a vision of students today

I saw this on YouTube today and, even though we are nearly finished with our project, I thought it worthwhile to share this with you all. It really makes you think about the way we expect students to learn compared to the reality of our students' lives. Even though these students are older it is still very applicable to our HFS students. I love the line that goes something like.... "the job I get may not even been created yet". We have to fine tune our thinking about engagement and the way students learn best.

EXPLORING ENGAGEMENT

1. We invite you to spend our presentation time exploring and talking to each other about some of the projects that we've been working on with our students as part of our learning projects.

Choose one of the links below to view our Blogs

3red2007.blogspot.com

4blue2007.blogspot.com

5blue2007.blogspot.com

6blue2007.blogspot.com

6red2007.blogspot.com

principalville.blogspot.com

After exploring one of our classroom blogs discuss with your team, "what is one aspect of the blog that you think would be engaging for children ?"

_____________________

2.Your group will be assigned a Web2.0 tool or Learning Object

- WIKIS

6-blue2007.

4blue2007.

bestplacetolive.

5blue2007poetry.

- VOICETHREAD

5 Blue - Class Discussion

5 Blue - Poetry

6 Blue - Class Discussion

- LEARNING OBJECT
The Gold Rush

Discuss, "Why do you think that this tool would be relevant to kids who are living in a digital age?"

____________________

3. What did we learn from all this experimentation, inquiry, risk-taking?

Engaging learning is
CHOICE
AUDIENCE
RELEVANCE
OWNERSHIP

Engaging teaching is
CONNECTEDNESS
HIGHER ORDER THINKING
ENGAGEMENT

____________________

4. Challenges and Directions

Number of laptops or technical equipment available when required

Some children are unable to access technology at home due to parental restrictions

Does the use of technology follow the 80 – 20 rule…. 80% content, 20% technology use

Technology has to be included as part of the learning experience, not an extra add on to the curriculum

How do we know that we have really improved student outcomes? Base line data needs to be collected

How can we share with the parents the wonderful work that students are doing?

WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN DOING ????

Learning B Team met on Monday in an attempt to establish where we all were with our projects. Also to make some plans as to how and what it is about our projects that we expect to include in our presentations.

It was interesting to listen to everyone speak about their experiences with and their thoughts about student engagement. We are a small group of people and yet we see things so differently. It really makes you think twice about your own thoughts when you actually take the time to listen to those of others.

It was an enjoyable day for me –I spent some time with friends, enjoyed numerous cups of coffee, ate lots of gummy bears, and actually set my “school brain” back into action.

It wasn’t until later that evening that I realised my “school brain” had been hibernating. However it was woken by the others in the team – and now it’s ticking again. I am thinking about all the different ways in which I can provide year six with learning opportunities that they feel are worthwhile. I continue on my quest to find learning experiences that will engage the children – I want them to be involved in their learning not to please me or because they don’t want to get in trouble but because they WANT to.

I believe that many of the Web 2 tools that the children and I have learnt about and used during the last few months have helped all us develop valuable social and communication skills. The children liked the fact that they were being provided with the opportunity to have a say about their learning – that is what they wanted to learn, what they learnt, how they learnt effectively and simply asking them for and valuing their opinion? They have acquired valuable skills through a medium which has engaged them, allowed them to direct their own learning and exposed them to an audience that they actually care about. Many of them have become valuable teachers; they have passed on their knowledge and skills to parents, to each other, and to me. I can only hope that we are able to sustain this during term 4.

So thanks to you all for giving up your time to travel up the mountain, for sharing your thoughts – even if some of our thoughts weren’t exactly focussed on our projects, for being happy to talk about what’s been happening in your own classrooms and thanks for waking up that part of my brain that was “hibernating”. (It must be because I don’t have access to Coke everyday whilst I am at home.)

Frustration sets in!

I am absolutely struggling with my PD! I am providing my children with engaging, challenging activities in mathematics. Check.
I am assessing through inviting comments on the class blog. Check.
I am taking anecdotal records and photographic evidence of my class totally engaed in a maths task. Check.
The mathematical discussions that I am hearing are absolutely mind blowing. Check.
The students are telling me that maths is their new favourite subject. Check.

Why then are my results on the topic test so poor? Does anyone have any ideas? is there anyone that could take a look at my topic tests and tell me where I'm going wrong? I really need some help from my team mates here.

Another way of expressing ourselves

Found another Web2.0 tool which allows us to express thinking & learning. (It puts a face to a comment). Here is my first attemt at reflecting on the 'blog phenomena' at school. (sorry about the washing in the background)

Can the 'blog' sustain us?

This cartoon got me thinking about blogs. We really are looking to find 'meaning' . That is the first task. The blog then becomes the 'medium' to make it happen. It keeps in perspective that we are all lifelong learners and ICT provides the tools to enhance this journey!
I'm starting to understand that the medium & the message merge together when we use web2.0 tools. The thinking I use to create a post is just as valuable as the final product! When others comment that provides another opportunity to synthesise and evaluate my thinking.

MORE TOOLS FOR ENGAGEMENT

This is a great tool that could be used by the children to share what they know with others, present a timeline of events, reflect on the meaning of scripture through pictures, or to simply present a story they wish to tell using audio and video.
The site does everything for you all you have to do is upload the images and add some music
Type animoto into google its the first listing. HAVE A GO - this is so ADDICTIVE and engaging.

Janine

Improving student outcomes...what a team!

This arvo the mighty B team got together. What a wonderful 2 hours of sharing. We each shared our project and the strategies we are attempting to improve student outcomes. Teachers shared ideas, frustrations, questions, breakthroughs with certain children, technology tips, resources and passion for making a difference. We filled the staff room with 'talk on learning', of our students and our own. It was a privilege to be with such professional and passionate educators!! Maybe we have rediscovered on how we can work smarter rather than harder with the help of our colleagues.
My role is to continue to challenge people to keep their eye on the 'main game' .... improving student outcomes and to show to ourselves and each other that we are making a difference to the HFS students. I go to bed tonight a contented principal zzzzzzz

DISCOVERY

Robyn, Luke, Kate and Janine recently attended a Maths 300 cluster meeting. During this time we were introduced to an extremely useful link on staffnet. The site provides online tututorials that explain many of the Web2.0 programs that we are using in the classrooms with the students and also discovering ourselves. The tutorials are available in both Mac and PC formats.

http://www.atomiclearning.co.uk/tutorials

GENESIS - IN THE BEGINNING

Well, well, well here we are sharing a hot beverage and some thoughts with our team. I am still unsure of exactly what it is I wish to achieve with my learners. I have so many thoughts racing through my mind that it is difficult to decide which of these thoughts and ideas I want to go with.
FOCUS - FOCUS - FOCUS.
I think my main FOCUS is going to be the engagement of the children - that is I want their learning to be meaningful - connected to their own life. I want to create a learning environment that allows children and myself to be committed to, interested in, responsible for and reflective of our learning. If I create learning experiences that are engaging I am hopeful that the achievement of learning outcomes for the children will be enhanced.
FOCUS-FOCUS-FOCUS
We all need to reflect on our learning - so I think the idea of a reflective learning log is worthwhile - I need to be careful though that the log itself does not represent just another TASK to be completed because the teacher said so. Even the log needs to presented in a way which encourages and interests the children.
FOCUS-FOCUS-FOCUS
So now I am back to beginning how do we engage children in their learning - what is it they need and want to know????? Learning needs to be connected to their lives outside of our little classroom at HF. Learning needs to inspire thinking - meaningful, useful and COOL thinking.

I'm so confused - too many thoughts too few neurons.

FOCUS-FOCUS-FOCUS

Janine

My thoughts about "team thoughts"

A great discussion starting with 'engagement' and what that could mean to our students at HFS. We talked about the sense of ownwership students need to have to engage a lot like we are attempting with our Professional Learning groups. How can we implement and embed Higher Order thinking in to our learning? The use of Learning Logs as a vehicle to engage students in thinking was discussed. We also need to then;

• model for the students by 'thinking out loud' and drafting a Learning Log
• Provide a number of opportunities to attempt this reflection
• Provide Higher order thinking questions ones that encourage students to analyse, explain etc

Great discussion team.. Looking forward to our next meeting!!

Engagement and Higher Order Thinking

I am currently interested in focussing on mathematics - how can I make mathematics more relevant to the learners, how am I achieving the "connectedness" for them, building a relationship between mathematics and real life?
In planning my units I think I need to address the issue of higher order thinking - how can I use higher order thinking questions to enable students to become effective self evaluators? I am very interested to explore the scvience and tech model show to us by Gary. This model has 5 phases to consider when planning a series of learning experiences - engage, explore, explain, elaborate and evaluate. With the system we have in place for programming I feel that I am not devoting enough time to developing meaningful learning experiences. I am going to revert back to the old system of writing specific lesson plans for a mathematical unit using these 5 phases of the model. I will then teach the unit for 5 weeks and provide children with a way of being self-reflective by providing them with a series of questions that will promote higher order thinking. These questions can be in the form of blog entries.

I also offered to collect a variety of questions that promote higher order thinking when reflecting on learning and I will give these to the group at our next meeting.

year 4 learning logs

well, after chatting this morning about the direction we will take im thinking that some kind of learning log will be beneficial to my childrens learning and my evaluation of my teaching and their learning. hopefully i can pinpoint what lessons were most 'value adding' to their learning and also, probably more importantly - what they want to know. that way, i can steer their learning to make it CONNECTED to their own life.
a weekly journal in which they can reflect on the weeks lessons and experiences about the theme unit will let me achieve this.

thanks for the hot choc janine :)

Luke's First Post!!!

Hmmmmmm. Well I don't know what to write but it's my planning day for the term today so everything is Sweeeeet! I reckon I might focus on the theme of 'taking resonsibility for our own learning' and trying to develop reflective opportunities for the kids, so that along the way, they can evaluate what and how they have learnt and what they might do differently next time. Yeah, that sounds like it might go alright....................

Starting the conversation

Team,
Found a sentence in an article which was a summary of what we were trying to achieve and investigate.. see what you think... ' to support each other to create innovative units of work which engage and challenge students by making thoughtful use of digital resources...' The big questions are 'how do we engage & challenge'? ... 'How do we make learning relevant to 21century students?' A while back I started a blog for myself. I have posted 2 great videos to get us thinking. The one to watch is called Pay Attention. Go to http://www.principalville.blogspot.com/ and see what you think.
Gary