Profiling my target learners

My target learners for this teaching as inquiry are at different achievement levels for maths. My class is split into two mixed ability groups for maths. I had to move some students into the group I will be focussing on to make this target group. I have based my selection of my target learners on my observations in the attitude of students towards maths, strengths and challenges in learning maths. There are some students in this target group who I have noticed are often absent. It would be interesting if this teaching as inquiry would change the attendance of these students. 

The assessment data for the students supports that they are all at different achievement levels for maths. I have collected data from PAT Maths and Gloss as those are the assessments we carry out for maths in our school. I have indicated next to the students' name their year levels as well. Looking at the summative data, I have identified some students did well in the Gloss test such as RL Y8, but this particular student did not pass the PAT Maths test scoring only 12/41. None of the Year 7s in my target group passed the PAT Maths test. 

Student voice is also another form of profiling I have conducted of my target group. I used a google form for this and the data I collated from the google form is really interesting. Below are the responses from the students. 

The question which really stood out for me in this data collection were the responses from the students about their friends being better in maths than themselves. This is emphasising the hunch that I have, that students do not identify themselves as confident in maths and often highlight the strengths of their friends instead. I was also surprised when I collated the responses in the same google form, where students listed who they thought were good mathematicians in the class. Many of the students listed by their peers did not identify themselves as being confident in maths. 

I am questioning if the students are being modest about their abilities or if they truly believe they are not achieving well in maths. This also highlights the question if I am giving the students enough feedback to inform them of their progress in maths. 

Deep learning conversations about planning for purposeful learning drawing on the Reading Planning Fala

Vocabulary

Through the learn activities, there is a focus on vocabulary in the texts. There is a shift in the student discussions where students are often questioning the meaning of words they come across in their texts. The students are also experimenting with using these words in their everyday conversations. Some of the activities around vocabulary are identifying how the words are used in the text. What about the text type, sentence, paragraph helps us predict what the word means? The students are now consciously using these strategies to predict the meaning of words they do not understand. 

Text selection

In a meeting with my sample group of teachers, we discussed the topic of text selection for learning. In the Reading Planning FALA, it states to have a specific text selection for a rich set of texts. We unpacked what this might look like as we select texts for our planning.

• Multimodal - comics/graphic novels, picture books, newspapers, brochures, print advertisements, posters, storyboards, digital slide presentations
• Caters for the learning intention - does the text support the lessons purpose for students to achieve the Learning Intention of the unit?
• Texts which are challenging and fosters perseverance of reading - are the texts challenging for the students? Do they enable the students to struggle with the text and seek clarification through rich discussions?
• Information/topic specific - do the texts relate to the topic of study? Enables wide and narrow reading for information? 
• Main, supporting, challenge text - Will two texts support each other and the challenge text encouraging the students to compare and contrast information from the texts and making their own conclusions?
• Student choice in text selection - Will the students have opportunities to seek more texts of their own choice which links to the unit of study?
• Vocabulary - texts introduces students to new vocabulary

There are so many aspects to think about with text selection but when teachers are purposeful in their text selection, the learning will be more purposeful, challenging and enjoyable for the students. 

Extended discussions 

For years, our school have focussed on having rich discussions during learning. In Maths with the use of TALK MOVES to facilitate discussions. In reading, a focus on having dialogic discussions. Yet, I still feel and observe that our students are reliant on us as teachers to lead discussions and prompt them. I have seen and experienced some excellent discussions where the students have been so involved in their discussions that it almost sounded like a heated debate about the topic. I did reflect after those lessons if it was the topic the students were passionate about or the texts or set up of the lesson. I believe purposeful discussions have to be planned for and that comes from the teacher knowing the focus of the unit of learning, the lesson and understanding the texts and where to focus the discussion for extended discussions. 

Reflection

It is great to be engaged in these learning conversations with my colleagues because it not only highlights what we need to work on but also empowers each of us to change our mindset and try new ideas in our planning and teaching. I feel we have definitely shifted in our understanding of how to plan and teach reading and it is still a work in progress but the shift in understanding is definitely evident from our professional discussions. 

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. 

The power of rich discussions in reading which translates to writing

I have been seeing a lot of improvement in the writing my students have been producing. The genre they have been working on is argument writing. It is wonderful when you see the confidence in students to voice their opinions and put their thoughts into writing. 

There have been a lot of discussions in Reading through the texts the group have been reading. The text Me, Me, Me by Renata Hopkins stimulated a lot of thinking about the use of devices and social media. The discussions were rich in sharing of ideas and exploring issues with social media and devices.

The supporting text was an article from Insight NZ was about the ban of phones in some schools. The supporting text discussion brought more insight into the challenges school and young people are having with devices. 

Through the rich discussions,  the students were able to brainstorm ideas to write their arguments confidently. I am really happy with the confidence the students have, to start their writing after being in reading discussions. 

The students have also been going out of the classroom to interview teachers and other students about their opinions regarding phones in schools. The joy they have in gathering views and opinions is just wonderful to see. Their use of technology in their learning is also very encouraging to their peers in other classes. 

Through rewindable learning the students were able to draft their writing using the brainstorm on the Google Slides. A lot of the students worked on their arguments from home and using the slides was essential in helping them with their writing at home.

Here are some writing samples the students in my class have produced:

Soane argument writing 

Richie argument writing

Presenting my inquiry to our staff

Last week, I had the opportunity to present what I have been working on with my teaching as inquiry. I was very happy with the feedback from my principal and colleagues because it shows my inquiry is moving in a direction where it could help my school and colleagues. 

In discussing that my focus is in embedding the Learn, Create, Share pedagogy in my teaching, I explained that within the Learn, Create and Share aspect, each word has a lot of deliberate teacher actions involved. 

I also shared what I have been trying to achieve with using the  SISOMO acronym with the creation of DLOs. I noticed my students are very confident in creating DLOs using Google Slides and Google Draw. At the DFI sessions I had been attending I learnt that SISOMO is when a digital object has sight, sound and motion. I have encouraging my students to use Screencastify on their devices for their DLO creations. They can still create a Google Drawing or Google Slide presentation but most of the explaining can be done by them using Screencastify. I will post up a few examples of what my students have been producing using Screencastify in my next post. 

In supporting my colleagues, I have sent a document where each teacher can explain how they are embedding the Learn, Create, Share pedagogy in their practice. After analysing this data, I will then plan a presentation to be presented at a staff meeting where we will collaborate as a staff to get a common understanding of how to embed Learn, Create and Share in our learning programmes. 

Using the Learn, Create, Share pedagogy in teaching Writing

My inquiry question is: Will an integrated literacy programme with a focus on Learn, Create, Share accelerate the writing achievement of my target learners? (Refer to 27 May blog post)

I have been putting a lot of focus on integrating reading and writing. The students have been using written texts for a lot of their learning materials in the last term. This term, I am working on using more visual and audio texts for their learning activities. 

I have been promoting the use of SISOMO (sight, sound, motion) when the students are creating their sharing tasks. I find using Screencastify is an easy and accessible app for them to use. The only struggle now is the noise level when the students are recording their screencastify recordings in class. We are working our way through systems where the students can break out into more quiet spaces to record their recordings.

With using SISOMO resources, I am promoting what I am encouraging the students to create. This term, we are starting writing with procedural writing. The two slide presentations are examples of the use of SISOMO learning materials for students. They are watching Youtube clips on how to make Hangi and Trifle, then they respond by answering response questions. In responding to the response questions, the students are unpacking what they  understand from the clips. This will help them shape their ideas when writing the procedures. 

The students are also using a planning sheet created for them to use. This will help them structure their writing. 

I am currently working through my deliberate acts of teaching to change aspects of my practice which I believe will change the attitude of my students to writing, bring about more fun in learning to write, emphasise the purpose of writing and the target audience and accelerate writing achievement in my class.

Tweaking my practice

The achievement challenge I have focussed on this year is to Lift the achievement in reading for all students, with a focus on boys and Maori students of both genders.

Throughout the year I have struggled with engaging certain boys in my inquiry group because of other factors in their lives affecting their learning. I quickly identified the boys were able to read but comprehending texts was a challenge for them. There is always the challenge of their attitude towards reading and learning.

Upon reflection, I started to have one to one conversations with the boys to reflect on how they found the reading lessons and materials. One of the responses I received was an eye opener when one of the boys told me "Miss I am getting bored with reading non fiction. Can we read some fiction?". I realised with our Genomics course and our camp pre work and post work, a lot of what we have been reading have been non fiction texts. Our class novel was a fiction text but I feel he wanted to read some non fiction as a group and discuss the materials in depth. The student's response was powerful. 

In the holidays I looked up some materials which can be used in class which links to our topic of Genomics. I found the TKI Literacy online site to be very helpful. They provide materials in digital form and also teacher support materials. 

Term 4 is always a very busy term with assessments and end of year activities for the school especially in a Year 7&8 class. However, I am determined to finish my this year off with a last great push with my COL inquiry. 

Teaching as Inquiry focus 2019

I have been very fortunate to have the opportunity to work with Jannie van Hees not only with my class but also in professional discussions. During our learning conversations I shared my goals for my inquiry which focusses on:

- improving reading comprehension

- encouraging my students to enjoy reading

- my students gaining more understanding of the world around them through non fiction texts and current events

- my students being a ripple effect to encourage reading in their homes

Jannie also shared the value of students understanding vocabulary and in particular cluster of words in texts. I had never thought of this. Upon reflecting on what Jannie shared with me about vocabulary, I now understand the value of students having a good understanding of vocabulary and how they are presented in texts. 

Below is my inquiry focus for this year. There are so many aspects I want to cover this year with my inquiry. I am eager to see the effect this inquiry will have on my students. I also really hope it will accelerate the progress of my students in reading as well as ignite or strengthen their passion for reading.

Will daily deep diving into quality, ‘cutting edge’ texts, accompanied by ’rich’ text conversations in which all participate, and with deliberate attention to words that co-occur to carry meaning, improve students’ reading comprehension and encourage their love of reading.