3rd September 2012:
Discovering where my students are at was my main goal for my first week at Dannevirke South School. I feel, after only the first week I have developed a positive repore with most of the students in my class. I feel like the students have the confidence to come to me and voice their concerns about their learning. This was evident during my maths lesson today. The squares maths group are currently displaying some difficulty with their maths. Carter in particular seems to be struggling with finding the tidy number to add in tens. I am pleased he voiced his concern to me as it enables me to adjust my teaching strategies to meet his learning needs. In response to this I will use lower decade numbers as I think the higher the number, the more confused about the learning strategy he is becoming. Rylee is showing increasing confidence with this strategy. She is successfully about to tell me in both the written and verbal form now she comes up with the answer using the appropriate strategy. I think she is ready to move on to three step equations.
I am really pleased with the effectiveness of the independent writing activities I introduced in the classroom. The 'spinning wheels' proved particularly effective as it sparked a sense of creativity in the students writing. I feel this holds them in good stead for including nouns, verbs and adjectives in their writing, something we are due to begin over the next few weeks.
I feel my classroom routines are beginning to sit well with the students. As soon as these become increasingly settled I will be able put 100% focus on my teaching strategies as opposed to behaviour management.
I am really pleased with my start in room 6 and am encouraged that the students will be great learners for the remainder of the year.
Professional Readings:
Teaching as inquiry reading 19.09.2012
http://nzcurriculum.tki.org.nz/Curriculum-stories/Case-studies/Inquiry/Teaching-as-inquiry
Recognizing Dyslexia
A Guide for New Zealand Schools
Small changes make a BIG difference
19th September 2012:
Today I introduced the independent reading and writing activities for the students to complete when they are not working with me or Heather. I maintained Aimee's independent reading and writing activities during my first week in room 6 as I didn't want to inflict too much change on the students at once. It also gave me an opportunity to determine the students attitudes towards learning and which students worked effectively (or not) together.
Although I my intention is to introduce a range of new independent activities, initially I introduced a new one each day. This gave the students the chance to understand the new task whilst still having the comfort of the 'tried and true' independent tasks.
Monday 15th October 2012
Week 1 to 6 Term 4 Inquiry is 'Massive Mammals'. I had no clue to the students prior knowledge concerning this topic so I used the 'Tuning In' template as a starting point. During the first lesson I gave the students the time and independence to talk about their knowledge of mammals in groups before reporting back to the class. Not only did this determine my starting point for inquiry, I felt it gave the students some ownership of their learning as they thrived on the opportunity to share with their peers about what they already know 'before the teacher has even told us'.
26th October 2012:
Running Records.
Helped me to pinpoint the areas of improvement in reading for each student. This uninterrupted reading time highlighted the areas for improvement
27th October 2012
The results of the students STAR tests showed many students vocab knowledge was at a critical level. For this reason, and after consulting with Cynthia I have made a conscious effort to encourage the students to ask when they do not know what a word means. When reading the big book I select a variety of words to ask the students. I have also introduced a synonyms activity for them to work on independently.
I found the first instalment of this course very helpful. I learnt about the 'action plans' for students who have severe allergies and the different treatment options for patients depending if they are conscious, unconscious or 'dead'. I feel it really developed my confidence in my ability to deal with an emergency at school at attend to the students needs as best as I can. The severity of such things such as asthma attacks and allergic reactions further instilled in me the importance of keeping the lines of communication open and clear between, teachers / staff, parents and students. This will ensure that the best possible action is taken for the particular student in the unlikely and unfortunate event of a medical emergency.
30th October 2012 Staff First Aid Course Refresher
I found the first instalment of this course very helpful. I learnt about the 'action plans' for students who have severe allergies and the different treatment options for patients depending if they are conscious, unconscious or 'dead'. I feel it really developed my confidence in my ability to deal with an emergency at school at attend to the students needs as best as I can. The severity of such things such as asthma attacks and allergic reactions further instilled in me the importance of keeping the lines of communication open and clear between, teachers / staff, parents and students. This will ensure that the best possible action is taken for the particular student in the unlikely and unfortunate event of a medical emergency.
04 December 2012
Stephen came and spoke to me this morning about a parent of a child in my class who is concerned their daughter is getting bullied. I spoke to the apparent bully at school today to get her side of the story. I made a conscious effort to remove her from the classroom environment and kept a calm but firm voice to allow her to tell me her side of the story. Although her interpretation differed from the events that Stephen was told she accepted that she needs to make some chances to how she interacts with some of her peers.
I was happy with this and left the situation at that.
At the end of school however this child's mother came and spoke to me to tell me about her daughters severe dislike of school and how she has huge difficulty making friends. This concerned me greatly as I hate to think that at the age of eight years old a child is already having social issues and doesn’t like coming to school as I feel this is a important age to develop social skills to hold you in good stead for life. I am very determined to get to the bottom of this issue. I have decided to implement some who class social interaction and team work activities as a way of illustrating to the students how important it is to include everyone in things, and maybe just open the eyes of a few students who tend to be more selective about who they spend time with to how it feels when they are left out.
I will also monitor this particular students interaction with her peers both in the classroom and in the playground. After speaking with Cynthia about his I have decided also to ask Caroline Gyde to come and speak to this student regarding her dislike of school in an attempt to get to the bottom of the issue and solve it before it is too late. Year 3 students should be coming to school with an excitement to learn and be happy to be able to spend the day learning, investigating and having fun with their friends. I would love to make this possible for this young girl who is at the moment missing out on all of this. I believe raising her self esteem level is key to this and I will implement the steps as previously mentioned in an attempt to achieve this.
13th November 2012
PRT Course Palmerston North- - If a student has difficulty articulating their knowledge on paper, ask them to use materials to show their knowledge and film it on your laptop. Use this as evidence of learning.
- - National Standards do not take into account the progression of students. Even if a student is ‘below’ they may have moved a lot to get to this stage. It does not take in to accountant the social and economic situations of the students. There is more to a child’s education than numbers.
- - You should never under estimate the importance of providing a culturally responsive and welcoming environment in the classroom to get the most out of the students. There should be a consistent link between home and school.
- - Encourage the students to think about their thinking and question why things are created. – why some things are the way they are.
- Learning as Inquiry: get them to think about he process of things rather than the product.
- Check List of independent activities
- Rubrix model on display – encourages the students to take ownership and responsibility for their learning.
Cultural Responsive Pedagogy:
Tataiako – Cultural Competencies For Teachers of Maori Learners
Ka Hikitia:
3 Key Principles
1. Maori Potential
2. Cultural Advantage
3. Inherent Capability - all have the capability to learn and be educated
Knowing, respecting and working with Maori learners and their whanau is very important!
Send positive notes home to the students parents – positive reinforcement.
- Happy grams
Need to implement more Maori content into my weekly plan
Teachers Council Website – Tataiako (download)
Mathematics Standards Years 1 – 8
‘Think Boards’ – different ways of working out the same problem (write it, explain it, draw it etc)
Resources: ‘Down the Back of the Chair’
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