“Future for our students” and some thinking on N.C.E.A…

Much is written about the future of work, where society is heading and what the education system to support this, will need to be. Here are a few opinion pieces on changing work…

• Poles apart? How technology & globalisation have affected the global workforce Sept. 2017
• The Future of Work: A think piece for the ESPAS 2016 annual conference, Nov. 2016
• Some well-known (and some lesser-known) facts about digitalisation, deindustrialisation and the future of work, Oct. 2016
• The future of work: A world of new and changing skills, Dec. 2016
• Labour market reform: Why skills matter, OECD Observer, Jan. 2016

In addition here is work from the OECD looking at Education towards 2030…

“Future of Education and Skills: Education2030

Globalisation, technological innovations, climate and demographic changes and other major trends are creating both new demands and opportunities that individuals and societies need to effectively respond to.

There are increasing demands on schools to prepare students for more rapid economic and social change, for jobs that have not yet been created, for technologies that have not yet been invented, and to solve social problems that have not been anticipated in the past.

One may argue it is still some time away to think of 2030 but this is the world in which those who are beginning primary school today will start their professional careers and those who are in secondary school today will become the core group of the prime working age. The project “Future of Education and Skills: Education2030” will target school education, both general and vocational, while recognising the importance of learning progressions and a life-long learning continuum”.

http://www.oecd.org/education/school/education-2030.htm

At a National level we have http://www.futureofwork.nz/education looking for change towards… 

All of this work shows the paradigm shifts that are occurring in the potential future of work. At the same time we have had a shift in assessment practice in New Zealand, however, this has been evolving for some time and the speed of evolution is not keeping up with what may be required in the future by our students as they leave the “Secondary Education System”. It is pertinent to reflect on the time line of the development of N.C.E.A.

NCEA timeline

The following summarised timeline shows how NCEA has evolved:

• Late 1997, the New Zealand Government announced a policy called ‘Achievement 2001’, involving a complete overhaul of the secondary school qualifications system. Under the new system, students would be assessed at three, or possibly four, levels of the same qualification, to be called the National Certificate of Educational Achievement, which would be registered on the National Qualifications Framework.
• In 2000, the start date for the new qualification was delayed a year, to 2002, because the system was deemed to be not ready, either at school level or at central agency level.
• In 2002, NCEA Level 1 was introduced and the first group of students and teachers began to experience the new qualification.
• Over 2003 and 2004, Levels 2 and 3 were introduced, and also the separate Scholarship examination, which was registered on the Framework at Level 4, but whose content was derived from the Level 3 standards.
• As each level was introduced, the previous qualification at that level was discontinued, except the Year 12 qualification, Sixth Form Certificate, which was allowed to continue for a further two years by schools that were not ready to move to Level 2 in 2003.
• In September 2004, the Minister of Education, Hon. Trevor Mallard, announced at a PPTA Annual Conference, that there would be a low-key review of the NCEA system during 2005, to inform strategic planning of future work to refine the qualification system.
• By the end of 2004, the qualification was firmly entrenched in New Zealand schools, and the first phase of implementation was complete.
• In November 2006, a new-look Record of Learning and Result Notice was developed.
• In 2007, a suite of improvements to the NCEA were announced by the Minister of Education. Among the first to be announced in July was NCEA certificate endorsement designed to recognise student achievement at Merit or Excellence level across all learning areas. In November, ‘Managing National Assessment’ reports for secondary schools were made available online.
• From the beginning of 2008, full-time moderators took up their appointments as part of a process to increase the amount of internally assessed student work undergoing moderation (approximately 10%).
• Reporting of Not Achieved results was introduced for internally assessed standards, and in March, a new monitoring process was announced, which would compare internal and external assessment data for NCEA.
• In April 2008 , the Record of Learning was renamed Record of Achievement, to better reflect its purpose. In May, random selection of internally assessed student work for external moderation was introduced, to increase public confidence in the credibility of internal assessment.
• In June 2008, the process began to review and align standards with the new New Zealand Curriculum (developed by the Ministry of Education) and address issues such as credit parity and duplication. Newly aligned standards are due to be introduced progressively, with level 1 standards first, in 2011.
• In May 2009, new-look statistics pages were released on the NZQA website, including data based on participation, gender and ethnicity.
• In July 2009, consultation was completed on the draft level 1 standards and draft level 1-3 subject matrices. New rules on further assessment opportunities for internally assessed standards were introduced in July 2009, allowing one further assessment opportunity (re-sit) per student per standard per year.
• In April 2010, Education Minister Anne Tolley announced the introduction of Course Endorsement for NCEA, to begin in 2011.  Course Endorsement enables students with strong performances in individual courses to gain Excellence or Merit endorsements in those courses.  Students will receive an Excellence endorsement for a course if they gain 14 credits at Excellence level, while students gaining 14 credits at Merit (or Merit and Excellence) will gain a Merit endorsement.  To ensure students are capable of performing well in both modes of assessment, in most courses at least three of the 14 credits must be from internally assessed standards, and three from externally assessed standards.

http://www.nzqa.govt.nz/

Much of this evolution has been tweaking. In contrast the development of the New Zealand Curriculum shows a different timeframe…

Timeline

New Zealand curriculum – draft 2006–2007

The timeline for consultation and implementation of the New Zealand Curriculum: Draft 2006–2007 is:

2006

July/August

Draft New Zealand Curriculum (English medium) published for consultation and feedback. (Feedback must be returned by 30 November 2006.)

September/October

Independent survey carried out to gauge penetration and understanding.

September/October/November

Independent focus groups.

30 November

All feedback and consultation completed.

2007

Draft Te Marautanga o Aotearoa published.

September

Proposed release of the revised New Zealand curriculum.

2008

Final Te Marautanga o Aotearoa published.

2008–2009

Implementation of the two partnership documents: the New Zealand Curriculum and Te Marautanga o Aotearoa.

https://www.tki.org.nz/

You can see that the assessment was developed and implemented before the New Zealand Curriculum (NZC). For this reason, is it really a surprise that in many schools in New Zealand Assessment continues to drive the teaching and learning. Even when the standards were aligned to the NZC half way through the timeline, there was really only shifts in semantics of standards rather than the actual outcomes themselves.

The NZC is applauded internationally for its future focus-see this article…

 http://perspectives.eiu.com/talent-education/new-zealand-leads-world-providing-future-skills-education-its-youth-according-new-eiu-index 

The challenge is not what the New Zealand Curriculum offers, the challenge is what are the intended and actual outcomes for teaching and learning in our classrooms across the country? In addition what are the intended and actual outcomes for the assessment aligned to this? If, of course, the horse comes before the cart.

This overview of the NZC shows why our curriculum document is applauded for it’s future focus…

I personally have a strong belief that what you assess, is what you value. Currently for most Secondary Schools, the major aspect of assessment falls from N.C.E.A and the Achievement Standards that align to this document. The limitation of this assessment system as I see it is that the Achievement standards align to this aspect of the curriculum.

Many of the aspects of our curriculum that are applauded as “future focus” come from other parts of our curriculum document such as, the “key competencies”, “values” and “vision”. While there has been a shift in curriculum documents and assessment towards some aspects of these “socio-critical discourses” the intended and actual outcomes of this can differ greatly (I went deeper into this in my own research).

 https://waikato.researchgateway.ac.nz/bitstream/handle/10289/8984/thesis.pdf?sequence=3&isAllowed=y

If the future of work is looking more towards skills and dispositions than content knowledge, how are we collecting and curating evidence of this?

Some schools have placed a real value on dispositions that align to the NZC such as the Hobsonville Habits from Hobsonville Point Secondary School.

Where the habits are taught explicitly and reflections occur that evidence learning against these…

or the awesome work that Liz and her team have done with real world, authentic projects that make a difference in the community. All aligned to the school vision and values…

For all the amazing teaching and learning, there is still a search through N.C.E.A to find assessments that may align. For example here are three different examples of standards aligned in different curriculum areas, that have a different focus…

Health

2

AS91237

2.3

Take action to enhance an aspect of people’s well-being within the school or wider community.

Physical Education

1

AS90969

1.8

Take purposeful action to assist others to participate in physical activity.

Social Studies

2

AS91282

2.4

Describe personal involvement in a social action related to rights and responsibilities

If taking an action in our community, is an outcome that we want for our students, that aligns explicitly to the NZC Vision as well as schools own vision…

Reach for the sky! Whaia te iti kahurangi

At Hobsonville Point Secondary School we believe in empowering young people with the skills to contribute confidently and responsibly in our changing world.

Then wouldn’t the ideal situation for aligning Curriculum, Assessment and Pedagogy, to be one where there are more generic standards, that do not sit in the subject silos, with specific contexts required to be used… should the context be more personalised, as is the case in our projects that use student voice and choice for what actions will be. Evidence could be collected over time in any context or several contexts and then this could be used to make judgements against the standards. Portfolios where the teaching and learning of relevant contexts to the students are collated over time. With generic standards of more future focussed skills and dispositions.

These standards would be better aligned to the wider NZC. Another example of this can be seen in this standard…

Physical Education

1

AS90966

1.5

Demonstrate interpersonal skills in a group and explain how these skills impact on others.

While this appears to be generic the Explanatory notes state that the interpersonal skills must be in a physical activity context. If the outcome that we want for our students for their future is interpersonal skills, why must it be in this context? Could any teaching and learning be aligned to this outcome? If yes, why is it sitting in a subject silo, with a specified context. This is compartmentalising learning. Not to take away from Physical Education and the development of interpersonal skills within physical activity, more to highlight this can be achieved in many contexts, for example impact projects that are taking action in a local community.

Could the Hobsonville Habits shown above, become generic outcomes for standards that students evidence overtime in portfolios? If these are the attributes that our whānau and employers are looking for, how do we value these outcomes as much as the high stakes outcomes currently in place in the N.C.E.A? There are still many knowledge and content based standards? If knowledge is ever changing, why are we assessing this? Can there be a shift towards skills and dispositions in our assessment system?

Such as these…

If there were more generic standards, would it allow there to be a power shift from the University end of things. Where, there is a hierarchy of knowledge and valued knowledge by curriculum area. Where universities still have a hold over the pathways that are occurring particularly at Level 3. Generic research standards, problem solving standards and more….

It is good to see that N.C.E.A is being reviewed this year,

https://www.education.govt.nz/ministry-of-education/consultations-and-reviews/ncea-review/

It is also good to see people on the advisory group that will bring some outside perspectives on what N.C.E.A can be.

At the same time they need to talk to schools that are pushing back on over assessment, that are trying to minimise over assessment and assessment driven programmes. That are personalising learning as the future of work documents talk to. That are taking action in their communities, while still working the constraints of the current system, that I have mentioned above. See the article below on this and what Maurie and HPSS have been pushing.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11940367

Also see RNZ Interview here…

https://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/ninetonoon/audio/2018629096/ncea-assessment-not-good-practice

Only then can we truly align curriculum, assessment and pedagogy to ensure personalised and best outcomes for our students to face the future coming their way….

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

engage through powerful partnerships ….contribute confidently and responsibly in our changing world…

Engage through powerful partnerships ….Contribute confidently and responsibly in our changing world…
Parts of our vision and not just rhetoric…

I truly believe that we are making a difference more than ever before. Many people are talking about MLE (modern, learning environments) rather than about the pedagogy. Here at HPSS, the thing that is apparent when you come into our school as an outsider is that it is all about the pedagogy, not just the environment.

I would like to focus in on the above two aspects of our school vision. In the past I have gathered anecdotal evidence on what “taking action” looks like in the context of PE in schools. My take on things is it is often just to meet the requirements of a standard. Often not really underpinned by the underlying concepts in the NZC. These underlying concepts are..

Hauora – a Māori philosophy of well-being that includes the dimensions taha wairua, taha hinengaro, taha tinana, and taha whānau, each one influencing and supporting the others.

Attitudes and values – a positive, responsible attitude on the part of students to their own well-being; respect, care, and concern for other people and the environment; and a sense of social justice.

The socio-ecological perspective – a way of viewing and understanding the interrelationships that exist between the individual, others, and society.

Health promotion – a process that helps to develop and maintain supportive physical and emotional environments and that involves students in personal and collective action.

Also often with a token relationship with Strand D of the HPE curriculum.

“Healthy communities and environments, in which students contribute to healthy communities and environments by taking responsible and critical action”.

As the National Moderator for 5 years for PE I saw a lot of work on taking action where it was often a one off event where it was difficult to reflect and act in an ongoing manner as would be expected by taking action models such as the action competence process (Tasker 2009)…

Action competence learning process

The action competence learning process is a process for engaging in health promotion. It provides a framework that enables students to take individual or collective action. The term “action competence” means the development of those competencies (understandings and skills) that enable students to take critical action. The issue selected for action should be one that students have chosen so that it has meaning and relevance for them. Issues will emerge out of the themes or contexts that are currently being studied. (TKI-HPE online)

At HPSS our students are only year 9 and 10, so we are not being driven by assessment to take action, rather by a belief and vision that involves…engaging through powerful partnerships ….contributing confidently and responsibly in our changing world…
Well I really want to reflect on the amazing impact that the akonga/students in our module MATHH is making for the akonga/students from Arohanui (the special needs school on site here at HPSS).

In this module we are working towards the following…
Modification and Equality for Arohanui Through the Hobsonville Habits (MATHH)

We will work closely with Arohanui in this module. We will explore how disabilities can effect peoples participation in physical activity. You will make sense of this by experiencing how it feels to have a variety of disabilities. You will innovate games, activities, equipment, space and rules by using and developing your knowledge of geometry and measurement. You will explore the specific needs of the students in Arohanui to allow you to transform participation for them. In all aspects of this module you will do this through the Hobsonville Habits.

Our learning objectives are..

To TEST by applying concepts from measurement and geometry to model physical education equipment and activities to transform participation by Arohanui students.

To REFINE physical activity and sport for Arohanui students by transforming games, activities, equipment, space and rules.

Along the way students have taken individual and collective action within this module and are taking action every week for two terms in an on-going way including reflection and action…

Students got to know their learners…

They plan in an ongoing manner, where there is individual responsibility for stations but collective action…

There is also on-going reflection and action about individuals that learners have worked with…

As well as personal reflections on the disabilities that they are experiencing through their own practical PE and how modifications are required from here, gaining understanding and empathy for others…

Pictures speak louder than words so here are the crew taking action…

In conclusion, taking action does not need to be token, assessment driven or one off experiences… it can be meaningful, authentic and truly make a difference and the highlight of my year to date is seeing these kids (both HPSS and Arohanui) developing the powerful partnerships we talk of and allowing our learners to be fulfilling the school vision of…contributing confidently and responsibly in our changing world…alongside showing our Hobsonville Habits in action, including, being compassionate, contributive, purposeful and resourceful.

Process over outcomes…Making learning visible in multiple ways….via blogging -teachers, learners, comments and authenticity

I love this image on technology and the “right and wrong learning outcomes”. For me this is an extremely important consideration for teaching and learning. Yes technology is shifting faster than ever before, yes we must engage ourselves and our learners in use of technology, e-learning, blended learning, whatever we may call it. Yes we must ensure equality for all, all learners need access to devices of some sort. BUT…… we need to think about all this with a pedagogical hat on!! Why comes first? What is the intended outcome? What are we wanting to learn? Why will this tool allow this? Not just a tool for the sake of a tool.

Therefore to blog or not to blog is not the question!

Why to blog????

There is multiple reasons that I believe that a blog can be a powerful tool for learning…

Firstly I believe that a blog allows gathering of naturally occurring evidence of learning, where the process of learning is gathered over time. Where the growth in the learning journey is visible to all. By all I mean, the learner, the teacher, the whānau and society.

Secondly, the learning is more authentic. This is due to the fact that the blog is out there for the world to see, to interact with and therefore the learning is augmented.

Thirdly, blogging allows for timely feedback to occur. Feedback from teachers, peers, whānau and other nodes on the network (Castells, 2000b). I have been giving feedback to my learners today in our integrated English and PE module. Feedback/feed- forward, where I hope I am making the learning more visible. Where I add value, challenge thinking and help shift the learners on their level of thinking.
here are some examples of feedback/feed-forward that I hope will add value for my learners.

In addition, I believe that a blog is a great way to document and catch the learning journey in a better way than many other modes. I believe that it allows for a way to capture formative data about learning without the high stakes of a final summative assessment. I therefore believe it allows for the true alignment of curriculum, assessment and pedagogy and disables the potential for assessment to be the main driver.

In integrated learning, it is enabling a natural connection between PE and English. The learning is occurring, in, through and about movement (Arnold, 1979). There is a holistic focus between the doing and the learning. We are looking at socio-critical aspects such as gender, socio-economics and more and the influence of these on participation and competence in sport and physical activity. We are taking the critical aspects of this even further. We are using this content and using a blog as tool to capture this learning and understanding. The mode of the blog is being used as a tool to develop the learners writing ability for English. A hook in for those who love either PE or English or both. A hook into another learning area where it may not occur and a great way to connect their learning.

Here are some pictures of our module in action…

To support the blog and make the learning even more visible, we have rubrics developed at school, that allow us to give specific feedback and feed-forward on where learners are at and where to next. The module is “Do we get what we are given?”, we are exploring nature vs nurture. We have a SOLO rubric for each level of PE and here is an example for level 5. We use the AO’s from the NZC to drive this and SOLO to show the level of thinking.

Here is the English rubric on writing, so that both curriculum areas have their own specific criteria to feedback on, even though teaching and learning is integrated.

We are practicing what we are preaching and both Ros and I https://plus.google.com/+RosMacEachern/posts are bloggers of what we are up to. We are also using a class blog as a platform for our teaching and learning programme, ensuring learners can access this at any time/just in time…
here is a link to our blog http://getgiven.blogspot.co.nz/

If you are reading this you may like to check out some of our learners blogs, so that they can get your voice as well, this will help us to make the learning even more authentic.

Finally, another great reason to blog, for us and our learners is sharing, sharing the range of different contexts, teaching and learning programmes, and ways of doing things that are out there, to keep being creative with the spaces between curriculum, assessment and pedagogy and not being stuck in doing things the way we have always done them. At the end of this we are looking for our learners to transform beliefs and societal understandings for others and what better way to do this than by sharing their journey with others and asking for them to be a part of it…

Watch this space as in my next blog I will talk to our cool module we have at the moment, integrating Maths and PE. Where students are integrating their understanding of measurement in maths with modifying activities for inclusion with our special needs unit (Arohanui) at school. A true reflection of our Hobsonville Habits in action.

Arnold, P. (1979). Meaning in movement, sport and physical education. London: Heinemann.
Castells, M. (2000b). The rise of the network society (2nd ed.). U.S.: Blackwell Publishing.

Highlighting Habits and Developing Dispositions…Leadership Inquiry…

In a world where knowledge is ever changing and easily accessible, shifts are occurring in the way teaching and learning occurs. Many talk of developing dispositions, working learning muscles, learning to learn, key competencies, capabilities, metacognition, making learning visible and more…However, while I am in full agreement with this shift in focus, I am also aware that this is an area that will not just occur, that need to be thoughtfully planned for, scaffolded and made explicit to the learner. Not just done to the learner and not just assumed that if you think you are developing dispositions that it will happen. Do the learners recognise what they are developing, can they highlight strengths and weaknesses, where they are at and where to next? If these aspects of learning are not explicit, who holds the power in learning? Also if as a learner I do not recognise these dispositions in action, how can I transfer their use to other contexts, situations and learning. Here at HPSS we have our Hobsonville Habits, this is our dispositional curriculum based on the Key Competencies and developed in conjunction with our school community, (learners and whānau). Based on what dispositions our community wanted to see developed to allow learners positive outcomes in education and life. Allowing them to “flounder intelligently” (Guy Claxton) in our ever changing world.

How these habits are being developed is an on-going process, that is changing over time, with a recognition that we do need to make these more explicit with our learners. This means that as coaches of our Hubs and teachers of our Learning Modules, we are in an on-going process of reflection and action of how can we do this better? How might we make these clearer? How can we develop these and not just see them as inherent in who we are? That we can change, develop and earn more than just content knowledge in education and work towards our goal of “Personal Excellence” as well as “Academic Excellence”. For me as a Learning Team Leader at school, this is something that I believe I have not supported my community on enough. For us as educators at HPSS, there is many new aspects to how we are doing things around here. Due to this it can be full on at times on the ground with your head in many spaces. If you follow the blogs of others at HPSS, you may be aware of those aspects. If you follow Sarah you will know about project learning here at HPSS https://twitter.com/hpssprojects Also our shift to collaboratively taught, cross curricular modules Steve explains these better than I could as a member of the SLL team https://stevemouldey.wordpress.com/2014/02/10/personalised-learning-at-hpss/#more-610 We are also reporting on learning in a very different manner here which Heemi explains in his posts on reporting and assessment https://heemimcdonald.wordpress.com/2015/06/04/school-reporting-whats-to-keep-secret/ So with many different aspects to the school curriculum at HPSS, I believe I need to better support my coaches in how we develop and make explicit the dispositional curriculum at HPSS. This does not mean that I believe that dispositions sit siloed in hubs and with coaches, more that if I help to build capability at a hub level, then I can support my coaches in transferring this to their teaching and learning in other aspects of the curriculum at HPSS. In contrast to sitting siloed I believe that we need to be making this clear, every day, capturing dispositions in action, “speaking learnish” as Guy Claxton would say and acknowledging when these dispositions are used, need to be used, or need to be developed. Due to this I am on a journey as a leader and have made the focus of my leadership inquiry for NAPP on helping to support the dispositional curriculum and the capability of my coaches to help make this explicit with their learners across HPSS. To do this I would take targetted action in my community-Waiarohia. To do this I needed starting data. My data is two fold, looking at my leadership strengths and weaknesses and also at my coaches perceptions of their capability in using the dispositional curriculum. Here is the starting data that I gathered, so that I can measure qualitatively the journey that we all take, including mine as a leader and my coaches as dispositional curriculum leaders. I gathered the responses from my coaches in an anonymous google form and this is a summary of the data…

What do you consider to be Sally’s strengths as the leader of Waiarohia? And why do you think that? Give examples where you can… Sally has many leadership qualities that she exercises in her work as W leader. For example Sally is purposeful in her work with students and staff. To be purposeful you need to spend time thinking about, analysing and planning for the purpose of what you do.Sally is always well planned in her work and has thought about where it might take people. Another great leadership quality of Sally’s is her enthusiasm for her work. This enthusiasm takes others along with her. She is also confident enough to take risks in what she does with teachers and try new ideas and new things eg planning the multifaceted Hub time programme. Sally also realises she needs to be responsive to people thoughts and feelings. She listens carefully in meetings and negotiates well through sometimes tricky situations. She is willing to change tack too if the feedback warrants it. This to me says she is very knowledgable in how to work closely with and lead a team of thinking adults to get the best out of them. As if this were not enough Sally also has the impact/outcomes on the students…in all her work with staff it always comes back to what is going to be best for student learning. Sally is also committed to doing things well and refining until it works well. Sally cares about the people she works with and develops good relationships with them….they are then happy to work with and for her and go the extra …. Passionate – You are clearly passionate about the learning that takes place in our community which is evident in your language and the activities you plan, particularly around the dispositional curriculum. This is a strength because it drives the team to participate, engage, and support the dispositions within our community. Collaborative leadership – You demonstrate a highly collaborative model of leadership which encompasses the views of all team members. This allows each member to be heard and feel valued even if they do not agree with the outcome or decision taken. Approachable/Supportive – You are always prepared to listen to, and consider different points of view. On a personal level you are also extremely supportive which makes for a supportive working environment within our community team. Knowledgeable – You know what is going on and always up to date with current discussion topics. As a result, you are confident with what is happening at any given time. This is reassuring as a team member. Her ability to support us as hub coaches around activities were are strengths do not lie (Hauroa). That is where her passions lies developing growth and understanding for the students. Very organised. Always has resources and ideas at the ready to help us and makes sure we know what we’re doing. Willing to listen to any feedback – always asks for opinions (even if no one has any!) Is keen to give support and has good ideas about how to do this. It always feels like Sally is on our side.

What do you consider to be things Sally could do better as a leader of Waiarohia? And why do you think that? Give examples where you can… ?? Have confidence in your ability as a leader. You are doing a fantastic job! You lead a positive, supportive team which reflects your leadership style. I can’t think of anything to improve on, sorry. I will try to think of something.

How confident am I in coaching learners in my hub, the dispositional curriculum- Hobsonville Habits? and why do you feel this way? I think I’m okay with it, but sometimes struggle with coming up with specific examples of what some of the habits look like in relation to “my learning’ e.g. adventurous. I have a vague idea of what adventurous learning might look like, but find it difficult to give specific examples of what students might do to be adventurous in their learning. I am confident in some aspects…growing in confidence and learning all the time. I feel this way because it is still new and we are all learning about it. I am not overly confident with the dispositional curriculum or habits because it is not something I have taught to any great extent in the past. I feel I have only a superficial understanding of this content myself. Hmmm to be honest I feel like I am walking in the dark sometimes I feel like I understand the direction of where we should be going but than other times I feel lost. When it comes to the Habits – it is hard from myself to explain in different contexts as one students might see it differently than the next student. Somewhat confident – I think I could do better in this. I’m not confident that my hub are thinking about and using the Habits apart from when we explicitly talk about them. I get this feeling from evidencing habits in the Learner Narrative – it feels like the kids are making stuff up on the spot rather than thinking about using the habits throughout the week.

How can Sally support my learning to better coach the learners in my hub the dispositional curriculum? The materials and activities you have provided are very helpful. Additional PD on dispositional curriculum and habits and how they impact learning would give greater depth to these activities. Keep on listening to your people…..keep on co-constructing the pathway through while keeping your eye on the goal…you are good at this (it is a hard thing to do but you do it well!) It would be great if we had some resources for talking about the operation of the habits in their learning. For example, videos or students in class or encountering difficult work and how they are using the habits or might better use the habits. Students seem to have difficulty relating the habits to their daily lives at school. Maybe suggest activities which students can use to gather evidence for habits? We could make that evidence gathering more explicit in extended hub but stress that it is not sufficient. How to scaffold the breakdowns of habits to students? Perhaps having learning conversations prompters ???

Is there any other ideas, thoughts, feed forward, feedback that you think would be useful to Sally in embarking on an inquiry into leading the dispositional curriculum and how it is coached/supported? Demonstrate how the dispositional curriculum and habits are integral to learning and not merely tacked on as an extra. This will make it more relevant to staff and therefore students. Awesome Miss. Love to hear how all this is going along the way. Making it easier to find all the information that Lea and LTL have placed….I struggle to find it – maybe it is the system we have created. Perhaps a more centralised system for tracking habits in a public way (like a star chart or something, rather than the Learner Narrative) to support getting in the habit of gathering evidence for the habits.

So while my coaches gave positive feedback about my processes of leadership, I also critically reflected on how they are feeling about the dispositional curriculum and see this as an issue in my leadership, that I have not supported them enough and that I need to take steps with my leadership to do so. There has been two parts to this journey so far and I have shifted my thinking on this after some reading and learning. As a community we have been working to make the habits visible with activities such as…

and

“Uptown funk” #HPSS #Habits… Creative and contributive 😊👯 http://t.co/0e0Hleb3hZ pic.twitter.com/gwkxpEAcnB

— Sally (@SallyHart72) February 10, 2015

and

Tahaki hub, exploring being resourceful #Waiarohia #HPSS http://t.co/jX98sJ7HxD pic.twitter.com/3h3unoow9d

— Sally (@SallyHart72) February 2, 2015

Each term we have had a focus on one or two habits that we dig deeper with. To start off with on this journey I started to develop resources and create activities to make the habits more visible, to use and share with the coaches. Coaches take turns at leading activities which focus on these habits and we try to consolidate this with greater focus on one or two. Cindy, Cairan, Jill, Martin, Tanya and Leoni have lead some awesome activities that have been carefully thought through and linked to the habits… To help support further, I have tried to develop some more activities. First of all I tried to scaffold the habits a bit further, using some of the work of Guy Claxton on building learning power https://magic.piktochart.com/output/5007410-hobsonville-habits-taken-furth The link takes you to an online version of this..

I have also tried a number of activities to make the habits more explicit in different contexts… Where learners developed thinking on habits such as… and this…

and

Also activities such as this, which was sparked by Bryce a member of staff who epitomises the Hobsonville Habits through his life journey, provoking the learners linking Habits to Hauora…

I consider myself to be a servant leader and in doing this I often go about doing what I am asking others to do and trying to “awhi” and support this in others. What I have realised part way through this process is this does not always lead to “sustainable leadership”. So I realised when I read “Coaching Leadership” a book by Jan Robertson that I was not always building capability in my coaches, if the leadership of the dispositional curriculum is to become more sustainable, then I need buy in and ownership by all my coaches as leaders. So aspects such as us taking turns to develop the habits in our community do build capability, by me developing resources to give to my coaches, I am not. So I believe I need to find a balance of developing and supporting ideas, which my coaches have asked for, but also allowing them to lead alongside me and develop their own capability in using the dispositional curriculum. Here are some snippets from Jan’s Book that show what sparked my reflections.

So after reading this, I shifted my inquiry, I asked my coaches, who wanted to be involved in a coaching group, where we work together to develop and collaborate around leading the dispositional curriculum. There was no imperative to do so, all of my coaches have agreed to be a part of this. While I had already started developing activities, we have shifted to all coaches taking two habits each to develop my learning activities for their hubs next term. Coaches will lead these with their own hubs and will reflect and refine after leading these. We will all share our process, refinements and thinking as well as supporting resources. This will enable all to be a part of the development, while also sharing the workload of doing this. I will also gather feedback and voice in coaching conversations about how this has supported or otherwise coaches next term. In finding a balance and not transferring everything to coaches and still supporting others, as we have IEM’s coming up where the learners are to reflect on “my-being, my learning, my communities and my habits” and this is a source of unease for some coaches, I have developed some scaffolds to support learners in thinking about these… Here is the IEM doc as developed by the LTL’s and Lea.. Here are some supporting scaffolds I have developed… Anyway, this is a very long blog post, however it is important for my leadership inquiry that I keep a record of my process and journey of leadership and learning, there is still a lot more to come, I hope this journey will help me build my leadership skills and also build the capability and leadership of others, while also helping to embed our dispositional curriculum in a sustainable way….

What are we really learning? Making Learning Visible..

What is the focus for educators around the country? Is it what are we teaching? Or is it what are students/akonga learning? What is the difference? Well I assume many educators out there could clearly articulate what the difference is between teaching and learning, however, how are they measuring it? Is it based on what I teach students learn? Is there assumptions at play on what has been learnt? Or is it deeper than that? Is there data and evidence collected, analysed an acted upon along the way? Are the tools, strategies and learning programmes modified along the way in a responsive way?

I have been lucky to connect up with Margot Bowes (Auckland Uni), Anne McKay and Kylie Thompson (Unitec) and Alex Smith at Rutherford College. Collaboratively, we are embarking on a journey supported by academics to take this to a deeper level. Here is a clip that they used when presenting at an International PE conference in Australia, talking about why we (as a group of Physeders) are interested in this and how it sits in my context at HPSS.

Movie on 13-04-15 at 5.08 pm from Sally Hart on Vimeo.

With the focus this term on Interpersonal Skills in PE, we have looked to see how we can ensure learning is visible along the way. How to capture evidence of where the learners are, while still holding tight to our philosophy of ensuring the learning is “in, through and about movement”, not diminished to just learning theoretically. Also not just a final snapshot of where they are at, but evidence collected in an on-going way over time, valuing the process of learning over just the outcome.

At the start of the term I gathered evidence on where learners were at, with their understanding of interpersonal skills as well as introducing how we would focus on these and apply and develop this understanding over the term. Development of both understanding of and application of interpersonal skills is imperative. This means that in the learning programme, there must be the opportunity to show these in action and we have done this using a variety of contexts, sports, team activities, group challenges and more..Here are a few samples of some of the evidence gathered…

With the focus on the impacts that interpersonal skills can have on a team, we set about using on-going evaluations of sessions. Where learners think of what they have just taken part in and reflect on specific examples of their use of interpersonal skills and how this impacts on their team/group and how they know this. These have developed along the way showing the growth in their understanding of interpersonal skills in action…Here are a few examples of these reflections…

We have developed SOLO rubrics for levels 4, 5 and 6 of the curriculum for Interpersonal skills, so that I can clearly articulate exactly where learners are sitting and what their next steps are to move up curriculum levels and SOLO levels, here is an example of one of the rubrics…

Part way through I captured another snapshot of where learners were at by using socrative, here is a sample…

Using both the data in the socrative, the describe++ sheets (evaluation sheets above) and the evidence of where the learners are at practically, learners have been given very specific midway feedback on where they are at in terms of both curriculum level and SOLO level within this. Here is a snapshot of this data…

Since then, as giving specific examples within reflections was a next step for many learners. I needed to shift again what strategies I was using to make this clearer for learners. I set up for students to take part in a peer assessment, where peers captured specific examples for their partner as it was happening in action, students then used this feedback to deepen their own reflections on what they are doing in action. Here is a blank copy, which learners did on hard copy, I will post at the end of the term..

In addition I have given students a learning reflection using De Bono’s 6 thinking hats to reflect on their learning in an explicit way…

Cindy that I am co-teaching with has added another level to this as, I am co-teaching with a scientist, who has made the use of interpersonal skills explicit in aspects she is working with here is an example of her doing so as well, allowing natural connections to arise within our different contexts…

This is only half way through the inquiry, however, from the many different tools, tasks and strategies that I have been trying to use to make learning visible, I feel the students/akonga have a very clear understanding of where they are at and what their next steps are. Towards the end of the inquiry, I will capture student voice on the process of learning that has taken place and make a final analysis of the intended and actual outcomes.

Pulling out the PE…Deconstructing my teaching and learning…what did I do with my PE hat in connected learning this year?-Resources and thinking to share…

The long holiday period is a time for rejuvenation, reflection, resolutions and relaxation alongside the chance for more intensive and invigorating whānau time! In my last post I recorded my thinking on the end of year celebrations and how this aligned with our values, see here
In this post I want to deconstruct my teaching as a bit of a resource bank for others, maybe Physeders will find this useful, maybe not, but I will put it out there. The links and connections I have made in teaching and learning I have been a part of have been a part of, have arisen from the three aspects of our school curriculum. These have included, hubs, specialised learning modules and Big projects. What I would like to do is share a record that includes resources that can be modified, shared and used to suit others learners and context.

A good way is to start with knowing the learner activities, over the last holidays, I prepared resources for a hub tool box for all our coaches to uses, these included activities for knowing the learner, hauora, quadrants of thinking and reflections. These types of resources in the past have been the scope of Health and Physical Education teachers and others who may use to get to know their learners at the start of a year. I would like to think that others may find some of these useful for getting to know more about their learners in any context, so here are the resources (I am adapting, but these are the current slides/cards)…

As well as the knowing the learner type activities that we have used with our hubs, which this year was a group of approx 9 students with each hub coach (shifting to 12 this year with the second intake for us coming in). I have also developed resources that I have used within modules across the year to get to know the learner in these different areas, with my PE hat on. Here are some of these resources below. I will not get into so much what was involved in the modules, but the resources and teaching and learning programmes aligned to our Big concepts each term, such as, identity, citizenship, place and space and systems.

The first one was exploring my pepeha, which learners also did-“Museum of Mihi”…

Explorations of family trees-“Museum of Mihi”…

Exploration of passions in PE-“P.A.S.S” (Physical Activity, Sport and Society)…

Exploring critical thinking in PE-“P.A.S.S” (Physical Activity, Sport and Society)…

My hub and their exploration of the local whenua and history of Hobsonville Point…

Goal setting the “purposeful habit” for “thought in sport”…

and my learners from my first big project, taking action at the primary school and demonstrating the school habit of “contributive”…

Haha, yes I do quite like Haiku deck as a form of presentation software!!!!

This was a planning board linking PE and physics-“going through the motions”…
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1sy76FoieK2NHVPGtdPtEJw3y8gckYSGVP6m34J_T_Ns/edit?usp=sharing

This was a scaffolded task for “going through the motions”…
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1iBMqZ03mMCyl6d3qMkxcUmINGQVOrtb8d4HlZB_t1LY/edit?usp=sharing

A google form gathering prior knowledge…
https://docs.google.com/a/hobsonvillepoint.school.nz/forms/d/1PNtYH4hCuWOglaqDyrGAbun9KUIcxT6aDcVXWmLca64/viewform

These are examples of docs and tasks that we did in -“move it, move it” -with Liz and Technology…

These are a couple of docs that learners have worked on to show the interrelationship between anatomical movements and cams and followers in technology…if you pan down the side of the docs you can see the whole thing…

This is an infographic for personal and social responsibility…this came from the module “It’s not all about me” and also “just do it and analyse it”… read reflections and details on these modules here…https://sallyhart72.wordpress.com/2014/09/26/i-am-a-writer-of-books-in-retrospect/

This was an infographic for “thought and sport”…here is a reflection and more on this module here…

About time! Overdue reflections and where to now…

There were many other resources that I used along the way, some are included in the deeper reflections, some are formats that cannot embed, others were using hobsonline and online forums etc to gather evidence along the way. Some verbal debrief docs and ongoing narratives that I have blogged about previously. This is a collection of a few, it may help to trigger ideas, it may not, but teaching and learning is an on-going experience that will evolve and transform as we go along the way, my ideas come from working with others in a variety of curriculum areas and from reflecting and acting, trying to be responsive to learners and the environment I work in…if not useful for others, it is useful for me to collate some of the ideas that have arisen for PE this year in the modules I have been involved in…I hope this may help others by sharing.

My major focus and goals across aspects of teaching in a connected, cross-curricular manner, where learning is attempting to being relevant and responsive to the learner, is to experiment, research, collaborate with other physeders (Alex at Rutherford is keen to get involved in working together-with her department), Bryce and Anna are at our school, with the potential to work with Anne McKay, Margot Bowes and Kylie Thompson with some flipped research they are looking at, with teacher lead research. Both Alex and I are keen to look at ways to develop, utilise and empower students through different modes of assessment and gathering evidence of learning along the way and in action. While the potential focus will have a physed hat from my end, it will still be in conjunction with those teachers I co-teach with this year and responsive to the learners that we have. Watch this space for reflections along the way…

Celebrating success….what do we value??

Cohesion of the first year in action at Hobsonville Point Secondary was highlighted in the celebration of success for our learners. It is possible to slip from a vision and revert to what you have always done…there was potential for this as 2014 came to a close. The end of year celebration culminated in showing how strongly we at HPSS feel about our dispositional curriculum. The crux of the celebrations was based on our Hobsonville Habits and school values. We did not revert to having top in subjects, which was imperative for a school connecting learning, working in a cross curricular manner, focusing on learning to learn and rather than just content and knowledge. There was multiple levels of celebration and recognition of mana motuhake “high expectations” in a different manner to those I have experienced in the past. In doing so a wide array of different learners were celebrated alongside each other. The thought and comments on why learners were being celebrated were thoughtful, meaningful and had the potential to bring a tear to the eye, this occurred with whānau, staff and learners and was a poignant moment in the journey of our school.

All learners were celebrated with their learning hubs, coaches, community and whānau. With three Hobsonville Habits being recognised, by self, peers and coaches as highlighting the success in their learning journey this year. Another example of whanaungatanga in action at HPSS!

At the main celebration each of the communities had a learner celebrated for each of the 10 Hobsonville Habits. To those of you outside this appears as just another list. However, for me this is a running record of our learners successes. Maybe also a trigger to rethink what you value at your school and whether your celebrations truly align with this…

Habit Awards – a student from each community who has displayed our Hobsonville Habits.
Resilient Award
Taheretikitiki: Gina Heidekruger
Tiriwa:Adriaan Olivier
Waiarohia: Katherine Garrett

Adventurous Award
Taheretikitiki: Alisa Warburton
Tiriwa:Katelyn Larking
Waiarohia: Joshua Van Wyk

Compassionate Award
Taheretikitiki: Jessica Su
Tiriwa: Lola Houghton
Waiarohia: Hannah Collins

Curious Award
Taheretikitiki: Liam Ranby
Tiriwa: Manoj Kumaraguru
Waiarohia: Matthew Van Gills

Contributive Award
Taheretikitiki: Joshua Hardy
Tiriwa: Erin Choi-Brown
Waiarohia: Joshua Long

Responsive Award
Taheretikitiki: James Anderson
Tiriwa: Natasha de Jong
Waiarohia: Gus Clelland

Reflective Award
Taheretikitiki: Antonia Smith
Tiriwa: Wai Ng
Waiarohia: Nat Hathaway

Creative Award
Taheretikitiki: Flynn Dawson
Tiriwa: Lola Houghton
Waiarohia: Andrew Jung

Resourceful Award
Taheretikitiki: Bennet Aitken
Tiriwa: Karl Voshaar
Waiarohia: Petra Brinkman

Purposeful Award
Taheretikitiki: Danielle Anderson
Tiriwa: Micah Tiriwawi
Waiarohia: Kiara Padayatchi

The community ambassador award was a special award, where as a community and then as a school we co-constructed the criteria with the learners on what this should involve…learners then voted for these awards, the supporting evidence that they gave supported choices for the habits and values awards also.
Here is a link to the criteria that the students came up with for what they valued in a Community Ambassador… https://docs.google.com/a/hobsonvillepoint.school.nz/document/d/1PG5ZKJTCmbLaVWh7vefl_R-6Q8ns1H2xIinru7yx-SQ/edit You can see there is high exectations by the learners in our school!!!

Community Ambassador Awards:

Taheretikitiki: Bill Savery

Waiarohia: Daniel Loa

Tiriwa: Jalen Wilson

Next was the values awards and this went across the whole school, with supporting evidence arising from learners voice and teacher recognition of those displaying the school values.

Value Awards: Awarded to the students who have displayed our HPSS Values

Connectedness Award: Matthew Van Gills

Collaboration Award: Natasha de Jong

Innovation Award: Angus Lynch

Inquiry Award: Antonia Smith

Excellence Awards: Awarded to the students who have displayed excellence in:

Excellence in Sport: Mackenzie Vellenoweth

Excellence in Arts and Culture: Rhiana Jellick

Personal Excellence: Tia Fue

Academic Excellence: Annie Wang

Overall Excellence: Awarded to the student who is recognised as displaying our values and our habits in everything that they do:

Excellence Award: Jalen Wilson

Alongside these celebrations were many examples of powerful partnerships in action such as Elise with Pete and the house of Shem…with her original song put out there…Year 9????

It was not only the celebrations at the end of the year that finished off 2014 with a bang! As a school we also had the most amazing time on camp. The learners and staff all had an amazing time outside the four walls of the classroom, the learning and value of this EOTC experience is best summarised by the learners, here is a great video put together by Lea and Pete to show this…

Looking forward to another year and another year level at HPSS this year. Looking forward to the opportunity for our foundation Year 9 to take on board the challenge of leading and learning from our new year 9’s. To further develop our school vision and values…At Hobsonville Point Secondary School we believe in empowering young people with the skills to contribute confidently and responsibly in our changing world.

To reach for the sky!
Whaia te iti kahurangi

http://www.hpss.school.nz/

You may never know what results come of your action, but if you do nothing there will be no result…

Words by Mahatma Ghandi…quoted by many…. These words when used, are they utilised in action? Are they preached without practice? Are they used to inspire and in turn cause action? What are the results when action occurs? One thing we are exploring at HPSS in a variety of ways, is the importance of action/taking action in learning. Learning that is more relevant and meaningful not only because there is a search for results and outcomes. But also that the learning arising from taking action, taking part in a process of taking action and the results that arise, whatever they may be… In doing so we are creating powerful partnerships on many levels. Working with the ARC, sustainable coastlines and the BNZ during this action, making the learning authentic and amplifying the learning process and outcome.

These pictures are from the “Big project” that Bryce and I have been working with a group of Year 9 students on this year. The students were involved in taking on-going action on Hobsonville Point. The action was to remove 1000’s of plastic bags from a mangrove area on the point. The “result” was a huge cleanup and improvement. The students made a major difference to the community but also to their learning through this process. I will let the students do the talking, here is their website, this contains the learney and was developed by the whole team, with roles of website development, storytelling, filming and film editing, brochures and more…

http://jalenw8.wix.com/action

The reflections by students show not only their learning, but thinking about the process and outcomes… Here is an example of a Year 9 reflection on the project… https://docs.google.com/document/d/1rPS-PuNNrerkKdFUueIr6Kihyg7frz7g-opd2NbofjM/edit?usp=sharing

This was the project that I have been working on. In conjunction with this project, there were many others taking action and making a difference. One group saving the near extinct, native plant, epilobium found here on Hobsonville Point… here is a video of their learning https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IDTwzDgwTVU

Another group landscaped a community members garden. All involving partners to ensure learning was real world and authentic. The school show ran at the same time, with students involved in promotion, back stage, costuming, makeup, lighting, scripts, acting, dancing, music and more. All based on their passion and opted into by choice. With the focus on 2025 and the future, students took action through their voice about issues and concerns for them, what they foresee and what may be… Hitting issues like, bullying, rubbish, sustainable transport, food, global issues of consumerism and more.. All coming to a head at the project celebration the other night. I feel very proud of HPSS when I see the outcome of all this real world learning and in awe of our year 9 students. See more of the photos celebrating our projects on the school facebook page… https://www.facebook.com/hobsonvillepointsecondaryschool

Projects are only one example of taking action, we also have Arohanui onsite, which is a satellite school for special needs learners. Students have been involved with these learners. Sometimes in “my-times” and sometimes in ways that they are taking action.
This is one collage that shows our students running physical activity for the learners from a variety of the satellite schools involved with Arohanui. Students giving back, making a difference and learning in the process.

On a different tangent but involving the same word “action”. As a physical educator connecting learning, in an integrated manner, through cross-curricular, collaborative teaching. I continue to revisit my strong beliefs around learning in physical education being “in, through and about movement”. Trying to ensure that the teaching and learning programmes that we develop for and with our learners still involve the “doing” while continuing to find connections with other learning areas.

Connecting this term in “going through the motions”, involving physics and biomechanics…looking at forces, motion, energy, projectile motion, force summation and more…
Students have their own youtube channel, with a collation of their own videos showing these in sporting contexts, developed in small group situations with voice overs of knowledge…students have also been involved in practical where the physics and biomechanics are applied, observed and recognised in game situations rather than just in set up situations.. I am amazed by their level of understanding of the interrelationships involved at year 9 and strongly believe it is from doing these things in “action”, applied and tried, not just learnt about in theory… The same module worked with an authentic partner the other day with a visit to the University of Auckland East Tamaki Campus, where students took their application a step further with 3D motion equipment and testing of forces in action with expensive equipment and software, making the learning again amplified to another level.

In another module “move it, move it”, PE is integrating with tech and is involving movement analysis, which they have explored in a variety of contexts and have now shifted to their context of choice.
In tech they made ergonomes, which they have used to draw phases of execution of a skill, they are now going to make cams and followers to represent the movements of the joint… these are examples of cams and followers https://docs.google.com/document/d/1WPuaTQjEY4XI2W33I0ij5XaVaFLiXIDKnOzKCr_tk0s/edit?usp=sharing

followed by drawings of the steps involved…

Students have also been making sense of movements in application…in a variety of contexts, using circuits, activities and their own contexts/activities to explore…
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1FNbxkahufVd8k2jaDXcEAwx5Xnpvmt5KNvb237DwlG0/edit?usp=sharing

The learning is connecting easily this term, it differs from term to term, always exploring how learning areas see links from concept to concept. The tension is to ensure that the “action” is still there…I feel like we are finding and exploring ways to ensure this that will continue into the senior school. With many modes being used to gather evidence of learning, see last term on verbal debriefs and narrative for feedback/feedforward…

We are inquiring into how? why? what? we are doing in our teaching and learning, but always coming back to positive student outcomes as a measure. For us this is not just academic excellence but personal excellence as well..represented by our Hobsonville Habits.

To finish this post, I return to Ghandi with a final quote, trying to mix things up at HPSS, we are are doing this on multiple levels of taking action and learning in action, anyone can do this, wherever you may be, just remember…

“I am a writer of books in retrospect…

“I am a writer of books in retrospect. I talk in order to understand; I teach in order to learn”
― Robert Frost

A pertinent way to start my reflection, while I promise to blog more regularly on many occasions, it sometimes calls for the term to come to a close. Time to catch a breath and to collate all the on-going reflections that buzz around in my head during the term. While the quote refers to “books” I choose to use the mode of a blog to do so…

During this term, I have had my Physical Education hat on in both of my collaborative, integrated teaching modules. The key concept this term has been on citizenship and while we have been focussing on strand C in the Physical Education curriculum, (relationships with other people). We have really drilled down into personal and social responsibility. One of the modules was called “It’s not all about me” and integrated PE-focus (personal and social responsibility)-Social Science-focus (rights and responsibilities/politics) and English-focus (oral language features). Working with the awesome and passionate @rosmaceachern and super Sarah @hpssprojects
Our Learning Design model focuses were…
To critically reflect and act on personal and social responsibility for self and others through the context of sport.
To make sense of the concept “rights and responsibilities” by comparing political systems and their influence on society.
To share understanding of citizenship concepts and oral language features by presenting an oral text.
This module went really well, at times it felt full on trying to get through all the content. However, where required we siloed a bit, while still ensuring the connections in our planning and what we were hitting. The intent was to look local (in the context of sport), National-connected to the politics and global- starting to look at rights and responsibilities on a global scale.
With a political focus, we had some super successful real world learning arise organised by Sarah and Ros. Sarah organised a political debate with all the political candidates in the Upper harbour electorate. Following the debate and with further exploration in class the students voted for a candidate and a party.
Here is a video that Ros and Logan (one of the students) put together, focussing on issues they are concerned about.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WqNznEZdUns&feature=youtu.be
Alongside all this learning in the Physical Education aspects, I had the learners, exploring, applying and developing their understanding of personal and social responsibility. Using two different models in this module. One was the sport ed model, where I used a modified version of the model- see the premise David Fawcett has shared here… http://www.slideshare.net/davidfawcett27/sport-education-model
We also used Hellison’s Model of personal and social responsibility. Here is an infographic I made of the different levels…The context was volleyball, while the focus was on developing personal and social responsibility, the unintended outcome was huge improvement in both skill and strategic play across the module. The impact on the functioning of the teams was clear.

The students took part in verbal debriefs each week on where they were at and where to next, I would like to develop good processes around gathering and summarising verbal evidence as a mode of assessment, while we are developing learning in Year 9 and 10. They were recorded individually in their groups reflecting on their learning. We did start a new narrative process during the term that needed to be written, so I feel like I doubled up a bit on what they were doing. My intent is to value the verbal and for me to summarise and feedback, feed forward without them having to write. Here is a link to an example of the SOLO rubric used during the module and one learners reflections on this, (I have removed names)..
https://docs.google.com/a/hobsonvillepoint.school.nz/document/d/1a42TsdMUifqmVuAP3r89ioj0pHb6xXIcqlDM72EcpJE/edit
The students really shifted both their demonstration and understanding of personal and social responsibility, which I got them to show visually at the end of the term…

In my other module “Just do it and analyse it”- a module mixing personal and social responsibility and statistics. While still using the above model by Hellsion, I went about things in a different manner.
Students co-constructed what personal and social responsibility is..

They also looked at designing different continuums for what that may look like at different levels of SOLO

In this class, contexts differed every week, students not only reflected on their own levels of personal and social responsibility, but also gave data on classmates levels, which were then used in the mathematical aspects of the module, where analysis of data and graphs was a focus. This is the google form they filled in each week to collect that data on… https://docs.google.com/a/hobsonvillepoint.school.nz/forms/d/1f0FrVGwwEAAI03c7Tuu8Y5kgEFRGKkhbwGY9imECQvU/viewform
The students also filled out ongoing written narrative in this module similar to the narrative document above, but without the verbal debriefs.
Here is a sample of a students final mathematical task/analysis, in relation to the data https://docs.google.com/a/hobsonvillepoint.school.nz/document/d/1e5cyAJneyfzrEYUQMa4lRB29QrGWxG0LgfJxiMZo4WI/edit
I really liked that the students analysed data in relation to their own/others personal and social responsibility, dependent on the focus question of their task. I also think it was awesome that they experienced so many different activities, contexts to explore their personal and social responsibility through, pair-work, small group work, teamwork, sports ABL activities, group challenges and more. The focus was not on skill level, or achievement. Rather the focus was on relationships, interpersonal skills and personal and social responsibility. What I would change is…that I feel with the final task, the data was slightly limiting, it would have been better to have data that allowed for a wider spread and therefore, analysis could have been deeper. However, I think the students appreciated using their own class data, rather than token examples.

This is my ponderings on the term just passed, I will definitely write a planning and preparation post, prior to term 4. I am excited to be taking part in the following modules next term…
…with my PE hat on

“Going through the motions”
Learning Areas: PE and Science
Description: This module will investigate physics concepts in the real world by exploring how understanding of physics can improve your sports performance.
Big Concept: Systems
Threshold concepts: PE – Movement concepts… and physical activity
Science – phyiscal strand: physics concepts, velocity, motion, forces, energy
Skills: Science – NOS Investigating and Communicating Science, Physical World (force and motion eg simple machines, energy transformations eg heat PE – Movement, concepts and motor skills.
LDM focus:
To make sense of biomechanics by connecting physics concepts to relevant sporting contexts.
To test physics concepts by applying through sport to optimise performance.

“Move it, Move it”
Learning areas: PE and Technology
Description: Is the body a machine? How do machines work? Learn about systems of the body and how they are used in anatomical movements. Systems include: the skeletal system, muscular system, cardio-respiratory system. Design and make a 3D model of an aspect of anatomical movement from MDF, using mechanisms – cams, gears and followers. The model will then be applied to sporting contexts.
Big Concept: Systems
Threshold Concepts: Technology -Systems and control-Process and components-Evidence based decision making
PE-Movement concepts and motor skills , positive attitudes, Challenges and social and cultural factors
Skills: Technology – Modelling, decision making, prototyping, sketching, evaluation and analysis
PE – Movement analysis, physical activity.”
LDM focus:
To test ideas by producing functional models and prototypes
To refine ideas considering aesthetics and function
To make sense of systems of the body and understand their function in human body movement.”

…and with my maths hat!!

The real “X” factor!
Learning area: Mathematics
Description: To learn about “algebra” in mathematics and then make sense of this further through a variety of sporting situations.
Big Concept: Systems
Threshold concepts: Properties of equations and expressions, properties of number, Number and algebra
Skills: Calculating, modelling, quantifying and communicate, Problem -solving and evaluating
LDM focus:
To make sense by understanding algebra through relationships, value and patterns found in sporting contexts.

Not to take away from other aspects of our curriculum, which involves many aspects of taking action…

Wishing all you educators a happy and well deserved break to refresh, reflect, replenish and find balance in your hauora.
Arohanui

Sally

About time! Overdue reflections and where to now…

Well it has been a while….Term 2 has been a very busy time and I have neglected my blog…something had to give though! (Submitting thesis tomorrow!!)

In the world of HPSS we are very busy as all educators are. However, in a climate attempting to truly personalise learning, working in a responsive environment, connecting learning, it can get a bit crazy. In a good way though, we are connecting learning not only through the development and implementation of our teaching and learning programme, but also in our collaborative teaching and planning.

I have several reflections I would like to make about the teaching and learning I was involved in last term.

In the big module I was involved in-

The Master behind the chef.

M.A.S.T.E.R –
“Mountains
Arithmetic
Science
Through food
Exploration and
Rotorua”-which actually turned out to be Rangitoto!

Big Concept: Space and Place

Threshold concepts: Measurement, ratios, decimals and percentages, fit for purpose, rocks, soil, volcanoes, tectonic plates, water, nature of science

Skills: Accurate measuring and estimation, carrying out scientific and mathematics investigations, involving, concepts, knowledge, nature and practice, design skills.

Learning areas: Science, Maths, Food Tech
LDM focus: Explore, focus, generate

Learning Objectives:
Explore by deconstructing the processes and different perspectives in the nature of science.
Focus by synthesising knowledge of maths and science through food.
Generate through inquiry showing “what enables the MASTER behind the chef”?

Reflections:
As I had a mathematics hat on in this module I had some interesting thoughts as I reflected on this in an ongoing way across the module..

The module started off with a bang with a couple of great ideas instigated by awesome @McGhiePete . Starting with what learners bring with them around food experiences. Creating stories of food experiences to hook them into the module. This was followed closely by the core sampling that you may have seen if you follow any of us on twitter…this felt like such a meaningful activity, the kids were engaged and in their reflections at the end of the term this was a highlight for many…

From here over the term we worked on ways to integrate mathematics and science through food. At times I did feel bit like the third wheel. For mathematics I found it easy to integrate the learning with either food or science. However, at time it felt hard to integrate the three easily. Science shifted to the fore a little more naturally and the science hat was held by well known, Miss edchatnz @MissDtheTeacher
It made me question whether possibly two is company, three is a crowd in terms of integration? Something to ponder further this term as I am in a big module again. It could be it was just the three learning areas for that particular concept was a harder fit at the time.

In this module as we had 60 learners, from session three on I grouped learners so that I could run a differentiated programme for the mathematics. On reflection I think I did this in the wrong manner. Due to the large array of abilities I grouped according to ability, something I never like to do. I reverted to this with such larger numbers in the module. In hindsight I wish I had made differentiated tasks still, but mixed ability groups for supporting and extension to occur. I feel I really extended the top group who moved right up to use of trigonometry using clinometres around the school (which they loved!!) However, I feel like I did not extend the lower to middle groups. My colleague Cindy who I consider a guru, talked to me about how even the lower ability groups could still get to use the equipment, work with others, even if the trigonometry was beyond them. When I am involved in a mathematics module again I will definitely do things in a different manner. There were many other great parts to the module and I loved seeing the outcomes of the kids inquiry, where they showed their understanding of mathematics and science gained across the module through food. There were types of rocks, volcanic processes, types of volcanoes etc… all shown through food.

Thought in Sport:

Exploring the power of the mind in a variety of sports and literature.

Big Concept: Space and Place

Threshold concepts: Physical Activity, Making meaning, Communication

Skills: Critical Thinking, Evaluation, Paragraph Writing using PEE structure, motor skill learning

Learning areas: PE, English

LDM focus: Explore, Test, Reflect

Learning Objectives:
To explore by investigating ‘Thought in Sport’ in a variety of contexts.
To test the potential of your mind by applying a range of strategies to improve performance.
To reflect on the effectiveness of your performance improvement.

Reflections:
I feel like these two learning areas married up well in this module, where I worked with Lisa. Through the contexts of sport and physical activity we explored the power of the mind. With a specific focus on being collaborative, resilient, adventurous and purposeful. All aspects of either our Hobsonville habits or our school values. here is an example of the type of reflection the learners did.

Here is a snapshot of a learner reflection…

We also looked at aspects such as goal setting and being purposeful, see here…

Highlights for me in this module were the fact I really feel like we hooked in the learners who love sport, into the focus on English and paragraph writing. Their reflections and the shift in their learning were obvious. Lisa also hooked the learners in by allowing learners to select their own sport person and use their biographies in contexts they were interested. These biographies were used alongside their own experiences for relevant and meaningful reflections. Adventure based learning activities were experienced, tramping in the Waitakere ranges, pushing them in fitness contexts etc… but always reflecting on the habits and the mind…In terms of improvement, I would just say more time, to develop their learning more, working on a term basis, I would like a bit more time with the learners to take things even deeper.

NOW IT IS TIME FOR TERM 3!! Where to from here?

Once again I am in a Big Learning Module with awesome @rosmaceachern and super Sarah @hpssprojects this time…

It’s not all about me

This module has a focus on good citizenship and involves students critically reflecting on personal and social responsibilities within the context of sport, leadership and government. Students will learn how to be effective and powerful communicators.

Big Concept: Citizenship

Threshold concepts:
Interpersonal Skills
Citizenship
Rights and Responsibilities
Making Meaning
Creating Meaning

Skills: interpersonal skills, resource interpretation, paragraph/essay writing, oral language skills, communication skills

Learning areas: Social Science, English, PE

LDM focus: Reflect, Make Sense, Share

Learning Objectives:
To critically reflect and act on personal and social responsibility for self and others through the context of sport.
To make sense of the concept “rights and responsibilities” by comparing political systems and their influence on society.
To share understanding of citizenship concepts and oral language features by presenting an oral text.

We start on Monday and already in our collaborative planning I can feel some natural links arising, where contexts and knowledge will be connected, meaningful and authentic… Yeah to another term of exploring connections in learning.

Also in a small module…

Just do it! and analyse it!

Big Concept: Citizenship

Threshold concepts: Evaluating and Critical Thinking. Personal and Social Responsibility

Skills: Analysing data through O.S.E.M and communicate findings. Interpersonal skills

Learning areas: Mathematics and PE

LDM focus: Test and Generate

Learning Objectives:
To be able to generate explicit findings from data.
Test by applying personal and social responsibility to sporting situations and seek feedback from others on this

We started this the other day with some front loading before getting into the practical context. With students co-constructing what personal and social responsibility is.

Also students made their first reflection on personal and social responsibility, see here…

Here is the example of Hellisons..

The focus from here is to gather data through the practical over time. their own data on personal and social responsibility that they will analyse, with a statistics focus within the module alongside the data that they produce through learning in sporting contexts…

Anyway, I am excited about exploring the new connections in learning this term. I am also excited that we have developed SOLO rubrics upfront this time to look at assessment for learning over time and the shift in learning, rather than assessment of learning at the end. We continue to reflect and shift where needed, with our processes and at times it can be full on. However, this is to be expected when you are doing things in such a different way to what has been done in Secondary Education before. I hope we can continue to innovate, engage and inspire our learners and I promise not to leave the next blog so long next time, so that ponderings and reflections are out of control 😉