Wordtoons

Prior to the Christmas holidays staff at our school were given some PD options, 2 - 3 different things with most people & needs catered for. I was intrigued by 2 of the options and a solid recommendation from my colleague @Generalrudd had me signing up for a Learning Network session with Dr Rich Allen.

I was sculpted into a 'Female' pose,
thanks @General Rudd for the photo.

Its too early in the year to be getting all reflective on this session, suffice to say that I enjoyed the PD and the day flew past. There was plenty of music, movement and laughter, some even captured on camera.  So instead, here is one of the great ideas/resources discussed today. Given that are some of my readers maybe a little longer in the tooth, if this is not 'new' I hope that my enthusiasm may renew your acquaintance with the tools.

Wordtoons
The principal of creating 'Intentional Doodles'. As someone who fidgets, I could instantly see the benefit of these. There is plenty of time when someone is talking that I start doodling on a page, but I had never considered using these as a teaching tool. I imagine that the more artistic children or those ESL kids who are still trying to create their own understanding of some words may find this beneficial. Here's one of my own from today, as well as a video from the professional.

A wordtoon of cat 30/1/14 by R Walker

It is a technique that I know will be successful in my room as it alters the recording of learning  and it allows students to personalise their learning. I can visualise it being used successfully for adjectives, action verbs and areas like the PB4L programme our school operates. Dr Allen had seen it used as an effective end of unit assessment and as a supplement to traditional note-taking (where students are able to add intentional doodles in the margin to aid retention.

Hope you enjoy the tool and try it out in a classroom sometime soon.

6 weeks & counting

My PRT time is rapidly drawing to a close, as we complete final testing and write reports I'm also trying to round out my requirements to meet my registration. I've just sent my form away but am pushing to fit all sorts of PD into a busy schedule, both school-wide and individual stuff. I'm starting to feel less like a BT these days and certainly not the one who started February 2012.

Ian, my MT, helps greatly, today after completing his own work he came and sat in on a science class. He shared a resource with me to advance the lesson and talked candidly about how to improve the lesson as well as follow the lesson up. he's done a good job, I'm no carbon copy but I was pleased, when told by someone else, my interests are rubbing off on him too.

Planning for the rest of the term is going well: lots of hands on science, we're using the pool for more than just PE, my maths has moved outside the classroom and we have a couple of great trips scheduled.

Next week I'm off to a course at the mighty learning network! have a writing observation and am doing 3-4 observations. The writing is all as part of my role as literacy leader but serve duel purpose for a BT obviously. The learning network course crept up on me and highlights my principal's realisation that I can't read a calendar.

To try and help with my final assessments I booked a reliever for Monday so I could take a release day. I gave the form to the boss, she accepted it gladly. About 10 minutes later, she plonks the form down in front of me and suggests that I pay for the reliever seen it would be double time - Labour Day!

I guess I'm still learning but I think I have found an app to organise my life better, furthermore I'm sure someone on twitter will tell me what day it is!

Enjoy your weekend, all 3 days of it! I will.

Engaging in PD, making it count.

Last Thursday I attended a course on Blended Learning provided by TTS. I'd headed down hoping to learn more about planning and designing better integration of my BYOD devices, desktops and the school iPads. But I also got some first hand experience with the Socrative tool, I'd heard a lot about this but just never translated this into classroom use.

My problem with using Socrative before Thursday was I thought it was reasonably similar to using Google Forms, which I do use. Further, I couldn't imagine that I would be able to use Socrative effectively when I don't teach in a 1:1 classroom.

The facilitator demonstrated Socrative throughout the morning (albeit in a 1:1environment), so problem 1 was solved. Socrative can be used with far less set up, it took me 2-3 minutes today to train up my 2 of my BYOD students to help as class experts and with a very quick introduction we had the class all using this today.

However, immediately prior to this class is lunchtime. I was chatting with our DP and we were discussing meetings for the week, including a planning and curriculum mapping meeting. I suggested Socrative, gave him a quick run down (based on my limited knowledge) as the bell rang and headed back to class.

My plan for my afternoon lesson involved using a Thinglink image of the Painted Apple Moth to discuss a variety of issues that surrounded this pest and how it was eradicated. Using Socrative this became much more effective and the students loved the more interactive element.


I can't create a 1:1 environment, we have 3 desktops, 2 BYOD devices today plus my phone to use with 25 students in class today. Nothing like jumping in the deep end! With some creative questioning, smart use of peer/share activities and rotation of students using the desktops we made good use of Socrative on our 1st attempt. The class told me that they enjoyed its use in the class and it added a different element of voice even if one response was a tad over the top:

 T: How do you think they eradicated the Painted Apple Moth?
 S: They could shoot it with a Tomohawk Cruise Missile.

I recognise that some days I'll have several more BYOD devices in the room, boosted by school iPads and during ICT week every child would have a laptop. All of these circumstances make including Socrative even more favourable. The instant feedback was fantastic but it also gave me another management tool, data to base decisions on rather than just feel and allowed everyone a voice.

After school, I visited the DP, here he is setting up a quiz to use at our staff meeting on Wednesday. So we quickly trialled his quiz.

Engaging in PD isn't about just attending, instead taking valuable advice or resources and putting this into action is the important element of PD in any profession. Sharing your new knowledge with others in your organisation is also a vital component of PD and with any luck you'll watch as your peers act on your enthusiasm and new found knowledge.

EduIgnite Presentation

Culture & school: Feeling embarrassed

I took 60+ year 6s to Henderson Intermediate today, clearly it was going to be a good opportunity for sighting some new ideas but it has really opened my eyes to some rapid & substantial PD I require.

As we entered HIS we were ushered into one of their halls where we received a beautiful Maori welcome, instantly, as the male teacher I felt a little unprepared and started racking my mind for all those things I was taught at Auckland Uni during teacher training *PANIC at empty mind*. The HIS children performed a stirring haka, waiata and their teacher was clearly fluent and well spoken in Te Reo. He also told us that it was an informal powhiri given that for many of our children their families have attended this school. Nonetheless I was totally out of my depth and I hated it!

I admit to being totally unprepared, but so were our children and when the speaker invited anyone to lead our school in responding, our Kapa Haka children weren't able to respond when put on the spot. But I'm not blaming them, they're children and I feel that I let them down. I can think of many excuses but none will ease my feelings including that my use of Te Reo in the classroom isn't as poor!

This time next year, I won't be feeling the same. Now where is that number & email for our school's Te Reo specialist?