Week 32- Changes in My Practice

Reflective practice is viewed as "a means by which practitioners can develop a greater level of self-awareness about the nature and impact of their performance, an awareness that creates opportunities for professional growth and development." (Osterman and Kottkamp, 1993, p.2).

I was both nervous and excited to take the opportunity of studying face to face and on line with a diverse range of educators. I can't believe that it is coming to an end. The most valuable part for me has been the opportunities to learn, make mistakes, reflect and grow as an educator in such a supportive and positive environment. The learning has been so much fun and has been something that I have looked forward to each week. This personal positive experience, in line with Practising Teacher Criteria (PTC) 7, has been something that I have been keen to try to replicate in my classroom environment creating an environment where the ākonga continue to learn, contribute, collaborate and reflect and make changes to their learning pathways.  For example in maths we are doing cafe style problem solving across groupings where groups of 4 students have to record and share their process and answers before moving on to another problem with a different group of 4. In reading the ākonga now work towards a contract, again across groupings, with increasing input into choice over how and when they complete, mostly, deepening understanding tasks based around SOLO taxonomy and the SAMR model, developed by Dr. Ruben Puentedura. My MindLab journey has given me the confidence to apply and get a leadership role within my school, heading up the senior syndicate next term so the experiences that I have had in the last 32 weeks are something I want to apply in my new role, guiding other teachers to move forward with me in e- learning and building students who are equipped with 21st century skills and above all fostering a love of learning.
Another area of my practice where the Mind Lab journey has impacted directly is under PTC 6 , conceptualise, planning and implementing appropriate learning programmes. My planning is becoming a lot more student focused, often with an integrated approach planned around authentic learning where possible. The learning flows more from one lesson to the next. The introduction of a class Notebook and having all the planning, collaboration pages, teaching videos, assessments and student's work being assessable all the time has aided this.
My dreams and directions for the future include continuing to have the confidence to explore digital technologies that we have been exposed to on this course with my ākonga such as coding, robotics, Augmented Reality and  Makey Makey.  To stay connected, through readings, blogging, twitter and google +, to current day trends, issues, thinking and pedagogies not as an observer but as a contributor. With my new role as syndicate leader, I want to model leadership that contributes to effective teaching and learning and promotes a collaborative, inclusive, reflective and supporting learning environment for the ākonga and staff.

References:

Ministry of Education (nd). Practising teacher Criteria and e-learning . Retrieved from http://elearning.tki.org.nz/Professional-learning/Registered-Teacher-Criteria-and-e-learning

Osterman, K. & Kottkamp, R.(1993). Reflective Practice for Educators.California.Cornwin Press, Inc. Retrieved on 7th May, 2015 from: http://www.itslifejimbutnotasweknowit.org.uk/files/RefPract/Osterman_Kottkamp_extract.pdf

Week 31 Crossing Boundaries and Disciplines

Jacobs(1989) defines an interdisciplinary curriculum as "a knowledge view and curriculum approach that consciously applies methodology and language from more than one discipline to examine a central theme, issue, problem, topic or experience."(p.8)
Mathison and Freeman stated in the conclusion of their study that those involved in interdisciplinary studies found the experiences favourable with positive outcomes including: active inquiry rather than passive rote learning; a student centered curriculum rather than discipline centered one; teaching of cognitive skills associated with real life problem solving; collaboration and making connections; diminishing scheduling problems and motivated students. However, Mathison and Freeman did state that there was little evidence provided as to whether these positive outcomes to integrated learning actually occurred and that there was a need for on going research to find out what is really happening in interdisciplinary classrooms and what the impact on teaching is.
Two potential connections that I have become more aware of and are my near future goals are an interdisciplinary approach around authentic learning and student centered learning. This term my students started looking at how we can make a difference in our world. The students looked at our school environment and combined this with the information they got from our principal who had recently visited her son who is working as a doctor in Cape Town and they came up with the idea of wanting to sponsor a child in Africa. They contacted the World Vision education liaison officer  and, through Skype, asked questions and gained a deeper understanding of the impact of sponsoring a child. They have been put in touch with another school in our community who is already sponsoring a child.  The upshot of all this has been them planning and running a market day for the school and the community. They have developed themes and put themselves into groups.
In line with the observations Mathison and Freeman made in their study, whilst my room is humming, and there is heaps of collaboration and problem solving going on, we haven't done maths, writing and specific reading for what seems like weeks and I am not sure what the impact on the student's learning has been! The students have written persuasive emails to our principal and board, made up order forms and fliers, designed posters, come up with questions for world vision, calculated costs, counted money. How do I prove that real learning is happening? How do I assess it? What do I write on my reports? Are any students going under the radar? It looks chaotic, I am having to bribe the cleaner and  there is a continuous pile of stuff everywhere. Is real learning happening? Is it student centered? As Mathison and Freeman imply, there are heaps of unanswered questions but my gut feeling is that it is definitely worth pursuing and it is a direction I want to head in for the second part of this year. However with this interdisciplinary curriculum approach in my classroom, there is certainly a need for more robust evidence and data to be collected and more checkpoints that need to be assigned along the way.

Jacobs, H., (1989b). Interdisciplinary curriculum. Design and implementation. Alexandria,VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.

Mathison,S. & Freeman, M.(1997). The logic of interdisciplinary studies. Presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association, Chicago, 1997. Retrieved from http://www.albany.edu/cela/reports/mathisonlogic12004.pdf: 

Week 30 – Activity 6 – Professional online social networks

1. What are potential challenges that teachers need to be aware of when integrating social networking platforms into teaching activities? Why?

Cyber bullying has been in the news again this week. Increasingly we are seeing people say, do and write things they would never do to another person's face. Some young people are becoming more and more desensitised with the language they write and don't hold back. Education is the key to cyber bullying. Schools need to be on top of it and parents need to be aware of what their children are doing. Schools and parents have to have rules and guidelines in place. Students need to consider the consequences of their words and action and understand anything that is sent to anyone can be found. Even if it is deleted, it can be found and it becomes part of their digital footprint. Pearson identified skills that students needed for the future including, behaving responsibly on line, understanding privacy issues surrounding digital and online content and presenting themselves effectively in online social networking sites. (Pearson, 2013). These skills should be an important part of the digital citizenship that schools promote to students.

      2. How do/would you use social media to enhance your professional development?                   Why?

I have found FaceBook a useful and informal way  to keep in touch with other educators and their ideas. It provides links to articles and useful websites. The New Zealand primary school teacher's page is designed to offer advice and share ideas with other New Zealand primary school teachers. I use Facebook following on from professional development. Facebook pages of the pd facilitators are useful places to communicate with other educators about what is working for them and for keeping up to date with the presenter's latest updates and further ideas. Sheena Cameron's, Hilton Avery's Sharp Reading and Pam Hook's Facebook pages are all good examples that have helped me sustain the learning from the pd and keep the momentum moving forward.

 The Ministry of Education’s Virtual Learning Network is a good place to connect to forums in the New Zealand context.  Malhuish’s highlighted the value of a networked approach to professional development and sustainability in her thesis stating "there is a recognition that one teacher can't be everything to all those children in that one class, that one school cannot have that wide range of experiences that they may need to address the emerging trends, that it means that having a broader wider network can help people have those conversations and come to common understandings together." (Malhuish, 2013, p.139) The VLN groups that I belong to are the iPad group and the literacy group . I quickly skim the threads as they happen and will save them for future use if I feel they are going to be relevant to my practice. Coming from a country school with only 5 other teachers, it keeps me in touch with what is happening elsewhere in the country and enables me to not feel isolated or stagnate so it is important for me as an educator to make the time to engage with VLN and other social networks.

Joosten, T.( 2013. October 22). Pearson: Social Media for Teaching and Learning. Retrieved from http://www.slideshare.net/tjoosten/social-media-for-teaching-and-learning-27456257?ref=http://professorjoosten.blogspot.co.nz/2013/10/pearson-social-media-for-teaching-and.html 

Melhuish, K. (2013). Online social networking and its impact on New Zealand educators’ professional learning.

Week 29 Ethics around digital technology

Our school has BYOD from year 5- 8.  In line with the Netsafe video, our school community values social networking as part of our teaching practice toolkit, we understand there are challenges with it but want to use it in ways that don't have significant risks. One of the areas that is tricky for our school is the blurred responsibility between the different sets of rules for home and school. Some students, when they are using their iPads at home, are allowed to watch and listen to videos and music and download apps and play games which are not suitable for the school environment. With the 2 sets of rules, the students can push the boundaries at school and this can cause problems when students and their peers have been found on games that they are underage for. We have had a few issues with imessage . The students have their own email through office 365 and we have had complaints from parents that their ākonga have been using imessage and that some of the things the year 8 students have been writing are not appropriate for the Year 5s to read.
If students are not being responsible with their iPads, the principal, the students and the parents have a meeting immediately and often as a result the iPad is confiscated by the parents or it is allowed for learning purposes only. To help counteract some of these issues, we have a policy of everyone outside at playtime and lunchtime and no one on their devises except during class time, this includes after school as well. In line with the digital technology safe and responsible use guide for schools, 2015, the principal and classroom teachers run a digital safety workshop regularly for anyone who is interested and go over the simple ways to protect your child (and yourself) from unwanted content and charges, social media issues or just how much screen time is appropriate. We discuss exactly how we use devices at school, how much time we spend on them and the expectations of them being used as an educational tool. We have tried having the digital workshop at a variety of times but struggle to get some parents to be proactive in the digital safety area until something has happened.  Some of our parents are unconfident in the area of digital technology and the ākonga know more and so control everything.  This was highlighted recently when we had a case of a year 5 child running up huge amounts on her mother's debit card buying all sorts of apps through the app store. It was almost like an addiction for the child. It is very hard not to feel some responsibility for such things as we encouraged the families to buy the iPad and we deemed that the child was old enough to be responsible around technology. One way of addressing this that our school community is thinking of is not letting students bring their own devise until the parents have attended a digital safety workshop. Our school needs to be thinking of ongoing ways to keep in touch with our families around digital safety to ensure that it remains a priority for them and us.

References
Ministry of Education. (2015). Digital technology- Safe and responsible use in school. Retrieved fromhttp://www.education.govt.nz/assets/Documents/School/Managing-and-supporting-students/DigitalTechnologySafeAndResponsibleUseInSchs.pdf

New Zealand Teachers Council.(2012). Establishing safeguards.[video file]. Retrieved fromhttps://vimeo.com/49216520

Week 28 Indigenous Knowledge and Cultural Responsiveness
Gay (2010) defines culturally responsive pedagogy as teaching "to and through students' personal and cultural strengths, their intellectual capabilities and their prior accomplishments"(p.26). Savage, Hindle, Meyer, Hynds, Penetito and Slater (2011) argue that "indigenous students value their identity as Maori learners and that they are proud of their Maori culture and identity and respond positively when a school enables them to be Māori rather than being forced to leave their identity outside the school entrance"  (p. 192).  Aotearoa is a bicultural nation and The treaty of Waitangi promised Māori, as Tāngata Whenua, the right to full participation in society. My view is that teachers and all the multiple stakeholders of a school, sharenresponsibility to embed biculturalism into school life and to help, through cultural responsive pedagogy, our indigenous students feel that their culture and language is respected and reflected in the school culture. 
Savage et al (2011) established that there was positive evidence of embracing all things Māori and  the impact of Te Kotahitangi was positive when the focus was on remediating teaching practices not remediating under achievement among Māori. Their research found that indigenous students valued schools where culture and language are valued primarily through: following Māori protocols and customs; where teachers learn and use vocabulary and phrases; learning from teachers and also teachers learning from students; inclusion of Māori cultural content in learning activities; where the students can choose what they want to learn and a caring and learning relationships are developed.   

How does culture apply to my class environment?

I feel an area where I use cultural responsive pedagogy in my classroom is in the teaching strategies I use and interactions I have with my ākonga. In line with 6 effective pedagogy that Bishop outlines: I care about Māori students as Māori; have high expectations for all learners; I provide academic feedback and feedforward; I use effective strategies such as collaboration and cooperation; I use evidence of students performance to guide my practice and my learners know about expected outcomes and what they need to do to get there (Bishop, 2015).

A school-wide cultural responsiveness that could be improved is in school activities. I would like to see our school start some school days with a hui, karakia, whakatauki or waita.  Our students participate in Kapa Haka and although last year we all learnt our pepeha, and we have held a hungi at school and visited the Marae, I feel this, in the words of the Prebbleton Principal,  is tokenism towards biculturism, rather than deepening our cultural understanding and embedding it in our day to day lives at school. The teachers would welcome professional development around Tikanga and Te reo but it would be important to have on board all the stakeholders of our school. As a school community I think we definitely have some work to do around this. 

Edtalks. (Bishop, R., 2012, September 23). A culturally responsive pedagogy of relations. Retrieved from https://vimeo.com/49992994

Edtalks.(2012, May 30). Mike Hogan: Culturally responsive practice in a mainstream school. [video file]. Retrieved from https://vimeo.com/43097812

Gay, G. (2002). Preparing for culturally responsive teaching. Journal of Teacher Education, 53(2),106-116.

Savage, C., Hindle, R.,  Meyer, L., Hynds, A., Penetito, W., Sleeter C. (August 2011).: Cultural Responsive pedagogies in classrooms: Indigenous Student Experiences across the Curriculum. Asia Pacific Journal of Teacher Education vol.39, No.3, 183-198.

Ministry of Educaton. (2011). Tataiako: Cultural Competencies for teachers of Māori learners. Wellington. Retrieved from: https://educationalcouncil.org.nz/required/Tataiako.pdf

Savage, C., Hindle, R.,  Meyer, L., Hynds, A., Penetito, W., Sleeter C. (August 2011).: Cultural Responsive pedagogies in classrooms: Indigenous Student Experiences across the Curriculum. Asia Pacific Journal of Teacher Education vol.39, No.3, 183-198.

Teaching Tolerance. (2010,Jun 17). Introduction to Culturally Relevant Pedagogy. [video file}. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGTVjJuRaZ8

A contemporary issue that is shaping NZ education is the shift of focus to student- centred learning. The Education Review Office encourages schools "to develop systems, processes and connections that put students at the heart of learning and teaching, rather than on the periphery of school decision making and the curriculum"( Education Review Office, 2012). Learning environments are developing where students are seen as partners in learning and where their student voice is valued and accepted. The use of digital technologies and the fact that the students can access their work from anywhere has meant that students are spending more time with 1:1 devises and collaborating with their peers than facing the front, being directed by the teacher. The traditional role of the teacher is changing. Teachers are working alongside students, guiding them and providing scaffolding to an individual or groups when needed. Students are setting their own goals and learning direction. A recent study from Academy of Finland shows " how technology enhanced learning activities have shifted the nature of teaching. Teachers are expected to be effective facilitators, engaging in  joint problem solving with their students." (Johnson, Adams Becker, Estrada and Freeman, 201, p.28). An issue with this shift in teaching pedagogy, is that teachers can feel overwhelmed by the rapid developments and need sufficient training and support to integrate emerging digital tools in their curriculum and classrooms effectively.
My community of learning is making the shift towards student centred learning. We are incorporating: student led inquiries; getting students to set their goals in relation to the expected level and identifying what they can do to make improvements; information about the students's strengths and interests are developing the classroom programmes and, where possible, students are being encouraged to choose the tools and the contexts that they use in their learning. In our school community we use Microsoft Office 365 where all the students can access the planning and contribute to the learning criteria. The next step with this is for the students to collaborate with the teacher to plan their own learning and timeframes within the framework of the school curriculum.

Creating authentic learning opportunities prepares students with lifelong learning skills such as critical thinking, reflection and problem solving, enabling students to enjoy future workplace success. While educators can see the benefits of authentic learning and are keen to embrace it, the government needs to help guide the schools through the process. Schools need strong connections with their wider community and these relationships need time to develop. Assessments, matrixes and check points of how students's skills are progressing need to be developed. Recent ways in which my community of practice are creating authentic learning opportunities include, taking our senior students back stage during the local drama production so that they got an idea of what jobs are important when producing a musical and they can then take on these roles, such as lighting, sound, set builder in our school production next term. This week I have a meeting with the local council and DOC at Wakanui Beach to see how Wakanui School can be actively involved in the Wakanui beach restoration project that has been proposed. Another exciting project we are involved in is raising funds to sponsor a child through World Vision. We are continually looking for ways and connections to engage our students to become lifelong learners. As teachers at our school we do not always get it right, classrooms can appear chaotic and some students get lost in the mix, facilitating effective collaboration is challenging,  it is hard as a teacher to stand back and not solve the problems for them particularly when momentum dips and there are timeframes to meet. Assessing the skills such as key competencies, school values and the principles of the curriculum and reporting these to parents and getting them to understand the value in them is an on going issue for our community of practise. I would welcome feedback from others on what is working for them.

References

Education Review Office, 2012. Evaluation at a Glance: Priority Learners in New Zealand Schools. Retrieved 18 May 2016, from http://www.ero.govt.nz/About-Us/News-Media- Releases2/The-three-most-pressing-issues-for-N

Johnson, L., Adams Becker, S., Estrada, V., and Freeman, A. (2015). NMC Horizon Report: 2015 K-12 Edition. Austin, Texas: The New Media Consortium.

The Organisational Culture that Underpins my Practice

Wilson defines the school culture "as the beliefs and priorities that drive thoughts and actions of people at school". He states that "the principal is the keeper of the thoughts and beliefs and says what they are and shows what they are.... Eventually you hear the echoes in the hall and see people carrying out the thoughts and actions and then you know you have built a culture". (Wilson, 2013, June 21).

I am lucky enough to work in an environment where the principal sets the tone for the values and how people treat each other. In the words of Dunkenblau, "she steers the ship and we all get on board." (Academy for SeLinSchools, 2015, April 28). The principal and the teachers make a conscious effort to create a positive environment where everyone is valued. Using Hargreaves typology of schools, I would classify the culture at my school as a collaborative culture (as cited in Stoll, 1998, p.10). Ways in which I contribute to fostering a positive professional environment in my community of practice include: sharing resources, plans and ideas through OneNote; regularly observing and giving feedback to my peers; leading "techy time" once a week so that my colleagues and I can share new digital and collaborative ideas; celebrating our successes and also taking responsibility for our continual improvement.

The Current Issues in my Community of Practice
One of the challenges for our school is to maintain our collaborative culture as we continue to grow. We are currently advertising for a 6th teacher and we are talking about moving to 2 syndicates, so the challenge will be to not let our culture slip to one Hargreaves identified as Balkanisation, where smaller pockets of collaboration grow and we lose the overall collaboration (as cited by Stoll, 1998, p.10). Our community of practice will address this by continuing to recognise, as stated by Trusheim, that "a positive culture does not just happen but has to be worked at and that the teachers and staff are a consistent entity and can build the culture, whereas the students pass through." (Academy for SeLinSchools, 2015, April 28). It is important that we embrace new members of staff, support them and understand that they are unique and will bring different skill sets and ideas which the whole community can benefit from and move forward together.

Another issue in my community of practise is that part of who we our is based around the small rural community in which we are situated. Some of the students who attend the school are third generation farmers from the district and some of the families can be quite traditional in their thinking and a little resistant to change. Whilst the history of our local area and strong community connections are important, our school community is changing. We now welcome students and their whānau from Ashburton town, from Hākatere, a small river mouth settlement, and from the Filipino and Fiji communites. The way that my community of practice will continue to address this challenge is to make everyone of our students feel valued and to have connections with all our families and their culture and values, taking every opportunity to make sure that the identity of all our community is reflected in our school culture.



References

Academy for SeLinSchools (2015, Apr. 28) What is school culture and climate? [Video]. Retrieved      from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-_NvhlcusQ

Stoll, L., 1998. School Culture. School Improvement Network's Bulletin, No. 9, Autumn 

Institute of Education, University of London

Wilson, M., 2013. TEdEd (2013, Jun. 21). Building a culture of success- Mark Wilson. [Video].

 Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_8Bjz-OCD8