Team Meetings

Meeting #2: June 19, 2017

Results from our first teacher survey.

All of our teachers had experimented with some form of Inquiry-based learning in their classroom some examples included: inquiry in conjunction with their Science and Social Studies units, Passion Projects, and Inquiry learning during French Language time (incorporating listening, speaking and writing). All teachers noted that students were highly engaged with this type of learning. Students were learning how to use new tools, they were learning more about technology and they were learning more about who they were as learners. One teacher noted that "Students learned about learning just by formulating their question!" Teachers found that inquiry-based learning fostered a culture of creativity and collaboration in their classrooms.

There were a number of challenges that teachers faced when implementing inquiry-based learning in their French immersion classrooms. Many students had difficulty learning how to ask questions. Accessing French resources that were at the appropriate level was a challenge, especially during free inquiry. Teachers questioned whether French language expectations were being met and wondered "Am I taking time away from something else to play?" Some teachers felt that there was a lack of French being used in the classroom and that they were becoming the "French police" as students were not communicating with each other in French. One teacher noted that "the most challenging part was assisting students with the structures and support they require for their inquiry to ensure they reached their learning goal/answer the question of their inquiry." Another teacher found it challenging to ensure that the technology being used was a being used as a purposeful tool to help with students' learning and not slowing it down.

Check out Lindsay Wright's blog about her experiences with Passion Projects in her grade 2/3 French immersion class.

Inquiry-based learning - cultivating curiosity in French

We read Chapter 5: “Inquiry-based learning - cultivating curiosity in French” from My FSL Learning Environment - The Key to Success! by Pamela Marshall Grey. The chapter outlines the inquiry based learning approach where "students' questions, wonderings, ideas, observations and thinking are at the centre of the learning." In engaging in this process students learn skills related to life long learning: critical thinking, problem-solving, communicating and expressing thinking and collaborating.

In the inquiry cycle students:

• Formulate questions and determine a focus for the inquiry
• Explore and investigate
• Analyze and draw conclusions
• Share and communicate learning

This cycle is a "cyclical and fluid" process where students can reflect on their learning and adjust their learning path based on their findings as well as classmates' and teacher input.

In French immersion we must keep students' language proficiency in mind. We may need to teach explicit phrases or responses to enable student communication. Some examples include:

• How to ask and answer questions
• How to express thinking (e.g. je pense que, selon moi)
• Being able to discuss findings (e.g. j'ai trouvé, j'ai appris)
• There may also be specific vocabulary that students may need to learn in regards to a specific topic

Much of our discussion after reading this article centred on the challenge of implementing inquiry-based learning in a second language. Besides helping students learn new vocabulary and expressions, there is the challenge of finding reading /audio / video materials that are at the students' level of French proficiency. This will be one of the main goals of our project and will be an area that we will revisit throughout the year.

Evidence Gathering

We decided that we would use the following tools to measure our growth as well as our students' growth during our TLLP project:

• Reading - GB+ DRA running records
• Writing - New writing assessment tool being developed by the BGCDSB FI steering committee (grades 1-8) JK/SK teachers will continue to use the 'Writing Rainbow'.
• Listening and Speaking - CEFR A1, A2, B1
• Capturing student and teacher learning through the inquiry process - Learning skills, twitter, sesame snap (Kindergarten), aurasma

At the end of our meeting we reviewed our budget and teachers had time to look for resources that they would like to purchase for their classes for September. We purchased the book "Dive into Inquiry" by Trevor Mackenzie and we plan to start discussing the book in the fall.

Meeting #4: October 25, 2017

We started off our meeting by sharing how teachers have been using the environment as a third teacher in their classrooms. We had taken pictures in all of our classrooms which show evidence of different learning zones, posted learning goals and success criteria, students’ written and oral language, growth mindset, and how we maximize spoken French in our classroom environment. Click here to see photos of what we’ve been doing already! We then discussed areas for future growth.

We shared what we have been doing in our classrooms in regards to implementing inquiry-based learning in our classrooms. What we shared relates closely to the discussion question from our book study. Click here to see our responses. Teachers are all keen to delve into inquiry with their students. When asked which supports they needed to move forward with inquiry in their classrooms, most teachers indicated the need for extra planning time and/or extra pd opportunities. Teachers were able to access these supports with our funding through our TLLP.

We then were introduced to our board's new writing assessment tool by Lindsay Wright, Eric Frampton and Samantha Pitre who are members of our board's French immersion steering committee. TLLP teachers had chance to review the document that we will be piloting with our students. Our next meeting will give us a chance to moderate some student writing together using this tool.

After our break teachers completed the beginning of project tech survey. Results of this survey will be shared at our next meeting. Teachers also completed an exit ticket commenting on what went well with our session, what tricky and which supports they need moving forward. Finally teachers completed a planning sheet to set goals for how they would continue to implement inquiry-based learning in their classrooms.

Meeting #9 and #10 June 4/June 14

Our team took some time to meet as a whole group again for two half days at the end of our project. We used this time to:

• share and discuss our learning from the project
• complete end of project surveys on our use of technology
• discuss sharing our learning with our French immersion colleges in our board
• upload lesson plans, worksheets, pictures, student data to our shared google folder to be linked to this blog
• collaborate on writing the final report for the Ministry of Education