Term 3 Week 9 Cross Country Part One

This is an example of writing after the cross country this term. This student was one of the target writers in the Te Whare Rama programme and completed this writing independently and without needing encouragement to keep working. Connections were made with prior learning to write this as we have been working on a moment in time writing. The learning environement was managed so that all students see theselves as writers and all students willingky participate in writing activities. The teacher sees all studens as writers and input is given as needed based on each student being a writer.

The model has been included as an example of a strategy to promote success as the students know what is expected of them and have a guide to work to. The remember to's were displayed from previous writing we had completed within a moment in time.

The SENSES

I feel

• I feel the fuzzy grass brushing my legs while I was sprinting as fast as I can.
• I feel the slippery slimy water mix while I was speeding down the water slide.

I smell

• I smell the citrus detergent when I slid down the waterslide.
• I smell the strong grassy smell coming from the hay bales which smelt like I was in a farm.

I taste

• I can taste my dry saliva jumping around in my mouth begging for water.
• I taste small portions of mud fling up in my open mouth.

I hear

• I hear screaming from the audience while I cross the finish line.
• I hear batches of wind echoing from around the hall while I climb awhwardly on the hay bales.

I see

• I see cones scattered around the place telling me where to go.
• I see stray twists of hay from theyellow hay bales waving in the distance.

I wonder

• I wonder who made cross country.
• I wonder if the next year year 6 track is the same is this year.

Monday 4th September

This is written in the past tense.  It is a memory of what the cross country run was like. Each sentence starts with a verb.   A verb is an action word.  Every verb has the ing suffix.

there are 4 linked sentences.  The sentences focus on the senses.  The first sentence says what happened and the second sentence adds detail.

I remember,

Dragging my feet through the thick brown mud

Curling my toes as I felt the sticky cold oozing through them

Gasping for breath as I tried to keep running up the hill a second time

Forcing my legs to keep moving me forward

Shivering as slimy soap bubbles slid down my legs

Rolling sideways off the water slide that was turning the grass to slush

Licking  sweat that was slowly melting from my forehead

Tasting the salty and hot liquid on my lips

That was my cross country run.

I remember,

Listening carelessly to the yelling from the younger kids wishing they would be quiet

Blasting noises rapidly and repeatedly in my ears

Splashing viciously into the soggy mud

Feeling the mud giving way beneath me at every step

Ascending painfully up the stacked hay bales

Walking up them slowly one by one

Charging fast through the cones at the finish line

Sprinting quickly with Suhyeok throughout the race

That was my cross country run. 😛 😛 😛

Term 3 Week 8 Teach me Tuesday

Teach Me Tuesday

Ok, so you’re going to be the teacher!

Grab a piece of paper, a pencil and write down what you need to prepare!

• Set a goal about what you want everyone to know at the end of your session and have a WALT in mind (We Are Learning To ...)

• Think about how you will know if your teaching was successful – what criteria can the children use to check they have completed and understood the learning?

• Think through your lesson and make notes about the order of the steps and the time needed for each step.

• Remember that your lesson should be no more than 25 - 30 minutes long – you should aim for 20-25 minutes.  Think about an introduction to your lesson, the main body of your lesson, a conclusion (wrap it up) and then time for questions and answers.

• List any equipment/gear you might need (make sure you bring it from home or if you need me to organise something, let me know beforehand)

Practice your lesson on your family – HAVE FUN!

Teach Me Tuesdays

Friday 7th July 2017

Dear Parents and Caregivers,

Each Tuesday throughout Term 3, your child will have a chance at leading the class in some new learning. They will be the TEACHER, this giving the children the opportunity to connect with others and share their special passions, interests and skills.  

Students will first need to decide on a goal - what the class will be learning from them (we call this a WALT - We Are Learning To).  It can be anything such as a dance lesson, teaching a new game, origami, learning a language, a science experiment, magic tricks, How to sketch, How to make and decorate cupcakes … Students will discuss their topic with me prior to their scheduled week.  Please feel free to talk with them at home about what they would like to teach and share with the class.  You may even like to help them plan their lesson.

Students will have a 25-30minute slot to teach their chosen lesson and there will be a question and answer time at the end.   It is important to note that Teach Me Tuesdays should be fun and stress-free.  There is no expectation for students to go to too much trouble preparing their presentation!  

A timetable has been created so the children will know when it is their turn to teach their lesson to the class.

I look forward to seeing the skills and sharing the interest that your child brings to the classroom.

Kind regards

Christine Robson

REFLECTION

TMT was a highlight of the term. The students eagerly looked forward to the presentation each week and all contributed to the learning environemnt with their enthusiasm and their engagement - very high participation levels. All students had a turn. The learning ranged from origami to drawing to cooking to decorating cupcakes to sports outside to language learning to dancing to science experiments. Photos were taken of each presentation and forwarded to the students so they could go into their learning journals for the term.

Would I do this again? - 100 percent most definitely.

What were the benefits? Empowering the students to lead the learning. Giving every student the opportunity to show their strengths and to present the learning in a way that they chose. Oracy levels increased as all students had the opportunity to lead and to be heard. All students, without exception took a turn and there was no trying to opt out.

What were the points to consider for next time? The presentations easily became longer than 20 minutes and fitting more than 2 in an afternoon became difficult. This meant that we ran over into Wednesday and sometimes even Thursday to fit in the students who were on each week. There was a level of familiarity that crept in which was in some ways beneficial as it broke the ice for the quieter students, however some students tried to take over others presentations. There was a need for reminders about how to behave as an audience and what the level of audience participation was to be.

The other two Year 6 rooms have run TMT for two terms, however I think running it over one term is enough.

The students have completed a reflection in a similiar way to what I have and so I will take the points from this into the planning for next year when I run this again for certain!

Term 2 Week 4 Maths Dyscalculia

Children come into the school year either liking math or not liking math. It can cause anxiety and fear, and low self esteem and low self confidence seems to be made worse by anything mathematical. 

Dyscalculia 

• There is no cure for dyscalculia. 
• It’s not a phase a child will outgrow. 
• Like the color of a person’s hair, it’s part of who they are.
• It’s the way their brain processes math.
• It’s important to remember that every child with dyscalculia has different strengths and weaknesses so take the time to find these out. 
• Create a stable foundation on which to build more skills.
• Hands on approach with materials.
• Grouping and regrouping very important.
• The long-range goal is to teach calculation techniques and reasoning that use math principles to solve math problems. 

I have been working with number patterns - taking away the fear of being right or wrong - by having open ended problems that need reasoning and personal circumstances when solving. I think the attitude of half my class who came in saying that they can't do math and math is too hard, is changing.  They are starting to understand that math is about patterns and looking for a pattern, finding the pattern, understanding the pattern, and then applying the pattern, takes away some of the anxiety they feel. 

I dont have students who are Dyscalculaic, however several of the points above are important for those who do find math challenging - grouping and regrouping, hands on, find the strengths, calculation techniques that make sense to the child - are important in a math programme.  I found math difficult at school, and I think this struggle has actually strengthened my ability to teach math in a way that is accessible and built on patterns. 

Week Eight Key Competencies

Key Competencies (KC's)    

Over the past year, I have had a growing realisation of the importance of the key competencies as learning behaviours and prerequisires to being sucessful academically.  The curriculum says: Key competencies are the capabilities people have, and need to develop, to live and learn today and in the future. 

The project Imaginery Land was first developed by Marion Littin. I changed elements of it to make it relevant to my class in the way it was worded and specific content to reflect previous learning we had been doing this term.  There were 3 compulsory tasks and options to choose from for further presentation of their country.  All presentation were completed on slides and shared with the class. The class gave feedback on what they liked about the country and about the imagination and thinking that had been used.  This feedback was given orally and then added (by the teacher) in the comments section on classroom before the work was "returned" to the students. 

Brief for Imaginery Land

Today you are going to use your Key Competencies. These are ways of working that help you to be successful learners.

1. Thinking - you are going to use your imagination today! You are also going to think about what makes a country a country and invent a whole new culture!
2. Managing Self - you have to finish your project by Thursday midday. You’ll need to plan your time and make sure you stay focussed.
3. Participating and Contributing - you are going to work with one or two other people on a shared slideshow. You will need to work together to contribute to the shared presentation.
4. Relating to Others - Speaking and listening respectfully and constructively is important. You are allowed to disagree, just do so respectfully and be prepared to negotiate.

5. Using Language, Symbols and Texts - well, this is reading, writing and maths. You’ll notice that the compulsory tasks all use these skills. You also have the option of inventing a whole new letter and number system!

Students were in self chosen groups of 2 or 3. They were reminded that these groups needed to be based on a learning decision rather than a social decision. Most students managed to do this and the groups all worked successsfully together.

The students loved the opportunity to use their imagination. No two countries were in any way alike, such diverse thinking and creating. This project lends itself to just so many paths for further learning and directions. I was really amazed at the level of thinking the students were able to do when given the power to do their own thinking with minimum guidelines. In fact I'm quite excited about how the students were, without exception motivated, engaged, creative, and all eager to share.

All students reflected on the key competencies saying what they had been successful in and what they thought they needed to develop further. (all on classroom)

Week Five Feedback and Feed forward

Feedback and Feed Forward

Very interesting discussion with the class about the purpose of feedback and feedforward and what it looks like in their learning. From the class - 

Feedback:

• You tell the person what they did wrong
• It is the negative parts
• The parts you didnt understand and they need to change
• The parts you didnt like
• You can say what you think is good about the work and what you liked

Feed Forward:

• What they need to improve on
• What they need to make better
• What they need to change
• The spelling. What words they need to write properly.
• Handwriting: How they could make their handwriting better. 

I was surprised that this is how the class saw feedback and feed forward as it isnt my understanding of these two aspects of peer conferencing. The vital part missing is the individuals ownership of the work and the reflection part for them to respond to feedback and feed forward that has been given. The class had the understanding that it was their job to make the work better by telling the person what had to be improved - rather than the owner making the changes in response to suggestions that had been made by their audience. 

I started a discussion about prompt beginnings to use when giving feedbck and feedforward. We took the word negative and bad out of the discussion completely. The new understandings we developed were:

• Feedback is when you show someone a part of their work that meant something to you.
• Feed forward is when you show someone a part of their work that as their audience you found confusing or would like more information on. 

The following prompts were developed by me with the class but as a class we talked through them together and they will become what we use when we are peer conferencing.  

Before I can get peer conferencing happening though, there are basic understandings of self management (key competency) that I would like to develop with the class so feedback and feed forward can be more meaningful. 

The personal reflection is the most important in the whole process and the part the class did not talk about at all when we were generating our ideas on feedback and feed forward. This personal reflection is where the student uses the feedback and feed forward to improve their writing / work and move forward in their ability to respond. 

Sentence Starters for Giving Feedback to your Partner:

Positive/Neutral:

I was really interested in what you were saying when…

My favourite part of your writing was…

I could really see / hear / feel what you were describing when…

I could relate to what you said when…

My favourite word / phrase you used was ….

This part made me feel…

This part reminded me of …

Your most convincing part / reason / evidence was…

Sentence Starters for Giving Feedforward to your Partner:

I was confused when you said… can you explain this to me?

I would have liked to hear more about….

I didn’t have a picture in my head. Could you use nouns / adjectives / verbs / adverbs in this part…

This part is hard for me to understand because the punctuation isnt clear. Can you make it easier to understand?

I didn’t understand this part … can you clarify it please?

I don’t understand what you meant when you said  ….

What else could you tell me to make me want to agree with you when you said…

What is your main point in this paragraph?

What do you plan to do next?

Personal reflection

My initial writing goal was… did I meet it?

What part of my writing did my buddy / group get confused by?

Where did they need me to tell them more?

What is one part of my writing that I could improve on?

What still needs to be added to my draft so that it feels finished?

Have I checked the Remember to?

What words could I add to make my reader see / hear / smell / taste / feel something I describe?  (have a picture in their mind)

Have I used paragraphs that make sense?

Week Three Digital Learning Class Agreement

Digital Learning Class Agreement

Hectors World has worked exceptionally well with the class to build the basic understandings of strong passwords and personal safety when on the internet. It has been a very good beginning to have in place before we started on our devices this week.

The class have all completed a slide presentation on what they considered the 3 most important messages to share about digital safety.  These are shared on the Room 22 Class Blog.    http://2017room22year6.blogspot.co.nz/   

These are what the class came up with as the most important points for us to agree on that we will do to be safe in our digital learning environment.

14th February 2017

Kia Ora Parents and Caregivers

This week we have started with our digital learning in Room 22.  

As an introduction to the year, we have been exploring the Hector’s World website looking at how we can be safe in an online environment.

From this work, the students and I have put together our expectations for the use of a device at school.  Please read through this with your child. They will be able to explain to you what each expectation means.

Once the expectations have been signed by you and your child, please return to school.  Your child will need headphones at school every day to use with their device.  I suggest these are not very expensive ones, earbuds work well.

I look forward to the work we will be doing in digital learning this year.

Regards

Christine Robson

Room 22 Class Teacher 

Digital Learning Agreement 

         

Week Two

Its very noticeable the students who know the difference between social time and learning time. The quality of work is considerably higher from those students who:

•  chose a place to sit and work away from distractions and a place that will enable them to actively engage in their work. 
• ask questions to clarify what is required of them.
• engage in learning conversations, not social conversations. 

Conversation this week has focused around three points:

1, You need to make a learning decision about where is the best place for you to sit. You can make a social decision at break times. 

2. A learning conversation is the talk we do when we are learning.  A social conversation is the talk of the playground. 

3. You have the right to chose if you are going to engage and be an active learner.  You dont have the right to make this choice for anyone else. 

This will be a continuous conversation until it becomes a routine and habit from all students. 

Next week I am going to explore the 3 stages of being an Active Learner and Pit of Learning.