Keeping Up with Mrs Faalili

Share 3 pieces of academic or professional reading and explain how they and other sources helped you form hypotheses about aspects of teaching that might contribute to current patterns of learning.  If I want my learners to be coming to school on time, motivated, and ready to learn, I need to make sure that I am being culturally responsive in my teaching practice and setting them up for success. "Culturally responsive teaching... strives to increase engagement and motivation of students" Michael Valvurs (2008) Culturally Responsive Teaching  Throughout this reading, the 'why' of a culturally responsive practice is unpacked. Increase in student engagement and increase of student motivation, transforming perspectives and empowering learners by using meaningful cultural connections, just to name a few. My target group are a group of Year 7/8 Pasifika boys who are all operating below, mostly well below their expected level. Not only are they operating behind their peers, ...

Inquiry question and theory of action/chain of events  My inquiry for this year is 'What changes can I make in my practice to ensure that my learners deepen their understandings of key concepts and ideas in Writing?' Unpacking this has allowed me the time to think critically about what my students are able to do and also their gaps. Over the course of this year and the ever changing changes in the world, my inquiry has taken a slight change in its focus, however, still relevant to Writing. The focus this time round is around integrated planning and how planning rich authentic learning experiences can encourage students to produce rich pieces of writing.

Describe how I will collect information about the implementation of my changed practice/intervention How will I collect information? -  Student voice , through google forms or interlead. See  T3 Student Voice Post  as an example. This will help me get an idea of where my students at and how they feel about writing. Do they see themselves as a writer? This will also give me ideas on the topics of writing, future lessons e.g. teaching them editing skills, word building, and also what I need to stop or cut back on doing. -  Student writing and analysis  of this. The use of LPF Writing and our school matrices to help make a judgement of what they can do independently. We are currently exploring the Writing LPF as a staff and refining our teaching practice along the way. We are focusing on one signpost at a time so this will allow for in depth reflection and refining of teaching practice. -  Student blogs - and the quality of their writing in the post. ...

20/08/20 - Home Learning Round 2 Self reflection Description Google Meets A ha moment Significance A Ha moment when Venia was helping Faiva during our google call with her instructions, and when Maia was helping Bethany by using present screen mode. Learning Our interactive activity this afternoon on our google call was BLIND ARTIST. Follow instructions to create a drawing. First round we did on paper, 2nd round we did on google drawing (assuming they all knew how to use google drawing) - NEVER ASSUME. Anywho, during the google call Venia didn't know how to colour her shape in - explained it to her. Faiva not long after, said he didn't know how. Venia chimed in and was explaining it. Brutally and very loudly. But clear and very precise, adding in other bits of information that would help him locate the colouring tool on there. As she's explaining it to him, I'm thinking OMG, GO VENIA and OMG THEY SHOULD BE DOING MORE OF THE EXPLAINING AND NOT ME! Duri...

Today, I used Google Form to collect student voice on their feelings about writing. Here are the responses.   My key take aways from this  More opportunities for them to be able to write about what they want (and put into practice the skills and strategies that we are currently learning in class) Think about how I give my instructions and explain - is it the pace? words I'm suing Give more time to plan writing Give more time to edit writing Teach students how to edit, self and peer check writing

Plan and conduct detailed inquiry  into  specific aspects of your current teaching  that are  relevant to the hypotheses you identified in the literature. Prior to lockdown, implementation of Daily 5 was the new intervention for me this year. Although it may not seem like an intervention as such, I wanted to develop independent readers and writers who had the stamina to be able to read and write for longer periods of time. It took most part of Term 1 before lockdown kicked in. We maintained this the best we could through online learning and intend to do so throughout the year, and if the unlikely events of another lockdown. A huge focus for me and my teaching has been on 'Work on Writing' and 'Word work' and how to use this time effectively during our Daily 5. Time was given to unpacking what it looks like for them, the learner and me, the teacher. Here's what we came up with (and are now constantly used in our classroom) a - Formative information abou...

Collecting evidence and data is proving to be much harder now that we're in lockdown and home learning. To help me start collecting data, I am using the Literacy Learning Map  from Gayle McIlraith from Learning Solutions and have used them to create a google form. This will help me collect student voice  Google Form - Literacy Learning Map . It's tricky thinking about the times that we're in and how we will collect evidence.  Here's what I aim to collect in the mean time ... (expect another post once things go back to normal - what ever normal is) 1. Collect student voice  Google Form - Literacy Learning Map . 2. Look at student blogs and analyse the work they're sharing  3. Look at student work (writing output) and analyse (identify strengths & gaps) This distance learning is definitely making it harder to collect evidence, but it also providing opportunities to be creative in finding ways to collect data. 

Evaluation 1. Summarise evidence about key changes in teaching and other factors that influence student learning. This year has been a great journey. Some wins and some losses but it's been great learning for my students but also for me, as a teacher. The use of ALL strategies has been pivotal in the progress that my learners have made. With the targeted group of 6 boys, I listened to what they had to say about reading - how they felt about reading, what makes reading enjoyable, what makes reading hard and spent time really thinking about how I will implement their reading programme. Seeing them consistently throughout the week was always a challenge - and not all weeks I was able to see them 3-4 times, but from the get go - we were open, set goals and worked hard to try and achieve them. Biggest changes in my practise - *Acceleration rather than remediation. I had to know what Reading looked life for Year 5s and 6s in the Curriculum. * Using ALL strategies; brain storm...

A review of my intervention. I've had to remind my self that my intervention is the work I'm currently doing with my Target Group/ALL Group. This intervention (ALL),  when reflecting and preparing for the week ahead looks like this: 1. Looking at the needs of my learners  - Analysing student output, discussion, ideas and participation from the week.  - Evaluating what needs to be taught (stick with same Learning Intention or change). Student voice collected at certain points within the term to encourage student driven learning.  - Once the teaching goals for the week has been decided, I unpack how my students are going to be able to achieve their learning goal specific to a reading strategy (comprehension). Because my intervention (ALL group) is a group of Y5 & 6 boys who are working just below their expected level, I am always trying to think of creative, hands on ways to introduce new concepts and keep them engaged.  - Plan and use the ALL ...

Gathering some base line data and actually getting into the classrooms today to see amazing reading lessons across our school today. - Looking at independent reading activities - Supporting learning activities for reading - Guided sessions - Collecting Student voice     Some takeaways and questions 1. How are we supporting the teaching and learning of decoding & comprehension strategies? 2. How confident are we at teaching decoding & comprehension strategies?  3. Do our learners understand the what, how and why of learning?  4. How do we support our teachers to be able to teach decoding & comprehension strategies? 

After analysing my data this year, (PROBE, PAT and student observations) I've selected and formed my ALL target group - Reading Focus. It's been a real journey getting to know my learners. I used the Learner Profile that we had received during our ALL PD to help gather information about my students. Because I know some of these learners are anxious 1:1, I conducted pair interviews and we sat down as a 3 to share and build their profiles. What have I noticed; - all my learners are boys - mainly year 6s (one year 5) - there is a mismatch between assessments (PAT & PROBE) - all my learners are working just below the expected level - they like to read non-fiction texts - there's a 50/50 split between prefer reading books/hard copy vs online/digital - 2 of them feel anxious when it comes to group teaching because it's too close to the teacher - vocabulary and not understanding what words mean make it difficult for them to understand what they are reading ...

Talofa  Lava! My inquiry this year as a CoL Within School Leader is how can I change my practice to lift achievement for Reading for all students, with a particular focus on boys and Maori students (both genders). I'm extremely excited to be able to delve into my practice this year and really look at how I can raise student achievement in Reading. Come on this journey with me. Malo Lava, Poto