep revising this topic regularly.  But the main idea of his blog was to alert educators to the problem of spammers and what to do. He does state that students within the AkoHiko cluster are familiar with the process. 

So the question still abides- Do I let my little seven and eight year olds loose to blog? 

Well if they are nurtured into blogging correctly, with the correct guidance and tools I think it will take them one step closer on their road to becoming a confident, connected, actively involved, life long learners. 

Step one- students from our senior classes are going to come into my class to teach my students how to leave quality comments on other students blogs, using the AkoHiko comment code- write a positive statement about what has been read, include a thoughtful statement about how it made you feel and then ask a question. Then use this as a reading activity.

Step two- guide students to add their own blog post on the class blog instead of me doing it all the time. 

There are still 7 weeks of school left till the end of this year, so by the end of the year the above should be in place.

References

Davis, V. (2014). A guidebook for social media in the classroom. Edutopia. George Lucas 

          Education Foundation. Retrieved from https://www.edutopia.org/blog/guidebook-

          social-media-in-classroom-vicki-davis 

Hoskins, J. (2016). Finding the right process, Ako Hiko Education. Retrieved from

         http://akohiko.blogspot.co.nz/

Tvoparents. (2013). Using Social Media in the Classroom. [video file]. Retrieved from 

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=riZStaz8Rno

Wilczak, D. (2013). The effects of blogging and podcasting on student achievement and 

        attitude in the sixth grade science classroom. Montana State University, Bosman 

        Montana Retrieved 

     from http://scholarworks.montana.edu/xmlui/bitstream/handle/1/2851/WilczakD0813.pdf?

     sequence=1&isAllowed=y)- 

The influence of law and Ethics

What are ethics?  From our class notes I understand that ethics are learned behaviours that have been shaped by a range of societal influences such as school, work, community, family, church, culture and sports. It is our individual interpretation of ethics that helps shape our ideas about justice, morality and virtue. I believe that everything we do and every decision we make has ethics at its core, which motivates our actions and decisions. I also think ethics are quite personal. What I feel very strongly about may not be quite so compelling to someone else. I am by nature a goody too shoes and I see things in black and white and I see very little grey. 

As I said ethical dilemmas are very much a personal thing and people reading this blog might not think it is too much of this issue, but it made me question what I felt was right or wrong. My dilemma was quite clear cut a few years ago, now it may not be quite so clear cut, although I would still make the same decision.

About five years ago I reconnected with an ex- boy friend, that I was dating when we were both teaching students, through facebook. He was a deputy principal in a school in South Africa, when we reconnected and I had been teaching in New Zealand for fifteen years. We chatted about our teaching experiences and he asked me to send photos of my classroom, my children and their work and he would do the same. At first I thought nothing of it and started planning what I would show off, but the more I thought about it, the more I felt it was not right. 

Catharyn Baird discusses the idea about a moral compass which is a guide that lets us know how we are supposed to act, we also have communities that have expectations about how we should act and behave. This is true because our teacher registration requires us to be "a person of good character "and we are to be "deemed fit to be a teacher" Hall 2001. Catharyn goes on to say that when these two ideas are in sync life is wonderful, but when they are out of sync we have what she calls ethical tension. 
So the moral compass, my own beliefs, told me this was not the right thing to do. The community our code of ethics for certified teachers states that we are vested by the public with trust .And the law also indicated this was not the right thin to do. The reading on Ethical and professional dilemmas for educators (2012) talks about student confidentiality and a students basic privacy rights. Our own code of ethics states that Teachers will strive to  protect the confidentiality of information about learners.

That was 5 years ago, I decided not to send him the photos, but I did give him my school's website details. 

Today social media and Facebook are even more popular and even if I keep the children's names out of the pictures and work, I still don't feel comfortable about sending this type of information. Our school has, as have  many schools in New Zealand, followed the digital revolution and now our school website has class blogs and, for our digital classes, student's blogs. If he were to look at our school website today he would have a much better insight into a New Zealand school, better than I could have depicted with a few photos. 

As I said earlier, this was my ethical dilemma, another person may not think it is such a big deal. 


References

Baird, C. Ethics for people on the move. TEDxMileHigh  Retrieved 
         from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dqMj51Ea1K8

Connecticut's Teacher Education and Mentoring Program. (2012). Ethical and Professional 
         Dilemmas for Education: Facilitators Guide. Retrieved 
         from http://www.ctteam.org/df/resources/Module5_Manual.pdf

Education Council. (n.d). The Education Council Code of Ethics for Certificated Teachers. 
         Retrieved from  https://educationcouncil.org.nz/content/code-of-ethics-certificated-t
           eachers-0

Hall, A. (2001). What  ought I to do, all things considered? An approach to the exploration 
          of ethical problems by teachers. Paper presented at theIIPE conference, Brisbane. 
          Retrieved from http://www.educationalleaders.govt.nz/Culture/Developing-leaders/What-
           Ought-I-to-Do-All-Things-Considered-An-Approach-to-the-Exploration-of-Ethical-
           Problems-by-Teachers 

Indigenous Knowledge and Cultural responsiveness in my practice

This is a topic that has become very important to me. I strongly believe the students I teach have a wealth of indigenous knowledge.  In the reading, Culturally responsive pedagogies in the classroom (2011), Gutierrezz and Rogoff explain that by validating the students' cultural identity and valuing the knowledge that the students bring with them, we have the potential to make the difference to our students learning. This means really knowing and understanding our students, not just academically but what their beliefs are and what is important to them. Professor Russell  Bishop emphasises the importance of building the teacher-student relationship. This shifts the idea of the teacher in front of the class delivering a lesson to their students, to a more friendly, more inclusive, interactive teaching and learning situation. I am a strong believer in making learning topics more representative of our students worlds. I also believe in using "Ako", where we have teachers as learners and learners as teachers.

Our school strategic plan states that we are committed to the celebration  of cultural diversity. 
For our students, it means
* the incorporation of cultural perspectives as an integral part of the classroom programme, * the celebration of the individuality of each student
* a focus on tolerance and respect of all cultures 
For our staff it means
* awareness and embracing of different cultural perspectives
* fostering opportunities to develop the respect and tolerance for all cultures
* high expectations of all our students
The reading, Culturally responsive pedagogies in the classroom (2011), goes on to say "culturally responsive teachers contextualise instructions in cultural forms, behaviours and processes of learning familiar to students". Our school has embarked on the communities of mathematical inquiry PD, where we understand how important families  are to Maori and Pacifica, how everyone helps out and how everyone has a job to do and that no-one is left behind. So we base our mixed ability groups on this concept- we are a mathematics family, no one is left behind.Each member in the group has to understand the strategy the group has used. Another very important aspect of a family is respect, which we also include in our lessons. This allows for students to generate friendly arguments in order to understand the concept/strategy fully. Other core values we expect to see children using are reciprocity, inclusion and belonging.  We further include the student's culture and life by making up story sums that are based around their  lives and culture, gaining this information from what our students tell us and from their recounts. We also make up problems about celebrations in their cultures. Our children also have the ability to celebrate their culture during the language weeks that are celebrated in New Zealand. The first week back at school, next term is Fijian language week and we have a Fijian family coming in to assist the classes to learn about the Fijian culture. We have already celebrated Samoan, Tongan, Maori and Arabic Language weeks as well as Matariki.

While we do a great job in celebrating our students' cultural identity I think we could probably do more about understanding indigenous knowledge. There are only a few teachers who have opted for the TESSOL diploma. I found the paper about bilingualism very informative. What people don't fully understand is what Cummins calls the 'common underlying proficiency' idea, where the first language has a rich base and ideas learnt in one language can be transferred to the second language- it does not have to be re-learnt. So in  the classroom we should encourage students to develop their skills in their first language and give them incentives to use their first language in the classroom in order to learn concepts in their second language. Our children come into our class with great knowledge, we as teachers need to plan for this transference of knowledge. 

It is very important that we know our students prior knowledge and build on that.

References

Cummings, J. (1992). Teaching for transfer: Challenging the two solitudes assumption in 
          bilingual education. In J.C. a N.H. Hornberger (Ed). Encyclopedia of language and 
         education (2nd ed). Boston. MA: Springer Science

Gay, G. (2002). Preparing for culturally responsive teaching. Journal of Teacher Education, 
        53(2), 106-116 

Edtalks. (2012, September 23) A culturally responsive pedagogy of relations. [video file]. 
        Retrieved from https://vimeo.com/49992994

Contemporary Issues or Trends

Doing the readings in this activity reminded me of my brother is so many ways.
The first is how technology has changed in our lives- when my brother was four years old, my mother took us to her work at the bank. She was a teller and in those days everything was done by hand. She was in the process of being trained on the computer. Her boss took us to see this amazing computer. It took up the whole room and had a variety of flashing lights, and all my brother wanted to know was, where the screws were. We were removed from the room very quickly. In those days computers where huge and slow, now they are incredibly small and incredibly fast and the speed of technology growth is mind boggling. The other thing that I am reminded about him is how he struggled at school and just was not interested, today he manages control system designs and system configurations. As a primary school kid he scraped through each year, junior  high was a bit better, but when he hit the last two years of high school everything came together and he passed his final year with 6 distinctions. For him it was electronics that was the light bulb. Sir Ken Robinson talks about divergent thinkers- well I think that four year old who wanted to know what made the computer work didn't fit into the "production line mentality of the schooling system he had to go through. How many of the students in our classrooms are like that four year old? What can we do to engage those students?

I totally agree with Sir Ken Robinson, as I did five years ago, we need to change the paradigms. But now I have a better understanding of 21 century learning and the skills our students will need. We need to shift the focus to student-centred learning, fostering our students' strengths and interests.ERO (2012). The trend I am going to discuss is collaborative learning.

Sir Ken Robinson talks about how children are better at some things and not others, some children like to work in smaller groups rather than larger groups or on their own. He claims most learning happens in groups and that collaboration is the stuff of growth. I have introduced collaborative learning in my classroom this year, as part of wanting to shift the paradigm and also as our school is doing communities of mathematical inquiries.  The collaborative approach focuses on four principles:  the learner at the centre, interaction and doing, working together and solving problems. I have found this to work for most of the children in my class as instead of sitting on their own thinking of ideas and generally getting very little done, if they have some one to discuss ideas with and produce a joint piece of work, I get better quality from my students.It also frees me up to act as a guide and to interact with my students and guide their thinking. It also allows children to learn from each other. I have moved from grouping the children myself to allowing them to choose their own groups. I have an arrangement in my classroom where there is no set seating. Students can choose who to work with. After reading  about seating in the NMC Horizon Report (2015) I will improve this  by introducing the idea of who can "help their learning not harm it" and tie it in with our school motto of "value yourself and value your learning". I can impress the idea of being responsible for their own learning. All new ideas I am working on this year. 

Our notes on collaboration in DCL discussed how traditional schooling does not prepare students well for the work place. In today's word business  projects often require collaboration across companies. (21st Century leaning design). So when planning for collaboration- teachers need to make sure the tasks given have shared responsibilities where all children make decisions together about the problem, after discussing pros and cons, and their work is interdependent. It would be a good idea to let children work across classes too, maybe even across schools.



References

Education Review Office. (2012). Evaluation at a glance: Priority Learners in New Zealand 
       Schools.    Retrieved  from http://www.ero.govt.nz/About-Us/News-Media-Release...

ITL Research. 21CLD Learning Activity Rubrics. Microsoft Partners in learning. Retrieved
          from https://app.themindlab.com/media/19751/view 

New Media Consortium. (2015). NMC Horizon report: 2015 K-12 Edition Retrieved from 
           http://cdn.nmc.org/media/2015-nmc-horizon-report-k12-EN.pdf

The RSA. (2010). RSA Animate- Changing Education Paradigms.[video file]. Retrieved from
           https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U