08/11: 'What does it mean to be a Successful Teacher?'

'What does it mean to be a Successful Teacher?'

8th November 2019

'What does it mean to be a successful teacher?' - John Hattie

"Your job is to help them do better than what they believe their best is"

Synopsis - Key Things I have taken away?

Throughout all of his research Hattie's focus for educators is to understand learning through the eyes of the student. So what is the most important influences on student achievement and growth?

• Hattie acknowledges the tension amongst priorities e.g. pedagogy vs content. However, he emphasises the need and importance of PD - that it’s not about what you learn today but what you do tomorrow
• He suggests moving the focus away from the strategies and instead provide evidence that you are having an impact on your learners
• Hattie addressed Educator Burnout in his book '10 Mind Frames for Visible Learning' - he believes this is because too many teachers believe they need to be constantly busy and work individually. Efficiency, reprioritising and removing certain content, collective and collaborative work can help to minimise burnout

How has it helped me?

Hattie emphasised that we need to take a look at how students are learning. Students need to be able to relay the ideas they are taught and relate them to each other. However, the strategy on how to do each of these are different. Hattie also emphasises that students need to be given a range of different strategies so they can be successful. This is what I have been focusing on with my inquiry throughout the year - ensuring to provide students with a range of different strategies to suit different levels within the class and learning styles. However, I may have not fully acknowledged students ability to decide when a certain strategy is applicable.

Hattie identified some examples of what student impact could look like; changes in test scores, change and growth in student work, student voice and how they believe they have changed/grown and teacher reflection on impact and change. I notice and identify these impacts. However, I don't always ensure that the student also notice these. Test scores could be obvious, but often students won't recognise the growth in their work. This was evident to me via a discussion with a student in my Level 2 Physical Education class. The student had chosen not to take PE for Level 3 because they were unsure they were good enough. I pointed out to them how much they had grown and developed throughout the year moving from Achieved's to Excellence's. This was not something that he had already identified himself.

So What?

• In recognising that students don't automatically know when certain strategies are most applicable, next year I will focus on introducing students to a range of strategies I will also emphasise when they would be appropriate to use.
• Next year I am going to aim to introduce further strategies to celebrate student achievement and growth. I hope in doing this that students themselves will be able to then recognise and celebrate their own growth.

30/10: Reflection of HPE Scholarship Process 2019

Reflection of HPE Scholarship Process 2019

30th October 2019

Today was the final day of the Health & Physical Education Scholarship process for 2019. For the Health & Physical Education scholarship students self-select a topic or issue they would like to exam in depth over a 30 page report. As this was my first year leading the programme I thought I'd take the time to reflect on the positives and negatives of this year's process to help improve for next year.

Tips for 2020:

• Multiple afternoon workshops
  This year we held 4 afternoon workshops in Term 4. Each workshop ran for about 3 hours. The aim of these workshops was to give students an opportunity to chip away at their report, while having the support of staff in the room. Overall this process was really effective this year. This worked better than previous years where we held two big workshops that ran for about 6-7 hours each. For 2020 I would look at potentially adding some in the final week of T3 to encourage students to start working earlier.
• Insist on drafts by end of T3
  This year it seemed like students started the writing process later than previous years. I'm not sure if this is because we had less NCEA students participating this year who are given class time? By adding a workshop or two in the final week of Term 3 I would hope that would encourage students to start writing earlier. I would also push for students to have a rough draft before the end of Term 3.
• Push criticality
  This year some students struggled with the level of criticality needed for their report. They often chose topics they were passionate about, which is great, but they often had a strong view or opinion which reflected as a one sided argument. This typically was harder for the Cambridge students and I wonder if this is due to the level of criticality in Level 2 & 3 Physical Education? I wonder if we can push the idea of criticality earlier e.g. in Dragon’s Den workshop?
• Focus on solutions
  Students often also underestimate the importance of the solutions that they suggest towards the end of their report. By really looking in depth to what they suggest such as how it would be implemented, the change they hope it will have etc it will show a deeper understanding and a more critical view.
• Encourage students to reference as they writeStudents often underestimate the time it takes for them to reference their work properly once they have finished their writing. By teaching students how to reference and to reference as they go this will help to eliminate the rush of referencing once a report is deemed complete.
• Research & ReadingsSome students struggled to find academic readings and references to refer to while writing their report. Next year a base folder could be made with readings applicable to different scholarship topics for students to access and utilise.

This process wouldn't be as effective if it wasn't for the help and support of the department. For now all we can do is wait until the results come out to see how our students have gone.

16/09: Undergrad Presentation

Undergrad Presentation

16th September 2019

This afternoon Rob Paterson, Georgia Dougherty and I went and presented to a group of Undergraduates at the University of Auckland on 'Stepping into the Real World". This is a result of an Auckland PENZ initiative from the Graduate Mentor group.

Last year we recognised the need for a new section of the Auckland PENZ Graduate Mentor group. We have had great success with our workshops run for first and second year teachers on a variety of topics including; surviving your first six months & expanding your toolbox, culturally responsive & relational pedagogy, marking & moderation and gathering evidence for the 6 teaching standards. However, we noticed that feedback from these sessions and from our own personal experiences, there were no presentations or tips on how to actually get a job upon graduating university. This lead to the creation of the sub-group of Undergraduate Mentoring.

The purpose of today's presentation was to present to undergraduates on what to expect in your first year of teaching and how to navigate your way through the job application process. Topics in our presentation included; CV & cover letters, interview tips & possible questions, relief and legalities. The link to our presentation can be found here.

A group of about 20-30 students from the BPE and Grad Dip programmes attended from Auckland University and a couple from the AUT Sport & Rec programme. Overall today's presentation was a success with those attending engaged throughout - this was evident through the great questions that were asked throughout the session and feedback from the lecturer (pictured below).

This has already been in improvement on last year's presentation, particularly presenting this earlier in the year and the ability to catch students from multiple different courses in the same session. Hopefully the students found it useful and were able to take away some tips to help them with their job hunting.

26/05: Reflection of 2.2

Reflection of 2.2

26th May 2019

What went well:

• Most students smashed the anatomy - this came through in student feedback where students identified that this was the easiest section

What could have been better:

• Students found the interrelationship slide hard. This was voiced both in class while completing the assessment and in the student voice feedback. This was also evident as some students chose to leave this last slide blank
• Students commented that they would have liked more one-on-one time throughout the assessment. I agree with this and when reflecting on the assessment I spent more time with 'needy' students who had a lot of questions or by checking in on students who I had previously identified struggling with the content. This meant that I didn't push some of my more capable students as much. This resulted in some students needing to resubmit their work as they are boarder line High Merit/Low Excellence

Changes for next time:

• Emphasis on referring back to anatomy slides at the start - quite often students complete this and then don't refer back to their anatomy. Is there a way to combine the biophysical principles more rather than laying them out in three separate sections e.g. focus the assessment on the prep, action and follow through phases incorporating anatomy and biomechanics and then using motor skills as a section later on how to improve? Will this create a more natural interrelationship?

29/04: T2 Staff PD Day

T2 Staff PD Day 

29th April 2019

Name of Course/Programme/Seminar: Term 2 Staff PD Day

Collaborative notes from today's PD session can be found here

Today's PD session started with Melissa running through King's Leadership journey to date.

We then moved into a group activity where we looked at different leadership statements and identified different behaviours that we currently see and what we want to see. I found this task useful and the group that I was working with had great engaging conversations of each of our given statements. It was interesting to hear the reoccurring theme for the want for more inter-departmental work across the school for us to share our best practice.

My highlight of the day was listening to Jo Martin speak about personal branding. I found the five theories of self and the different ways of catching people's attention particularly interesting. More detailed notes can be found here.

My key takeaway from today would be to use “yes and” instead of “yes, but” and ensuring that I lead with my best values.

09/04: Inquiry Update for 2019

Inquiry Update for 2019

9th April 2019

What’s happening and why?

• As this has been my second year looking into independent (2017 - L2 PED) and self-directed learners (2018 - IG PE) have found that a lot of strategies that I was purposely putting in place now come naturally.
• I find it easy to note the difference in the need between independent and self-directed learners and what is needed for different students at varying levels levels of age, ability and curriculum. This makes it easy to identify the needs of the students and action points that can be put into place.
• I am involving whanau and other support networks more effectively and earlier on. An example of this is identifying students who were struggling in IG after the first 6 weeks and contacting Housemasters, Mentor teachers & the Y11 Academic Coordinator to flag these students. This also lead to contacting home for a couple of these students. This has largely had a postive impact and in most cases has increased the work ethic of students in the class. Another example of this is that by identifying that I have a lot of priority learners in my Level 2 class I emailed home before the start of the written assessment with due dates and where they can go for support. I also broke down these dates with students in the lead up to their assessment, 3 weeks prior to them starting the assessment, so they didn't feel it had been sprung on them. Majority of students felt that going into the assessment that there were no surprises. They knew what was expected of them to reach an Achieved, Merit or Excellence.
• A new initiative for 2019 to help IG students identify weaknesses is that I complete a 'End of Unit Test Teacher Reflection'. An example of one of these reflections has been attached to this post. By doing this I am able to analyse what went well, what didn't and what needs to change. By completing this before handing back student test papers with results it gives me an overview of what may need to be revisited. Following this students are given back their test papers and are encouraged to look through these. We then go through common mistakes or questions that were not answered well as a class before students being able to ask their own questions about the test. Students then write in the correct answers on their test papers to help them with future studies.

What’s not happening & why?

• Although student ownership and accountability has increased within these classes from the start of 2019 to the end of Term 1 not all students are on board. I believe this is largely contributed to in the range of abilities in both my L2 and IG classes. The top students tend to take all advice on board where as those towards the bottom need more help in finding their own way. As this gap is large I have been trying to incorporate strategies to ensure I am still pushing those at the top and helping those at the bottom reach their level of success.

What am I going to do to influence what is not happening?

• This is something that I am considering looking into further and is a potential inquiry for 2019. How can I focus on differentiation in my senior classes to help push students at the top while not leaving those at the bottom behind? It was interesting to listen to Bridget presenting on her inquiry from last year as I could take and adapt some of her strategies such as scaffolding, key word lists, focus on fun/hands on activities in Periods 5 & 6 to help lift and students creating quizzes and mark sheets. I'm sure that there are other strategies that I already have in place to help with this that I could make more deliberate.

28/02: Goals for 2019

Goals for 2019

28th February 2019

Before returning to school I took the time to sit down and think about what I want to get out of the year ahead.

Below are the goals I created for myself in 2019:

1. Work/Life Balance
   1. Use 3 tips on the way home
   2. Ensure work is completed prior to deadlines e.g. reports started and completed before deadline
2. Student Support & Contact with Home
1. Continue with termly emails home
2. Notify parents earlier if student is struggling – copy parents into email reminders to students, call home for help and support
3. Help parents to support students by sending out term planners with due dates and notify parents when internal assessments are starting
4. Continue to keep academic coordinators, teacher mentors and housemasters in loop
5. Also remember to write home if a student is doing well – email, postcards, EPAs
3. Leadership Development
   1. How can I support my HOD more?
   2. What new initiatives can I bring to the department? Or how can I help to strengthen existing initiatives?
4. Differentiation (possible inquiry topic)
   1. How can I personalize teaching and learning experiences for my learners?
   2. How can I support the needs of my priority learners more?
   3. How can I show students that I know what they do and don’t know?

With it only being Week 5 I find it interesting reflecting back on these goals. I believe I have been focussing and working towards student support & contact with home and differentiation of lessons:

• I have been in contact with all parents and guardians of my students to introduce myself and inform them about the course
• I have been wrapping support around students who are already struggling in certain courses
• I have been using different teaching styles to meet the needs of different students and to match what students identified as their preferred learning styles
• Students have had options in class to have more guided help and instruction vs more independence and extension

However, I feel like I have been neglecting my work/life balance and leadership development. Although my work/life balance isn't bad at the moment I have no set structure or rules in place which I will probably need later in the year as we start to reach crunch points. As for leadership development I have been asking my HOD if there is anything I can do to help but nothing more.


It will be interesting to reflect on these goals towards the end of Term 1 to see how they progress.