Exploring Science thru Newsboard

Last Wednesday Anne Barker Project Leader (Primary Science Education) Te Toi Tupu came into Whetu and modeled a Newsboard rich in literacy and science. The article she shared was Mystery Lake in Tunisian Desert Causes Both Joy and Concern from the Dogo News Site. The Achievement Aim she drew from was Understanding about Science and the purpose of the session was exploring the process of science and science capabilities. 

My AHA moment was the realisation that there is observing and inferring and the use of questions to clarify thinking. By teasing out observation and inference the learners thinking was challenged and they became more aware of what they were thinking. I had never put much thought into observing and inferring being different but also part of one another and then wondered how often I have used both to explain when I really should have been focusing on one.

I began to think more about

• the way in which I question...why? what if?  How do you know that? What makes you think so? How could you check that?
• the language I use...expressive, topic specific or scientific 
• how I can use questioning to challenge thinking What is your evidence?
• using graphic organisers more effectively through learner purpose and choice.Learners choose the best graphic organiser suited the purpose, evaluating whether worked and why.

As a team we valued the way Anne challenged our learners thinking in a supported environment and was a great model of doing this in a way that was not threatening but encouraging.

This has happened!

Priority No. 2

Learning Dispositions - What are these? What do they look like? What do they look like for us?

This last week as part of our PLD programme we had a Skype session with Sarah Martin, Foundation Principal of Stonefields School. She led us through what she has been building with her school in terms of Learning Dispositions. A lot of knowledge gathering and idea developing was done through reading research from Art Coster, Guy Claxton, Dreyfus and John Edwards. Students were interviewed: 

What do you do when you are stuck as a learner? and What makes a Powerful Learner? 

The results were eye opening and offered up many questions as to what powerful learning looked like and how teachers were making a difference.

From here the school explored what it learner qualities looked like and through a series of PLD came up with

• Be Self Aware
• Wonder
• Think
• Connect
• Be Determined
• Question
• Reflect

Within each of these Learner Qualities is an easy to follow progression. Underpining this is the importance of Foundation Literacies in able to learn and relationships!

I realised that I had explored this path a few years ago with my then Year 4 class. My point of reference then was "Building Learning Power in Action" by Sarah Gornall, Maryl Chambers and Guy Claxton. I have found the text and am reading it again! Next I will build my understanding and knowledge more by reading material that is shared with us by Sarah Martin and Daniel Birch (Hobsonville Point Primary School).

Long Time No See!

As you can see from the title it has been a while! A lot has been happening this year, this crazy ride doesn't seem to stop nor would I want it to...
The highlight of the year so far would have to be the #edchatnz conference at Hobson Point Schools. Wow - what an experience! All of our team (Whetu) and Whenua were immersed in another world for two days. We made the most of the opportunity to meet face to face the educational 'nuts' that we have had twitter conversations with on various themes. Dare I say it, but Saturday was even better than Friday. MissDtheteacher was the lone nut who, with a small dedicated group of follower nuts pulled off a two day conference! There were a variety of speakers, workshops and even a Political debate!

To make our lives easier we created a doc to record our ponderings and wonderings as well as tweeting up a storm with 'aha' moments. There was a lot of discussion around each breakout and ways we could grow this at NPS.
WHETU

• Developing our Whetu Trust license - lanyard with areas etc that learner was allowed access.
• Learning on Top - Simple list of learning tasks that had to be completed, then there was the Negotiated list.
• In/out board that had each area learners could be. Moved name across so everyone knew where they were - building independence.
• “Supported”, Self Managing”, “Self Directed” learners placed themselves accordingly which enabled next steps.
• Creating a corner nook, separated by positioning furniture.
• Lowering the roof level (?!) to create an intimate safe space.
• Building on Impact, consciously using immersion (HPPS) to build understanding and knowledge (ie, trips, guest speakers, collaborative planning, designing, etc) Trips don’t need to be a huge RAMS thing but we need to utilise this.
• Get Kidsedchats up and going again!

---

• Evaluations of the first few days - sort of like the form we did but could do one earlier in the year?
• Alan November - Who owns the learning?
• The first few days, and the last! Ending well.

---

• Dispositions - Marama team (Karla)
• Peer tutoring
• PEEL paragraph - Point Explain Example Link. Teaching science students to put their knowledge on paper
• Learning dispositions - what are these? Need to know more!
• pbl - Make a difference, be authentic, opportunities to learn, everyone involved - keep it real!
• pbl - How can we use our design brief to tell our story so that it has clarity and relevance?
• pbl - We need to develop our own pbl rubric relevant to our learners and the big picture
• Use buckets to store their gear - easy transport!
• Show work in progress
• Edtalks - how to hack a classroom Anne?
• Bottle bivy

---

• Need some help developing questioning techniques - Anne is really good at this...
• Getting things started - using an image - football world cup example - woman in the dumpster. Generating questions around this.
• After going on a trip use playdough to re make the scene/environment. Could be interesting to do with River Boys comparing stream to Piako.
• BLOGs - getting our blogs up and going, dedicate time in team meetings
• Reverse mentoring - fresh eyes, critical friend to challenge, share, set goals and develop ideas How can we develop this in Whetu - use of Anne/ MK? (Separate to appraisal)
• Whiteboard paper stuck down centre of table??? Warehouse Stationery!
• Don’t use ‘No’ use ‘Yes and...’ Yes, that’s a good idea and…’ add to the solution.

• Booktrack Classroom -investigate further, could be used to add a dimension to Passage Picker in Book CLub. Option - take the same passage and everyone in the book club adds their music choices. Katie has set up a Whetu A/c all book clubs will be entered on her email account.
• Other…
• HPPS - planning 2-3 weeks ahead so it stayed relevant and learner focused. We feel we do this much better than we used to, listening to student voice - passions and wants.
• The Secret Literacy - David Didau

Once back at school...

What we have initiated!

1. Work in progress (art on the wall)
2. Katie is having technical difficulties with BookTrack, has emailed them about this. We are going to include BookTrack in our Book Club roles.
3. Developing questioning - Anne came in and modeled the Newsboard, continuing with questioning in our Newsboards.
4. Reverse Mentoring- have asked for fresh eyes on our programmes (Anne, MK) and will delve into feedback, set new goals etc.

 Our Next 5 Priorities:

1. Whetu Trust License - develop criteria for what this looks like in Whetu (gather a working party together - the smarties, who can lead and come back to main group) TAB
2. Learning Dispositions (Powerful Learning) Karla & Team Marama 
3. Learning Space, work with what we have a lot more. Using sheer drapery to break visual lines. Creating smaller areas within the large. (Use them to create a breakout space illusion) Katie to investigate sheers. 
4. Kidsedchats Holly
5. Develop our Impact Rubric. Whetua

Discovering the world of Twitter!

As part of my journey beyond my comfort zone in every way you can imagine - I am now a follower of Twitter discovering a wealth of educational observations and thinking that will impact on my world.  I am a follower of Claire Amos and my Principal - Neil Fraser.

My eyes have been opened to the resources out there - people and things. Of note this week have been Blended Classroom where Framing, Showing What You Know and Peer Tutoring are outlined - 'stuff' we know as teachers but forget to reflect on. My goal for the nest three weeks is to make sure I implement these ideas.

From a Tweet from Claire Amos I read a post from Lea Vellenoweth's Blog - "Into the Future - Teaching and Learning" where she talked about Big Picture Education happening at Hobson Point Secondary School. From this blog posting I have ordered a book - 'One Kid at a Time - Big Lessons from a Small School'. I am hoping that this text can help clarify my thinking about where we are wanting to go in our school.

Whew, Week 6 already!

It is hard to believe it is the beginning of Week 7! Time to reflect on what has been a pretty crazy first 6 weeks at school.

What were once a library, Room 14 and Room 12 are now three classrooms joined together, maybe not physically but in thinking. This was life at the start of the year in Whetu where all of the Year 5 and 6s are together in one area. We have the 'Hub' where most of the collaborative learning takes place; it is also our largest space. The 'Hui' room is where we meet as a team and has spaces available for small group and individual learning and then we have the QZ (Quiet Zone) which is just that - a quiet space to learn or have teacher meetings. It took a while for the students to get used to the expectations in each area but there has been improvement as the students realise the importance of which space they learn in and why.

I am enjoying working collaboratively with Holly and Brenda, who have strengths in different areas and are as keen to share and learn as I am. Brenda is our maths lead, Holly our writing lead and I am the reading lead. We also pick up other curriculum areas that are our strengths so the planning load is shared which makes a difference to our time. Focusing on one area such as Stage 6 maths, or Early Level 3 in writing means that you get an in-depth understanding of what is required for next steps and achievement.

An addtional positive we have found is that we are also able to carry the load of our High needs students whether behaviour or learning  - it’s not just weighing on one person’s shoulders and this allows us the opportunity to step back and view from different angles to best help our students.

Newsboard - Organ Donation

What started out as a Newsboard session has exploded into it's own Inquiry! All thanks to a video shared with me from Anne Barker (Primary Science Facilitator)  - Somebody That I'll Never Know (Gotye parody) Organ Donation which led to a discussion around organ donation. They were hooked! From here we discussed key points from  NZ Future Problem Solving around organ donation in the year 2025. After a lot of cruising the Internet searching up interesting information around organ donation we were ready for our next task - Anne brought in a teaching manikin AND the major organs from a beast (heart, lungs, kidneys, and bronchial tube) which the students dissected with Anne's dissection kit.

From here we looked at the news report of  Dad uses 3D printer to make his son a prosthetic hand  and the possibilities this could open up. WOW! Students also contacted ODNZ (Organ Donor New Zealand) about the process of donating an organ and receiving an organ. They are keen to send along an expert to speak with us!

Our next visitor was the recipient of a heart 14 years ago - the students had some very interesting questions for her...What did the surgeons tell you about your operation? What was your greatest fear having a transplant? Do you know anything about the person who donated their heart?

The students were totally focused during her visit - one of the biggest thoughts to come from this was how important your attitude is...just like life in general!

I'm not sure where this will go at this stage, in the time we have left this term but am thinking that organ donation awareness within our community could be our making a difference.

Term 3 - better late than never!

Where has the time gone?!
Term 3 was busy with assessments, literacy, mathematics and Inquiry.
There was some nice growth in Probe reading results, GLoSS and PAT Maths which was great for the students and the work they had put into their learning.

Short and sweet!