Thoughts Term 1

Student Motivation:

In order to increase student motivation this year I need to allow the students to have more ownership over what they work on and produce. Last year most tasks were set by me so everyone's content on their blogs was the same. In order to accomplish this I need to allow time for the students to work on individual projects. An important element for ensuring the success of this is the need to clearly scaffold them into independent working expectations with clear, planned monitoring of their work. This is because last year, given greater freedom, several students, in particular boys, didin't get tasks completed. I think a contributing factor in this is their hook into particular games. Given lack of monitoring and supervision they just couldn't stop themselves from playing.

Thoughts

I am going to try have a week on week off approach for Reading and Writing. This will mean I will have half of the groups in daily workshops with me for 1 week while the other groups are working independently, then the following week they will switch. I thought that while one set of groups are working independently on reading tasks, the other set will be working independently on writing tasks.

If this goes well I might try and extend it to one maths group a week working on a strand problem solving task independently. Effectively having 2 tasks per term for each group.

Monitoring

I need to work on a daily monitoring system. I think I will initially start with a step by step process to check their ability to work independently. Maybe all independent groups have a check in at the beginning and the end of a lesson. To start with the tasks need to be simple so they can be mostly completed at the end of the week, with the following week being used to touch up etc. By the end of the 2 week period we need a presenting Fri with peer marking/feedback.

Ideas

Writing:

Independent writing on a subject, but needs to be published creatively. Have a list of online sites for publishing.

At the start of the term students write a range of possible independent ideas for writing. Could be a novel, articles, review, poems, songs, argument, description, recount, biography, . Have pages on site with guide line for approaching each type of writing.

Keep a tally of the types of texts written. Try and do 3 different types during the term. Have a variety of options for publishing, Filming spoken word poetry. Documentary, slideshow, animation,

First task. Holiday recount/poem. So the focus is on the creative publishing.

Sharing day: At the end of the 2 week slot. Might not be enough time so might have to have a random selection of kids. Could share out writing projects to view and reflect on in pairs.

Reading: 4 week cycle

Task 1 - Podcasting script.

1st 2 weeks (1 indep/1 homework) finish reading book. 3rd week - (2nd indep week) Podcasting script. Completed by end of week 4.

If complete podcast then can do another activity

27/1

After talking to Helen who has just come back from a conference on thinking in Wellington I've had some revisions on some of my ideas.

I think the direction I'm taking is the right one but it is still too constrained. It still doesn't allow children to take control over the direction they want to take their learning. Thinking of trying to open the options up earlier but with careful scaffolding into making sure they manage their time well.

Also thinking about incorporating into the more competent students guided reading/writing more thinking/evaluating/synthesing/problem solving components - to help build more creative thinking.

1/2 Way Through

Reflecting on the term so far on the whole I'm feeling like it has been of mixed success. As usual I have fallen into the same trap as usual of having felt the pressure to launch back into small group teaching after only week 1 - 2 (for our kids this type of intense teaching has proven to be the most successful). However what this has meant is that I haven't spent the time necessary to monitor and guide the children in the expectations of the processes and quality of products expected for the independent work. The consequence of this has been that many of the children have had difficulties planning their tasks well and haven't managed to complete in the time frame. Part of this may also be that I purposely made the timeframes tight but am thinking that it might be too tight for the process to work well. The products so far have also lacked depth and quality.Not having time to check in with how they are going with it hasn't helped I think. I am looking forward to this Friday's presentations to see if the quality has improved.

I am wondering whether I will need to look at revising my programme to come up with a system that works better. Also I am thinking of adding in some guidelines or framework to help focus their projects slightly.e.g. having them relate to a theme of some sort i.e. success, perseverance, etc.while still allowing them the freedom to decide how they want to convey that.