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Growing my practice [Teaching as Inquiry]
Growing my practice [Teaching as Inquiry]
This Growing My Practice assignment is based on the teaching as inquiry cycle [p 35], in the NZ Curriculum.
This assignment is about being a reflective practitioner.
The three parts may be summarised by the following 3 guiding questions from the Education Hub
What is happening for my students and how can I improve their learning experiences?
What information can I draw on to inform new approaches I want to trial in my practice?
What measures will I use to know if what I am doing is actually having an impact?
We have broken the assignment into 3 distinct parts, based on practicum.
a) Getting to know my leaners their needs and interests (week 1)
b) Planning to try something different : a deliberate teaching action (among the many things that you will do every day) (week2)
c) Implementing the action and evaluating the impact of our deliberate action ( week 3 onwards)
For successful completion of your inquiry it is important that you meet your weekly deadline.
A. Focussing Inquiry (Practicum week 1)
In the first week of practicum consult with your associate teacher to select 3 students from the same class who are not yet achieving at the expected level in a particular area or not engaged in the learning. We will call these students your target students. Over the week you need to:
Get to know more about your target students, eg social, contextual and academic information/data. Your associate may be able to provided formal testing data and/or background information, you can collect samples of student work, korero with students to find out about their whanau, interests, strengths and perspectives about their learning, and make observations of their learning interactions in class.
Identify the expected level the student should be working at (ie the appropriate level of the curriculum, P 45), providing specifics of what they should be able to do in relation to the learning they are currently engaged in.
Identify the level the student is currently at, providing specifics of what they can do in relation to the learning they are currently engaged in.
Prioritise what is needed to accelerate the learning/ improve the engagement of your target students and the class. Remember to accelerate learning we try and develop ways of supporting the student to engage with learning at the expected level, as opposed to remediating the learning and filling in every gap.
These students will help you to focus your thinking about what strategies you might use and in the design your learning plan.
The target students are also key in helping you evaluate the impact of your strategies that you will plan to use when you start teaching your class. You will describe these strategies in part B of the assignment (Due end of week 2).
You should refer to the NZ Curriculum documents, Literacy learning progressions, or NCEA during your focussing inquiry.
Part A is due for submission at the end of week 1 of practicum.
B. Teaching Inquiry (Practicum week 2)
In the second week you will refer to relevant documents and research and draw on your own experience and that of colleagues to determine what strategies you will use (the how) to accelerate the learning of your 3 target students and also improving outcomes for others in your class. You may also consider student voice to help guide you.
This is about you trying something different. This is not about putting in place individual plans for each student.
In this case the difference is compared to the teaching strategies students have had exposure to this term. If you are in a full time teaching role this means doing something different to what you have already been doing.
Examples of documents and online resources are:
strategies discussed or experienced at the face-to-face days
You can post questions and ask for ideas by adding class comments to the relevant teaching as inquiry section on Google classroom. Note that this discussion space is to draw on the expertise of all participants rather than just the facilitators so feel free to answer other peoples questions.
This section requires you to:
describe the strategy you will be putting in to place - this needs to have sufficient detail so that it is clear how you will be doing things differently
justify the strategy selection - how do you know that this is a good strategy to adopt - you should refer to research or explain how the strategy aligns with principles of effective pedagogy (this may include culturally responsive practice eg ako, power sharing etc, or effective assessment practice - eg clarity, feedback etc and so on).
explain how you plan to monitor the effectiveness of your actions - what combination evidence will you gather (eg student work, student voice, associate teacher observation, etc).
Do not make your inquiry "a mile wide and half an inch deep". You should choose only one or two strategies in order that you can observe, measure and adapt in the time that you have.
Growing your practice is about the small changes you consciously make to your practice.
Part B is due for submission by the end of week 2 of practicum. It is important for you to meet this deadline so you can spend the last two week of practicum implementing, observing, adapting and measuring the effectiveness of your strategy with respect to your 3 target students and your class in general.
C. Teaching and Learning and Learning Inquiry (weeks 3 and 4 of practicum plus reflection time after practicum)
Part C has two sections
Section 1 needs to be completed during weeks 3 and 4 of practicum.
Section 2 will be completed after practicum is finished.
Section 1 & 2 will be submitted in one document.
This final section incorporates
the teaching and learning - implementing the strategy or strategies and monitoring their effects (weeks 3 and 4). This may include some adaption of strategies as you respond to feedback from students. You should record:
your monitoring evidence. Things like what you noticed in student engagement, task completion, sample of student work (after), student voice.
any changes you made from what you planned to do in your teaching as inquiry section with justifications.
the learning inquiry - This is where you reflect on what you learnt as a result of the teaching and learning section and identifying possible next steps for you as the teacher. You should discuss:
the impact your strategy had on the student learning of your target students and how you determined this impact (ie analysing your evidence).
the impact your strategy had on the learning of other students.
possible next steps for you as a teacher - both in terms of the strategy you implemented and in your teaching generally.
Part C is due the week after practicum and before the final Face to Face day
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