Doug Wilson - Special story about Room 14

We have been on an incredible journey this year with a fantastic NZ author we have become friendly with – Doug Wilson (the author of the Tom Hassler series).  It all started in Term 2 when we read one of his Tom Hassler stories and emailed him and told him how much we loved his story!  He then responded and answered our questions, and then came and visited us – to meet us and talk about what it was like to be an author.  He then was so inspired by meeting us and our enthusiasm for his writing that he created a novel about us!  It is a tale about us going on a school camp when an evil organisation takes over the district of Waikato and we have to save the day!  We read it as a shared story and each of us had a part to play!  We loved the story about us.  Doug then told us that he was sending it to his editor, to perfect and clarify the story.  He also check that each student had a part and were mentioned in the novel.

Today we had another email from Doug, to tell us that the special story he wrote about Room 14 has been sent to the publisher!  Woohoo, we are now waiting for a response from them, but have our fingers and toes crossed that they love it and are keen to publish it for the NZ market.  Doug has also said that if it does get published he would be happy to print 100 copies, with a fine tweak to make the school Vardon, to give to our school as a donation to use or sell how we saw fit, and with our class doing the cover art for this one off micro launch.  How exciting is that!!!!! We will now wait with baited breath to hear back from the publisher – we will let you know how we get on!

Inquiry Writing Focus - Reflection Weeks 4, 5, and 6

It has been a few weeks since i reflected on how this has been going unfortunately, time has flown by so quickly in recent weeks and i just haven’t had the chance to sit down and reflect on how my inquiry is going!  Will try and make up for this now.

Our writing programme is ticking along nicely, with our focus still being on ‘Exposition Writing.’  We have completed a second piece of writing.  The student’s first looked at an exemplar of writing on the topic ‘Kids Should be Kids’.  I then got the students to argue against this idea.  We use the ideas the author had used but did the reverse. The focus for this exposition was to include at least one rhetorical question, and to use time and text connectives.  This was pretty successful, and the students we able to do most of the planning themselves using the planning template that we used from the exemplar previously.  The only thing they are still struggling with is being able to come up with two reasons to back up their originally opinion statement.  Hopefully this will come with more practise, as I eventually want them to be able to do this themselves without me needing to spoon feed them ideas, or having to get the ideas from their classmates sharing.  We will be self assess our writing on Monday and i will give these students feedback on their completed writing.

This week the whole class will be rotating around 4 different arguments writing ideas for and against each argument as they go.  Then the class, including the inquiry group, will select the argument that most interests them to write their next exposition on.  Im hoping that this time around, the inquiry group won’t need to meet with me for as much time to create their plans, as they should have a wealth of ideas in which to use to create their plans.  The focus for the writing will be to ensure there are two clear reasons for each of our topic paragraph sentences.

Overall, i think this writing unit is going well.  The inquiry group seems to find this factual writing topic a lot easier to achieve the goal of ‘adding extra depth and detail’, and the improvement in the girls writing is greater.  When i reflect on why this is it could be because they don’t have to use their imagination as much as they had to with narrative writing.  Exposition is based on your opinion of a topic and your reasons for thinking this.

Inquiry Writing Focus - Week 3 Reflections

This week i found that things flowed even smoother during group rotations due to the students being used to the routines and structure of the lessons that we have had for the couple of weeks.  The inquiry group continued their narrative stories using the planning template they created in their books discussed in my reflection last week.  We also started our new genre focus this week exposition writing.  The whole class wrote a sample on the topic ‘all Vardon School students must now wear a uniform to school every day’.   The students then had the opportunity to assess their samples against the success criteria

These are my observations or thoughts about this group from the week:

• ·         The template the inquiry group created was useful and they could write this with little discussion and motivation from me – they could create their own ideas to add to this without as much discussion needed as the previous time. 
• ·         The template that they created didn’t have as much detail as the previous plan they did for the soccer ball story.  This could be either because the extra detail icons weren’t on their page as it was on the previous plan and/or because we didn’t spend as much time talking about their plan like we did last time.
• ·         All four students used this template structure to create a plan for the planning part of their exposition sample.  This is exactly what i wanted, for these students to have a template they felt confident using when they are required to write a sample, or a piece of writing and a template is not provided for them to use.  However . . . . this wasn’t quite the right writing genre to use this template for i.e. there’s not setting in an exposition so you don’t need to plan for it, but they’re getting the idea and giving it a go now which is awesome to see!
• ·         The boys are making good progress with experimenting with new ways to add interest with their writing and writing for longer periods of time, but the girls are still at a standstill.  They take a very long time to get started and having taken many risks at all with trying new things in their writing to add interest.  I know one of the reasons they are at a standstill is because they find it really hard to come up with ideas.  They can plan out what will happen at each point of the story (the intro, the problem, the solution and the conclusion), but find it hard to add in the bits in between to connect all these ideas together.   I think the fact they sit together could be part of the problem too as they then kind of feed off each other negative vib about being stuck and having no ideas.  It will be interesting to see how these girls fair with their writing during expositions, as being a factual piece of writing, they may find these easier to write and to add details to.
• ·         Tickled pink and grow for green is going really well, having the kids talk about their successes and justifying their reasons and really positive.

Inquiry Writing Focus - Week 2 reflections

This week was our second week with our inquiry project throughout the senior syndicate.  I found this week was a little less stressful than the previous week, i think because each of my groups has now established themselves with a piece of writing and are up and running.  My input now with each of my other groups is now less of a facilitator but more of a prompter of goals giver of feedback and feedforward so i found it a lot more manageable this week.  I enjoyed using the ‘proved it pink’ and ‘grow it green’ feedback/forward with all groups this week.  Having the students justify where and why they had ‘proved it pink’ using the success criteria was extremely satisfying and rewarding.

Meeting of the group during staff meeting this week:

This was a very productive and informative meeting this week.  We looked over each of our samples and discussed the commonalities we noticed between all of our samples – See these listed below:  

Looking over our time 1 data/samples and things that we’re finding a similar between all of our samples:

• They are not re-reading writing to check for sense
• brainstorming - not in order and hap hazard
• editing needs work
• using words and language but not for the way they are intended for - not using them to enhance their writing
• no development of setting time or place
• no explanation of what their story is about and why the events are happening
• lots of telling -  no showing - little to no adjectives
• not using dialogue or not using it correctly
• don’t know the difference between formal and informal writing
• using slang and think its awesome writing
• making sense
• endings are not always satisfactory

It was heartening to see that we all had students that had similar areas to work on.  We decided that planning was still an area of need for our students and decided to continue to make this the focus and goal for our inquiry groups.  We also decided it was important for the students to learn to plan using a template they could create themselves, rather than always relying on a teacher to provide this – as during assessments, we do not provide them with templates.  Over the next few days our student will be creating a narrative story with the same learning goal as before using a plan that ive titled with my students ‘the box plan’. 

Divide the page into 6 with the headings below:

• Setting
• characters
• problem
• solution
• ending
• powerful words

We all decided that the next focus for writing would be picture prompts - 3 pictures to choose from, but each teacher will select what is best for their group.  http://writingprompts.tumblr.com/page/55

 My students found this plan easy to use and i was pleased with what they came up with.  Our lessons followed the same structured lessons as the first rotation, and children are due for teacher feedback after Monday’s session.  Completion of this story is due Wednesday.  We will then be completing samples for our new writing focus which is ‘exposition’ on Thursday.  Exposition writing is to help tie in with speeches, which are happening this term. 

 Thoughts for the week ahead:

I am interested to see how we will cover some of the writing needs for our students during ‘exposition’ writing, I haven’t sat down and thought it through yet, but some of the learning needs may be hard to cover off during a writing genre such as this.  However as with all learning needs, teachers find a way to cover what is required with the time and the focus they have, so we will see how we go!

Inquiry Writing Focus - Week 1 reflections

This week we started our inquiry project throughout the senior syndicate.  We started the inquiry by gathering data on these students we thought we would have in our inquiry group, but also asked the whole class to complete the sample in case the children we thought we would be using for the group weren’t actually the ones we most needed to target.  Based on what the four students i had previously thought would be the best for my inquiry had produced in the sample, i am happy to work with these four.  See my notes in the post below to see what they can do successfully, and my ideas for the things i think they need to master in order to be able to create writing that has more depth and detail – effectively pushing them from a good level 2 to at least a basic level 3 writer. 

My plan was to meet with my group for the last four sessions of the week – each day building on the previous day, and building on the WALT I had decided for the group which was ‘to add depth and description to my writing’.  Boy was it a struggle!  I found that the way i had structured my 45minute writing session just couldn’t realistically fit in a warm up and two group rotations.  My focus of course this term is for the inquiry group which i have called the ‘personifications’, but even planning to have 15 minutes with them just doesn’t feel anywhere near enough time to really explore the things that i feel they need to work on.  I felt so rushed and like i was motoring through all i had planned to get through, doing none of my activities any justice at all, and coming off like a bit of a grump.  I love teaching writing, and this structure felt like I was doing myself and my students a severe dis-service.  Something has to change.   I don’t want to focus only on the inquiry group as my other students have needs, and i am not willing to give away my warm up time as i feel that this is a time where i can do some great hotspot activities which help to achieve some of the goals students have from their reports.  So am at a bit of a cross roads.  Do i go to whole class teaching and take the personifications?  Effectively only having two groups?  But then, this would be very frustrating for my top group who don’t need step by step instructions, and need the chance to meet with me to see ways that can extend their ability that is to far advanced for the rest of the class!  What to do, what to do!!!!?????  Any ideas???  I’ve decided that now that most groups are up and writing i will trial having the separate groups for another week and then will reflect on how this goes at the end of the week.  We have one more week of narrative writing after this, so may change my approach for our Expositions writing focus.

Sweet Tweets - Restorative Practise Activity

This term I will be undertaking a ‘sweet tweet’ community circle task.  I wanted to build on the person outline task we did in term 1 in our learning logs to further strengthen our class community and to build our class culture even more.  The person outline task we did during the first weeks of this year involved us each writing a special message to each class member around their person outline in their learning logs.  This helped to break the ice, and get each of us to think about each member in our new class and appreciate what we knew about them then.  I really found this task such a powerful activity as my students were buzzing after they read all of these short messages and it really helped each student to feel welcome in the class.

This term I wanted to do something similar as we are about half way through the year, and we now know more about each other.  So I was lucky enough to purchase some ‘sweet tweet’ templates from a resource store in America and will be doing this with my class over the first 4 weeks of term.  Each student will need to choose one classmate a day to observe and think about.  Their exit pass for each day is to have written a sweet message for that classmate.  This will be recorded with their initials in the grid on the cube under the board.

My learning intention with this activity is:

• To notice the great things about each of the members of our class
• Show appreciation for the things that our class mates do and say
• Understand why it is important to tell other what we appreciate about them
• Feel a sense of belonging to our class community
•  Everyone getting that feel good feeling upon reading their messages from others

During our first community circle for week 1, we will be discussing this and the purpose of the task.  We will also be discussing what kinds of things we will be looking for in our class mates, (linking these into our 4R’s and TRUMP’s etc) and how we need to be specific– as i don’t want messages like ‘you are nice’ etc.  Children will be encouraged to write up ideas on paper for the board.  Come check it out in Room 14 and have a chat about how it’s going with a member of our class.

Our Class Assembly 2014

On the last day of term was our class assembly. We had a great time sharing our learning for the term about space! Watch the video below to see out performance. A big 'Thank you' to Leah's granddad for videoing this for us :)

Literacy Circles - Update

Here are some photos of one of my students from my top group running the literacy circle of my 2nd to top group.  it went really well and was great to see the kids taking the led role in this.

Literacy Circles - My Revamp

I have been running literacy circles with my top two reading groups for a while now, and really enjoy the discussions that full out of the literacy circles, but felt that at times children were just going through the motions. I felt I needed to 'freshen up' how these were running and make them a bit more effective and also more exciting for the students.

I was doing some research and exploring what others were doing and came across this blog: http://www.3rdgradethoughts.com/2012/04/daily-5-series-read-with-teacher.html from Stephaine who is a 3^rd Grade teacher in America.

She had developed a literacy box for her to use with her reading groups - as you can see below:

I thought I could modify this a little bit, and make a box that the discussion director would use to help develop further discussion and talk about what the group has read in preparation for the literacy circle. I found the same cards that Stephanie had down loaded for free from the teachers pay teachers website. These cards will be super-helpful because they are so quick and easy. I sorted through them and won't use every one, but most of them are fitting. I just printed them and laminated them so they can stand up to lots of use. I will keep them in a bucket and the discussion director will use them at the end of the literacy circle.

I also bought a set of these cubes from Really Good Stuff. Although it is an American website, which does not ship to NZ, I was able to get them posted to my cousin who lives in America, who will be coming out to NZ in two weeks – talk about great timing!  I love these the most because they are a bit more complex than the cards and one even focuses on vocabulary, prefixes/suffixes, and finding meaning through context clues- yay! Kids will love to roll them and then focus on finding the answer to the cube after we have discussed the novel.

As you can see, none of these are too complicated or heavy on the prep time. The choices serve the wide variety of abilities in my room as well as all of the books we read as a group. I am really looking forward to seeing how it works out and it's will be fun to see kids grab a card and/or cube and have a specific goal to attain in our literacy circles.   It has also made the literacy circle more enjoyable the discussion director person as it gives something to rather than just introducing the others and is easy for them as the questions and vocab are all ready to go.

Do you use any of these resources or others for literacy circles? I'd love to hear about it :)  Will post some photos of the completed box and the kids in action next week.

Maths Streaming - Senior Syndicate

This year the senior team has decided to stream across the classes for mathematics - number teacher.  Streaming is method of placing students in temporary instructional groupings according to
their assessed readiness to learn particular skills.   All teachers in the share
responsibility for the entire year levels, with each providing focused instruction to
groups of students brought together by academic need and readiness, rather
than by class assignment.

Our goal is provide appropriate, targeted, math instruction that is tailored to students’
fluctuating readiness levels.

Our Method:
 • Students will be taught the number strand of the mathematic curriculum and will have the other streams taught by their classroom teacher.
• Prior to the start of all number units, students will be pre‐tested using
tests that assess the same unit goals as those that will be assessed in
post‐unit‐assessments.
• All students will pre‐test at approximately the same time,  on the
same day.
• Students will be re‐grouped temporarily for the next number focus, according to their
performance on the pretest.
Teacher assignments will focuses on:
o Key concepts and objectives
o Lessons as outlined in NZ Math with emphasis on pre‐test
gaps
o Extensions designed to challenge students who demonstrated
pre‐test mastery

Benefits
• Sharpens teaching focus to a narrower range of student readiness levels.
• Fosters student interaction with others at similar readiness levels.
• Provides customised level of instructional challenge for students, unit‐by‐unit,
ensuring that they are neither overwhelmed nor stagnating.
• Allows free movement between short‐term groups to accommodate
individual students’ developmental progress as well as setbacks.
• Cultivates student growth by fills conceptual gaps while avoiding redundant
instruction

We found the 6 weeks that we trialed streaming across the syndicate very beneficial for both students and the teachers and have decided to do continue to stream for all number units.  The next being at the end of this term for a multiplication and division focus.

Brain Breaks

Last term I trailed using brain breaks to break up my teaching lessons and help to elevate children getting 'stale'at their desks.
Using physical activity challenges in the classroom helps children be ready to learn and remember information better. Physical movement increases blood flow bringing more oxygen to the brain and leads to improved concentration. Brain breaks can be used to energize a group after lunch or relax and calm a class before a test, or to break a block up before you start a new lesson. Well-developed breaks can help students stretch, develop flexibility, improve coordination, and gain focus for the next lesson.
The idea is to provide some moderate activity that gets the blood pumping so form and skill are not the focus of activity breaks. Some movements can also incorporate core academic concepts. 
During term 1 I gave a whole bunch of brain breaks a go to see which the class liked the best.  These ranged from movement actions and stretching at their desks, moving around the room and high fiving 5 classmates and songs.  Overall, the kids loved them all, but their favourites seem to be songs with actions.  Their favourite being the 'shark song' which i have posted below.

This term i'd like to try some other brain breaks and also get feedback from the kids and see what brain breaks they like the best.  Any suggestions or ideas would be greatly received!

Movie Making Term 2

This term I would like to get my class into movie making and creating using the ipads.  i thought i would start them off using 'itrailer'.  This is an app that helps the students put together a 'mini movie' in the form a movie trailer.  They use small video clips and photos to put this together.  Below is the success criteria i have create to help guide the groups:

 

I will post some links to the trailers when they are completed.

New Reading Learning in Room 14

During this holidays I have spent a great deal of time anaylising my reading data and looking at my lower learners of reading to see the areas where they were lacking.  My lower 4 students really lack in thier comprehension skills.  So this term I thought I  would trial a programme I read about online to see if this increases their comprehension ability. 

The RISE Menu System has been designed to encourage higher level reading comprehension skills in a fun, meaningful and very simple way:

R - Retell
I - Infer
S - Synthesize
E - Envision and Connect

Reading is thinking and understanding text.   This programme helps focus your reading instruction on what really matters: Higher Level Comprehension.

Using this menu system and the included response sheets to give students the instruction and guided practice that they need to develop comprehension skills.

The RISE Menu and response sheets are a perfect springboard for students to discuss their reading with each other, deepening their understanding even further!

Restorative Practice

What is restorative practice?

The essence of restorative practices is disarmingly simple: that human beings are happier, more productive and more likely to make positive changes in their behaviour when those in positions of authority do things with them, rather than to them or for them.

Restorative practice at Vardon School:

Restorative approaches was originally sought as an alternative to more punitive disciplinary systems and procedures where often there was little or no links between ‘wrongdoers’ and those they have ‘harmed’, nor any real connections between the punishment and the actual offence.

The reason I am so keen on the restorative approach in my class and school is because previous measures are also often failing to meet the relational needs of teaching and learning in 21st century schools. Increasingly schools are finding restorative approaches more effective in establishing long term lasting changes in relationships, more connecting of the members of a school community, more involving and hearing of victims, and more enhancing of climates of care within schools as a whole.

I’ve been reflecting on these two questions since our TOD when Marcus and Myra posed the following questions in relation to our work in restorative practise:

 

·         Think about a student who features regularly in our reflection book?

·         What reasons are they listed in the reflection book?

·         What could of you done differently with this student?  

 

The student that I have been reflecting on featured a number of times during 2013 (last year).  Generally during the first and last two weeks of a term.  Generally this student was in the reflection room for being off task, but occasionally for ‘bullying’ type behaviour against one child – name calling, and fighting.

 

In reflection of how i dealt with this student – i do feel that i did a great deal of things to help prepare this student for success with his learning and behaviour – things such as lessons durations tailored to his attention span, a behaviour smiley face book to monitor his behaviour during blocks and break times, reflective conversations where the student discussed how he was going with his learning and behaviour, incentives based on his interests – (4D shark, games of rippa rugby), consistent txt message and email contact with his parents.  A great deal of this students behaviour issues came about because of his short attention span during key learning subjects.

 

There are always other things I could have tried or done to have further success with the student.  Ideas I have had since reflecting on this student:

·         Tried some team building or relationship games with the student who he had friction with to try and build a more positive relationship between the two of them.

·         Included brain breaks during lessons.  This student’s attention span was extremely short – perhaps breaks within the learning sessions would have helped to stimulate his attention further.

·         Made even more of an effort to include some of this students ‘loves’ (sharks) into his learning tasks – read more books about sharks, maths that includes sharks etc.

·         Tried to incorporate more art based activities during key learning areas to hold his attention.

I’d love other suggestions you would have handled this student.  What kind of activities or learning situations would you provide?