Blog – Page 169

March 4, 2012 Carmen.Oliveira Assessment, Communication Tools, Diverse Learning Needs, Learning in a Real Life Context, Resources, Use of Technology

Engaging and Supporting Kids Through Technology

One of my favourite moments to take in during a school day is watching kids as they become completely engaged in their learning. I love to see their eyes light up, their facial expressions full of curiosity, and the buzz of interested voices in deep conversation. It’s what teaching and learning should be all about.

In our classroom, this experience often happens when kids build on and explore topics and concepts through the use of technology. We are fortunate to have a SMART board and a set of laptops which we use on a regular basis to support our lessons. It’s quite interesting to see the difference between how the students view and use technology now and how they did in the beginning, when everything was a novelty. Through guided lessons on how to use technology to support our learning in constructive and meaningful ways, students moved away from simply wanting to play games to using it as a tool for research, independent reading, organizing their work, communicating with myself and their classmates, presenting projects and assignments in various creative formats, but of course, playing educational games is always an added treat!

Last week we had a metric conversion competition between each group by using an online game. You would have thought you were watching the final of the World Cup of soccer with the cheering and excitement in the classroom. Watching the teams work together to solve the metric conversions was a delight (they got extra points for demonstrating their cooperation skills) and I used it as an opportunity to assess their learning of the math concepts.

Using computers and laptops is just another way to add to the learning experience and it works when students become responsible for using technology at appropriate times and for appropriate reasons. It’s not that I think we must have technology to teach engaging lessons and keep kids interested in their learning but in the reality we face today as educators, it sure is a very helpful tool!

Students use a laptop to read a newspaper story and discuss their ideas and opinions through guiding questions.

Students testing their knowledge of energy conservation by "living" in an online home and applying their learning.

A group uses recess time (their decision!) to work on a project involving the presentation of a PSA and brochure.

March 1, 2012 Samantha.Perrin Occasional Teaching, Planning, Professional Learning and Growth

Colleague Collaboration and Leaving a Teaching Assignment

In just over a week, my LTO (long term occasional teaching) teaching assignment will be over, I will say good bye to my lovely Grade 1 students and surrender myself to new students and the world of unpredictable daily occasional teaching once again. Leaving a classroom, just like starting up a classroom, is a process that requires planning, communication, organization, and it is a process that is seriously benefitted by collaboration.

In my school year start-up planning, I was mindful of the kind of student-information that I would need to have on-hand to transfer over to the returning teacher. In my planning I made sure that information on students, timetables, assessments and the like were all clear, concise and put together in such a way that anyone could make sense of the information. I started this when I created learner background forms back in September (with parent information, information on allergies, caregivers etc.), which were placed in a divided binder where the students’ progress report, report card, IEP’s and parent communication records would later be added). This process of having to later transfer student information was also in mind when I created student files with examples of student work and diagnostic testing for an informative ‘at a glance’ of each student, that could easily be passed on to a new teacher.

In the month leading up to the ‘transfer’, I took inventory of the classroom supplies that the new teacher would need for the upcoming months and made sure to place my order so that the class was short on things that might come in handy (fresh glue, markers, erasers, pencils). I also made sure not to over-order knowing that the teacher might want to order supplies in June for the upcoming 2012-2013 school year. I made sure to return books to the library and return any borrowed resources to other teachers in the school. As a child I was always told to ‘leave a place in the same, or better, state as which you found it’, good advice for any teacher, whether they are changing classrooms, leaving from a leave, leaving after a day of supply teaching or leaving a long term occasional assignment.

I have also been in touch with the returning teacher, and we plan to meet next week, when she will observe the classroom routines, meet the students and we will also have a chance to go over some of the planning and she will get a sense of where I will be leaving off. I have also emailed her my day-plans template, week at a glance timetable and class list, so that she does not have to re-invent the wheel, and so that she can focus on other priorities such as getting to know her new class. She also knows that she can contact me with questions once she returns to work.

I know that a lot of what I am doing isn’t actually required of long-term occasional teachers, or of contract teachers who are going on leave, but I believe that teamwork and collaboration are positive and essential practices for any teacher. We teachers are not required to meet, or to share our personal ‘creations’, to share our units, resources, ideas, or hand over our ‘intellectual property’, but we put so much of ourselves into our work to benefit our students, why wouldn’t we share if someone could add to it and make it better? Why wouldn’t we divide the labour so that more attention can be given to an area that needs it? Or Why wouldn’t we lean on one another and be a team so that we restore ourselves from time to time and take turns leading the charge?

I have been in teaching situations where I was given little, or any information on how to program my classroom, which resources to use, how to order supplies, establish systems or routines (teaching under these circumstances can be quite challenging, a trial-by-fire learning experience that is never forgotten), and I have also been in teaching situations where harmonious team work, sharing and planning was the norm (which had an even more positive impact on my experiences as a teacher, my learning and on the kind of things the students and I were able to accomplish in the classroom). Perpetuating a practice that supports teachers, inexperienced and experienced, that allows them to succeed and in turn assist the students succeeded is just another reason why we teachers should do our best to help each other out. Whether we are moving classrooms, going on leave, leaving an LTO behind, or leaving a classroom after supply teaching for a day, I hope this post helps us all be a little more mindful of other ways we can be more positively collaborative and communicative with our colleagues.

February 29, 2012 Erin.Grewar Classroom Management, Diverse Learning Needs, Learning About Your Students

What’s All the Noise About vs. Tomb-Like Silence

Sangeeta’s January posting What’s All the Noise About struck me as something to which all teachers can relate. I found that as a beginning teacher, I was often “aware” of the amount of noise in my classroom however in teaching French, I always felt a certain legitimacy with student interaction. As Sangeeta also mentioned it’s a trait that also characterises different styles of teaching. I know that oftentimes, teachers are judged (even by their peers) as having a lack of classroom management or that their students are too wild to be doing anything productive.

However it seems to me that it all relates to the level of comfort of the teacher and the task at hand. As long as students are on-task, discussion and interaction demonstrate to me a high level of engagement. One also has to take into consideration that students need a release. In teaching exclusively rotary classes, I’ve found that students coming from strict environments where talking/discussion is discouraged in favour of silent work time are often the most challenging when they come to my class as they are frequently the ones who “chatter” incessantly. Although a definite proponent of student talking, I would say that there are a couple of considerations:

students don’t have a licence to talk indiscriminately (ex. during your lesson)
the noise level doesn’t interfere with students being able to work productively
you are not disrupting another classroom
your students are on task and engaged
you feel confident and comfortable

I know that I’ve found it personally rewarding to see students engaged in a lively discussion over an assignment. To me it demonstrates that (mercifully) they are involved and care about what you’re teaching them.

February 28, 2012February 29, 2012 Alison.Board Assessment, Diverse Learning Needs, Learning About Your Students, Learning in a Real Life Context, Planning

Opportunities Beyond the Classroom

This week is our school’s Speech Arts Competition. It was introduced at a staff meeting with the hopes that all classes would participate. Some teachers are enthusiastic, some are not participating, while others (like myself) are using it as an opportunity to focus on oral language skills. I am presenting it to the students more as an opportunity than a “have-to”. There are kids who are thrilled to create or memorize a poem, add dramatic flair and share it with the class. There are others that are anxious about selecting a poem, being able to memorize it, and having to present in front of their peers. Despite emails of worry from concerned parents of the anxious children, I continue to remain calm and relaxed about the process. It is the process that I want the children to learn from. If a few of the students are too nervous, they can recite their piece to me quietly when students are working independently. This option has eased their worry, however I am sure that when the time comes they will be fine, as a sense of community and support already exists within the group.

There are so many opportunities at our school for those who are confident expressing themselves in writing, visual art, or sports. I think that the Speech Arts Contest will appeal to those students who have abilities in oral language and drama. There are so many forms of expression, yet children are often presented with the same options. As teachers, we need to look for opportunities to explore other options and to provide students with a multitude of languages for self-expression, whether it is sculpture, nature, music, or math. I have one student who is often invisible in group discussions. Yet, if I play music or show a video with music, her face lights up, she moves to the beat, and she becomes the most visible.

With over 30 teachers and 500 students, our school buzzes with activity and events. It can be overwhelming for some (like myself) to participate in all the opportunities that are created by various staff members, such as growing seeds and tending our school garden, attending the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, participating in food drives, or sending Valentine’s to the Senior’s home, in addition to your own class trips and activities. However, I have realized that these are opportunities for the students to experience forms of expression beyond what I may provide in the classroom. If you can connect these opportunities with your own plans (such as graphing for Data Management during the food drives), the learning and the experience becomes authentic.

February 22, 2012February 23, 2012 Carmen.Oliveira Assessment, Planning, Professional Learning and Growth

Success Criteria: Let’s Accomplish Our Learning Goal

I remember sitting in a workshop last year where we were challenged to look deeper at the learning goals we set for our students and how we should co-create the success criteria in order to ensure that students understand how to achieve the goal or expectations set out for a particular unit/strand. I also remember wondering whether it would be worth it to put in the time and effort to fully implement this latest strategy/tool in my own classroom with all the additional initiatives I was taking on with respect to my professional learning. I decided to learn as much as possible about using learning goals and success criteria in my teaching and assessment practices.

Today, I can honestly say it is one of the best learning experiences I’ve had in my career thus far. In many respects, it has changed the way my students understand what they are learning, why they are learning specific concepts/skills, and how they can demonstrate what they know.

Everyday I share a learning goal with my class and how that concept/skill will help them in a real life context. Within each unit of study or topic we focus on, I create the learning goal by using the curriculum expectations and, together with my students, we co-create the success criteria to achieve the learning goal by using mentor texts, level 3 and 4 responses, etc. Students know the importance of using the success criteria to edit, revise, and share their knowledge and understanding in a clear and concise way.

We have a saying I took from Maya Angelou: “When you know better, you do better.” When students know what is expected and how they can achieve the learning goal, they have a better chance of succeeding and progressing further.

How I share learning goals and reflection questions with students each day

Students know what they are learning each day

A student uses the success criteria to revise and edit his writing

Students use success criteria to peer edit by adding descriptive feedback

Students use the descriptive feedback from their peers to work on their final draft

February 14, 2012February 14, 2012 Tina.Ginglo Building Inclusion, Planning, Resources

Accountable Talk

I agree with Sangeeta, there is nothing like a room buzzing with students…talking!!! I don’t think that you can have a collaborative engaging learning environment without a little noise.

Frank Serafini has written a number of books about developing engaging reading programs (e.g., The Reading Workshop, Lessons In Comprehension) and he is often invited to speak at large literacy conferences. In one of his sessions he said, half in jest, that when we read a great book, we don’t get excited and rush to make a diorama. Rather, we want to talk about the book! We must allow and plan for productive accountable talk in our classrooms.

One strategy that is popular in my class is called, Paired Verbal Fluency. I picked up this strategy years ago when I attended a Bruce Wellman workshop series. He also includes this strategy in his book with Laura Lipton, Pathways to Understanding: Patterns and Practices in the Learning Focused Classroom (ISBN 0-9665022-0-5). This strategy is great for getting students verbally active before, during and after learning. I often use it to activate prior knowledge, to review concepts already learned, before the learning continues. It is also a great strategy for consolidation. For example, the other day I used it to review what students learned from our study of the Underground Railroad.

The directions are rather simple.

Students work in partners. Partners decide who will be person A and which partner will be person B.
I present the topic that is going to be discussed. For example, “What is the Underground Railroad and why is it an important part of our history?”
When I say, “Go,” person A speaks. Person A begins to answer the question. Person B listens carefully, but does not add to the discussion. Person A speaks for 60 seconds.
When I say, “Switch,” it is person B’s turn to speak. Person B should not repeat anything that person A shared. Person B is simply building on A’s answer. Person B speaks for 60 seconds.
The process continues for another round or two, but for each round, the time is decreased by 20 seconds. For example, person A will now continue to build on to person B’s response, being careful not to repeat anything B said, but this time, A will only speak for 40 seconds.

Students enjoy this strategy. It teaches them to listen to each other. Other effective strategies for fostering accountable-talk include the Give-One, Get One strategy and the Walk Around Survey. These strategies also have the added benefit of getting the students moving around the room as well as talking. Other strategies can be found in the Ministry of Education’s A Guide to Effective Literacy Instruction Grades 4-6 – Volume One, 2006. You can find this document at eworkshop.on.ca.

February 13, 2012 Samantha.Perrin Occasional Teaching, Professional Learning and Growth

Staying on Top of Your Professional Profile

It’s that time of year again. Its report card and parent-teacher interview time, but also for eligible to hire teachers without permanent contracts, long-term occasional teachers, and occasional teachers it’s about the time to re-apply to boards for hiring for the next year. It’s an important process because if we don’t do it properly and on time, our livelihood as teachers could be compromised the following year.

While the process of re-applying is not new to me, I still find it a little bit stressful because of the timing of it (coming off of the holidays, assessment/reporting) and the importance of being able to stand out and be up to date, and reflective of my accomplishments as an educator. After teaching all day, taking courses in the evenings, report writing during evenings and weekends, the gathering of materials for applying to boards ( which includes cover letters, resumes, references, OCT information, teacher-appraisals from pre-service teaching) it is a big undertaking, as is updating the information and properly uploading it as per the board’s format.

I understand the challenges that a lot of beginning (not-permanent) teachers go through this time of year, because I experience it myself. This is the time of year that I need to be acutely attuned to my students’ learning (their assessments, class room lessons, report-card writing, preparation for parent teacher interviews) and I also have to be concern myself with my own learning/accomplishments and securing future and more permanent (or at least, predictable) employment. Having been through this a few times, I am learning how to be smarter about keeping my professional portfolio up to date so that I am able to focus on my work in the classroom and my other commitments. I have gotten into the habit of updating my resume every couple of months, including more recent workshop experience, teaching experiences and taking away information that may be redundant or outdated so that I don’t have to sit and stare blankly at last year’s resume contemplating what to add. I also make it a point to contact my references to ask their permission and briefly discuss the work that they can comment on. I keep scanned copies of important teaching related information and cover letters for easy access and easy uploading.

While I don’t love the process and the timing of having to reapply to boards annually, I understand its function for being up to date and retaining people who are committed to becoming teachers. As a result of my learning how to manage and keep up to date with my professional profile, I have enjoyed the varied experiences of teaching in different grades and different classrooms, and I hope that other ‘new teachers’ find my tips helpful in making the hiring process a little less difficult.

February 10, 2012February 11, 2012 Alison.Board Building Inclusion, Diverse Learning Needs, Learning About Your Students, Professional Learning and Growth

By the way, what is self-regulation?

Last week, I had the opportunity to attend the Director’s Leadership Series – Early Years Strategy launch. The highlights included an address from Dr. Chris Spence about the importance of intentional inquiry and a presentation by Prof. Shanker on self-regulation in the early years. I feel the need to share this as it struck me how timely his presentation was, as we were all assessing students on their “self-regulation” for report cards. Although we are provided with some examples of what self-regulation is, such as “Sets own goals and monitors progress towards achieving them,” it may be difficult to apply this statement to a 6 or 7 year old and their opportunities for self-regulation in the classroom.

“Self-regulation is not self-control,” said Dr. Shanker during his animated and engaging presentation. However, he suggests that many of us see the child that does as he/she is told as the one that is most able to self-regulate. Instead, it is the child that uses less energy to deal with external stressors and is able to be calm but alert – the optimal state for learning. By stressors, he is referring to auditory and visual stimulation that children may be sensitive to. They become focused on the stressors, use energy, zone out, and then aren’t able to follow what they should be doing. It also begs the question for us as teachers, how to provide an environment with less stressors for the children and how can we help our students find strategies to deal with their emotions and support them in self-regulation? This ties in with many of our early discussions on our blog about Tribes and inclusiveness, since creating positive energy supports the students ability to learn, whereas a negative energy drains them. It also ties in with our discussions about the importance of the classroom set up, as Dr. Shanker suggests we consider what type of a classroom environment will enhance energy (a calm energy for learning).

I found this professional development opportunity connected well with what teachers are grappling with right now. Dr. Shanker touched on behaviour, anxiety, as well as ADHD and Autism and their relationships with self-regulation. My class is currently discussing the big idea, “What is Well-Being” so we are explicitly discussing what distractions there are, what helps us to be calm and alert, and what can we do to self-regulate throughout the day. This afternoon after coming in from the yard at recess, on of my students asked, “Can we do the rainstick thing?” ~ a little mindfulness for a minute seems to be working for us as a first step to discovering how to self-regulate.

iDirector’s Leadership Series – Early Years Strategy.

An address from our Director, Dr. Chris Spence
Presentation by distinguished Professor Dr. Stuart Shanker on self-regulation in the early years

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February 8, 2012February 8, 2012 Carmen.Oliveira Assessment, Communication with Parents and Guardians, Interviews, Report Cards

Constructive and Productive Parent-Teacher Conferences

Just having read Alison’s post “Reflecting On Reporting” I have to admit that all too often we tend to become focused on assessing our students with tools and strategies that can feel overwhelming in our need to “get it right” with respect to our evaluation of the students’ progress. The fact that “a picture says a thousand words” is good reason to use pictures and video as a very valid and authentic form of assessment. What a meaningful way to share student learning with parents…

Speaking of parents, I’m beginning to prepare for the Parent-Teacher conferences next week. I have found that the preparation beforehand goes a long way to create an opportunity for a constructive and productive meeting during which time we can cover the student’s strengths, needs, next steps, and celebrate accomplishments. I do this by:

1. Sending home a pre-conference letter getting the parent(s)/guardians to share their thoughts, questions, concerns, etc. about the report card and listing possible topics/questions they hope to cover during our conference. This gives me time to gather the appropriate samples, resources, and recommendations specifically tailored to the needs of the family.

2. Using data from their report card, their Daily Journal, and conversations with me, students choose 3 goals for the following term and specify the steps they will take to achieve them along with how they will celebrate their success. Students share their goal setting plans with parents during the conference.

3. During the conference, I keep notes based on our conversation (on my computer) and by the end of the night or the following day, I send the notes in an email to the parents (in our class we communicate through email which I’ve found very helpful and parents appreciate the opportunity to get in touch with me without always having to come in or call).

It may seem like a lot of work but I’ve found that our conferences are constructive, productive, and best of all, we cover a lot of ground in a short amount of time. It makes it more effective to work toward our goals when we (students, parents, and teachers) are on the same page.

Below I’ve attached the goal setting template my students use in preparation for conferences.

goal setting

February 3, 2012February 5, 2012 Alison.Board Assessment, Report Cards

Reflecting on Reporting

After spending the last week or two working on reports, I have asked myself what I can do to make the reporting process more efficient next time. My dining room table was covered in piles of workbooks, an array of notes, observations, and my assessment binder. More than enough right? Well, maybe because I am very visual, (and thorough), I needed something more to assure myself that I had considered the “whole child” as Tina had referred to in an earlier post. So I went to the computer and opened my file of photos from the classroom. Here were some images that captured demonstrations of learning skills and showed understanding of the curriculum in a different form.

This photo of the girls weaving makes teamwork visible, as they share the task of weaving with one piece of fabric.

Another photo (see below) shows a student demonstrating independence in her learning. She is using both the text and the world map to find information about a community in Pakistan.

Photos like these are a form of documentation. Documentation can be used for reflection as well as planning. Documentation can be shared with the children, the parents, or colleagues. We see children in the classroom every day demonstrating learning, and often don’t think of taking photos of such every day events. However, during report card times these photos are an invaluable part of the assessment process. Next term, I plan on using my camera every week!