Changes in practice

I have been a teacher for over 20 years and still felt ill-prepared for the demands of collaborating in an Innovative Learning Environment. After doing my own thing for so long, I knew it was going to be a challenge to have to share the same teaching space with others. It was obvious that I needed to upskill and fortunately, I heard about the Mind Lab opportunity.

After a hard 32 weeks, I am glad I took up this opportunity. There are so many topics I could not sink my teeth into because time simply did not allow it. I had to prioritise.  My hope was to regain the confidence I felt slipping away as I tried to get on top of the New Zealand Primary School curriculum. I got that as well as a renewed sense of purpose

I haven’t seen myself as a leader in New Zealand, as my focus was entirely on giving the students in my class my best, secretly worrying that this may still be less than what students in other classroom were getting. Compliments and positive appraisals did help, but the confidence levels were still well below where it was. I definitely did not look forward to working with other teachers, fearing I would be the weakest link!

It is now almost a year later and I did a complete 180.

Criteria 5: Show leadership that contributes to effective teaching and learning. Professional knowledge in practice

The first week’s reading about leadership and followership certainly influenced my thinking. This helped me to understand the shifting of roles when collaborating with the other three teachers in our learning space. Also significant was the view that you do not have to be in a position of power to have influence. Having cut my teeth in a time when ideas about leadership were very different from the modern understanding, learning about the new approach to leadership helped me to understand the dynamics of the team. The analogy of the dancing couple discussed in week 1 of the course, was especially significant for me. Over this time, having worked so closely with others - and you can’t help to compare - I am holding my own, contributing to an environment where students experience effective teaching and learning.  

Criteria 7: Promote a collaborative, inclusive, and supportive learning environment.

Developing my understanding of collaboration and other  21st century skills,  enabled me to contribute during professional development sessions, during our planning meetings and it enabled me to work collaboratively with others. Knowing that your opinion on pedagogy is valued certainly helps with your own confidence. More important, is the fact I could use my new learning to have those hard conversations, that I am able to justify my opinion and ask the right questions without burning bridges.

It does take everyone’s input to build a team that is inclusive and supportive, and we are still building the trust needed to be truly collaborative, but I am thankful for having the knowledge and skills to add value.

Next goals

I will continue studying and I am set on doing a mathematics paper. Studying has been time-consuming and, as the Mind Lab quotation rightly states, “...we can only prepare teachers to begin teaching,” I need to take the time to implement what I have learned to help my team build a fantastic Innovative learning environment.

My interdisciplinary connection map

My initial feeling was that the readings on interdisciplinary curriculum were  more for the benefit of secondary school teachers who, as subject specialists, need to develop ways to collaborate across different subjects.  As primary school teachers, we already use an integrated curriculum and it is rare to see subjects taught discretely.  This feeling was reinforced by the fact that the goal of a curriculum like this is to help STUDENTS synthesize discrete information and to connect such knowledge to the needs of everyday living (Mathison and Freeman, 1997).  Furthermore, according to Jones (2009), the interdisciplinary approach is a key concept to the advancement of SCHOOL CURRICULUM at all levels.

Further reading, made me realise that I have been making interdisciplinary CONNECTIONS with outside agencies such as Auckland Transport as the Travelwise Lead Teacher,  the Resource Teachers for Learning and Behaviour (RTLB) and the Outreach Service Teacher. As teachers/professionals working together, we do synthesize discrete information and connect this knowledge for the benefit of our students and communities. Working with these outside agencies are interdisciplinary because the disciplines (agencies) are kept distinct and in focus.

An external agency I want to work with better is the Outreach Service (ORS) teacher who is supporting me with a lovely girl in our room. The  ORS teacher has specialised knowledge on working with students with Global Development Delay.

Working with students with special needs was not included in my training, whilst it is this teacher’s bread and butter. Working with the specialist teacher has helped and, looking at the conceptual model for successful collaboration, I can see why it has worked and the area we need to work on to improve.

Firstly, in terms of goals, we both want to support the student to maximise her potential, so we share a common goal.  Secondly, in terms of qualities/attitude, we both have the patience and we are both prepared to do what is needed. We respect each other as teachers and we feel safe to critique and be critiqued.

It has been hard to schedule a regular time to sit down together and we have been relying on her weekly reports, Seesaw, emails and the short conversations we had every week. To support my student even better, we need to schedule more time. At the moment, I have been reading up on how to use the Numicon resource, which is taking up a lot of time. I have had useful conversations with the ORS teacher, but having more time would be hugely beneficial. To get around this, Technology could perhaps provide a solution as we could schedule a time to have a video call.

As it is impossible for any teacher to be an expert in every field needed to teach every child, and it is impossible for any staff to possess all the skills they could possibly need, it is certainly worth the effort to strengthen interdisciplinary connections with external agencies.

Reference:

ACRLog. (2015). A Conceptual Model for Interdisciplinary Collaboration. Retrieved from http://acrlog.org/2015/05/14/a-conceptual-model-for-interdisciplinary-collaboration

Jones, C. (2009), Interdisciplinary approach - Advantages, Disadvantages and the future benefits of interdisciplinary studies, ESSAI: Vol. 7, Article 26. Available at http: //dc.cod/essai/vol7/ess1/26

Mathison S,  Freeman M. (1997). The logic of interdisciplinary studies. CELA, University of Albany, School of Education, NY.

Professional online networks

A quote from the Connected  Educator video that remains with me, says,”I can’t see how you can be an educator in the 21st century without being a connected educator.”

Another quote says, “...surround yourself with passionate educators from different backgrounds.”

I have never been keen to use social media in my personal life. I have tried using facebook, but could not sustain going onto it regularly. I have created a Twitter account a few years back and haven’t used it until we needed it during the face-to-face sessions. The past nine months since the start of this course using Google +,  has been the longest time I have consistently used social media and I have learned to  appreciate the benefits of being connected with my fellow Mindlabbers. This has motivated me to look into joining the  New Zealand Teachers Facebook to help me connect with passionate teachers all over New Zealand.

Our school have started to use Yammer - a social media tool - to share our successes in the classroom with our school community. It is still early days, but the tool is being used with varying levels of success by the different teams, which made me ask, “Why is that?”

To me the difference seems to be the teachers who are using the tool. For whatever reason, some teachers are putting more energy and time into adding content regularly, while it is just another thing to do for others. Not every teacher makes use of social media. According to Sharples et al (2016) the project falls flat unless the projects have experts to inspire and engage people,  because no one is required to participate. Without the presence of at least one expert per team, it then stands to reason that it is highly likely for such team’s use of social media to fall flat.

I have been fortunate to be exposed to research to influence my opinion of social media and opened my eyes to the possibilities presented by it. I am far from being an expert so it will be a while before I will be using it in the classroom. Further, effective learning will vary from student to student according to their knowledge and competence of these platforms. (Mindlab class notes, 2017). This quotation refers to students, but the same could be said for teachers: Effective use of social media platforms will vary from teacher to teacher, according to their knowledge and competence.

The use of social media is here to stay and we need to familiarise ourselves with it. Joining platforms that connect us with other professionals is a great way to start.

Legal and ethical contexts in my digital practice

We ask parents to give us permission to publish images (still and moving), displaying pieces of work (multimedia, written, musical etc) on school sites or in newsletters/publications. Most parents give their permission but some parents don’t, for very good reasons.

The requirement to honour the wishes of those parents creates an ethical dilemma for teachers because we want to share the fantastic things happening at school. However, deciding whether to post a picture of students taking part in a school-wide event, like the school Triathlon, becomes quite an undertaking, as a student with restricted permission could be in the photo.  Our school does have a document which indicates the permission levels for each class, but few teachers know all student in a school, let alone knowing in which class they are to do a quick check.  

A teacher may email photos to staff to check before he/she post it online and if nobody objects, goes ahead with posting the photos.

Potential issues with this:

• Did his/her colleagues get enough time to respond?
• Were his/her colleagues in a position to respond? Someone could be sick, or unable to check emails for whatever reason.
• Images of students could actually be posted online against their parents’ wishes/ instructions.

Posting a photo against parents ‘ wishes will violate our code of ethics, which requires teachers to show commitment to parents/guardians, and the family/whānau by respecting their right to privacy Teachers recognise they work in collaboration with the parents/guardians and family/whānau of learners, encouraging their active involvement in the education of their children. They acknowledge the rights of caregivers to consultation on the welfare and progress of their children and respect lawful parental authority (The Education Council Code of Ethics for Certificated Teachers).

Potential negative consequences for the teacher and the school:

• This could compromise the trust the parents have in the school to care for their child - Responsible care to do good and minimise harm to others is a fundamental principle that governs interactions of teachers. (The Education Council Code of Ethics for Certificated Teachers)
• This could compromise the respectful relationships the school wants to build and maintain with the parent and the community.
• This could negatively affect relations between colleagues as the teacher who could not access emails, could then be involved in an unpleasant situation.
• This could negatively affect the relationship between the student and the teachers, which will affect student’s learning. The code of ethics requires teachers to develop and maintain professional relationships with learners based upon the best interests of those learners. As well as promote the emotional wellbeing of learners.
• News of this could spread and mobilise more parents against the school, which could turn ugly.

To prevent this, it may seem easier not to bother with posting school-wide photos at all, which has happened.

A better option may be to keep a record of students with restricted cyber-permission and include a recent photograph of each student. As the number of these students are usually low, it should make it easier to be checked by the teacher involved, without the need to involve everyone.

Indigenous Knowledge and Cultural Responsiveness

Gay (2001),cited in MIndlab class notes (2017), defines culturally responsive pedagogy as using the cultural characteristics, experiences, and perspectives as conduits for effective teaching. In my opinion, one cannot be culturally responsive without having indigenous knowledge. As a cultural minority myself, I am all too aware of the need to feel valued and respected for who you are. One of my goals, therefore, is to make each student in my class feel valued and respected.

I was fortunate to attend an information seminar for overseas trained teachers at the start of my teaching career in New Zealand. I did not learn everything there is to learn about the different cultures in New Zealand, but it did influence my cultural lens (Bucher, 2008, cited in MIndlab class notes, 2017). This reminded me how easily I could insult or hurt people, parents, students and colleagues, without meaning to. In my culture, for instance, it is a show of affection when you ruffle someone’s hair. I also never thought that stepping over someone’s outstretch legs could be an issue. I stopped doing these as well as several other things after learning about them at the seminar.  I also started to focus on using the Maori language in my practice and attended the Te Reo course offered by Unitech. I’ve learned and I am still learning about Maori tikanga.

Improved knowledge of Maori tikanga, helps me be responsive, but, as an immigrant, I also had to try and understand the culture of Kiwis from European descent, different Polynesian cultures, Asian Cultures, as well as the Indian culture to help me teach the children in my room. Using the Mauri Model,  I would place my Cultural responsiveness in terms of my vision , mission and core values at level 3 - Mauri ora, although there is a lot more I can and should do.

As information about Maori protocol is freely available and the presence of  strategies like ka hikitia in schools, it is unlikely that teachers in New Zealand Schools would not have some indigenous knowledge.  Yet , Savagea ,Hindleb, Meyerc, Hyndsa, Penetitoband and Sleeterd (2011) reports incidences of racism in their recent study, which is an outrage. This supports the view that people can be culturally unresponsive, even though they possess indigenous knowledge. Why this happens, is anyone’s guess.

In terms of policies,  I would describe my cultural responsiveness as Mauri Oho. Up until last year I have deliberately included Maori tikanga and te reo in my room. For instance, we would say a karakia together and sing a waiata at the start and end of the day, and say a karakia before eating time. This year, I am working with three other teachers who want to get started with the day as soon as possible. I find myself in an advocating role where I need to justify the use of time for saying a karakia and singing a waiata. Sadly, with my energy going into learning to work in an Innovative Learning Environment, this is an area that needs to be picked up again.

Reference:
Savagea, Hindleb, Meyerc, Hyndsa, Penetito and Sleeterd (2011). Culturally responsive pedagogies in the classroom: indigenous student experiences across the curriculum. Asia-Pacific Journal of Teacher Education. Vol. 39, No. 3, August 2011, 183–198

Contemporary issue or trend in New Zealand or internationally

Identifying the trend

According to the NZ Herald, Computer Science was already introduced in NZ Secondary Schools in 201. The Conversation, 2015, puts forward that coding is a growing trend as the United Kingdom, Estonia and  some states in the USA have already introduced it in primary schools, and the Australian Labour Party wants it in every Primary and Secondary School.  According to Code.org, 32 states in the USA, allows Computer Science to count towards High School requirements in Maths and Science. Most recently, the process has also just started in NZ to include digital technology in the curriculum.

Why teach coding?

According to Edutopia: Coding in the classroom: A long-overdue inclusion,

• reading and writing code is the new literacy as it prepares students for a technical revolutions that spans cultures and language boundaries and it is a way of thinking about problem-solving.
• it is a tool to improve educational equity as it exposes computer science to students in lower socioeconomic groups that would otherwise miss out opportunities this provides.
• it offers inclusion as students on the autism spectrum can be better prepared for the workplace.
• It can improve neuroplasticity as children who acquired a second or third language, even a computer language, showed functional changes in the inferior parietal cortex.
• It improves STEM proficiencies. LiveScience  reported in 2014 that the USA, UK and Germany will have a shortage of workers in the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics fields by 2020.

NZ need to prepare students to fill this market. An article in the NZ Herald quoted John Straker, founder and CEO of Straker Translation, saying that he sees the gap growing between what kids are learning and where the world is going.

Why am I interested in Coding? and  Benefits to the Education system.

I started teaching when typewriters were the popular technological invention, so over the years, keeping up with technological advancements in education has been essential to stay relevant in education. Now that we are preparing students for 21st Century learning and have started teaching in Innovative Learning Spaces, the benefits of Coding seems to tick many of the boxes.

Code.org’s curriculum overview list the skills that will be developed through coding:

• Creativity
• Collaboration
• Communication
• Persistence
• Problem Solving

These are 21st century skills we all need to develop in our students.

As a complete novice in computer science, I have offered Scratch as an elective in 2016 and it connected with many of my students, including students who are below National Standards in Reading, Writing and Mathematics.   As I researched trends in Education, I felt a stirring in my belly - usually felt when I get excited - when I started reading about coding. I am aware that coding is offered as part of my current study program and I enjoyed the time we spent on exploring Scratch, but my time and attention was occupied by other topics. This reflection helped me to see coding as another step towards staying relevant to educating today’s and tomorrow’s children.

Possible response of my local community

According to code.org 90% of parents in the USA want their child to study computer science. I believe that our parent community will have a similar view, and our students will love it. The main obstacle I foresee is the current workload and focus of staff to get their heads around teaching collaboratively in an ILS. That is already taking up a lot of time, energy and mental space, so I don’t expect everyone to be excited about coding just because I am.

However, once Digital Technology becomes part of the curriculum in the near future, as recently announced, and it becomes a priority, coding will be embraced by most staff members. Hopefully, we would all be more comfortable teaching in an ILE and have the headspace to take on another challenge.

Current, but common, issues in my professional context.

Our school is about 98 years old but it’s still growing and changing. In my opinion, our school is in its midlife development period (Stein (1985), cited in Stoll, 1998, p.9). I have experienced change from the time I started, with the principal, having started just a year ahead of me, being new as well. Nine years later, the latest changes include shifting into our new purpose built ILE, as well as adapting to a new principal with all the changes/improvements he plans to facilitate.

We were not impressed with the narrow focus on Reading, Writing and Mathematics created by National Standards. In spite of this, we still focus on educating the whole child. We teach an integrated curriculum to contextualize our teaching. Our children, climb trees (in spite of the latest Health and Safety Rules), play sport, music, act in plays, ride bikes and ramps at school and are exposed to activities to develop their maturity and confidence.

A handful of parents has their own ideas on what should be taught in schools. To remedy this, we try various ways to keep parents informed of what happens in the classroom. A few years ago, I had the opportunity to explain to a parent why we do maths the way we do when he sat in on a lesson I modeled for parents on one of the Parent and Grandparent days we hosted. We also started using blogs, which was not as successful. Our latest strategy is using Yammer, a social media website where we hope to build on our sense of community.

We are also competing with intermediate schools to keep our year 6 students with us until year 8. This is an ongoing process which is reviewed regularly. Making use of specialist teachers in Science, Music, Art and PE, appropriate use of ICT and providing a caring environment is a strength. We are lucky to have a special group of Year 7 & 8 teachers. The culture of care and emotional displays are common, especially at Year 8 Final Assemblies. According to Stoll, 1998, this sense of family is typical of Primary Schools (P.10).

A small number of parents have also taken their children elsewhere in anticipation of us moving into our ILE’s this year. We’ve managed this process by keeping the parents informed through parent meetings and inviting them into our classrooms, by acknowledging their concerns and through our commitment to keep their children safe. We have also shared the research and motivation for the change through community meetings and through daily contact with parents. The message was: We are also scared, but it is the right way to go and we are up for the challenge!

We are also competing with intermediate schools to keep our year 6 students with us until year 8. This is an ongoing process which is reviewed regularly. Making use of specialist teachers in Science, Music, Art and PE, appropriate use of ICT and providing a caring environment is a strength. We are lucky to have a special group of Year 7 & 8 teachers. The culture of care and emotional displays are common, especially at Year 8 Final Assemblies. According to Stoll, 1998, this sense of family is typical of Primary Schools (P.10).

Most of the norms listed in Stoll and Finch’s list, such as shared goals and responsibility for success, are embedded in our school. We are a happy, supportive group but most of us still find robust reviews and critique difficult and are perhaps not as open as we could be. Therefore, with reference to Judith Warren Little (1990), cited in Stoll, 1998, who states that collegiality creates greater readiness for reviews and critiques, we have room for improvement to be truly collegial.

Reference:

Stoll. (1998). School Culture. School Improvement Network’s Bulletin 9. Institute of Education, University of London. Retrieved from http://www.educationalleaders.govt.nz/Culture/Understanding-school-cultures/School-Culture

My community of practice - an honest reflection

The latest community I've become a member of is the collaborative team I share an Innovative Learning Space with. We are still in our infancy as a team, having started in term 2 last year while we were still in our single cell classrooms. It was hard to experiment with ways to collaborate and maintaining a single cell at the same time, but we learned a lot about ourselves and each other.

I believe that this team, have evolved into a Community of Practice (CoP).

A CoP is defined as “groups of people who share a concern or a passion or about a topic, and who deepen their knowledge and expertise in this area by interaction on an ongoing basis” (Wenger, McDermott & Snyder, 2002, p.4).

I will attempt to justify my statement, using Wenger's three essential elements, also drawing bits from the descriptions on the Wenger-Trayner website.

• Joint enterprise/The Domain
• Mutual Engagement/ The Community
• Shared Repertoire/The Practice

Joint enterprise

Our joint enterprise is the welfare and learning of approximately 90 students placed in our care. We had opportunities to opt out of the team, but we chose to work together.  By toughing it out together through those very difficult initial stages, we have developed an understanding of what works for us, and what does not work. 

Mutual Engagement

We have come as far as we have by working together - mutual engagement. We have developed norms together and have had a few difficult conversation. We always knew that we would have to have these conversations sooner or later, so it was dealt with in a very professional manner. At this stage, I would say that our levels of respect for each other's ability and work ethic are higher than our levels of trust. We have weekly planning meetings and also meet informally to discuss urgent matters. Decisions made during these informal discussions are recorded in the following planning meeting. 

Shared Repertoire

We have certainly developed a shared repertoire. Since we have started we have developed processes, and structures that facilitate us working together in a shared learning space. We have, for instance, developed our own behavioral management procedure, based on our beliefs. We have developed and reviewed our planning documents, shared timetable, as well as developed shared online resources. This year, we will also share one classroom blog as well as set up our ILE as a team. 

My practice within our CoP

According to Wenger (2000), knowing is an act of belonging. In the beginning, I felt at times disconnected from my team. For example, when I did not understand a document we were developing. Luckily, I do not leave myself wondering for very long and I always catch up. I catch up by staying engaged, by reflecting on what I do not understand (imagination) and by sharing my perspective to give my colleagues the opportunity to align their practice with mine. Wenger (2000) states that 'alignment' is not a one-way communication and, looking back at my own experience, I agree with him.  The times when I experienced a strong sense of belonging, were the times I shared my initiatives and noticed how my practice aligned with the practice of my colleagues, or how they have adjusted their practice to align with mine. Therefore, I would describe my role as being and active member who leads when necessary.

Reference:

Wenger, E.(2000). Communities of practice and social learning systems. Organization,7(2), 225-246.

Wenger, E., McDermott, R., & Snyder, W. (2002). Cultivating Communities of Practice: A Guide to Managing Knowledge. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Business School Press.

http://wenger-trayner.com/introduction-to-communities-of-practice/