First Assignment for Mindlab

For our first Mindlab Assessment we were asked to "identify, justify and plan a digital and collaborative learning innovation applied to a specific area of your practice." This then had to be submitted in a video format in 6-8 minutes. 

This task was more challenging than I had first anticipated... I did a lot of professional readings and so when it came time to get all of my ideas down I had so much to say! 

The challenge that I identified in my practise was lack of students originality and creativity while completing learning tasks. I was aware that students were sometimes scaffolded too much and really wanted to look into ways I could challenge them to be more creative. 
Research shows that Problem Based Learning and Collaboration are two ways to increase creativity. I also came up with an idea around using learning questions instead of using learning outcomes to also increase critical thinking and engagement. 

Here is my slide deck and below is my video presentation. (Don't you hate listening to your own voice! I sure do!)

In reflection I am aware that I did not explain my plan in enough detail for someone else to understand it... but I did well anyway and thought that I would share it with you so you could all see my thinking behind my first assignment... 

I am using Cybersmart Buddies to increase collaboration, have used the learning question to turn my lesson into a problem that needs to be solved and am challenging the students to share their own unique voice for something that is an identified problem in their community. Let's see how successful this will be over the term! Look out for students projects being uploaded to their blogs on the twitter feed here. 

Next steps from Data 2018

Well... this year has taken off and we are already in week 7! It has been a while since my last post and I apologise. We were super fortunate to have the Woolf Fischer Research Team down to present our data from 2018 and give us an indication of areas we are doing well in and others that we need to improve in. WFRT also gave us some areas of inquiry for this year - which I will talk about below. 

Pockets of Promise: 

Writing
Students from year 0-1 are making accelerated progress and are getting close to meeting the National Norms after their first year! Well done Junior Teachers!

On average all students in writing made more than norm progress.

In three schools students ended the year with achievement higher than national norm.

Over two years (2016-2017) all students are still making more than expected progress in Writing.

On average our boys are making more progress than our girls in Writing.

All ethnicities made accelerated progress.

Future Focus/ Next steps:

Reading

50/50 split between students making accelerated progress and low achievement in Reading.

We are still making progress in Reading, just not enough progress - not the same amount as the National Norm. This is an area to look into as it is unusual to have higher Writing achievement than Reading. How can we accelerate progress in this area? Is critical thinking an area that needs to be developed for students to be successful in this area?

Math

In general Students across all ages are (1 year) below the National Norm in Maths. We need to accelerate this in order to make progress. When looking into ethnicity Pasifika and Maori are on average 2 years below the National Norm - Why is this?

This is a great place to start for our inquires this year. The researchers always have me leaving with more questions. It is positive to have such clear information and data to think about.

I guess you will just have to wait and see which area I plan on focusing in on this year!

Chapter One - Creative Schools - Ken Robinson

At the end of last year I was very fortunate to be gifted the book "Creative Schools" by Ken Robinson. It has been sitting on my desk waiting to be read for a while now, and finally I have the opportunity to open it. I thought it would be a good idea to reflect upon each chapter as I uncover new thoughts and ideas. 

So here is Chapter One - Back to Basics. 

The beginning of the chapter went back over the importance of students relationships and how really knowing your learners makes such a huge difference to their (and your) attitude to learning. In my new role, I am working with a large range of learners and am finding it really difficult to connect with all of them. I know that this is something that I should work on more, and am hoping that I can connect with them through their blogs - as this gives me a larger timeframe to work in. I also need to work on connecting with the staff I am working with, making time to talk to them informally about what really matters to them... I feel an afternoon tea coming on! haha! 

The chapter then goes on to talk about the political nature of Education and the theory behind standardisation lifting society. By understanding where these people come from and seeing their idealistic point of view, we can assume that this is a theory that may work. But hold on, we are not all the same, so how can any test show what we are truely capable of? 


"Healthy economies depend on people having good ideas for new business and the ability to grow them and create employment." 
if schools were a business we would not say the customer was failing. It is the system that is failing not the students.