Showing posts with label equity in learning. Show all posts
Showing posts with label equity in learning. Show all posts

Thursday, 24 October 2019

Manaiakalani Wananga -2019




A two day journey through the impact that Manaiakalani has in education.

'The Manaiakalani Programme'

Digital Fluency / Accelerated Outcomes

An intentional, focused, evidence-based programme to support your community of learning move from the analogue world to the digital world 

Increasing teacher effectiveness and accelerating learning outcomes in this digital environment.



Day One ... we visited two schools on the Manaiakalani Journey ... seeing children in action.

"Desperation into Admiration" - the future for our children

This is the difference that comes for Manaiakalani being involved in our community, our learning, our education!

How fortunate are we to be a part of this outreach programme that is changing lives, adding value and making the world a better place for all learners.

Through Manaiakalani we not only make the future for our learners brighter yet ours also! 

Young people who are:
“confident, connected, actively involved, lifelong learners”
NZC 2017

Who are instructional Leaders?
'All who exercise influence to make a positive difference'
Vivianne Robinson 2011

'Learn, Create, Share'
Our mantra that is the focus of our delivery in the class to make learning for the children more authentic and to increase student agency!
It is through this model that my own learning and skill in ICT for the betterment of my teaching world, my learning world and my personal world is developing!

SHMOOSHED - A new word that means just as it sounds.

With the support of the partnership between Manaiakalani and Wolf Fisher we have the benefit of gather, sharing and analysing data in such a way that we can build on and improve the learning outcomes for all students. Together we can learn to make the most of all learning opportunities.

From the data gathered overtime the investigation into BEST practice is now benefiting us all! The breakdown of the data- the findings have assisted us in identification of these elements that make the difference to not just learning yet acceleration.

Just as we set deliberate acts of learning for our students we can also foster this for our teachers in order to make change and to increase acceleration and achievement for our students. Manaiakalani and Wolf Fisher have identified the strengths and weaknesses across our cluster and it now our responsibility to respond to this proactively and to change our practice. Robust discussions in our schools and across our cluster will support this change.

This statement may seem logical yet is it intentionally part of my daily teaching? If not it soon will be!!


Collaboration ... must be part of the reading process and reading is a language based activity and discussion will strengthen the outcomes! 
Student Agency- learners selecting the text to read and the way they will share their findings increases engagement which will increase ability.


A HUGE bonus today was our opportunities to talk in groups across not only clusters yet also the regions ... this has been very powerful to bring to light where we are at in our clusters and that we share the same challenges and having them openly discussed and solutions offered has been so valuable ... learning from clusters that a five years down the track is brilliant
Image result for reading strategiesAs in writing ... when our focus moved from teaching surface features to focusing on the deep features acceleration occurred ... we now need to shift our teaching focus in reading the same way. Is this the time to increase mine and other teachers understanding of  Reading ... to unpack it just as we did for writing, to develop the language of reading ... to move away from teaching to the level to teaching to the need ... to also ignite our own passion for reading.

T-Shaped Reading is a researched initiative that is well supported as BEST practice by Manaiakalani and supported by Wolf Fisher research data.

Thank goodness Manaiakalani is rewindable as we were given the privileged of listening to innovative teachers that are excelling in their delivery! Each delivery ... 6 minutes long!

MIT- Manaiakalani Innovative Teachers

What do I feel has possibly been lost over time that supports learning and acceleration?

  • The Tuakana-Teina philosophy - the planned and formal inclusion of this has faded in our school yet can it be just as powerful when we foster and encourage it as a way of being in our school and for us to encourage the philosophy across the school in order to build relationships, develop confidence and mana within all our students across the curriculum.
  • Ubiquitous"presence everywhere or in many places simultaneously."
  • Provocation - 'something that stimulates' ... excitement, instigation, incitement

Investigate ... 
SOLO - 
DIMIC - Developing the Mathematics Inquiry Community ... NZMATHS

Let's celebrate brave and committed leadership

We are not here to keep you happy in your misery

Pat Snedden

Instructional Leadership

What am I going to do as a leader to make shifts happen?
How am I going to lead our teachers to make the change to accelerate achievement?


Raise teacher understanding so that they rekindle their passion for doing what we love ... increase our pedagogy. 

Today has inspired me to believe more in what we can do as a teaching profession through collaboration with our colleagues.

"Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much." – Helen Keller

Sunday, 20 October 2019

Visible Learning ... Mind Frames


Improving Practice through Mind-Frames

John Hattie's mind frames have supported me in unpacking my beliefs I hold as a teacher and a leader.

John Hattie believes “that teachers and school leaders who develop these ways of thinking are more likely to have major impacts on student learning.

The presentation below is how I see myself as a teacher, leader and coach.

Friday, 17 May 2019

DFI - The Final Frontier - Week Nine

Revision

Today was all about reviewing the distance traveled after Nine INTENSIVE weeks of ICT learning. The Manaiakalani kaupapa of making learning visible, rewindable and equitable has certainly been reflected for me in the past few weeks as I have built up to taking on an exam.

I was able to use the skills that this DFI has taught me to view youtube, rewind skills taught in prior focuses and to save information all in readiness to sit the Google Level One exam! While not achieving the exam this time I am certainly close enough to had a resit in 14 days time. The challenge was real and my efforts stellar!!

I have learnt that learning is never ending and with the support of GOOGLE and a network of colleagues every challenge is achievable ... if not at first most certainly soon after!!

I learnt that the struggle is where the learning takes place and it is through the struggle that we achieve. It has been too long since I was last challenged in the way that I expect my learners to be challenged and this was a good feeling and a timely reminder how good ... no great ... achieving feels after the struggle!!

The skills I have learnt in applying the different tools and apps to assist me in keeping order in a busy life have been invaluable. Thanks to a fantastic SMART phone support, advice, planning, assessment and lists is never far away. Sharing across many devices and with teaching colleagues life is certainly much SMARTER!
 These pictures are a reflection from last weeks learning where I introduced my class of 5 year olds to CODING UNPLUGGED! Such fun ... I could see so many curriculum skills being covered as well as collaboration and communication. The list of learning skills was endless!!

A HUGE thank you to our fabulously patient and knowledgeable facilitators Maria, Amie, Step and Herman. Meeting new faces and learning partners has also been a highlight of the DFI experience!!


Friday, 10 May 2019

Computational Thinking ... Where will it take ME?

My Digital Journey

Magic Moments at 

Gisborne Mindlab


Getting my head around the new 'Digital Technology Curriculum' for me is a NOW step. Fortunately we have supported PLD through Cognition. 

Listening to Dorothy share with us today of the challenges of equity across our communities is such an eye opener every time. The positives today is thanks to being able to connect digitally we are able to keep our communities connected no matter where they be!

Digital devices are so much more than a tool! They are windows to the world!! Keyboards to collaboration and connection!

The Mindlab

What a fabulous space The Mindlab is to work in. Great to revisit and reconnect. This time round I feel much more digitally proficient and the new learning shared made so much more sense!! I was able to listen to and learn new skills and then adapt them to suit my age group so look our Room 7 Makauri School ... we will be learning to code!!

Playing KAHOOT! was a real heart pounder ... not a good thought when the Google Level One exam is 3 hours of STRESS!!!

Practicing Coding with real live ROBOTS. To achieve this successfully with 5yr olds I would tape the grid on the floor, provide left and right arrows to assist with not knowing left and right while they are learning this. We will explore coding using our Duplo blocks too.

'Lightbot' is an app for the ipad to teach children the beginning of programming. Great for covering the Mathematical terms for left,  right, 1/4 turn and 1/2 turn.


Such fun collaborating with a friend ... risk taking and applying new skills is so much easier!!

My first steps to begin the learning of coding is introduce the concept through materials in our room. Creating a grid on the carpet and one on the wall are places I am going to start ... watch this space as I will post pictures of our progress!!

Booking times with The Mindlab for our class is the plan for Term 3 !!
A great step to wean me from Manaiakalani and to keep my skills rolling!!

Next Week ... Google Level One Certification time!!



Friday, 29 March 2019

DFI - Daring to Dabble with Devices

Digitally Smart- Cyber Smart ... skills for life!

The Cyber Smart curriculum enables us to learn the skills to keep ourselves. When we teach learners to be Cyber Smart it takes away the opportunity to be UNKIND to others.
Using the Cyber Smart slides we explored the importance of Being Cyber Smart. Using Screencastify I created a video to share the learning around our 'Digital Footprint'.
Thanks to my new learning skills becoming part of who I am I now as I am more confident with HTML i have embedded my video, moved it around and added breaks.


Our online footprint ... what is my profile like? Watch this clip below to see how we would explore this with our students at school.





Hapara


A fabulous way to ease the monitoring and managing of students on devices. I can see current work, shared work, stored work and where the children have been on devices both at home and school Emails can be seen, passwords reset for the children and group emails sent to the children. This is a service that will support me once I have moved into 1-1 Devices with my class on ipads. This is tool I can see will enable me as a teacher to ensure that my students are being Cyber Smart! I will also be able to see all the children' ipads at once on my screen so at a glance can see where they are all working. I will be able to see their folders also to ensure that they have saved their work accurately.
The image below is a little something to think about and reinforces the purpose behind all our students using Chrome Books and encouraged by Manaiakalani. Manaiakalani carry out trials in classroom to ensure that we are using the best and most up-to-date devices! 

Explain Everything

This is an app for our ipads that I have been wanting to become more familiar with as it is highly recommended by Manaiakalani as a tool for Years 1-3 to use to share their thinking. I believe as I become more confident in this app that I will be able to create activities for the children to work with during learning time.


In my personal life gaining the knowledge and supporting information provided by Manaiakalani in SLIDES around Cyber Smart will help me to check my digital footprint and ensure that I am portrayed in a professional manner. 
I am also very excited about the fact that I am gaining the skills and practices of the Learn, Create, Share with Manaiakalani ahead of time before 2020 when my students and I will be supported in the 1-1 Device Programme.

Friday, 15 March 2019

DFI - Connecting with Each Other


Connecting with Each Other

Today my skills with google drawings increased as has my understanding of and ability ... you will notice this wee gem I created on google drawings has been added to this blog. Manaiakalani's kaupapa is all about empowering, challenging and added value to our personal and professional lives digitally and now after 3 sessions I am beginning to feel a little more accomplished!

Thanks to the assistance of a passionate blogging colleague I am also acquiring the skills to begin personalising my blog which I am now becoming more connected to.

I am beginning to add to my google slides skills in which I am creating my digital pepeha. I have added this below so you can see I am very basic at this stage. The great thing about everything connecting is that as I work on impact for my Digital Pepeha in drive it will also update here ... now isn't that clever!!



My challenge that I am continuing to solve is how best to communicate with my families and the purpose of BLOGGING!!
Til next week team...

Monday, 29 October 2018

Box Four of The Fourth Box


To enhance engagement add student voice and student choice ...