Teaching

Teach and respond to learners in a knowledgeable and adaptive way to progress their learning at an appropriate depth and pace.

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Te Tiriti o Waitangi Partnership

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Professional Learning

Learning-focused Culture

Design for Learning

Teach in ways that ensure all learners are making sufficient progress, and monitor the extent and pace of learning, focusing on equity and excellence for all.
Specifically support the educational aspirations for Māori learners, taking shared responsibility for these learners to achieve educational success as Māori.
Use an increasing repertoire of teaching strategies, approaches, learning activities, technologies and assessment for learning strategies and modify these in response to the needs of individuals and groups of learners.
Provide opportunities and support for learners to engage with, practise and apply learning to different contexts and make connections with prior learning.
Teach in ways that enable learners to learn from one another, to collaborate, to self-regulate and to develop agency over their learning.
Ensure learners receive ongoing feedback and assessment information and support them to use this information to guide further learning.

Evidence

Resources

Scaffolded Investigation Template

Ball Drop Experiment Write-Up Template

Initially given to all students, particularly when focussing on a new part of the Investigation Write-Up. Students used their work as evidence to self-assess their skills and progress. This particular template was used when the students were focussing on developing their

Generic Investigation Template

General Experiment Write-Up Template

Given to students who had rated themselves more highly in their self-reflection, or who were assessed as requiring little help. This template was also used during summative assessment at the

Multi Lesson HyperSlide

1. Intro to Nuclear Physics

This hyperslide was used over multiple lessons to enable students to learn concepts at their own pace. However a limit on the total time for document completion was implemented, so as to provide students with a guideline for completion and to prevent students wasting class time.

These slides provide a scaffold for differentiation. When done in google slides, there is also the capability for real time tracking of student progress as well as the ability to provide specific and individualised feedback and feedforward.

Single Lesson HyperSlide

Electricity - Conductors and Insulators

This hyperslide was used during one lesson to enable students to learn concepts at their own pace. Students still had the goal of completing the slides during the 90 minutes but could be flexible with the time they spent on each task.

This allowed me as the teacher to take a more facilitatory role and interact with the students one-on-one.

Student Work and Feedback

SOLO Taxonomy

9SCI PE Assessment Feedback.pdf

Feedback on a student's end of topic checkpoint. There are four questions and they choose the one that they feel they will be able to answer most successfully.

9SCI Presentation feedback.pdf

9SCI Presentation SOLO feedback.pdf

Gamified

9SCI PW task feedback.pdf

Senior Physics (NCEA)

Level 2 Physics - Online Checkpoint (during COVID-19 Lockdown)

Level 2 Physics - In Class Checkpoints

phy200 mechanics checkpoint feedback.pdf

PHY200 electricity checkpoint feedbacj.pdf

Level 3 Physics - Online Checkpoint (during COVID-19 Lockdown)

Level 3 Physics - In Class Checkpoints

PHY300 waves checkpoint feesback.pdf

PHY300 checkpoint feedback.pdf

Lesson Observations and Reflections

Lesson Reflections (Wed 19 June 2019)

Wednesday 19 June Lesson Reflection

Completed after each lesson. Noting the positives, things to work on in my practice, and notes for next time. Next time is either the next time the particular activity is run, or the next lesson.

This tool helps me to be objective (as I can) about my teaching practice. It also provides a space for me to analyse the successes and areas of improvement of particular activities, which I can then apply to similar tasks or when I run the activity again.

This allows me to adapt my practice to the students, their current understanding, learning methods, and mood. Daily lesson reflections also enable a freedom to continue to trial new activities and pedagogies.

Student Self-Reflection of the Method (2019)

Self Reflection - Method (Evidence)

Students' self-reflections for the skills required to complete an Investigation Write-Up were collated. Their self-reflection was completed using SOLO Taxonomy, with their level corresponding to a numerical value for data analysis (i.e. prestructural = 1, unistructural = 2, multistructural = 3, relational = 4, and extended abstract = 5).

Year 9 STEM Lesson 19/10/2020

9STEM Lesson Plan 19/10/2020

This intro and planning slide is projected on the board at the beginning of each class. As students walk in they are able to see what they are doing in that lesson, and what they need to be able to do by the end of the lesson.

T4 W2 - NP Observation & Feedback on Effective Teaching Practice.pdf

Teaching During COVID-19 Lockdown

School Letter to Parents

Letter to parents re online learning.pdf

Subject Teacher Letter to Parents

COVID-19 Parent Communications.pdf

Reflection

I have found it very straightforward to meet this standard, as the act of teaching is the cornerstone to the profession. As a science teacher I am naturally reflective and keen to explore varied pedagogies. This has included thematic learning (forensics), gamification (year 9 science), and online learning.

I have particularly focussed on student agency and providing opportunities for students to develop their self-management skills (one of the NZ Curriculum Key Competencies). This has been achieved through the use of hyperdocs and enabling task choice. It is becoming increasingly evident that students will be relying more heavily on their skills to self-manage and self-teach as technology continues to rapidly develop.

Accessible learning is increasingly important as students are generally arriving in year 9 with literacy below the expected curriculum and age levels, and with little to no science knowledge. As science is another language as well as new ideas and concepts, making the tasks and concepts accessible to all students no matter their literacy and prior knowledge is vital. Several techniques were employed to enable this; differentiated and scaffolded tasks, multimedia presentation, specific literacy tasks (sparklers), presenting knowledge within a real world context or theme, and tactile/kinetic learning to name a few.

As I came into teaching to spark the same enjoyment in learning and understanding that I experienced as a student, I am highly invested in attempting new pedagogies and techniques that enable enjoyment in learning.

Next Steps

I am still learning how to judge appropriate levels and timeframes for work output and task completion, however I know this will come with time. Timing and expectations are something that I have found to be a more difficult aspect of teaching since I began my training. This was made more difficult with this year's implementation of gamification at year 9 as I was creating tasks unique to my class with different motivations and expectations from traditional teacher-led learning. These tasks, and expectations, were revised through this year but still need to be refined for next year.

As a Science Department, there has also been a shift in focus from content to skills in line with the continually changing world and job market. The two major skills were research and scientific investigation (or experimentation). This requires a very different mindset and approach to teaching, and consistent energy not to fall back to content-first.

I have been exploring more creative assessment techniques in the junior school but would like to extend that into the senior school. This would require greater preparation as any NCEA internal assessment task must be approved prior to use. Student buy-in is another factor into task creation, and sometimes, particularly in senior physics, students are expecting serious assessment for a 'serious' subject area.

This year was my first year of embedding gamification into my teaching, and while there were many successes, there are many aspects that need improving, adding or removing. This revision process comes with all trials particularly one so large and all encompassing. I will therefore need to take some time to reflect on the gamification this year before making a plan and the changes. It will also require a significant amount of time, energy and focus to implement the many changes I have in mind!