Wednesday 24 May 2017

In a nut shell...

IS THERE A CORRELATION BETWEEN AN EMPHASIS ON THE KEY COMPETENCIES AND IMPROVED OUTCOMES IN LITERACY?
Spiral of Inquiry
Helen Timperley, Linda Kaser and 
Judy Halbert.
Manaiakalani Inquiry Diagram.png






These frameworks seem to blend together quite well.  I am currently in the 'LEARN' stage in the 'Learn Create Share', so moving through the scanning, focusing and developing a hunch in the spiral.

I found the TKI information on Teaching as inquiry very helpful - thanks for sharing Fiona Grant.

SCAN
The Key Competency of Thinking is quite unique. It encompasses all of the others and is the basis for all learning in the Learning Areas as well. Using Language Symbols and Texts is a “lead in” to Literacy and contains many of the skills needed by our students for Literacy acquisition.
FOCUSING
  • Would a focus on the Key Competency of Thinking improve Literacy outcomes for our students aged 16-21?
HYPOTHESIS
  • It would seem logical that by emphasising the thinking skills, whether they be lower order or higher order , I would anticipate improved student outcomes in Literacy for our senior students.
RESEARCH
  • I would have to inquire into various approaches to the development of thinking skills such as Multiple Intelligence's, Bloom’s Taxonomy, Habits of the mind and thinking keys. I will have to develop teaching strategies such as task rotation and put these all into practice.
TAKING ACTION
I will have to engage in professional learning and development programmes, trial the strategies with students and ascertain which have had a positive effect and why.
CHECKING
Have I made a difference?
How do I know? (Learner outcomes, progress and achievement data)
RATIONALE
So why Literacy? As a school...
  • We are already collecting data on Literacy and have a baseline established
  • Our IEP progress and achievement is already being collected in Literacy
  • Authentic Literacy activities are one of three essential elements for success
  • There are a number of effective Literacy strategies already in place
REFERENCES
Education Review Office (2015) Raising Student Achievement Through Targeted Actions
Education Review Office (2016) Collaboration to Improve Learner Outcomes
Manaiakalani Community of Learning: Future Focused Learning in Connected Communities 2016-2018
New Zealand Curriculum (2007)
Robinson, Viviane (2011) Student Centred Leadership.

Schmoker, Mike. (2016) Leading with Focus

Thursday 18 May 2017

What does assessment look like for us?

Assessment
In the senior cluster at Sommerville we have developed our own assessment across the five targeted curriculum areas.
For the purpose of this inquiry I will focus on Literacy and the assessments tools we use.
One of our best tools for assessment is through a document called Student Learning Achievement Profile or S.L.A.P for short. This process allows for great student agency as they are able to select a goal for the term as well as teachers being able to select a goal for the term.
Twice a year every student is graded against our Functional Literacy checklist. This a checklist which we have designed that covers all the areas we felt important for a student in the senior school at Sommerville to be working towards.
Also probably our most important form of Assessment is the Individual Educational Plan (I.E.P.) which are short and long term goals that have been created by the teacher and parent with the support of the student and therapy team at Sommerville. This year has seen every student with a literacy focused goal that has been broken down in to termly achievement check points so that we are able to gather data and report back at the end of the year on the students achievement.
To make this easier to collect data I have created a termly google form that is completed by students, teacher aides, and teachers. Here is an example.


Wednesday 10 May 2017

Who are the learners

Before I research and gather evidence to create my hypothesis. I thought it would be better to put the
students first and give everyone a bit of background on who they are. All students are working and well below any national standard and have never performed any formal standardised assessment for literacy.
I will explain and go through the forms of assessments we use in Te Hapori the next post.
All the students that I will be using in my inquiry have various forms of autism and learning difficulties but I would much prefer to concentrate on what abilities they have and how I can best increase and accelerate their learning through the use of thinking skills, frameworks, and activities.

Alias
Age
Ethnicity
Years in Te Hapori
Ben
20 years
Indian
1.5 years
  • Positive attitude towards reading and writing
  • Is able to form sentences both written and spoken.
  • High amount of anxiety when working independently (will try and copy)
  • Speaks well and is able to ask Who, What and Where questions when having a conversation.
Matt
17 years
Niuean
0.5 years
  • Negative attitude towards reading, very low reading vocabulary.
  • Can write familiar words otherwise would prefer dialogue to explain his answers
  • Excellent speaker and is able to ask meaningful questions and follow instruction when verbal.
  • High anxiety when working with a peer and also group.
Sam
19 years
Cook is
1.5 years
  • Positive attitude towards all literacy activities
  • Very low writing and reading levels
  • High amount of anxiety when working independently (will cry and become withdrawn)
  • Speaks well can follow 2 step instructions and is able to ask, Who, What, Why.
Jess
18 years
Filipino
0.5 years
  • High anxiety when faced with difficult task (will become silent and non responsive)
  • Must work with support
  • Has a satisfactory level of written vocabulary
  • Great language and questioning skills
  • Can form written sentences when supported.
Denise
19 years
Samaon
0.5 years
  • Positive attitude towards literacy
  • Very limited written vocabulary (likes to copy)
  • Struggles to have conversations and ask questions
  • Speaks in 2 and 3 word sentences
  • Unable to function without support.


Image result for critical thinking

Monday 1 May 2017

Think about it.

My

Inquiry

for 2017


“Recognising and spreading sophisticated pedagogical practice across our community so that students learn in better and more powerful ways...”

The Manaiakalani Community of Learning is working together on this task using the expertise existing in our community of learning. There are 6 achievement challenges that each of the teachers have aligned their inquiry with.

In 2017 for my inquiry I have selected the CoL achievement challenge 5.

"Improve the achievement of students with additional needs in the learning areas of English/key competency using language symbols and texts"


I have decided to target 5 students in my class. The class is Te Hapori and is part of the senior cluster of Sommerville Special School. Te Hapori is a transition class with student aged from 17-21 in their last years of attending Sommerville. Here is a link to my class blog to give you are better description of my learners and our curriculum.

After meeting with my principal and teaching and learning team I have decided to focus my inquiry to specifically look at the improvement of thinking skills.


"Improve the achievement of students with additional needs in the learning areas of English using the key competency thinking."

The teaching as inquiry framework I will be using in 2017 has been specifically co-constructed for Manaiakalani schools using the familiar Learn Create Share structure.
The elements in this framework share close similarities with other models New Zealand teachers use.

I will be labeling my posts as I update my inquiry throughout the year to make the content easy to access.

Labels:
LEvidence, LScan, LTrend, LHypothesise, LResearch, LReflect,
 CPlan, CTry, CInnovate, CImplement, CReflect,
SPublish, SCoteach, SModel, SGuide, SFback, SReflect

Label Key:


LEvidence
Learn - Gather Evidence
CPlan
Create - Make a plan
SPublish
Share - Publish
LScan
Learn - Scan
CTry
Create - Try new things
SCoteach
Share - Co-teach
LTrend
Learn - Identify Trends
CInnovate
Create - Innovate
SModel
Share - Model
LHypothesise
Learn - Hypothesise
CImplement
Create - Implement
SGuide
Share - Guide
LResearch
Learn - Research
CReflect
Create - Reflect
SFback
Share - Feedback
LReflect
Learn - Reflect


SReflect
Share - Reflect