23/8: Reflection - Class Reset

Reflection: Class Reset

23rd August 2016

Last week Gina asked to see me regarding an incident involving a Taylor student. While having a chat we started to speak about classroom and behaviour management. I mentioned to her a chat that I had recently had with Alex. This was regarding the fact that a lot of my relationships I had built with students were based off a relationship base of liking each other. These relationships are starting to backfire and some students are trying to push their luck because not all cases had a form of respect. I made a comment to Gina that this was what I was worried about at the start of the year and wish I could redo it. She mentioned that in the past she has done what she calls a reset. When she is not happy with the way a class is going she tells them they are going to reset and lays down the rules.

After this chat I decided that is exactly the type of strategy I need to try with my boys health class, so before their next health class I decided to write down my key points and rules that I wanted to bring up with them. These included:
-I have not been happy with our health classes recently, mainly behaviour and work ethic
-even though I have trialled different activities to see if I would get a positive response they are still being disruptive and rude - I know they wouldn't behave like this in other classes
-moving forward; if this continues I will write a seating plan for each class and will assign groups instead of being able to work with friends, hands up - no calling out whether its a proper answer or not, verbal warning and then name written on the board - if name is still written on the board at the end of the lesson they will receive DT

After waiting for the class to arrive and settle I went through my points with the class. I was pretty impressed with the reaction I received as they were all dead silent and looked a bit stunned. Overall the reset worked really well and I wish that I would have thought to have done something like this earlier. They completed all tasks set and behaved much better. Although there are still some points to work on I believe that if I remain consistent with this new reset I will have much more productive lessons in the future.

16/8: Reflection Regarding Parent Contact

Reflection Regarding Parent Contact

16th August 2016

Last week I sent home emails to parents regarding their son or daughter failing an assessment due to not submitting their assessment or submitting it uncompleted. They were general emails based off school templates. After sending these emails I had contact with parents by phone and email regarding the matter. This contact made me realize a few points; I don't have enough contact with parents, I should have sent at at risk of failing email and sometimes calls are better than emails.

I don't have enough contact with parents
After having sent out these emails and hearing back from a few parents it hit me that this was the first time I had been in contact with some of these parents and it was negative. Although I have recently started to send home 'warm & fuzzy' praise emails on a Friday and had met some parents at parent-teacher interviews I haven't met or had contact with many.
I recall that at the start of the year a teacher mentioned that she sent home an email to all of her students parents introducing herself. This could be a few weeks into the year with a few strengths and weaknesses or goals that their son or daughter may have for the year ahead. This would also make it easier in future to send little report emails (positive or negative) along the way. It may also mean that when it comes to parent-teacher interviews parents have some idea about what their child is doing within your class.

I should have sent 'at risk of failing' emails
Although this may not have been applicable to all of the students, it would have helped for some. This pre warning home may have helped parents to have a chat to their child regarding the assessment and may have been able to provide some information earlier if they were struggling etc. It may have also helped with the shock that some parents seemed to get. Hindsight is a beauty.

Sometimes calls are better than emails
After some of the responses, both over phone and email, I had a chat to Dan Mitchell about it. He told me how he is trying to phone a lot more parents rather than sending emails, or phoning and warning about an email that is coming before it comes. Things he pointed out:
-a phone call and the effort behind it can be more respected than an email
-you are able to talk about the issue at that time
-you start to build a relationship with the parents
-you can still send the email as a formality after

He also gave me some pointers for talking to parents and a reading that he found useful as his first year of being Housemaster (linked below). Pointers included:
-understand that the parent is the biggest supporter of their child
-be empathetic and let the parent know you understand how you feel
-if you are unsure about something shut the conversation down (e.g. you need to talk to ____) or return to your main point
-repeat the parents main points back to them to show you have some understanding
-know your main point or where you stand before making the call
-don't make any promises


Link to reading: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B8SyJqn0M1mhRVBnSEw5QTd4aTg

15/8: PD - Technology within PE with Julie

PD: Technology within PE with Julie
Howick College Visit

15th August 2016

Today I spent the morning at Howick College with Julie Breen. The main aim for this morning's PD was to gain help on how to use technology within the class. Not only did I enjoy my time there but found that I have come away with some points to think about and some ideas to trial. Below are some notes I took while at Howick:

Key points:

• Technology needs to be used with a purpose – don’t just use it because it’s there
• Reflection - Noticing the difference or impact between new school and old school - is new school more effective?

Ideas:

• Set up a padlet or blendspace for different NCEA standards – all content in one place 
• Copy of the class padlet (padlet settings – grid/freedom)
• Students can add to padlet by introducing new posts/ videos that aren’t displayed until moderated by teacher
• Base copy that each class starts with at the beginning of each year 
• Padlet of class contract at the beginning of the year – photo of the class as the background
•  Drugfreeworld.org posters
• Use of backchat (interactive questions that presenter can see etc) when doing PowerPoint – Google Slides
• Use of padlets for students to ask questions they would like to find out within a unit
• Use of padlets for students to look at multiple articles (scoop it) and write a reflection
• This can be used in classroom debates
• Multiple summaries and reflections of articles in which students could use when writing their assessments
• Looking at articles taking into consideration others points of view

What I’ve seen:

• Year 9 class focusing on dance/movement – reflection on Schoology in regards to lesson & unit objectives through set questions
• Unit criteria on the board for students to clearly see
• A question including lesson aim under criteria on the board
• Students finished finalizing dance and then had to teach another group
• Groups then had to assess how well each group did in a dance and teaching in regards to criteria that was introduced before dance was created
• After teaching each other students needed to grade other groups in relation to the criteria – this could be seen and also helps to link to unit objectives
• Year 12 using class padlet to find information on short and long term effects of exercise
• In expert groups looking at the 4 categories of energy systems, respiratory, muscular, cardiovascular
• Jigsaw – become an expert on your topic and teach others
• Aiming for this class to become more responsible for their own learning
• 2 year 10 classes learning the same thing but taught completely different
• 1 class lecture type style – teacher talking, pictures on the board, asking students to answer questions
• 1 class using PowerPoint with videos and GIFs
• Year 12 class Kahoot to recap knowledge and introduce new learning for this lesson
• Sometimes likes to use socrative more than Kahoot as some students focus more on reaction times rather than the correct answers
• Then use of padlet, schoology and course booklets to help answer the questions (can count as an exercise log)
• Questions are broken down to allow for Excellence answers if all questions answered properly

8/3: Lesson Reflection on Class Feedback

Lesson Reflection on Class Feedback

8th March 2016

8/8: Mentor Report Comments

Mentor Report Comments

8th August 2016

When the time came to writing Mentor Comments King's provided plenty of help. Below are links to attached documents:

King's College Writing School Reports (2016) - Mentor Help Guide: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B8SyJqn0M1mhYkpieWRYTjVuQkE

Gina's examples of past Mentor Comments: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B8SyJqn0M1mheHk2b1FGbmhER00

After looking at the exemplars I decided to create a plan of attack, as to how I was going to structure each of my mentor comments.
My plan of attack:
-a comment about what they are like in mentor
-an overview of their subjects; what is going well, room for improvement, common themes
-comment about an interest
-a note about looking forward to setting goals in upcoming weeks through Mentor Period

To ensure I could follow this plan of attack I made sure to print off the girls reports so that I was able to look at their grades for both Term 1 & 2, teacher comments and any extra curricular involvement. When reading through their report comments I would then highlight common themes and check that grades were improving. Below are some photos as examples:

As mentioned by Gina in the email below, my mentor comments showed that I knew the girls well. I also believe that I have formed a good relationship with them as they feel able to come to me for advice for both learning needs and extra curricular activities. This helps to demonstrate the relationship we have built which focusses on both their learning and wellbeing (PTC1 & 2). By spending the time to thoroughly go through each of their reports and actively seeking help and feedback to help with my report writing I am able to relate to PTC4.

5/8: Taking the Focus Off Content

Meeting with Alex 

Friday 5th August

Last week I met with Alex regarding key points she is starting to pick out of my lessons. These included:

• instructions given
• teaching to make students confident, connected, actively involved lifelong learners rather than focussing on content

Over the past week Alex has given me some key points to work on in regards to giving instructions:

• keeping instructions concise (she demonstrated an example which included repeating instructions 3 times to students and it only took 2 1/2 minutes for instructions to be given and students to be working on that task)
• checking for understanding e.g. body language (glazed looks) rather than asking
• repetition of instructions (repeating 2-3 times)
• demanding of attention e.g. use of whistle, making sure all girls are paying attention (off screens, not talking)
• use of "when I say go..."

In regards to teaching to make students competent future learners, Alex got me to watch a video Ken Robinson - Creativity in Education (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NFubmeHDtII) or full length video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iG9CE55wbtY). 

Key points I took from the video:

• education killing creativity?
• children aren't afraid of being wrong but by the time they become adults they have lost this
• we are educating people out of their creavity as we are taught that mistakes are bad
• due to being afraid of mistakes we are less likely to be creative/original
• we grow/are educated out of our creativity
• intelligence is diverse, dynamic and distinct

Alex expressed her concern that I am too busy focussing on the content that I am teaching rather than focussing on creating competent learners (which is the key different between the new and old curriculum). We then looked into the 2007 curriculum. She pointed out to me that within the curriculum strands that they don't specify certain topics that need to be covered in either PE or Health throughout the year, they are only a method of reaching the aims within the strands. She then pointed out the main aim of the curriculum is expressed through the vision, principles, values and key competencies. To make myself concentrate on achieving these rather than focussing on the content and context of the lesson Alex has asked for me to highlight how I am supporting and developing these 21^st century competencies within each lesson by writing them in my plan book.

To help me with this focus she has given me a list of things she would like me to use within my lessons for the week:

• Padlet
• Kids to create a video
• 3 different ways of getting people into e.g. pre planned groups, similar background etc – be able to explain why
• Question dice
• Post-it
• Students to reflect in 3 different ways e.g. think-peer-share, exit slips, email
• Students to teach

4/8: Reading Reflection - High Impact Leadership by John Hattie

High Impact Leadership by John Hattie

4th August 2016

Key points taken form the reading:

• Two types of school leaders - instructional & transformational leadership
• transformational leadership focus on teachers e.g. setting visions and creating goals
• instructional leadership focus on the students e.g. concerned with the impact that teachers and the school are having on the students learning

(Key points describing attributes of high-impact instructional learners)

• high impact leaders are able to create a space were everyone successfully learns and where learning is welcomed rather than tolerated
• both teachers and students being able to look at errors as an opportunity for learning 
• visible learning so students clearly understand what they are learning and the progression e.g. learning intentions and success criteria known and seen so students are able to understand the purpose of their learning and are able to monitor their progress
• as students move towards student-centered learning they are able to discuss about what they are learning in classes, not what they are doing

My copy of the reading with highlighted notes and points can be found: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B8SyJqn0M1mhaG9zSmxxWVU0bUE

Even after reading this and recognising that instructional leadership aims to focus on student-centered learning I failed to reflect this in class today. In my girls PE class instead of allowing students the opportunity to sort themselves out into even teams, with a range of abilities before their netball assessment today, I took charge. I went through the assessment papers (which the girls had graded themselves) and read out their names to put them in teams. To make sure the girls didn't get mixed up I asked them to move out to certain areas. After all names had been read I then asked them to come back in to listen to instructions of getting bibs etc. In short I wasted a lot of time when simple instructions of get into even groups of mixed ability would have ended with a similar result. I could have also given the instruction that once the teams have been sorted to get bibs on and jump onto a court ready to play. 

By giving those simple instructions not only would I have saved time but also presented students with an opportunity to organize themselves and have a choice of who was in their team.