Grouping and High Teacher Expectations PLD Day 29.1.19

Grouping and High Teacher Expectations  PLD Day 29.1.19

Presenter: Christine Rubie-Davies, The University of Auckland


The presentation from Christine Rubie-Davies today explained the consequences of teachers having high and low expectations of their students. Teaching practices were outlined, that could improve the self-esteem of students by steering away from purely ability groups in class. She explained that a student's self-belief is affected by teacher expectations. What the teacher values and how a teacher interacts through non-verbal and verbal signals all send a message to students about their ability.

Robert Merton was one of the first researchers to investigate the topic of self fulfilling prophecy. Bob Rosenthal was, however first to apply this concept to education (Pygmalion in the Classroom). Rats and psychologists versus teacher and children interactions, and beliefs were investigated and a framework was designed by Christine Rubie-Davies to detail how the instructional environment and the socio emotional environment (aka class climate) are influenced by several factors.

Reflective question for teachers

 How do you form expectations? What information do you use to make decisions about students?

We discussed the various ways we gather information about students such as...

• achievement data
• personal narratives and info
• previous support provided, and diagnostic labelling
• previous portfolios, reports or profiles presented

Some NZ research examined the resulting effects of teacher attitudes towards ethnicities and those students' achievement. It indicated that Maori were lower in achievement than other ethnic groups. The teacher's belief about the student's ethnicity appeared to influence the teacher's own expectations.

Reflective activity

Teachers were asked to sort the teacher behaviours into two categories, those of interactions with high achievers and those of interactions with low achievers. Teachers gave more quality time to high achievers than lower achievers. Also more wait /processing time were given to high achievers. High emotional support was given to high achievers whereas low emotional support was given to low achievers. Studies on teachers' attitudes and expectations can be influenced by bias, prejudiced and stereotypical (Babab).

It was noted by the research that, when gathering student voice,  students took note of a teacher's non-verbal language and were quick to detect insincerity, even mixed messages. They could identify the differences in how teachers responded to or treated high and low achievers. They noted that brainy students don’t get told off. 

Consequences of expectations

Two factors that influence student capability are; opportunities to learn and the extent to which mixed ability groups are used.

Lower achievers have less opportunities to learn, and less positive interactions. High achievers have more opportunities to learn,  receive positive emotional interactions, and experience challenging learning opportunities. If a student knows that a teacher likes them they will make a bigger effort. 

The way that achievement data is shared and children are grouped often forms negative self-beliefs. Teachers need to be sensitive to how this is shared as the damage can be big.

Teachers attitudes can change the learning trajectory. It was suggested that teachers video themselves teaching to analyse how they interact with high and low achievers.

 Teachers' expectations can preserve self esteem and make the pace and rate of learning easier as well as level adjustments.

Which of the high expectations are already embedded in my practice?

• Gathering student voice about seating/grouping.
• Learning goals based on assessment info  
• Clear routines 
• Extended explanations
• Flexible groupings
• Positive climate
• Scaffolding
• Use links to prior knowledge 
• Fostering relationships
• Give choices
• Be positive
• Mixed ability groups for maths word problems etc
• Consider each students narrative.
• High expectations for all students

Changes I am considering to my teaching

• Multiple opportunities to learn
• Critical thinking activities for all students
• Check non verbal language
• Check bias and prejudice
• Have flexibility in groupings across subjects and focus on the learning rather than ability
• Frequent feedback based on goals
• Video self for observing expectations and non verbal behaviour
•  Responsibility for learning
• Intrinsically motivated students
• Choice of what reader they have
• Ways of grouping students could involve responses to topics to mix them up, perhaps a theme box e.g. frogs and related tasks on a web
• Home reading cards with colour wheel colours, that contain differentiated instruction for parents e.g.,red books- I can read this by myself, yellow books- I can read this with some help
• Theme box e.g.,  for shared reading higher order tasks
• Mixed groups for some “reading activities”, pairs, task board/tumble with student choice.

Group reflection

Setting up a high expectation classroom

Evidence of reflective and professional practice-Term review

Term Review for Term 4 2018

The term review provides evidence of reflective practice that forms new goals for the following year. It is informed by a range of data; narrative, formative and summative.

In addition to the review I have created...

• a Google Sheets data workbook to track student achievement over the course of the year
• a data analysis "Quadrant" sheet that names students who require extra support
• wedge graphs to show individual student progress in Reading, Writing and Maths
• a Senco data tracking sheet, a Senco data analysis report, a Senco Improvement Plan and a Senco Annual report that support the students who are Tier 2 or 3 for assistance.

Reflection from Manaiakalani Staff Meeting 30.10.18

Reflection from the Manaikalani Staff Meeting 30.10.18

Reflection Questions

Do your learners know the process of learn, create, share? No

Do your parents/community know the process of learn, create, share? No

Is this visible on your school site/class site/class blog? No

What are your ‘next steps’ for 2019 to improve visibility of LEARN CREATE SHARE in your class?

• Create a class site
• Create a class blog
• Teach children how to capture and share their learning, use Google Apps etc.
• Learn the technical aspects of how MK's style of visible and rewindable learning
• Learn how to juggle learning with shared devices

How can I, as a facilitator support you to enable visible Learn, Create, Share in your class?

• How to set up the bones of my class site
• Ensure my ipads/devices are set up
• Some work around organising my images/photos to embed in site
• Get my class blog set up
• How to assist my one or two day a week reliever with my class site

Digital Fluency Intensive Reflection 19.9.18 Week 9

Digital Fluency Intensive Reflection 19.9.18

Manaiakalani Pedagogy

Ubiquitous Learning  and Rewindable Learning.

• Anytime 
• Anywhere
• Any place

Rewindable learning helps this accessibility and makes it easy for learners to go back and revise their learning. For priority learners, blogs and blog comments help students to progress in literacy throughout the holidays or at least not slip back.

Rewindable learning

We reflected on one way we have scaffolded ubiquitous learning and I thought about the "old" technology of modelling books and charts of success criteria. I look forward to the new ways of  supporting rewindable learning through blogs that capture the learning and other people's comments as well as the resource links within the site. Also there will be helpful links for parents who can hook into the class resources.

Students can make tutorials by using Screencastify to share with the class. Other app.s to explore for this purpose could be ...WeVideo, pixiclip, explain everything, Movenote, Flipgrip

Opportunities for future teaching and learning

• The COL person in the school (MK)
• Click on the MK labels
• Teaching as Inquiry- Manaikalani Innovative Teachers- PLD 
• 1 hour a week with the facilitator next year
• Tania Coutts- online facilitator- registration for Tuhi mahi tuhi atu
• Twitter feed- hash tag based, following groups, worth discussing as a staff
• Google + , set up a default to publish this to Google + website (see the slide deck about Google plus on minutes- What's the fuss about Google plus... share to Google plus from your blog post. Join communities (of schools and clusters).

Looking back over the eight weeks reflect on what you have learned, created and shared.

I have learned about the different Google Suite app.s and have created drawings, documents, worked within Drive, sorted bookmarks, arranged my calendar, worked with Quicktime, Screencastify, tasted ideas for robotics...

Reflect on what you know you need to focus on and gain more fluency in. Consciously decide where to get the help you need.

I will be moving into creating my Class Site fully, in preparation for next year's launch. I will be searching for resources from other Sites that will help in this construction and will be working closely with our facilitator and pilot teachers to fine-tune the Site. I need to sort out the ipads and PCs in readiness for the class Site.

Identify your strengths and what you can contribute to the wider community of learning and learners.

I feel quite confident with Sheets and Forms, Docs and Drive, blogs and playlists.

Digital Fluency Intensive Reflection Week 8 12.9.18

Digital Fluency Intensive Reflection  Week 8   12.9.18

What did I learn that increased my understanding of Manaiakalani pedagogy and kaupapa?

Empowered

The Manaiakalani pedagogy this week was "Empowered". 

Children are disadvantaged or disempowered by having less exposure to known words through less hearing and reading thus limiting vocabulary; through less formative instruction; through lack of digital technologies and connectivity; all of which can limit later life choice in real life circumstances. 

Agency is having the power or capacity to act and make choices. This ability is limited when students start school already behind in foundational skills for learning.

Manaiakalani's aim is for all students to feel at home in a digital world and in this way all students are empowered to have student voice, learner agency, and the ability to express themselves etc.

Digital technology is not just regarded as a tool, rather, it transforms the way students learn (Dean Shareski). As educators, we are encouraged to mix and match the old technologies with the new; the best of both worlds.

Kerry Boyde-Preece, from Manaikalani, explained that student learning "lives on in the blog". It has a life. It is a living artefact. She described how blogs give life to student talents that may not have normally been promoted within the school curriculum. Students are empowered by knowing how to blog and put their work out to the world. They receive feedback and comments that add to that feeling of being empowered and links them with others with a similar talent.

Newly created jobs, such as drone operators are made possible through cutting edge digital knowledge. Students who have developed knowledge in this area have far more opportunities for employment. 

For Manaiakalani, the default is being visible. Kerry says that you can't truly be empowered  without being visible, connected, and ubiquitous, i.e.,work any time you choose and on a global stage.

We were challenged to reflect on how each has been empowered by Manaiakalani.

Professionally, I have been empowered with the increase in teaching knowledge. I have learned many new skills that I can share with my students, to help them learn, create and share.

What did I learn that could increase my confidence, capability or workflow as a professional?

Tania Coutts spoke on the key topic of Computational Thinking which is part of the New Zealand Technology Curriculum/Hangarau- Matihiko (Maori medium).

"The new content has been designed to be flexible, so it can respond to new developments and technologies as they emerge". Nicki Kaye, June 2017

New acronyms to be aware of in the curriculum are...
CT4DT- Computational Thinking for Digital Technologies

3DO- Designing and Developing Digital Outcomes

Kia takatu a Matihiko- The Digital Readiness Facebook page-https://www.facebook.com/kiatakatu/

Pikau/ Toolkits on the above page provide courses that are a good place for teachers to understand the new curriculum.

This an excellent video is about "What most schools don't teach".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKIu9yen5nc   

Also, a nifty little poster about 'Ten reasons to teach coding'...

What did I learn that could be used with my learners?

Most of the app.s we played with will be shared with our students. I worked with Robyn on the green screen video. This was very new to us so we were reliant on the instruction of our patient tutors to create a short green screen video with a background. I took an image of the trees outside and part of the waka shelter on the Waitangi grounds as the background. To this Robin added her ScuptGL image and Blake's video. The background noise was split out. 

Sculpt GL

I had a limited play with this app. with the resulting rather clunky image of DFI. 

 Block Coding-Robots: This app. was great for helping students construct a sequence of steps for the robot to follow. 

Clapmotion: I observed others telling a story with this app. and Lego figures.

I would like to explore more of Tinkercad, Do ink, Tilt Brish, and Paint3.

What did I learn that could be used to increase my confidence, capability and my workflow in my personal life?

I was reminded of how wonderful iMovie is for creating movies and slide shows and the work with a green screen took this knowledge to a new level. It was great to play and explore with new technologies and the opportunity builds my confidence eventually.

Digital Fluency Intensive Reflection Week 7 5.9.18

Digital Fluency Intensive Reflection Week 7  5.9.18

What did I learn that increased my understanding of Manaiakalani pedagogy and kaupapa?

Connected: Future focussed learning in connected communities.
Clarelle Carruthers from Point England came to speak with us about the Manaiakalani pedagogy of being 'connected'.

Being part of the Manaikalani community means that we are connected to a powerful network of similar schools, across the country and world. There are 19,000-22,000 Manaiakalani learners in secondary, area, primary, kura, and Catholic schools. Together we share the same pedagogical language, and 'paddle in the same direction', aiming at the same goals. Our common curriculum is centred around the 3 big pedagogies; Learn, Create, Share. 

We stand together. We are not alone. 

Each term the school focusses on one of the key pedagogies, although, all 3 are frequently referred to in class throughout the year. The planning allows for teaching and learning resources to be targeted at that area of focus. 

Term 1. Learn (about how to use the tools correctly)
Term 2. Create (using a variety of modes, digital and best practice teaching strategies)
Term 3. Share (Using the Google Suite)
Term 4. All

Other ways for teachers being connected are through groups such as...

• Google suite online groups
• Cybersmart curriculum 
• Twitter- Manaiakalani Cluster
• Tuhi Mai Tuhi Atu -(write to me, write to others) where we need to register our class
• Tania Couts is our online facilitator; register online

To maximise the benefits of 'Connect' a teacher needs to be committed to sharing their teaching and learning. Being able to benefit from other teachers' resources and ideas means that, as a teacher, you will be able to share your resources with other schools. 

What did I learn that could increase my confidence, capability or workflow as a professional?

Clarelle shared her IT Bingo which contained a growing Multi text Data base.

We evaluated other class sites using the two criteria of visual appeal (the shop window of the teaching and learning) and  user experience (ease of use  for students where 3 clicks gets to the learning).

The course was full of handy resources and tips for developing our class Site as well as exemplars of excellent class Sites. These will help in the development of my own class Site. Going between Google Drawings and Google Site to create the 'bones' of my class Site was new learning for me. The front page of my own class Site is below. It is a work in progress.
https://sites.google.com/ahipara.school.nz/room-8-class-site/home   

Ethical and practical issues around students who were not allowed to share via digital technologies challenges our school to consider our policy.

Google Training modules will increase my capability with the app.s.

What did I learn that could be used with my learners?

The day focussed on the learning being visible to learners and ways of constructing a vibrant and well designed class Site for them to easily access the learning. The resources will open up a broader, more self-paced programme. The careful unpacking of the 3 key pedagogies over the course of each year will help students understand each one better. 

 I enjoyed the Pixabay site for images.

What did I learn that could be used to increase my confidence, capability and my workflow in my personal life?

The new frontier of class Sites increased my understanding of what was involved to make a Site that would engage, teach and inspire students to learn, create and share. 

Digital Fluency Intensive- Reflection Week 6

Digital Fluency Intensive- Reflection Week 6

What did I learn that increased my understanding of Manaiakalani pedagogy and kaupapa?

Today the pedagogy was about Cyber safety. Students are introduced to different aspects of cyber safety each term. All students are explicitly taught the aspects contained in the curriculum. The emphasis is on thinking and behaving in a safe, smart  and positive way online. Opportunities are provided for students to use digital technologies to harness positive  messages to share with the wider community. Manaiakalani also has a kawa of care pedagogy that underpins all aspects of teaching and learning and promotes positive interactions. Students are encouraged to create work that their families would be proud of.

Cyber Safety Messages: Be internet smart, alert, strong, kind, brave, awesome.
The Cyber Safety Curriculum contains amazing resources behind each button:

We also learnt about the historical  research behind the devices. It was a reminder of the hard work that has gone on behind the scenes, that has resulted in the right choice of iPads and Chromebooks.

What did I learn that could increase my confidence, capability or workflow as a professional?

Using Learner devices
On a Chromebook- The Hapara Teacher Dashboard: Empowering visible teaching and learning. We learned about the Hapara Dashboard where the teacher's planning, relevant links and students' work was visible, along with the Highlights and the Workspace where teaching ideas are visible to a wider audience (once the teacher has shared their own Workspace). The planning examples were helpful for setting expectations for teaching older students, in particular. 

A few handy hints for when I set up Hapara were I need a list of classes, teacher emails for each class, subject folders, student emails, and classes students belong to. I log in with school password and class password. Click on the star to put it on my dashboard.

Chrissy Smith, acting principal at Paihia, presented her timetable for older students, that contained links to resources and showed when the teacher was available. She explained that the students choose what learning they will do and when they will do it. They plan their own week's timetable. 

Becks from the Te Ngahere class at Paihia reminded us to check the permissions when sharing work. The multimodal style of her planning provided for well integrated learning and age-appropriate, authentic contexts.

Khismira Lai from Pt. England spoke about her experiences with using Hapara on iPads and creating new projects in her class. We created a new project where we took a photo and inserted text, pages, audio and shapes. We explored the tools of the project and I took a photo to share as I didn't know how to share it from the student's iPad I was using. 

Lisa, DP  from Ohaewai School presented her sabbatical research about Using Learner Devices. She showed how she is building resources from other schools that can be shared with all schools. These looked to be a real timesaver for teachers.  

Class visits
We had the privilege of visiting one class of 46 students, all of whom were using devices. Discussions with the students explained how they navigate their own weekly schedule and store their work in the Hand in sheet.The level of engagement was high.

What did I learn that could be used with my learners? 

We completed a digital dig, something that all students should do at the beginning of the year. This explored the short cuts required to perform different functions. 

I will be using the Cyber safety curriculum and encouraging the kawa of care once my class Site is set up.

I learnt that  the "ducks need to line up" at the outset of commencing Hapara and the devices need to be well set up before work begins. Installing the Explain Everything app. at the outset assists implementation of this type of learning. Systematic, whole class and well structured introductions to using Hapara need to occur for young students.

The Hand in sheet is a place where each student shares their work with the teacher. I like the  colour coding of work, similar to traffic lights like this at Paihia School.

What did I learn that could be used to increase my confidence, capability and my workflow in my personal life?

Most of what we learned or heard about today will bring a new focus to my teaching.

Planning from home will be enhanced with the Hapara style of planning although hard materials for juniors would still need to be gathered, which means time at school.

I like the idea of building a bank of resources that can be utilised again or modified to use across a number of year levels, for special education or across schools or roles. Anything that reduces the time spent sourcing foundational resources would be helpful.