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.