Week 1 of Digital and Collaborative Learning Post-Grad

 Last week on July 17th I started my postgraduate study. 

Online sessions will be every Wednesdasy 6:30-8pm and every second Monday 6:30-7pm (tutorial).

It's been great for networking so far. I have had some homework - to choose an innovation article from 2012-2023 Open University UK..

I chose one on Social Justice Pedagogy and created a five minute video summarising it and saying why I found it interesting.

Link to article is attached - article #8

Social Justice Pedagogy

RE Staff Meetings

 I have led several staff meetings this year for RE, leading into To Tatou Whakapono Our Faith - the new RE curriculum.

Here are some of the Slides (some were in powerpoint so not link-able)

6 November

Term 3, Session 2

7 February 

14 March

RE Staff Meeting Term 4

Annual Plan 2019

I have updated the BOT three times on our progress in achieving Catholic Character goals as part of the Annual Plan.

Here is the evidence.

I believe it also summarises a lot of what I have done in my DRS role this year.

RE Inquiry

This was the report I submitted to the BOT this month, reporting on Self-Review in RE for 2019

February 2019 - December 2019 (ongoing)

1. Focus: How successfully are we facilitating an ongoing encounter with Christ at our school?
2. The Process

We began with a survey of parents at Term 1 Meet the Teacher Evening in February,

Our questions and responses were

1. What do you think our school does well to enable your tamariki to encounter Jesus and grow in relationship with Jesus?

*Fostering a relationship with Jesus through our teaching of the RE curriculum

2. What do you think we could do to improve your child's relationship with Jesus?

*key to full answers on next page

Findings: This whanau survey was very affirming for us in terms of our community identifying a range of ways in which we successfully facilitate an ongoing encounter with Christ for our ākonga, particularly through our classroom prayer, Masses and liturgies. The two areas for further scoping and development which we picked up on, were daily meditation and opportunities for our ākonga to reflect on their relationship with Jesus. 

3. How the outcome of this review is expected to enhance the Catholic Special Character of our school.

Using Daily Meditation to Facilitate an Ongoing Encounter with Christ.

Our first step after the initial whanau survey in February was then to ensure that daily meditation is up and running in classes each afternoon. Our focus for one of our RE Staff Meetings in February was around Christian Meditation and on 30 July (Term 3), Fr. Peter Murphy will facilitate another session on this with staff.

In Term 2 the DRS gathered teacher and student voice around how Daily Meditation is going. This was also a good opportunity for ākonga to reflect on their relationship with Christ.

On 19 July, 16 teachers attended the One Wise Man PLD Day, lead by Fr. Richard Leonard, with a rich focus around encounter with Christ.

On 30 July, before Fr. Peter begins his PLD about Christian Meditation, the DRS will show the staff the findings of our Meditation Staff and Student surveys from last term, so that they can celebrate and reflect on some of the successes and challenges so far as we move forward with Fr. Peter on this.

Findings of Staff Survey

All teachers are meditating with their ākonga three-four times per week. The amount of time the children meditate ranges from 2 to 5+ minutes. Older children are generally the ones who are meditating for longer. Here is some further feedback.

What do you find have been the benefits of Daily Meditation for you and your ākonga?	What are the challenges of Daily Meditation for you and your ākonga?	Do you think that non-classroom staff should be participating in Daily Meditation also?	Have you any further comments?
Settles students	Time on sportsday	If in class
Calmer	The children that disrupt others.	They do if present in the class.
Students settle well to learning after meditating. They have a positive attitude about it generally and are open to the benefits of meditation	Some of the boys really find it difficult to close their eyes and sit still.	Yes as it's in-keeping with our special character and good role-modelling.	Classes going to Sport in the afternoons should be aware the school is meditating, maybe hold off a few minutes or go quietly at 1:40?
I find that it settles the students straight after lunch and allows them to have time to focus on themselves and their own prayers.	Getting the children ready for meditation, once they have begun they proceed really well.	It is a really enjoyable and peaceful moment of the day that can benefit all people in or out of the classroom.
Settles students after lunch. For some specific students it allows them the chance to let go of things that have happened during lunch time	Students arriving late to class and coming in after meditation has begun.	Yes	It is great. Wish I had been using it long before this

Calming down after playtime, refocus ready for learning after lunch	Some students struggle to maintain sacred silence, fidgetting	Yes, if they are in the classroom they do take part
It makes them quiet.	The fact that we have no time to do our current curriculum so ends up being something that we have to squash in.	They aren't in our room then.	No thank you
Peaceful calm reflective students	The usual students who need transitioning after lunch can be disruptive as they still have "issues on top" that need dealing with before they are ready to meditate.	Sure
Relaxed students. sets up for great learning in the afternoon. Calms down children if they have been upset during lunchtime.	None now. Took a few weeks for the children to get used to sitting/lying down quietly and and bring still but are experts now.	That would be nice.
Nice chance to stop and be int he moment	fitting it in when we are so time poor and have so much to fit into our days - leaders/duties - kids all over the place - coming in at different times.	If it is expected of everyone - then yes I do	no thank you
Calming students after break	Having students arriving on time at mediation starts straight after lunch and not disturbing those who have settled.	Yes, If they are in the classroom with the students, otherwise Teacher Aides working or moving students in and out of the class disrupt the silence.	Most children are able to self manage themselves into settling into mediation.
an acknowledgment of 'kind acts' & respect for other's personel space - as Jesus would do. encourages a gentleness within the mood of the class often mediation reflection time is encouraged to share with others in their home has encouraged students to become involved in incorporating their ideas into their mediation time/theme	it is a learning process - of physical "stillness" and having to experience the "stillness of throught" - but I am always happy with involvement	should be their preference from an invite
Peaceful classroom, clam to start the afternoon after lunch time.	getting started can be a challenge depending on how the children have come in from lunch.	its a lovely time to reflect so wouldn't see why not. If we are wanting to do it as a whole school.

Findings of Student Meditation Survey 

(Scale of 1-5)

RE Staff Meeting 5 February

Today I lead RE staff meeting around Meditation as the main topic.

I am hoping this will kickstart our whole-school meditation, with clear understandings for teachers going forward. I also hope that it will enable students to encounter Jesus Christ daily.

Here is my slideshow from today.

Maths Workshops

This term we have been using Asttle Maths test next steps of students' data analysis, to provide workshops. Students opt in to weekly workshops based on their goals. If no workshop is on offer for their goal, they do independent work on their goals.

This arose from PLD we did around student agency in Term 3 holidays. It involves a lot more collaboration among the team.

I have found this valuable in terms of revision for the students. Students say they feel it is personalised for them, but an adjustment in terms of a different team approach compared with how we did things before.

Here are some Asttle Maths individual learning Pathways. Student goals are in BLUE. They move to RED (GAPS) once they feel they have worked on everything in the blue section.

Challenges for us as teachers are finding time to conference with individual students and finding time in a hectic schedule to fit all of the workshops in. Sometimes collaboration is difficult in terms of communication or teachers not being prepared for what we are working on (just a planning/time factor really as we don't have much "collaborative planning time")

I have really liked how teachers have shifted classrooms too, showing our flexibility and less "owning of spaces"

I feel we could improve on this by planning more for the independent work students do on their goals and fitting more time in for conferencing on their goals.

The other thing I would like to improve on is students reflecting on their goals and showing evidence of achieving them.

Student Agency Breakout at ULearn

As well as doing one day of "Changing Spaces" on Tuesday 10 October, I am doing three days of ULearn (11-13 October)

Here is the slideshow re. Student Agency, a breakout I've just attended. There were some great discussions about how to do this authentically! Looking forward to furthering this with my team this term!

Today's CoL PD around Mentoring and the Spiral of inquiry

Here is a Padlet of teachers' hopes and fears from our CoL journey so far.

BLOGGER Tutorial

Today I assisted teachers in the staffroom with posting on their classroom or professional practice BLOGS.

Improving Boys' Literacy - Here is our CoL Slideshow for staff. We did this PD with Joseph Driesson on 21 March

CoL PD Cultural Responsiveness

Here is one of the Slideshows from our Cultural Responsiveness PD days with South Auckland COl on 28 and 29 March. This PD was very thought-provoking. We got to explore the surface features of culture and the deeper features. There was a lot of sharing around what the resasons may be as to why Pasifika and Maori learners are not achieving comparatively with other ethnic groups. The Treaty of Waitangi and our country's bilcultural identiity was a huge focus.My take away questions to reflect on are:

1) How will I engage Maori and Pasifika whanau with their children's learning?
2) How does my classroom environment and practice reflect the bicultural partnership of Aotearoa?
3) How can I accelerate learning of Maori and Pasifika students in my team?

Writing Workshops in the Senior Team

This term we are trying to meet the needs of learners in our team through writing workshops.

We did asttle writing Week 1 and based on punctuation results, we grouped students for workshops.

There have been teething problems in terms of a very busy timetable and trying to fit it in.

However, students feel they were able to target specific needs more and wish to try workshopping early Term 2 for another writing area (structure and language next time).

Here is one of my presentations for my punctuation workshops.

Student Learning Pathway BLOGS

Today at my Team Meeting, I showed the other team members how to set up student BLOGS.

Here is the letter I have drafted to inform Senior Team Parents

Tuesday 26 July, 2016

Dear Parent/Caregiver,

One of our strategic goals as a school this year is to further parents’ engagement with their children’s digital learning. In the Senior Team we are also trying to promote student self-monitoring of their own learning. To achieve this we require them to know what their learning goals are and to take steps towards achieving them. This involves reflection and evidence of work done towards their learning goals.

This term the Senior Team students are starting their own Learning Pathway Blogs. They will use the Blogger Google App, which will be under their St. Joseph’s login. These BLOGS will be private and so only viewed by you the parent, the student and the teacher. Your child will need your email address in order to invite you to be an “author” / reader on their BLOG. So please accept their email invitation when you receive it. You will also receive an email each time your child posts on their BLOG.

On their BLOG, students will post evidence of work done on their reading, writing and maths goal, as well as learning they are proud of. Please include a current email below so that you can be part of this learning journey with your child. If you have any further questions please do contact us.

Many thanks

Mairéad Gallagher, Ajeshni Buksh, Tricia Kenny & Noreen Meikle

e-Leaders South Learning Hub Meeting

At today's e-Leaders meeting we explored digital literacy and the skills students need to research and use the internet ethically. I prepared a PREZI around this topic with a group of other e-Leaders. Suggestions for useful classroom tools today were KAHOOT and QUIZZIZ for generating and competing in online quizzes around our learning topics. Angie (our facilitator) will try these with some of St. Joseph's students next Tuesday. Once I trial it I will recommend to the staff as a tool for learning and put on our student intranet.

Parent emails (Engaging whanau with children's learning digitally)

Here is the doc I shared with teachers to encourage them to gather all parent emails at conferences next week.

Kia ora

Here attached are the email address of parents from your class, as accessible under “pupil lists” in e-tap.

If you want to access more of them to add, please use etap

and go to your learner hub, then quick lists and then

contact details

Can you please use this printed list at your parent interviews next week to get parents to quickly add their current email address to the list?

That way you can share google docs with them when their children do well and you can email them yourself of course when you need to. You can also create a parent contact group in your gmail contacts.

Please let me know if you are unsure about any of this. I’m happy to help.

Many thanks

Mairead

Parent Emails

At today's staff meeting I showed the staff how to locate parent email lists on e-tap. One of our e-Learning strategic goals is to engage parents with their own learning through digital tools.

So I anticipate that once teacher's have accessed parent emails on e-tap, they can ask the remaining parents for theirs at parent-teacher conferences on 12 and 13 April.

Then teachers will be in a position to create a gmail contact group of parents for class notices, to email parents easily to celebrate learning or discuss learning and also to share any google docs or slides created by students with that student's parents.

Hopefully parents will begin to comment on their child's learning using google drive or blogger.

Blogging Workshop

Lead by Saunil from Cyclone

Today we learnt how to create all of the labels we need for posting about our professional practice. Four of us attended the accelerated workshop at 2:15 and then stayed on for the second workshop to assist Saunil in teaching the process to the staff.

These labels are now all set up and will allow us to easily link our practice to PTCs, goals, areas of responsibility and school targets. Very exciting!

Label Post #1

This post will create Practising Teacher Criteria labels for my blog.