Term 2 Week 6 and 7 Tuhononga Day and Oracy

Week 6 Tuhononga Day - Judo

I have labelled this Key Competencies because judo is about self discipline, managing self and co operating with a partner.  

I had 31 students in the group from Year 2 to Year 6.  Johan Boshoff took the group as the coach and I assisted, with Tracey Clarke helping to manage the students.  There were a small group of Year 2 and 3 boys who struggled initially with the self management aspect as they were playing around rather than listening and needed considerable re direction to get them focussed. However this was achieved quickly once I had seen whothey were messing around with and separated them, and as they were active for most of the time and only had minimal periods where they were required to sit and listen or watch, they were able to achieve the techniques.   Freddie became my new best friend!

Week 7 Oracy

Reflections during Team Meetings on reading we were given to read on Oracy and Oral Language in the classroom.

Week 7 Term 2

I found the reading very interesting.   The breakdown of the types of listening - informational, critical or evaluative, appreciative and empathetic differentiate in a way I hadn't really considered before.  Similarly, the type of talking - Exploratory, Presentational and Conversational.  Makes sense now that I have an awareness of the types.

Facilitating classroom talk - I use the talk moves from math and across the curriculum.  I have a hands down classroom and students know they are expected to do the thinking and to have a contribution if they are asked to share.  I use wait time and have been working on extending the length of this to give more time for thoughts to be processed.   There is still very much a girl-boy division in the room with choosing a buddy to talk to or work with.  Unless I intentionally make them choose a buddy of the opposite gender, or do the names out of the hat sorting they will always stay within the same gender buddy. This is an area to work on.

Recently I have started having students who have wanted to read a section from our class book have the opportunity to. The class have responded respectfully and there is always a volunteer wanting to read.  I am aware of keeping mat time to a maximum of 10 minutes at any one time so listening is active and directed. We do sharing back of thinking - with the focus being not on having a  correct answer but on using subject specific language and academic language as opposed to conversational language. In writing we have been exploring the difference between informal writing e.g journal and diary writing, and more formal writing  i.e an information report, and have taken this into modelling these types of language when responding to each other.   Negotiating and the way we talk to each other has been a focus as well as we have been learning and working with the differences between a social conversation and a learning conversation.  

I see oral language as being the basis of everything. It has been particularly noticeable with Yunseo  that there is so much she hasn't understood and cannot participate in as she doesn't have the language to explain or to understand.  

Week 8 Term 2

Listening to the language of the classroom. What interactions are the students having with each other? Social or learning conversation? Are there supportive words, or put down words being used?  Are students responding to each other? Who is doing the talking most?

This week the students have been very engaged on their Imaginary Land 3D maps. This has meant working in their group which was self selected so mostly based on friendship.  The conversations have predominantly been learning - discussing what to do next, dividing up jobs, time management with an encourager usually apparent just naturally in each group, and using the 3D math language when deciding which shapes to use.  One group had a team member away who would normally dominate. I wondered how this student would fit back in - he tried to dominate the other 2 verbally but they were too far through the project and although a little disparaging in his comments about their efforts, got on and helped them.  Very little talking from me this week, very much student to student and student to teacher talk. :)