ICT over 2012

This year got off to a great start with the Learning @ Schools Conference to gather lots of new ideas to use in the classroom.
Etherpad (a collaborative writing tool) is one thing I learnt about at the conference and have enjoyed using. It has really motivated my students to write and helped other more capable students step into a leadership role, while others have gained from having additional modelling.
It has been awesome to have a year with the netbooks and these have become integrated into my programmes. Planned for during reading, writing and maths time. Netbooks have become a huge hit in the class and I have had to roster the kids on for a morning each so that all the resources are fairly shared around because they are so popular.
I have become more confident in using my teaching station this year. Setting challenges before school for the kids to jump on the mobi and add a caption to the photo, or do a number of the day.
Next year I am fortuante enough to be heading to the Thinking Conference so I will no doubt be inspired again with new goals for 2013.


STEPS FOR NEXT YEAR
-I would like to continue using my interactive teaching station more particuarly in literacy. I would like to integrate writing using it by having a sentence starter up in the morning and getting students to add a sentence or so each before school and then bring it back up during writing time so that everyone has contributed to our story.
I started using it more for my spelling programme this year and would like to continue this in the mornings having blends up and getting the kids to write as many words as they can think of using that blend/diagraph/word family. Then using the highligher tool to highlight the chunk.

-I haven't really used the i-pod touch that is available in the Middle Syndicate to use and I would like to see how this tool can further motivate my students.

-Train experts up in all areas (with new Year 3 students coming through) so that the kids can go to a voice thread expert, photo expert (to upload a photo to a blog) etc.

-Get kids confident in using a range of tools and become confident in asking to use them for a particular purpose.

-Use the easispeak with my less confident writers so that they can get their ideas down and then replay them to write, before losing their thoughts.

Interwrite- how it is working in the class

One of my goals with interwrite was to get the kids using the mobi pad more so that when they are using it at maths/reading/writing time they are confident and not spending half their time trying to use the tool.
Below are some examples of the children learning to use the mobi pad in the mornings before school.
Spelling looking at 'un' and what words we could make with it.

A maths number of the day where kids had to show how they could make the number 95.

And for writing we created similes using the tough as nails comparison.

Interwrite Session

With all the new exciting technology in the classroom it is important not to forget about the teaching station in my classroom. I use it lots as a projector and always have but the challenge is to use it for MORE than just projecting.
I love that when a child doesn't know what an animal looks like for example you can just jump on the laptop and pop it up on the screen for them all to see and really get feeling for what you are talking about.
I have been incorporating it more into my rotations lately (maths/reading/writing). I find the children do need to practice using the mobi pad and where to put the pen as they can sometimes accidently rub out their work. But like anything it just needs practice and this means me providing them with the opportunities to practice. Perhaps having it up in the morning with different learning tasks eg: adding a simile to the chart, could mean that they are using the technology in an educational way and are practicing using it.
Some ways I have recently used it are; with a maths group to look in a fun way at before and after numbers. I have used it in reading to collaboratively work together on finding the main idea. In writing we have used it to model creating an emotion poem.

The kids love working on the teaching station but I do find I need to have a leader as there can otherwise be fights over the pen and controlling it.
My challenge now I guess is to try to use it for at least one maths/reading/writing session each day.
I need to also look at ways to use it for spelling.
The key to the teaching station is to make it interactive and like many forms of technology the more you play the more creative you can be with it.
Perhaps another challenge of mine could be to try and share once a week/once every two weeks a new way I have used techonology in my class??

Promise Jar

Well the promise jar has been a success!
On Monday we started the week by coming up together with our classroom goal and how we would achieve this. Then we sat in a circle to share what we were going to work hard on with our behaviour to put in the promise jar. What a great day we were all able to have, the kids really responded to this circle time and talking and I guess giving them a chance to think about and acknowledge the behaviour that sometimes gets them into trouble because they have completed their work or they are distracting other etc.
Some examples of comments that went inside the jar were...
-I will be kind and I will get my work finished on time.
-I'll be nice and friendly and responsible for what I do.
-Be a good role model and I won't break any of the Golden Rules.
-I will follow the Golden Rules and be responsible for others to learn.
(Just for time, as the children went around and shared their promise I wrote their name at the top of the page and their promise).
Yes there were still times where I had to remind some children that they might have to look at their promise again on the whole I was very impressed!
While this week is set to be another busy one and the weather will mean a lot of indoor lunchtimes I am confident that it will be a good week :-)
Below are a few pictures of our class goal and promise jar.

 

Busy Term+New Student=Circle Time

This term has been a busy one so far and is only about to get more hectic!
My class had our class assembly in Week 4. We have started production rehearsals, we have performed our  Kapa Haka and dances to parents, we have had cross country practices which has all led to the usual timetable been somewhat thrown out the window.
All week I found myself getting frustrated that I had limited time to squeeze the reading, writing and maths into the day and that when it came time to do these things the kids were often off task, loud, calling out on the mat and it felt as though they had forgotten all the things we had worked hard on building.
Getting a new student on Monday I had talked to the kids about being role models and demonstrating the correct behaviour for our new student and gone over the reflection book and room and what these meant.
But by Thursday night I knew I had to think of a different way to approach things as the kids were still rowdy and I could feel myself becoming quickly annoyed by their behaviour.
As a result we started Friday morning off by talking in pairs about what is expected in Room 11 behaviour wise. We then shared these ideas back to the class. We re-visited our Golden Rules and looked at examples of what these meant. Then we sat in  a circle and made a promise to work on one way we would make today a good day. (That might have meant putting our hand up to talk, or being focused on our work etc).
I explained that I knew their normal routine had been interrupted lately but that we had to be resilient and flexible to change and remember to work really hard when it was time for learning.
This set a great tone for the day and the kids got off to work well and yes it did really cut into the morning but I think it was important to take that step back for everyone to have a reminder. Because if learning time had continued it wasn't the most productive anyway so half an hour-three quarters of an hour I am hoping will more than pay its dues with the kids work habits.
There were still times during group work that I had to remind students of what they promised today and I did still use the reflection book when students had been reminded several times. But I feel that on the whole the day was a lot more enjoyable for me and therefore must have also been more enjoyable and satisfying for the kids too.
Come Monday I plan to let the kids share their weekend news in small groups like normal to get it off their chest and then we will have another quick refresh of the Golden Rules and making another quick promise.
Perhaps I set up a promise jar?? Then when children are not living up to their promise I can tell them to go to the jar and read their promise rather than have me harp on reminding them. (Maybe this will be more effective? And a constant reminder that they can refer back to when they need re-focusing).
Having had the addition of a new student has highlighted how far the kids have come with the restorative process which is pleasing to see. And while their behaviour hasn't always been perfect this week they have still been quick to remind our new student of how we behave and what is and isn't acceptable in our classroom. Which I think shows their respect, ownership and pride for their classroom environment and that they do want to get on and learn.

Maths Symposium

In the holidays I attended the maths symposium, I was lucky to have quite a bit of PD around maths last year in my first year of teaching and this provided me with another boost and way to look at my maths programme. Two of the three workshops I attended were all for integration of maths. They talked about how many of us will teach addition subtraction for the first seven weeks then multiplication and division for the next seven, always beginning the year with statistics and so on. But why? Why do we have to start the year with statistics? Shouldn't it be brought in throughout the year when it actually fits, when kids can engage in a more powerful statstical investigation than how many people in the class have brown eyes etc. In my first workshop the teacher was all for fully integrating maths. She would select her big idea (often one driven by the kids interest, she would pose the question to the kids what do you want to learn about)? She would then brainstorm all of the maths that linked into that big idea (INCLUDING ALL STRANDS) to become more than just creating word problems around the big idea. Because "REAL LIFE IS A PROBLEM TO SOLVE."
She gave us one example to look at that she had used with a Year 5/6 class who were heading to camp. She asked them what they would have to prepare and get ready for going away. Naturally the kids came up with the maths they needed to use and highlighted areas that needed teaching. Questions like what will we have for dinner? Deciding to have burgers one night they had to do the costings (working with money) then the butcher might give them the price in kg's rather than a set price so they have to work out how many kg's of meat they have and how much it costs per kg to work out what their quantity will cost etc. The distance (measurement) from school to camp and how long the travel time is to book the bus etc. She would have what she called teaching clinics where if children had to learn a particular skill/strategy to work out their problem she would bring that group together for explicit teaching to happen. Meaning the teaching was relevant to what they were doing at the time. I can see how this would increase children's buy in particularly for students who often don't see the relevance of what we are teaching. Also if they are using the skills they are naturally getting the practice needed to consolidate a new skill.
I can see this idea of integration working really well. However I am a bit nervous about the fact that each group might be responsible for a different part and therefore if you are not on the dinner team you might not learn about weight and using kg/g for the burger patty pricing. How do you ensure that every child gets taught every strand in a fully integrated maths programme?
During the workshop she gave us a chance to brainstorm all the different ideas we had for a big idea with a lot of us looking at the Olympics we decided to run with this big idea. The ideas we came with were;
-MEASUREMENT-distance between NZ and London
                               -times recorded eg: in swimming, running etc with split seconds
                               -time zones (NZ being ahead of England)
                               -mapping-distance between one venue and the next
                               -money-cost to get to the Olympics
-STATISTICS-most popular sports watched
                       -most popular athletes
                       -probability with medal prospects
-RATIOS/PROPORTIONS-chlorine/water ratio for the pools
                                            -decimals with the times eg: 1:12:45
-GEOMETRY-Olympic rings/shape (working with compasses)
These were the ideas that we came up with in a quick five minutes I am sure there would be more still but you can see very quickly just how much learning there is behind a big idea.
I still find it a scary thought that I am skimming over a number of areas and the children are not given time to master a skill or that particular strands or strategies are being taugh to some children but not others. So I am going to try and meet this idea of integration halfway until I become more confident in it. I have started a new thing called mailbox maths in my class where the class receives a letter from a book character that we are reading or have just read about. They pose a problem to the class to solve for them. I am going to make sure that I use a range of word problems across the various strands for these. (The idea for mailbox maths was taken from http://thefirstgradeparade.blogspot.co.nz/). I like the idea that it is teaching children to find the number problem in the word problem and share strategies being able to explain to the character who wrote the letter how we worked it out. As well as using reading skills to read the letter and writing in following the structure of a letter when replying.
I am going to use Olympic maths in my rotations. As a class we have found that the cheapest kids flight to London return is $2100. So as a reward for good behaviour I am giving out 'dollar points' to see who can reach the Olympic Games the fastest. Every second Wednesday Michelle comes into my room for BT and I usually get her to take a strand with me reinforcing it as well. This term we are looking at geometry to tie in with the Olympic ring shapes (I can see the kids doing some circle art work-praticing the skill of using a compass). To hold the interest in the Olympic games we will look at doing some statistics around our medal count and most popular athletes and sports. Some of these integrated ideas may end up beng more whole class but it still exposes children to the concepts while maintaining their numeracy projects maths.
Other things I gained from the key note speakers was the idea of letting kids wonder and then focus them n on what you want them to look at. Learning from our mistakes is a common saying but often kids are too scared to give things a go because they know it will be wrong. We need to encourage kids to put commit an idea to paper because doing something even if you know it is wrong and then working out why it is wrong may bring you to the right way of doing it and therefore the answer.
One key note speaker who was also a classroom teacher and DP talked about how he would often pose an open ended rich word story problem with three levels of the same sort of question. Children could then choose which one they wanted to tackle or may choose to do all three. I found this an interesting point as it is simliar to three level guide questions in reading. We get children to do all three in that case but they are scaffolded up to the tricker questions. I like the idea of giving children the choice as I think the more reluctant mathematicans might be more willing when they have choosen which problem they which to solve. This teacher encouraged students to have a go at solving a problem and then sharing back to the group but he gave students the opportunity to rehearse their explanation in two's or three's. When it was shared back to the group he encouraged the rest of the group to question the student sharing. He initially gave students a copy of these maths questions to train them in probing each other for more information and understanding.
-What does that number mean?
-What do you mean by...?
-Can you show us what you mean by...?
-Can you convince me...?
-Why did you...?
-How do you know it works?
-What about if you say...does that still work?
Use these words 'so,' 'if,' 'because,' and 'then' in your questions.
And lastly I really liked one problem a keynote speaker posed around fairness.
The question was 'Who is the most generous?'
KIM-Had 10 fish and give up 2 fish
KELLY-Had 10 fish and give up 3 fish (so Kelly is more generous she gave up more)

KIM-Had 8 fish and gives up 2 fish
KELLY-Had 20 fish and gives away 2 fish (so proportion wise Kelly had more to give away so Kim was more generous even though they both gave up 2 fish)

KIM-Had 20 fish and gives up 4 fish
KELLY-Had 10 fish and gives up 2 fish (so they were both as generous as each other)

KIM-Had 20 fish and gives up 5 fish
KELLY-Had 25 fish and gives up 5 fish (again despite the number of fish given up being the same Kelly had more to give away so Kim is more generous)

KIM-Had 20 fish and gives up 5 fish
KELLY-Had 25 fish and gives up 6 fish (Kelly had more to give away and gave one extra away then Kim so she is slightly more generous)

I liked this problem as it would challenge children's thinking having to justify their reasoning and understand that while some of the time they were giving up just as much as each other it wasn't always equal.

Jill Eggelton

Before the holidays I was lucky enough to attend a workshop with Jill Eggelton in our school hall. It was nice to be able to put a face to the name that so often crops up at reading time! She spoke a lot about the importance of poetry to the point of SATURATION. She considered it an integral part of the literacy programme promoting creative and critical thinking encouraging children to think and imagine as poetry "wears what it fancies." I enjoy teaching poetry both in the writing and reading sense. I find the boys I have taught like that in writing poetry they are not expected to write much. The actual craft of poetry is often more challenging then a straight recount but the length makes it seem more achieveable to most. It was interesting that she touched on having a collection of little chants or raps to perform to get children used to that natural rhyhm of a chant or rap and the rhyme found in nursery rhymes that so many children can no longer recite off by heart. At the time my class were learning about sound and gearing up for our sharing assembly with the Middle Syndicate and parents I had taught my kids a little chant
"I eat a strawberry
pop it in a bite.
Eat it with some ice-cream
oh it tastes just right!"
The reason for learning the chant was to teach the difference between beat and rhythm. So half the class clapped a steady clap to create the beat while the other half recited the chant to create the rhythm.

She used the example of the Copycat Rap which I am keen to use as much as a singing activity as a reading and listening to the rhythm of the chant activity.

Copy me cat! … Come on and rap! …

Copy that boogie … Copy that clap …

Fingers that click … And feet that tap …

Twist your tongue round the copycat rap, yeah

Rap, rap, copycat, copycat rap! …

Verse 2

Put a bit o’ rhythm … In the gap …

Be a drum machine … Pow! and Zap! …

Bounce your lips round the copycat rap, yeah

Rap, rap, copycat, copycat rap! …

Copy me cat! … Come on and rap! …

High voice

Low voice

Quiet voice

Copy me cat! … Come on and rap! …

Copy me cat! … Come on and rap! …

Copy me cat! … Come on and rap! …

OH YEAH? … We’re DONE! … OVER and OUT! …Teaching poetry does give children a love for language, they love discovering that oh the last word of each line rhymes, and in turn we expose children to the power of words.
Jill was very much for FREE VERSE over giving them a particular structure to work within the confines of. I do still think that it is important that we expose children to different styles of poetry so that they can choose when one might be appropriate for what they are writing. As well as for those students who struggle to get started often they need some structure to flow because free verse is way to broad. However I will experiment with some more free verse to get the creativity flowing. I have recently signed my class up to the literacy shed (with the idea of opening their blogs up to a wider audience) but it has some cool images that could be used to inspire poetry along with images from Worth1000.
Jill talked about having a picture/photo to inspire children to create a poem about. She then used the idea of creating a thought picture and say the photo was of a tree the children would write to them not about them.

The elements of poetry that Jill went over were;
-Rhyme-letting the words sing
-Rhythm
-Sound of words-such as alliteration, soft words, hard words, lovely words etc.
-Imagery-using personification, similes etc
-Meaning-having emotion to reach the eye, the ear and the heart
-Word order and choice-to get the most out of the limited words on the page
-Tone to bring the poem to life
-Senses-using the five senses in creating poetry

Two quotes that I really liked from her talk that I will end on are "Poetry will dance in a child's head long after the words are finished." And "Future is the past returning through another gate."

Verse 1

Etherpad

Having spent part of the term learning to write a procedure we have followed this on with writing an explanation which is along the same lines but more difficult. So knowing that my lower writers were still struggling with writing a procedure with all of the structure and instructions which are easy to follow I thought we would start off our explanations working in groups (mixed ability so that kids can learn of one another particularly the lower ones seeing from the more capable ones how it is done). We began with the topic of how milk is made. I gave each of the four groups a powerpoint which I found on http://www.farmersdairy.ca/pages/community/HowMilkIsMade.php which was awesome because it had a picture with a blurb underneath. They then had to cut each part out and create a flowchart which is a great way to plan for an explanation piece of writing. Once they had created their plan they had to use it to as a group create their group explanation beginning with a tittle, opening statement or question and then the explanation. In the class we have four netbooks so one group at a time I thought we could use etherpad to collectively write an explanation. It was cool to see that those who wouldn't generally write much in one writing lesson were wanting to play their part and loved seeing how much they were writing and what parts were theirs. It was definitely great for motivation (even for the more able writers). I managed to capture some videos of their initial thoughts which was exciting to see.

Next we did an explanation on how a tadpole turns into a frog. I found a cool template for creating their tadpole and turning it into a frog on http://teacher.scholastic.com/lessonrepro/lessonplans/profbooks/tadpole.pdf and then printed off some information on the process. From these I got some of the group to work through with me highlighting the important points while the others that are more hands on learners to create the tadpole/frog model. As a group they then created a flowchart plan from their highlighted texts. Then from their plan they created their explanation. The groups have all used great opening questions and are obviously learning from the experiences. Once the group had finished their explanations together I conferenced with the group against the tick checklists that we use in their books for different writing genres. This got them justifying that they had completed the explanation.

So next step is to write an explanation on why birds chirp and then why popcorn makes a popping sound. I have got notes for each child to highlight and put into order. From there I will get the two groups that have had a turn on etherpad to have a go at writing their own explanation and the other two groups will take their turn on etherpad working collectively with their writing. 

Appraisal Goals

Following my first visit for my appraisal Marcelle and I had a chat about my next steps when delivering my maths programme. Having netbooks in my classroom I am now integrating ICT into my reading, writing and maths programmes. BUT the reality of using technology in the classroom was witnessed in my appraisal. Unfortunately my netbooks weren't allowing me to save into favourites so I thought the next best option would be to type up the websites and save them into a word doc so that the kids could go to that copy it and paste it into the URL space. For some students this was no trouble and away they went but for others it was a difficult task navigating their way around. Spending time struggling on their own to sort it out rather than move onto the next task I had allocated or asking another person in their group meant they wasted some of their learning time. Hence one of my goals was to establish netbook experts. I thought it was important to have experts for each group this way we don't just have a couple of experts who are pulled out of their learning time with me to sort a problem out for someone completing an independent task. Hopefully by having a couple of experts in each group they can help sort each other out. To help me in my attempt to make the kids more independent I can now save into favourites YAY! So I have created a folder for each group within favourites. Using the teaching station I was able to show the whole class how to access their favourites folder and the task that had been set. The experts then showed everyone how to do it giving everyone another opportunity to watch how it is done but also to confirm to me that each of the experts knew what they were doing. This has worked well so far :-) and the confidence in using the netbooks will hopefully cross over into the other learning areas. I guess integrating netbooks into our learning is like anything else it will take sometime for it to be 'the norm' and for everyone to easily access it takes practice.
Another goal was to get the kids more confident in using the language to explain what they were learning. Last year I went on some maths PD and discovered during that the benefits of getting the kids to come up with the WALT at the end of the lesson to check who got it and who didn't. I do find this useful but the other day a couple of kids were telling me what they learnt and said things like 'what a third of 18 equals,' (which was more about the problem we had been working on). What we were really learning was fractions of a set. This got me thinking that perhaps with them coming up with the WALT they were not being exposed to enough modelling of the language of what they have been learning. As a result I have since established a page in their modelling book where at the end of the week I talk about what they have been learning to do and then get them to help me put it in their words to write in their modelling book. I have told them that they can use this to come back too if someone asks what they are learning to do and they want to say more than just learning about fractions. We are referring back to this learning goal at the beginning of lessons (when it still applies to what we are learning). In the short time this has been established in class I have noticed an increase in children's ability to answer the question of what they have been learning to do, which is great to hear!
All through the groups modelling books I write the children's names when they give me a strategy of how they work out a problem which provides great formative assessment. When I think kids might have just about got a concept I will pose a problem and give each child a piece of paper to show their working on and glue this in the modelling book as another snapshot of where they are up to with their learning. But one thing that was picked up on was that there wasn't one place that I could quickly glance to see who has got a concept and who hasn't. Hence this became my next learning goal. So on the bottom of the page with our weekly WALT statement/goal I have used a pink post-it note to show which kids have 'GOT IT' and a yellow post-it to highlight the kids that still need some 'PRACTICE,' at it. Then after each lesson I have started putting in little pink and yellow bubbles the kids names in the appropriate box. It is interesting that after introducing it to them they are now at the end of the lesson putting themselves in the boxes saying "I think I still need some practice at that." This is great to see as it merges the two latter goals together as kids are obviously becoming more responsive to their learning goals and were they fit with it.
So all in all I think as a class we are making some good steps towards achieving these goals and I look forward to contining to see improvements in their mathematics learning.
Below is a snapshot taken from one of my modelling books showing how I have set up the new language WALT focus and the assessment at a glance.

Connecting students with others

The other day a colleague shared his learning from a workshop he attended at the beginning of the year, of being globally connected. It was cool to see what he had learnt and what he had taken away from the workshop and used in his class. One thing that stood out was e-pals (modernising the old-fashioned pen pals to become an online pal). He had used his contacts around the world to do a similar thing and it was neat to see emails between children saying 'mince and cheese pies were her favourite food and she enjoyed netball,' her buddy replied with 'what is a mince and cheese pie?' This opens up real and exciting learning opportunities for the children. Giving their writing an audience and purpose and more ownership over ensuring it makes sense and that they give detailed descriptions for others to understand. He also touched on some other cool websites like Kiva (which would be great to use if you were doing an entrepreneurial study as you loan people in third world countries a small sum of money to get their business ideas up and running. This means recognising a good idea as well as giving someone the break they need, showcasing another way of life that many are not exposed to. But getting back to e-pals. Following my colleagues sharing I attended a session at Southwell to do with e-pals. This teacher had used it with a range of age groups and loved seeing the learning that came out of it. She had made contact with schools overseas but also said it is nice to make contact with a school in your area and then at the end of the term meet up face-to-face for a picnic. She talked about the benefits that she had found from using e-pals. Getting the kids to take home their email replies and use them as a reading task at home. The idea of the audience and if their buddy is a good writer it may encourage them to lenghten their own writing as well as proof-read their work especially if they find their buddies hard to read due to surface features. E-pals do have pre-planed units for getting to know each other and the different cultures each pal brings which she had used and created a DVD with her class to showcase their school and community. The only down fall being that sometimes the buddy school isn't as into it as you are and this meant her school didn't get a DVD back which can be disappointing. So getting excited about the prospect of e-pals I headed home and jumped on the website. I thought about buddying up with a London school and looking at what it is like having the Olympics at their backdoor step. But with holiday differences this wasn't going to work. So then I started to think more locally. I have a friend who has a Year 3 class at Frankton. Her and I have started going on each others class blogs and leaving comments. My class just love getting comments from anyone but the idea of a comment from another schools teacher really gets them excited. So with the kids excitement and this newly formed link I thought why don't we try giving it ago with the two schools. On the Olympics theme I thought why don't we buddy them up and give each buddy a country. They can then be responsible for researching about that country that is attending the Olympics and put together there work on a Google Docs or email a powerpoint back and forth depending on ability. Stacey and I are going to meet in the holidays to look more at how we will work this for Term 3. But it is an exciting venture and one I am sure the kids will benefit from. One of my students yesterday came into school excited that she had made a face-to-face link with a girl from the Frankton class. It just so happens they do Ballet together. So I guess the limits to this e-pal concept are only limited by our imaginations.

Restorative Practice

I am still struggling with the right time to use restorative practice in class.  I have used it a lot in the playground and find that often with the younger children they almost just want to be listened to and have someone hear their grumbles. So getting them to explain to each other how it makes them feel means they feel as though they are being heard. Asking students 'what do we need to do to make this right?' they will often volunteer the suggestion of apologising on their own. I have noticed that even within my class I need to work on developing the language that they use to describe how they were feeling because often they will use angry when really it might be that they are frustrated and maybe their actions came across that they were angry so they need to be able to better explain this, or you get the generic 'I felt sad' answer.
I have used restorative chats in class but find it a difficult juggling act between it being the right time and not taking away from learning times. I have found that there are occassions during guided reading/writing/maths where various children completing independent follow up tasks are being disruptive. It would be an opportune time to have a restorative chat about their behaviour, who it is affecting, how it makes me feel, and how we can make it right. BUT I am often torn. Restorative chats can't really be rushed you need to approach them calmly and not appear like quickly give me the answer I want to hear because I need to get back to my reading group. Therefore it is hard to know if I should interupt a groups learning for 10 minutes when they weren't the ones mucking around. I know that in the long run the children's disruptive behaviour should minimise and it may get to the point one day where all I need to say is I need to catch up with you for a restorative chat shortly and that maybe a reminder to get back on task. Fingers crossed!
It was interesting using circle time on the first day back at school following the course in the holidays. I modelled what I wanted from the students (to talk about how they felt coming back to school) I said I was excited to be coming back, seeing them all again and hearing about what they did in their holidays and that I was well rested after a good holiday and made sure I went to bed early last night. It was interesting hearing them talk about their feelings. One girl came to school late and was upset because we were in the hall not where she had expected us to be in our classroom. When it came to her turn in circle time she said she was excited to be returning to school because she liked school. Others then piped up saying no you were crying when you came into the hall you were sad. But I talked to the class about them being her feelings and that she could share what she wanted and talked about how she now felt happy again because she had found us.
During the two-day course Marg talked about building relationships and how when we get tired we will often revert to the more authorative figure. I guess I am more conscious of this and how I could have approached the situation differently now. There are some students in my class who need constant reminding of how to sit on the mat and manage their behaviour or work independently. When I have reminded these students constantly throughout the day I can sometimes feel myself becoming annoyed by this. I have used some restorative chats with these students but like anything it is an on-going process that hopefully will get easier as the students and I become more confident with the practice.

Goals for E-Learning in Term 2

This term Room 11 have had their application for a class set of four netbooks approved, which is very exciting!
The kids have loved jumping on these and going about their inquiry learning, researching and finding out new facts/information when we have borrowed these from classes in the past. This term I want to;

1) Continue this emphasis on inquiry learning, by giving students time during 'topic' to come up with questions they want to learn more about and structure their own research and learning with teacher guidance and support. Inquiry learning is so much more powerful to the individual.

2) Intergrate them into my daily reading, writing and mathematics programmes. Using websites like studyladder to perfect a new maths skill, using them to read for meaning by jumbling up a poem and getting the students to put it back in the correct order, practicing typing skills during handwriting. Using tools like Etherpad for my reluctant writers.

3) Of course use them to make more regular posts on their individual blogs. It is hard to get around everyone and to encourage them to make posts on their learning when you have one classroom computer and a computer suite time that you are trying to balance with research, posting and practicing skills like mathletics.  Having netbooks in class will allow this to happen more naturally so that our ICT suite time is a time for going on the blogs and what ever else we may need them for that day.

Literacy and ICT

Last week I attended a literacy and ICT course with Innes Kennard. The first activity we did with Innes was looking at a poem by Shel Silverstein. He had muddled the order of the poem and it was our job to put it back together. Without reading for meaning the children can not accurately piece the poem back together. I have since started the bases of a digital file of poems out of order for children to put back into order.  It is interesting that some of the children do not pick up on the clues that follow on while others find the rhyme the clue. One poem I used had about marching and the next line went left, right, left, right, but some children did not make the link between the action of marching.  Another interesting comment he made is that computer work should be collaborative and therefore should be in font size 24-36.

During Innes' teaching career Margaret Mahy would often pop into the school. She spoke to a class once saying she had one line that she really wanted to use in a book. The sentence has ended up in a short story 'Chocolate Porridge and Who Ate It.' But the powerful point was that Margaret Mahy told the children "I never know how a story starts until I know the end." Innes then set the challenge of perhaps starting with the last sentence first during writing time. Writing it at the top of the page and then beginning the story but having that ending there as a reminder. This is something I am yet to try but I am keen to give a go particularly with a few of my boys who hate planning their writing but say they have all of their ideas in their head. Maybe they do and putting the sentence at the top will give me piece of mind that they know where they are heading?

Innes had an example of a procedural piece of writing that again he had distorted the order of. This time he had created a table so that children could transfer the information across in the correct order. A great idea for reading for meaning but I also thought it would be great to use on my students who struggle to sequence their writing in order of the events.

He also had a range of images of animal or peoples eyes and using these as a starting point for a point of view piece of writing - looking at life through someone else's eyes. I have used quirky images from Worth1000 before and enjoy the discussions and stories that come out of these images. It could even be taken a step further through drama and getting the children to look at an image and then tapping them on the shoulder getting them to tell others what they are thinking (pretending the image is them, keeping with the point of view aspect).

Innes also set up digital cloze activities by double clicking on a word and selecting a red line in its place. Then when the children add the missing word in it will show up in red as they write over top of the line. Not having the words in a word bank they may come up with slightly different words but this in itself is a great exercise in synonyms.

A punctuation exercise we did was in having an un-punctuated piece of writing. He told us how many paragraphs the original copy has and we had to try and find where they fitted. The reason for telling the kids how many paragraphs there are is that otherwise they will add in five times the number of paragraphs there really are.

Handwriting was another area he spoke about. Computers are the way of the future and the modern version of handwriting is typing. From now on I am going to get one child to complete their handwriting on the computer using the keys and getting used to where the letters are on the keyboard. (Perhaps I should be doing this at writing time as well)? Innes talked about separating the keyboard into left and right sides (the letters you type using your left hand and the letters you type on your right hand side). Knowing what level they are on the bottom, middle or top row and what they sit next too. With increased typing speed the ideas are able to flow more easily.

Innes finished by briefly touching on a writing competition through NZTA.govt.nz which would be good to check out.

The ideas were all great ways to incorporate ICT into your daily programme, it is still difficult with one classroom computer and teacher laptop however to feel like everyone is involved and making the most of their time. But I still feel that there are lots of great ideas that can be implemented straight away.

Learning at Schools 2012- 10+ways to raise achievement in literacy with Jill Hammond

The key message in this session was MOTIVATION. In any area of learning children must have a stimuli, something that will motivate their learning. If it is writing they need to have an audience otherwise what is the point? With an audience comes feedback and with feedback comes improved writing.
So often we tell our students how to present their work but Jill posed the challenge of expressing themselves in a way that interests them. That makes sense but I also think they need to have a certain level of understanding in all areas of writing to be able to deliver their message in the best possible way.
One tool that Jill introduced me too was Etherpad. This is a good collaborative tool for writing and will be great to use on my reluctant writers. It reminds me of Google docs but is probably more child friendly. Students can then work together on a piece at the same time or one could be writing and the other buddy could be editing it as they write. When it comes to editing using track changes (in word) can be a useful tool as it gives the students ownership and credit for their hard work as it is improved.
She also spoke about using wordle to highlight to children how frequently they use words such as 'and' or 'then.' I can see this being a powerful tool as you often point out to students how often they use these words but you wonder how much they take it on board, but if they understand how a wordle works and realise that the bigger the word the more often you have used it in your writing it may make them think twice about using them next time.
Another tool she touched on was using powerpoint and using the action button to create a story that has numerous endings. This could be a fun reading/writing activity that requires students to think at a higher level in each creating a different ending for the one story. Later in the year I will keep this in mind to try as a collaborative task with my top reading group to extend their understanding of what a good book needs.
When looking at motivation I loved the idea of Lulu.com that Kevin Honeycutt introduced us to a publishing tool where you can actually purchase the children's work. How cool would it feel to be a 7-8-year-old and be a published author. I can see how students would then take more pride in their proofreading/editing phase.

Learning at Schools 2012-Solo Taxonomy with Pam Hook

The SOLO taxonomy session with Pam Hook was great for learning ways of showing students how to clearly follow their own progress and then create their next learning steps. What I like about this higher order thinking is that it gives students the power and they become responsible motivated learners. While at primary we often have to push for work to be handed in or finished but when they get to high school there won't always be someone reminding them of when assignments are due, so isn't it better to prepare them now rather than later on how to become motivated life long learners? While the names of the stages are quite large (prestructural, uni and multistructural, relational and abstract) I like the images that are linked in and the hand signals children can use. In class I will often use the thumbs up if your confident with the instructions, thumbs sideways need it explained one more time and thumbs down need to stay on the mat and work with me; I can see the hand signals of SOLO taxonomy being used in a similar way.
In the Middle Syndicate we always allow a page or two for each of the key competencies under the headings of thinkers, managers, communicators, contributors, explorers. There are great rubrics based around each of the key competencies which I will be putting into each of the kids learning logs and getting them to rate themselves as managers, thinkers, contributors, communicators and explorers and what they need to do to reach the next level. One important aspect when children are anaylysing where they are at is that they say my learning is at a relational stage NOT I am relational.
One great idea that Pam used as an example which I will be keen to try was teaching children to back their ideas up in their writing (could be used for expository). In one colour paper the children sequence the event, with the piece of paper going vertically up the page. Alongside this they put another colour paper to answer the why questions and add the detail. Once children had this planning under their belt they writing becomes a much stronger piece.
A cute You Tube view that explains SOLO a bit futher was put together by Newmarket School and can be seen on the link below.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dV6Dmm7X4Eg

Learning at Schools 2012-Marnia View TV

It was really neat to go to my second session with Marina View school to learn about their television studio. I don't know if part of my interest was sparked from my former occupation as a journalist or my own enjoyment of being part of a television studio at intermediate but it was the idea of a TV station at school that drew my interest to this workshop. It was great that a dozen or so children came a long and could give us teacher (or in this case students) some what of a crash course in how to put together a basic show. I was amazed to find that they do it all using an Adobe programme (Adobe Visual Communicator).
The childrens enthusiasm for the show was evident particuarly in the fact that every Monday, Wednesday and Friday they get to school at 7.30am in order to set up ready in time to go live at 9am.

What Marina View School have now is as the result of 10 years of hard work.
So where do we start with this cool new tool?
-Could it be used to screen book reviews?
-Could the class put together their highlights of the week and screen it in a show to share with family?
-Could it be used as a publishing tool for students to show their work at the end of a topic?
-It would be a great tool to teach the technique of interviewing and asking the right questions, leading into writing newspaper reports.

The teacher challenged us to come and visit the school to look more closely at what they are doing with the TV station and to make our own bulletin back at school which if we sent it to him he would include in Marina View's show. I then discovered that Cambridge East School have also more recently set up a television station, so I would be keen to take a visit out there on one of my BT day's to learn more about how they use the TV station, what it adds and what benefits it has for the kids. As well as taking Marina View up on the challenge of sending in a bulletin from Vardon School.

Learning at Schools 2012 - What is Good Thinking with Mary Ann Mills

Wow what an awesome two days to re-inspire you with different ideas to use in daily teaching!!!
The first session I attended was all about thinking and giving children the opportunity to teach (or lack of). So often children do not recognise opportunities to ask questions to further their thinking or understanding. Ways around this was to keep a journal of things at home that were of interest and then ask themselves further questions around that topic. Or to do a similar thing with newspaper articles or stories that raise further questions and therefore thinking. She started the session with an interesting activity showing us a picture of around seven different footprints, she got us to tell a buddy what the story behind it was. Following our sharing she asked what questions it raised and what assumptions we made from the picture. (If you want to see how this works check out http://ohthethinksyoucanthinkatvardon.blogspot.co.nz/ shortly, our new thinking blog for Room 11).
Thinking is one of the key competencies but Mary Ann challenged us to look at the way we are teaching this skill of thinking. Particularly the higher order thinking as looking to the future so much of NCEA is based around the higher order thinking. She showed us some great examples of children furthering their own thinking through personalised projects which got me thinking....so much of our topic time is teacher driven in regards to the overall theme or big idea that we choose to teach. I then asked myself....What high standard work would we get, especially out of our reluctant learners if they had two weeks to conduct an individual research project (IRP) under teacher guidance/facilitation?
Coming home that night I had lots of ideas buzzing around thinking about thinking. I went home and set up our Room 11 thinking blog attached to our class blog. In the first week I want to set up a voicethread giving each child the chance to explain what they think thinking is/means, this is something we can then revisit. As well as experimenting with the picture idea that Mary Ann began her session with. Further ideas for the thinking blog is children's personal inquiry...responding to articles with their questions...responding to quirky artwork.
I look forward to what this thinking brings and the added spin off that it may have in children's questioning skills during reading time.