Adults are not unimportant! We ARE important. We have knowledge, craft, wisdom, experiences to offer. Adults and students have synergy when they work together.
Why not...
Teach students how to provide technology support for teachers
- In the classroom
- Collaborative learning
- Allows students to play an important role
- Provides support for technology use outside of formal professional development.
Insert slides etc from website Learning @Schools
Don't confuse assessment and measurement. Assessment is not a numbers game. Assess means to gather information about what someone can do.
Which of the Key Competencies are strongly built into your Learning Area. (Maths) Understanding symbols and text, thinking, participating and contributing..
T Thinking
R Relating to others
U Understanding language symbols and texts
M Managing self
P Participating and contributing
Are you currently developing the Key Competencies both implicitly and explicitly.
If explicitly, exactly how? What explicit strategies?
- Matrices
- WALTs and success criteria
- Planning explicitly, then teachers reflect together at the end of lessons to see how they went with that focus
- We can look at it at a micro level (How did we go today? In this unit?) Or at a macro level (As a school, over time).
...Around the traps.
What concerns do you have?
What challenge do you perceive?
Tick it off mentallity - written in plans but nothing very deliberate going on at all.
"We already do this".
We don't know how to assess them?
Takes time to develop them.
Monitoring the KCs
Why bother assessing?
If you don't assess then they won't be valued.
Who is the assessment for?
Teacher, children and parents.
Given why you are assessing, what information is needed?
How can we gather information?
Nature of the KCs
- Non-linear
- Complex
- Interactive - overlap - integrated
- Individual - personal (all about myself)
- Situational
- Quality
- Open ended - continual growth possible (no limits, there's always a next step)
- Other?
Process to get to the heart of KC teaching
1. Reflect on someone (adult or child) who you believe demonstrates a specific KC at a high level.
A) What were the attributes / dispositions they displayed? What skills did they use?
Relating to Others - humour, thoughtfulness - awareness of what was going on in people's lives - checking in and following up - small, kind gestures - genuinely interested in people's news - talks kindly - listens with empathy
B) Read the NZ Curriculum description
Not just about having the skill!
The skills need to be fed by a disposition or attribute or personal quality. This is why checklists don't work. Anyone can learn to have the skills of a KC but it requires personal qualities to enforce them.
2. How did you KNOW they exhibited the key competency at a high level? What were the signs / circumstances? (Much harder question!!!)
On what basis did you know? What was the evidence? Did they pass a test? Did you give them a mark?
We can only KNOW when we observe people in real situations, in a variety of contexts, in comparison to others. We need to have scales of reference.
Observation of the competency in authentic situations. (Most often easier to observe in extra curricula activities). THE OTHER PROBLEM IS that when we set up artificial activities or remove kids to an artificial environment (eg camps) kids demonstrate the KC BUT then when they return to school they no longer demonstrate it.
The highly competent individual demonstrates the competency...
- Consistently over time
- In a range of contexts from familiar to challenging
- A high level of complexity
- Autonomously - without support and self initiated
- Self aware - reflective - prepared to act to improve
- Persistence - keeping at it
What does this mean for me?
How can I ensure my students have opportunities to demonstrate their KC in REAL, authentic contexts at school, in our room?
I need to ensure that I FREQUENTLY organise group, co-operative work in a variety of subjects, so that children have to relate and think.
An interesting point - does this explain at some level the difference in behaviours children demonstrate at home and school?
Example of school matrix for monitoring KCs
Consistency Occasionally - frequently - Routinely
Context Familiar - New/Different - Challenging
Complexity Simple - Compound - complex
Mindfulness Imitator - Initiator - Autonomous
This matrix helps pinpoint how a student can be helped to develop a KC.
What does this mean for me?
Breakout 2 - Karen Boyes - Teaching in Authentic Contexts
Necessity of experience is vitally important. We need to allow our students to experience things.
5 year olds should be being the aeroplane in the playground not flying the aeroplane.
Some children need to get off track to learn. Sometimes we need to let them make mistakes to get the lesson.
In life, if you don't get the lesson, life gives you the same situation over again and again until eventually we DO get it!
If we 'save' children and don't point out why something happened then they may never learn the life lesson. eg: "I can't come to this study session. I have to go to art and finish my portfolio or my teacher will be cross". (Needs to learn the lesson of time management and she won't if someone doesn't point this out to her).
Sometimes we need to return to a task and do it again after evaluation so chn can put their new learning into practise.
Long Term Memory
- Must make sense to the learner
- Must have meaning in their world
2 sins when planning!
- Activities - lets do it 'cos it'll be cool!
- Coverage - doesn't matter if they learn it - we've covered it.
Planning for Deep Understanding
- Teach and assess for understanding
- Identify desired results
- Determine acceptable evidence
- Plan learning experiences and instruction
The 5 senses
Create a birthday party for a 1yr old child that engages all the five senses. (Each group could take a different sense to work on).
Sound
I've just had a call from the conductor of the NZ symphony orchestra he can't come now to our school concert. Let's make instruments and have a concert for the parents. (some chn working on percussion, strings, etc).
Geology
Laws and rules
Mini Beasts
Scientists have discovered a new animal and they aren't sure what it is...?
Miss B has a large garden and she has noticed there are a lot of different minibeasts in it. She's heard that some minibeasts are good for gardens. What is the problem? What do I want them to learn? What attitudes and skills will they practise? Bee keeping? Miss B wants to keep bees to help her garden. Miss B wants to attract birds/minibeasts to her garden. Can you help her?
Rocky shore
Countries around the world
Examples of Problem scenarios:
- Can you make me a sign for my Mexican restaurant? It needs to have a spinning part to grab attention.
- Mad Max trashed the classroom as a way to hook them into a cycle safety unit.
- Unit on cookies. Make, bake, package and market. Team challenge. Winning team gets to spend the profit. (Chn then learn about profit). Research target market. Taste test.
- Design a monument that reminds locals to care for each other and think of each other.
- We're having a party! Design invitations, welcome posters, maps for the classroom, etc. (Assessment task is oral language. Can preschoolers introduce themselves and show someone around?)
- Jim Hickey TV1 weatherman is going on holiday for one month and needs a substitute.
What extra knowledge / vocab / instructions will I need to teach to make this work?
Bring in kids strengths and weaknesses.
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