Diary of a teacher on lockdown

We have had a good run since last year and life almost felt normal again. At the beginning of this month, the news, social media and communication in schools started pre warning that it was a matter of time before Covid's Delta Variant will affect New Zealand. I was sitting in a Manaiakalani leader's meeting when our principal sent through an email from the ministry asking teachers to start preparing just in case we have to go into an urgent lockdown. 

Today, we heard the update from the Prime Minister that there as been a positive case of Covid in the community and it is Auckland. It is unsure if it is the Delta variant but genome testing is being conducted to determine if it is the Delta variant. 

Here we go again. We are going into teaching from home and students learning from home. We got communication from our principal that we can access school devices tonight and hand them to students in preparation for learning from home. Luckily for me, most of my students take their devices home and also VERY LUCKILY, my class had a practice lockdown drill in class yesterday. YES! Just yesterday we had another lockdown drill. 

What does a LOCKDOWN DRILL look like? 

In my best Jacinda Ardern voice, I announced to the class that there is now a positive case of Covid in the community and in an hour New Zealand will go into Alert Level 4

The students sit at their tables with their devices and chargers

We check all devices and chargers have labels with the students names on it

All students go on to the class site and go into our Home Learning page

On the Home Learning page, the students join the class meet using the link on the Home Learning page

I then accept all the students and we smile at each other while I take a screenshot to capture our beautiful faces on screen 

Benefits of a Lockdown Drill

I have peace of mind that all students have a working device and charger

All students are able to go on to the Home Learning page and access the class meet

Our new students to our class and Manaiakalani are taught how to access the class meet link 

I am confident our class site is easily navigated by students and parents to access the meet link

All devices are chargers are labelled 

Therefore, tonight, it took me about three minutes to take the devices out of the lock up cupboard and put them on the table. It took about 30 minutes to wait for my students to arrive and pick up their devices and that was it. Done! I left school confident that in the morning I will be seeing my tamariki on our first meet in this August 2021 Alert Level 4 Lockdown.

Guiding questions about self efficacy

In the planning of my self efficacy intervention for my students. I have been having a lot of conversations with my buddy teacher who is a long time colleague of mine. We have been discussing what we have been observing with the progress of our students in their project work and more importantly their self belief and perseverance when they come across a task which they find challenging.

At times, as teachers we might say the students are not working hard enough. However, as reflective practitioners, we have to think of what is underneath what we see. In a way thinking about the iceberg image. We only see the tip of the iceberg but beneath the surface, there are more we need to consider, in this case the challenges our students are experiencing. 

I have been doing some readings on the resources available on The Education Hub, I came across guiding questions teachers needs to ask themselves on how they are building the self efficacy of students. My experiences in conducting teaching as inquiries has taught me that inquiring into your practice is not just about looking at what the students are doing and how you can change that. It is also a deep reflection of yourself as an educator, mentor, teacher to your students. 

Below are the questions with my responses:

How often do all students in your class experience success with their learning?

When I first read this question, I thought of course my students experience success with their learning every week. However, I re-read the question and saw it referred to ALL of the students. I would like to think that all my students experience success in their learning on several occasions a week. How would I measure this though? Without qualitative or quantitative data, how can I be sure the students are experiencing success? This is a really interesting question which is highlighting the importance of noticing when students are experiencing success and also celebrating success. I know my students experience success, whether it be solving a problem in DMIC, completing all their blog commenting for the week, completing a task they have been working on for their project or for some...There are so many ways to experience success but what this question made me realise is the lack of noticing when success is experienced in my class and acknowledging and celebrating success. 

How do you scaffold learning into smaller tasks, so that students experience smaller successes more regularly? 

With Project Based Learning, I realised after the first project that the tasks we complex for a lot of students. The students struggled to manage the tasks because it required a lot of planning and self management. In the second and third project we planned, we looked at breaking down each task on the submission form so the students understood what the task required them to complete. Now, as the students work through their tasks, they have the submission form open on their devices so they are able to check if the requirements of each task is met in their work. 

My buddy teacher and I have also been discussing working with students who are struggling with completing their projects on breaking down the tasks to manageable sections for them to complete. 

This question is emphasising the importance of scaffolding students to experience success by working on smaller tasks and experiencing success. In my intervention, this is an aspect of I am incorporating into my self efficacy intervention. Students experiencing success regularly and working through manageable tasks which will enable them to experience success and build their self efficacy.

How do you communicate your aspirations for your students, and let your students know that you think they can succeed in their learning?

I have always been a teacher who communicates my aspirations for my students. I strongly believe in building a positive relationship with my students and this starts from the very first day of Term 1 every year. When a student is feeling down, I always take the time to unpack how they are feeling and the factors which contributed to their emotions. Often I find the students are able to articulate how they are feeling towards the situation but often neglect to consider how they contributed to situations. It does take a lot of time to build the trust of students but I always find that once the students have my trust and I have theirs, collaboration, teaching, learning, sharing...is more effective. 

With learning, I always emphasise to my students that success is a matter of perseverance and resilience. Failing is a part of learning. I do not hide my failures from my students. I often embrace my mistakes and share these with them and we collaborate together to solve challenges we have in class with learning. 

These guiding questions have been a good reflective experience for me to think about what I am currently doing in my practice and what I still need to work on. Following on from this post, I will complete the rest of the iceberg with my target group where they will unpack what is under the iceberg for them. 

Casual chain for my inquiry

This is the casual chain I have created for my inquiry so far. I have identified the area I will focus on for my inquiry and also the actions I will implement for this inquiry.

 

The big focus of my inquiry is to build the self efficacy of my students so they are able to make judgements about their ability to achieve a task or tasks. 

I have chosen to focus on the Manaiakalani Community of Learning, Achievement Challenge 4. To increase the achievement of Years 7-10 in reading, writing and maths. Through this inquiry, the goal is for these target learners to increase their achievement in reading, writing and maths. 

With the Project Based Learning approach we have implemented in my class this year, I have noticed a lot of my target learners, struggle with the self efficacy to pursue a task. Giving up or saying "I can't do it" was becoming a common trend. After observations of my students, gathering student voice, marking the first two projects and giving feedback, I realised my target learners had very low self efficacy. They were threatened by the complexity of the tasks and did not attempt the tasks at all. 

There are other aspects I thought about when I was thinking about my 2021 inquiry. Were the instructions explicit enough? Did I provide enough scaffolding materials to help my learners carry on with the tasks when they were not in class with me? The answer to some of these questions were NO! While I thought all the students were able to understand the task requirements, my target learners needed more unpacking and more explicit instructions in chunks to be able to manage the tasks and see themselves successfully completing the tasks. 

In my inquiry this year, I will build a framework within my practice which focusses on building the self efficacy of my learners. 

The outcomes as stated above are what I hope my students will achieve through my inquiry in building their self efficacy. 

The intervention design incorporates actions which will be taken by myself, the target learners, their peers and their whanau. I am focussing on a lot of collaboration from all the contributors towards this inquiry with an immense emphasis on my role as the teacher. 

I also wondered what could be done earlier in a child's education to help build their self efficacy but for now I will implement my inquiry and see how this can be translated to our other classes in our school. There are other aspects which are yet to be added to this casual chain such as my deliberate acts of teaching and how student progress will be documented and regularly recorded. 

Analysing my own practice

I have been reflecting a lot about Project Based Learning and how this has been going for my class. It is a different way of teaching from what we have been doing at Glenbrae School but I always believe changes can bring new learning and challenges for the better. 

I have collected student voice from my target group and learnt that they do like the Project Based Learning approach. 

I came across The 'big six' - catalytic digital teaching capabilities through my readings. 

1. Ambitious outcomes for all
2. Eyes on text
3. Language and vocabulary development (KC - language, texts and symbols)
4. High level discussions (KC - participating and contributing)
5. Transforming and transference of knowledge through creation
6. Making thinking visible (KC - thinking)

In planning our current project of Great Books I looked at The 'big six' - catalytic digital teaching capabilities and tried to plan activities which encompass all these capabilities. I reflected on how I can better implement the Project Based Learning approach to cater for how we learn in Manaiakalani schools.

The Great Books unit is a unit I have looked forward to planning because of my passion for literacy. We chose the book Refugee by Alan Gratz because a few years ago, this book was a great novel which I read to my class and it just really engaged my learners. There are so many learning opportunities present in the story and using The 'big six' - catalytic digital teaching capabilities will ensure my learners will gain so much more from their learning activities. 

Below are the slides with the learning activities I have planned for English, Health & P.E and also Social Sciences. I have planned these activities with a focus on The 'big six' - catalytic digital teaching capabilities.

Great Books English Slides

Great Book Social Sciences Slides

Great Books The Arts Slides 

Great Books Health & PE Slides

Coaching as part of the DFI team

 It was only last year that I got the opportunity to be a participant of the DFI programme. I thoroughly enjoyed reinforcing what I had learnt throughout the years I have been in the Manaiakalani cluster but most of all reflecting and being grateful for where I am in my career because of the many professional development opportunities and being part of a great vision for the tamariki in our area.

Back track a little bit, I became a teacher because I wanted to empower our Maori and Pasifika students in education. I have always been passionate about education in my family, church and wanted to spread this passion to my community. When I graduated, I first applied to be a teacher in Mangere. Although I had a good chance of getting the vacancy, I made a decision not to go through with the application process but instead applied for a job in Panmure. Little did I know then, it was the start of a career of empowering myself, meeting highly professional and passionate educators and also being a part of a team who have a vision to empower tamariki in their learning. To learn locally and think globally. 

Through Manaiakalani, I have been an MDTA mentor teacher working with a beginning teacher at the time who is also very passionate about education and a very effective teacher. I have been a CoL within school leader and now a CoL across school leader. 

This year, for the past two terms, I have been coaching in the DFI team and also working with teachers in my school on my second day of release. For me, it is a wonderful feeling to share what I know and learn with other teachers about teaching in this digital age. We have so many tools available to us but how we utilise these tools to be effective and safe for our tamariki is a very vital part of our learning. 

I don't need to remind teachers about last year when we had to go into our first four week lockdown. Some teachers shared their frustrations and anxieties on social media because they did not have the tools to connect with their students during this time. It was not the case for Manaiakalani schools. We were set up ready to go on the first day of the lockdown. 

Through the DFI journey, I worked with many teachers who are dedicated to implement and utilise digital learning in their classrooms. They are all at different levels of their learning journey but the willingness to learn was there. It is always great to see when teachers are keen to learn and implement what they learn in their practice because I know that is how we are empowering our learners in this digital age. 

I strongly advocate for teachers to do the DFI course. It will be an empowering experience which will enable teachers to be more effective in their teaching practice. 

Back to the drawing board

I have been looking deeply into my practice and identifying trends in my teaching and the learning of my students. After gathering data from the first student voice survey, I was thinking my main focus will be on feedback and feedforward. Through implementing this feedback and feedforward system through commenting on student work, oral discussions, peer assessments and communicating with students through emails, I realised there was something more that I could do. The feedback and feedforward was happening in class regardless. The student voice collected emphasised to me that through Project Based Learning, some of the students felt I was spending less time with them in discussions and giving feedback. That I have now addressed through a more focussed approach to giving feedback and feedforward to students. 

Throughout, this time of the students working through their projects, I have always been keeping a closer eye on students who were not completing their tasks unless being monitored or given consequences if they were not to complete their tasks. I also noticed some students really struggled to manage their time and their work. The big projects is too much for them to unpack and plan around. They needed a lot of support to be scaffolded in how to complete each task. 

Could building self efficacy in students be my inquiry focus?

Through marking of the first projects the students completed, I noticed a trend in work the students handed in. Some did not complete every aspect of the task, some did not attempt some of the tasks and some students missed out on tasks altogether. 

In class, I would encourage the students to work through their tasks, give them support my verbal and written feedback but still, I was not receiving the work I was hoping the students would hand in. I believe the students did not have the belief in themselves or the motivation and determination to carry out their tasks until completion. Thus making self efficacy a very important focus for me in teaching using the Project Based Learning programme. 

What is self efficacy in students?

According to Pajares (2002), 'Self-efficacious students exert extra effort, persevere with difficult tasks longer and show resilience by bouncing back from difficult learning situations. Students with high self-efficacy regard problems as challenges, set goals and are committed to them, attribute failure to lack of effort or as yet unlearned skills or content, and increase their efforts in order to overcome failure'. After reading the article by Pajares, I knew this is what I want to focus on because these are the goals I have for my students. To be able to persevere when tasks are hard, set goals, bounce back from difficult learning situations and be committed to their learning. 

I am wanting to find strategies which I will implement into my practice which will foster and build self efficacy among my students. I am thinking of incorporating strategies I find in readings about self efficacy to design a learning framework in my practice which will build student self efficacy. 

Inquiry question: Will a self efficacy framework designed for my learners, build their self confidence in their abilities and enable them to have more self efficacy to persevere in difficult learning situations?

In Parajes (2002), there are some strategies mentioned to build the self efficacy of students. I will now gather more readings about building self efficacy and reflect on what I know about my students. I will from there start to build the self efficacy framework which I will implement in my practice. 

Reference: Pajares, F. (2002). Self-efficacy beliefs in academic contexts: An outline. Retrieved from https://www.uky.edu/~eushe2/Pajares/efftalk.html

Digging into my current practice

 Who better to hear from than the recipients of the learning?

I have collected student voice from my target group by using google form. The questions were based on what I wanted to learn from them in how they have experienced how we learnt in literacy with a focus in reading before we started Project Based Learning in our class.  I also included questions about how they see themselves as readers and if they are encouraged by their whanau to read at home. 

Hypothesising

Before collecting student voice, I had hypothesised that giving more opportunities to be creative in their learning through their projects would accelerate student engagement and accelerate student achievement in reading. However, after reading the responses from students, I am now rethinking that oral literacy with a focus on teacher and student learning conversations around feedback and feedforward would be my focus for this inquiry. 

In a previous blog post, I shared an analysis of the impact of Project Based Learning which was conducted in the USA. A common theme which arose from this analysis was the limited interaction between the students and the teacher with regards to the learning. I strongly believe that teacher and student interactions and korero is vital to the learning of students. 

My hypothesis

"If I have planned learning conversations with students with a focus on feedback and feedforward, will this improve their ability to discuss their learning and accelerate their achievement in reading?"

The big BUT at this time. I have to do some more reading around learning conversations around students with a focus on literature from New Zealand. As my students are mainly Maori and Pasifika, I want to learn more about how to facilitate RICH learning discussions with my students. Why I am thinking this is because if I am focussing on feedback and feedforward, will the conversations be around me just talking and the student listening? I would like the conversations to be around what the student identifies as their needs and how I can give feedback and feedforward to scaffold them in addressing their learning needs. 

There are so many other aspects which I will incorporate into my inquiry this year but learning discussions will be my main focus in my deliberate acts of teaching (DAT).

Other aspects of my teaching as inquiry

Using the BIG SIX - catalytic digital teaching capabilities 

1. Ambitious outcomes for all
2. Eyes on text
3. Language and vocabulary development - language, texts and symbols
4. High level discussions
5. Transforming and transference of knowledge through creation
6. Making thinking visible