Tweeting in LC4

I've been using twitter in the classroom for some time now but am constantly picking up new ways to do things, naturally we're all learning but its the launch of Twitter into the classroom that I'm specifically referring to.

Going into HPPS I was wanting to use Twitter again but was conscious that I'd need to focus my attention elsewhere first and that there would undoubtedly be differences in the approach to what I used at my previous school (blogged here). Some differences featured primarily because of the use of Kidsedchatnz and others more for the use of Twitter generally.

Here are some things we did launching Twitter in LC4 and HPPS more widely:

The launch of a laminated Tweet board for every student in LC4. There are plenty of examples on the Internet but our example allowed for students to draw their own avatar, username and the box at the bottom allows for students to retweet or favourite their peer's tweets on the wall. This is all with the purpose of creating familiarity with the medium.

When an account was established for the school it was decided that the username should be generic for the school. This would allow for minimal clutter/confusion of accounts and that I could manage this account, the school retains control through a collating usernames, passwords and security questions for all social media accounts. For the record, along with other coordinators at Kidsedchatnz we believe that all class twitter accounts should include the username for the teacher in control of the account. This means should a dodgy tweet be sent it is easy to connect with the teacher who deserves to know what their kids have done, when moderating chats with children this provides an extra layer of support that is quite helpful.

Discussion about the use of social media with my co-teacher Amy and our principal signalled that clear communication with our school community would need to take place. This was a marked difference to my previous school but in hindsight is valuable and I would recommend this regardless of school practice. I sent permission forms home outlining the purpose of Kidsedchatnz specifically, as well as placing a poster about Kidsedchatnz on the walls of both LC3 & 4 for our school community to read.

Once these components were all in place I pursued a path which is more akin to what I have done in other years. A couple of classes introducing Twitter, tweeting & Kidsedchatnz for those that are interested. When a Kidsedchatnz session is taking place I now try to ensure that the children are always in pairs so that no inappropriate tweets get through, this doesn't rule out poor spelling or off-topic tweets but that is largely a work-in-progress.

I always have the HPPS kids account on my Tweetdeck as a user column, this provides me with an ongoing record of what the kids are tweeting (as shown).

Some useful things to know if you are launching Twitter in your classroom:
It is possible to revoke permission to the Twitter App from the main Twitter website- a useful tool if you have loaded it onto multiple devices. Just go to Settings>Apps to revoke access.

You can schedule tweets through Tweetdeck, I've used this when moderating the chat sessions as it frees me of the need to post the questions and lets me concentrate on reading all the tweets.


I hope this is helpful for those investigating using Twitter in the classroom.

Any questions feel free to tweet, email or comment.

Innovation - Term Reflection

"HPPS - wow!" you exclaim.

One of my first thoughts on heading there was how I would be able to push my creativity and innovation in the classroom. Naturally, I would look to include innovation somewhere in my personal goals. We have several goals to set, so within my own Personal Professional Development I decided that I would "Evolve my teaching through innovative and responsive practice".  I could achieve this through the following: 

• Attend regular professional development in numeracy and literacy.
• Implement and reflect on innovative teaching practice.
• Regular professional reading.

I completed all my Individual Education Meetings (IEMs) on Monday and naturally teacher brain decided to redirect its energies rather than relax, reflection on innovation became the focus. How might I have been more innovative? What if this had been my previous classroom? What barriers had I perceived/removed/battled? How might I change my practice in term 2? It is also worthwhile to think about what innovation means, for me it is not a synonym for technology in the classroom. I recently stumbled across a definition (battling to find the reference right now) that included all the 'radical or incremental change' stuff that seems to be always present but for the education context included the important addition that it would add value. 

During reflection I became dubious as to whether I had been innovative and responsive, or more importantly had I added value to Learning Common 4 (LC4) or any other part of HPPS. I decided a good old fashioned stock-take was needed. I needed to simply evaluate each and every tool or idea I'd used this term and make a judgement on whether it has added value.

Kidsedchatnz:
Have introduced twitter in the classroom to LC4 and LC3. After 1 term students now opt-in on the Wednesday as part of their independent learning activities. There are some regular participants, a few who have decided it isn't for them and for some it depends on the topic. I have remained very hands-off with Kidsedchatnz this term to allow for student voice (a concern I raised in an earlier post) but am needing to check-in with participants early term 2 so they can identify some purpose for their Kidsedchatnz participation, be it literacy, dispositional or topic focussed. 

Immersion Workshop:
Week 5 we held our immersion workshops where all of our staff ran a small workshop to give students an insight into a world they didn't know. This is to help our students find their passions for the Project Based Learning. This term we were focussed on Inventive Thinking. With Caine's Arcade in my mind, my workshop was construction we had Lego, wooden blocks and stacks of cardboard boxes. My workshop was targeted for our Y0-4 learners and from the looks on their faces they had a blast inventing some pretty cool things, including tanks, time machines, boats, mermaid robots (who knew?) and towns. Construction has continued as a theme for some learners as they have created projects inspired somewhat by these early steps. Learners in LC4 also had my lego out for a time which has led to great discussion and writing.




Food Tech Workshops - Burritos & Kebabs
I blogged about this experience elsewhere but since then several projects have been initiated where food is part of the solution. I was also quite proud to hear some students talk about my food tech workshops in their celebrations for the term! 
term! 

Cricket World Cup
Heading into the CWC I had identified that there were many possibilities for integrating this into LC4. I waited to observe that I had students interested before using this in any way. I initiated a workshop early on that several boys opted in for, we brainstormed ways that the CWC could be utilised as a learning experience. They were particularly interested in bowling speeds, average speed of a bowler, the impact of technique and the variabilities created by the type of ball that is thrown. For me, new to HPPS, this was an exciting moment. Student voice, responsiveness, integrated & authentic teaching, what an opportunity! Sadly, in the hustle & bustle of HPPS and the learning journey that I was on this didn't go much further. The students managed 1-2 independent time slots focussed on their CWC work before it fell on to the back burner as they entered the immersion and design process phase for their Inventive Thinking projects. This was definitely a missed opportunity for innovative and responsive teaching, it required more steering by me but I was busy trying to juggle my first term requirements.

Design Process 
Early on Amy and I discussed using the Design Process for forming our project groups in LC4, I was excited by this as I had not used as a teaching tool nor been part of the process in any other organisation. Here was an opportunity to make additions to my kete of teaching tools while in the classroom, surely a bonus of team-teaching. I read about Amy's Design Process work with LC2 in 2014, and readied myself for learning. We took several days to move LC4 through the various phases but they came out the other end with their projects and a good understanding of why they were doing their projects. Some students even celebrated various aspects of the Design Process in their IEMs, whether it was their contribution to the ideation, the solution they'd formed as a team or how their dispositions had been challenged or grown. I see this as my first iteration through the Design Process and could write a post about it, but I think this should wait until I have taken more of a leadership role in its use in LC4, that will come when we head into our second lot of projects late term 2.

Reading Opportunities - 40 Book Challenge & Book Chat
Working with several of my readers I identified that they needed some challenge for their reading. They are all very keen readers with well developed reading ability but all tend to read within 1-2 genres. I've talked with them about a 40 book type challenge, emphasis on reading not numbers. I've used the 40 Book Challenge in class before and know it can provide some of the impetus required to take a look at different genres, thus growing our reading skills, vocabulary and general understanding of the world around us. We haven't worried about a way of monitoring the challenge because its the reading that is uppermost not writing about our reading, although Amy and I are wanting to implement some ways to provide some evidence of learning within reading. The 40 Book Challenge awaits as an untapped tool that I have introduced to LC4.

A colleague in Christchurch has developed a twitter-based book chat with her students. I had two of my students participating last year as it provided them with an opportunity to regularly discuss the books they were reading and expand their reading horizons. I have mentioned the existence of this bookchat to some of my students but need to facilitate their participation early in term 2. 

Where to next:
As we reviewed Term 1, I shared my frustration with my self-diagnosed lack of innovative teaching. I knew that my first term would be challenging in a new school but that I didn't feel I'd met my own expectations. The conversation took an interesting spin as we considered the impact our planning had had on this. We'd started with the lofty goal of having every week well planned in advance but ended operating on a just-in-time model as we responded to the needs of our learners. We discussed how this would have a large impact as more planning equates to a longer lead-in time and therefore more time for innovative teaching. Twitter chats, food tech lessons and construction workshops all necessitate preparation and use of any technology is enabled by more prep time also. However, directing a child to a website or app upon a teachable moment doesn't require much prep, just that the tool is top-of-mind at the required point in time.

During these discussions I was reminded of a blogpost that our principal shared with us in our innovation community. It centred on the importance of finishing, that completing a process or inquiry of learning is powerful and allows the learner to practice, develop and understand the various components required for mastery. It provided a challenge, the idea that innovation can lead to lots of uncompleted pieces of work. This reading summed up a conversation I had with another colleague about artistic endeavours that can lead to vast quantities of half-finished work, and frustration for a teacher that the true learning hasn't taken place yet.

In the last week of term 1 Amy was busy downloading information to me that may be helpful in term 2. Learning to operate our robots and what she had done for Coding within HPPS was high on the priority list. It was exciting being the learner again and in the short space of time we spent on this, combined with the reflection about my own innovative practice I felt invigorated. 

I'm still not sure if this was just my own self-doubt created by higher expectations, but the goal deserves the honest reflection and now I have a clearer pathway for term 2. Student voice, innovative teaching practice that adds value, advance planning and all tempered by a renewed emphasis on finishing experiences fully. 

Weeds, Reflection & Immersion

"That's not all we're learning here".

Words that brought a smile to my eye after a journey into the learning pit or in professional kitchen terms "the weeds" on the Wednesday previous. My thinking aloud throughout this Friday's immersion session hopefully helped the students think about their own personal learning pit experiences.

This week in LC4 we have been working on our reflections as the students have been focussing on the nice, fluffy stuff. Things like "Drama was fun because we..." or "I liked using the robots because..." and while it is important that we celebrate, the purpose for our reflections is to help us improve our learning. With this in mind we spent part of our Learning Advisory time on Monday focussing on reflective writing, reinforcing the purpose of reflection, unpacking what learning is and getting them to draw their learning journey. We also introduced them to and quickly explained the learning pit and a common success graphic (as shown).

Source: Student's blog post

       

Source: http://lifehacker.com/5992287/success-is-a-squiggly-line

Wednesday, Amy and I planned two different immersion activities. Both were designed to provoke wondering's and introduce the students to a world they might not know about, Amy was taking a robotics workshop and I a food tech workshop in one of the great facilities we have at HPPS. Our learning at HPPS is based on 3 key themes across the year, Inventive Thinking, Digital Age Literacy and Effective Communication as discussed in the NCREL research. These themes are integrated throughout the curriculum and the students all undertake projects in an area they're exposed to during the immersion phase for each theme. Previous to running the food tech workshop I'd established a list of food dislikes that the students have been adding to all week. For the first workshop, I planned a quick tasting session and kebabs.

Source: http://pict.sdsu.edu/engauge21st.pdf

I'd had a quick tour through the kitchen and knew it was well stocked with equipment and thought that I'd be fine, I enjoy cooking at home and some judicious use of class management should see me though great learning experience for the group. I recognised that there were a number of hazards to mitigate, minimise or eliminate and I would think aloud about the Risk Taking that I was modelling for the children. Daniel popped in just before the session and gave me some sage advice that he uses when running food tech workshops also but I think liked the idea that I was giving this a go.

Getting the class into the kitchen took longer than I thought.The tasting session went fine, but took a little longer than I thought, there were lots of grimaces, smiles, laughs and chatter as they tried chorizo, courgette, whole grain mustard, japanese barbeque sauce and a soy butter sauce. Because they were enjoying the tasting I allowed them to continue but looking at my watch could sense that we would have to work quickly to be finished by morning tea at 11am. As we handed out the ingredients and the children started working I realised that I was in jam. The children's knife skills meant a slower preparation time and that my supervision skills were on high alert, I was constantly bombarded with questions and I didn't know the kitchen as well as I thought. I could hear Gordon Ramsay screaming in my ears, countless reading and viewing of cooking material confirmed in my mind, I was in the weeds and the customers would be waiting for their meals a while. After far longer than I'd planned the children were starting to eat their kebabs, smiles were everywhere as well as a few going in the bin as they found bits they didn't like but this is about risk taking. We were still a mile away from being cleaned up though!

Time for spanner in the works. My phone went, it was my daughter's daycare, she'd had an accident and might need to see a GP or the hospital, they couldn't reach my wife! When I'm deep in a project, event or problem I know that hard work can get me out, I pull out the hard yards and reach the end. It was frustrating to think that this wasn't going to work. Amy had arrived in the kitchen (she'd finished as it was 11am) and told me to go, she'd supervise the clean up. I couldn't even stay to solve my own problem. DAMN!

When I returned to school, Thursday, I learnt that the children still had a great time and I'd had reflection time to figure out what went wrong and how this could be remedied. I knew that I was the cause of this situation, there was no one else to blame. I knew before hand that the kitchen skills and speed of most would be slower, I should have planned accordingly. The questions I could have solved with the use of recipes! A more analytical tour of the kitchen and prepping some of the items before hand all would have helped too. I spoke with Daniel and quizzed him about embedding the literacy and numeracy into food tech and suggested that visuals illustrating chopping/dicing might be helpful.

Friday arrived, time for session 2. Time to do battle again. Ingredients were put on each table, along with a recipe for 3 of the four components for our burritos (one shown, the other two Mexican Rice and chicken with a Mexican rub). I'd thought far more analytically about the time management and decided that the tasting session would be for children when they had a free moment or completed jobs. One recipe I'd written myself based on something my wife and I love, I'd included some visuals of what each part looked like to assist the children. 

I outlined what we were going to do, how I'd changed the format of the workshop based on my reflections and that I was confident the changes would make it a better experience for everyone.

The children dived into the work and I was able to facilitate their immersion far more ably. The questions that were arising could be answered quickly and prevented problems from spiralling, we were being efficient with our use of time and working relatively cleanly. This meant that I was able to spend some time helping some with knife skills, some talking about the meaning and process of simmering, some we talked about fractions and there were some excellent little moments where the recipe wasn't followed but the right outcome was reached. I noticed late in the piece that 1 group had used a medium sized tumbler for their cup measures, on Monday I plan to try a little comparing exercise with them. All in all, I never once felt like I was in the learning pit or the weeds. 

So when some visitors popped their heads into the kitchen and the children wanted to share their learning, I was super proud. "Learning to cook?" the visitors questioned.

"That's not all we're all learning here," one wise student replied.

Preparing burritos (Clockwise from top left): Ingredients & recipes on tables,
students working independently chopping meat and vegetables, reading our recipes,
cooking and cleaning up as we go.

Day 28 #28minutesofWriting - 784 minutes later

Entering the #28daysofwriting challenge I thought it would be great to get back into the habit of blogging and increase my page views. This was quite a self-involved motivation and but I also knew that through regular reflection and writing I would be able to make more sense of my first steps on the journey at Hobsonville Point Primary School. At some stage in the future I knew that this would pay dividends.

I haven't posted for the last two days but I have posted far more days than I've missed, have learnt far more than I had imagine and helped to formulate some strategies that will assist my professional and classroom practice for a long time. Not all of these lessons revolve around explicit teaching practice but need to be outlined nonetheless.

Professional reading:
While my initial involvement with this blogging challenge was far more selfish, the 28 minutes of writing has been far exceeded by my professional reading throughout. Reading many blogposts has inspired, challenged and taught me a huge amount. It has created a reading list that will take me a long time to complete if ever. I use to regularly read several colleagues blog posts but this number has increased dramatically. Most importantly, I have read posts that have held different views to my own. Two texts I've been inspired to read are Game Storming and Drive. Game Storming was purchased by Amy and we've already integrated successfully one of the activities we uncovered in there.

Writing Style:
I still find that I am reluctant to comment on the many posts I read (hence my enrolment in #28daysofcommenting). Some have made me feel quite inadequate as a writer - I strive to write to the level of some of the posts I have read. I have recognised for a while that I am sometimes not as analytical as I need to be, HBDI analysis confirmed this showing that my last thinking preference is Analytical/Logical but it isn't far behind. Reading posts I have established that my ability to integrate evidence based analytical thinking in a natural writing style is weaker than I would like it also. Between Ewan McIntosh and locally Steve Mouldey, I've found blogging styles I'd like to emulate but I've also appreciated the raw energy and emotion behind other posts. 

Reflection - remove your ego:
Warm and demanding is the ethos at both Hobsonville Point schools, it can feel very confrontational initially but if you can strip the ego from your thinking and deal with the issues then reflection can become very rewarding. Challenging myself to remove ego or baggage from my thinking as I have approached some of my posts and my general 'unschooling' at HPPS has resulted in many interesting discussions. It's also allowed me to consider whether any tool/programme/activity/assessment is best for anyone learner. I think it is best summarised by attributes which feature in the HPPS Mindset continuum. 

Sharing, Caring and Bewaring:
I'm not sure if Bewaring is actually a word but being aware just didn't sit right on the page ;-) I've enjoyed the commenting and community of writing that has grown from Tom's #28daysofwriting but it has also led me into discussions and posts that don't feel comfortable personally. In several posts I've made sincere efforts to confront thinking that may be challenging for others, clearly public forums such as a blog are dangerous tools. Currently, I'm reading Jon Ronson's new book So You've Been Publicly Shamed, a book which covers the negative exposure that can unwittingly be secured through social media. This is the world that we tread with our virtual support networks. Sharing, caring and bewaring has to be uppermost in our minds.

Goal Setting:
Throughout the 28 days I have queried much of my thinking and in this quest I have read many different posts, it has made goal setting for 2015 quite difficult. I have got to a point where I recognise that Student Voice, Design Thinking and my own capacity to think analytically will most likely form parts of my professional objectives. How these will actually shape up I'm not entirely sure.

28 minutes never seemed like a difficult target, but 28 days of writing certainly did! Although I didn't meet 28 days, I know I've definitely met the target on average (28 days x 28 minutes = 784 minutes). 

Cheers Tom, thanks for the journey and I look forward to our next 28 days commenting.

Day 24 #28Daysofwriting - Choice or Voice?

"What is the difference between student choice and student voice?

How you using student voice to inform learning in your learning common?

How are the activities you have in your learning common responding to the needs of your students? Or do they just keep them busy?"

These 4 questions were posed in our staff meeting this afternoon, the example being whether I had considered these in my enthusiasm to bring Kidsedchatnz to HPPS. I know that the example wasn't a personal attack, more an extension of the "Warm and Demanding" culture at the Hobsonville Point Schools. But as I quickly pondered these questions I decided that Kidsedchatnz does deserve this lens being put to it. Not just for its use at HPPS but for its role in schools as we seek to grow it. 

Some readers will know that I am one of the coordinators at Kidsedchatnz and love what we have done with participation increasing significantly since it began. I've posted about it frequently (e.g., here and here) and it has been integral in my own PD as my role and enthusiasm has grown.

I sat in the last block this afternoon running a workshop to introduce a variety of Yr 4-6 students to twitter this afternoon, in preparation for the first chat this afternoon. All of them would have a range of learning and dispositional needs. Without rambling through how each child's needs are met, I think there are still valuable questions and answers contained within a focussed reflection.

Core Education outline successful student voice (in relation to MLE's) as being:

• do students have ‘the power to act’ in the MLE?
• are all learners empowered to make choices and decisions about how, where, what and when they learn?
• are learners a part of their own learning support network within the MLE?
• Is the design of the MLE adaptive to learner needs and ambitions? (http://www.core-ed.org/professional-learning/mle-matrix)

Where does Kidsedchatnz fit within the lens of choice versus voice? Kidsedchatnz and the topics that have been used have always relied to a large extent on student voice, over time our team of coordinators have accessed our participants to establish topics, questions and activities. But is this the voice that is required? If I am the moderator for the week, I've always posted a topic using my class to generate the questions, but the weeks that I'm not the moderator I can't say that it is my student's voice, but this is where choice comes in I would argue. I've always given my learners the option to take part in a chat session, if you're not interested in talking about EOTC or Science you don't have to participate. 

Once in a session then student voice is obvious, the children have agency to express themselves within the topic, and can support, question and discuss the topic with other students. In the past, I have watched as different students engaged in quite different learning conversations based on their own interests.

How you using student voice to inform learning in your learning common?

I have to confess that Kidsedchatnz is a 'programme' I have experienced success with and is easy for me to fall back to/rely on. This is the worst form of teaching we've discussed with Daniel, when things are tough or we're in the Learning Pit, we can revert to what we know. However, while Amy will be confirm that I've been proactive in pursuing Kidsedchatnz being used at HPPS, I've been very pragmatic. I know that should demand (aka student voice) not be there, then I can not reasonably continue to dedicate time to Kidsedchatnz. 

If I am sensible about HPPS involvement in Kidsedchatnz and use student voice then I will be looking at student interests and where possible looking to create an opportunity for my students to really express their voice. 

We have also used flipped lessons and activities as a precursor to the chat sessions. Student voice could be used here, creating an activity that students want to do with the follow up being the discussion questions formed by the learner.

How are the activities you have in your learning common responding to the needs of your students? Or do they just keep them busy?

I once ran into a topic that my students at HNS just weren't interested in, but I also use to have 1-2 other activities on offer. At the time I would argue that these additional activities were responding to student voice and worked against Kidsedchatnz participation, a student even told me that I should make the options less exciting. Using the warm & demanding lens, I'm not sure I would now judge them as being responsive but hindsight is 20/20. At the time I'd blindly ploughed on and believed that the options needed to be less exciting, but if they were truly responsive then Kidsedchatnz should have been the option to remove.

I am confident that using voice & observation my learners will be able to meet many learning and dispositional needs though Kidsedchatnz. For some learners, participation in any given week may lean towards being stuff they do rather than a great learning experience. But if they were to exercise discretion around the topics they engage with, and fully extend themselves in those chat sessions then it ceases to be stuff and becomes the awesome collaborative and connected communication experience it can be.

Kidsedchatnz will be under intense scrutiny at HPPS, I think this is positive and if the scrutiny is warm and demanding then it may signal an awesome growth period for my beloved Twitter-based chat. In the afternoon, Amy and I run responsive workshops (e.g., Movie making or Garageband). The workshops are set up to help with a need that we have observed, students can lead them and they generally need to opt-in for these workshops. We will easily be able to identify if students are not opting in, each days planning is there for both Amy and I to see and it will quickly become obvious if my time could be better spent elsewhere. Although, if Kidsedchatnz was to truly become responsive then maybe there are some amazing opportunities that could be pursued.

Student voice or choice? Or just stuff?