Treaty Workshop

Yesterday we did a Treaty Workshop with Amy Tipene.
It was very thought-provoking and there was a lot of discussion around deficit thinking and casual racism. It's important not to jump on the inference ladder.
We also thought a lot about ways to uphold the treaty principles of partnership, active protection and participation.

Here are some notes from today:

Writing Approaches

Here are the approaches I have tried in writing to lift achievement of target students. They are based on boy-friendly strategies as well as student agency.

12/06/17

I am using graphic organisers to plan their writing and continue to use the self-assessment check-list. I am also providing exemplars of quality writing of the genre or the main idea we are writing about. This is done on the data projector or paper copies and we read together and analyse before writing.

Students are continually reminded of their writing goal and posting on their BLOGS to show they are achieving their goals in writing.

30/05/17

We have been using our novel Holes as a writing context (recommended by Joseph Driesson at Boys’ Literacy PD). Students have all been quite engaged with the task and are all giving it a go and risk-taking (yes!!). I am going to try to get students to incorporate evidence towards their second writing goal - which many already have! (as well as self-assessing). I hope that this student agency will bring on improvements in their writing. Evidence will be posted on Learning Pathways BLOGS.

16/05/17

I will ask students to check on their other writing goals. Have they achieved any of these in their writing?

If so, they can use this as evidence on Learning Pathways Blogs.

15/05/17

Two weeks ago the students made a “We like writing that..” list. This is now glued in their books and on the whiteboard.

This checklist will help to enhance deeper features. After a discussion with TM (target student), she has identified that “making her writing more interesting” is her goal and that she can use this check to achieve this goal. She knows that ticking 2 of these means she has achieved it and 3 means that she has mastered it.

Here is the “We Like Writing That..” list (student-driven)

10/05/17

I emailed PM’s mother last night to inform her that he has been working hard on his speech-writing. NH got a certificate on Monday as well for his efforts and attitude.

Students have set their goals which are up in the classroom. Learning Pathways BLOGS  have been set up for students so that they can show evidence of achieving their goals (3 pieces of evidence per writing goal - accountability) 10/05/17

Students have all had individual feedback on their speeches so far in Google Docs 9/05/17

They have a checklist of persuasive techniques that they are working on (Boy-friendly!).

BLOGGER Tutorial

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

Learning Pathway Blogs: Student Agency

I have been assisting my team in getting Learning Pathways BLOGS up and running.
I have visited Rooms 4 and 6 to lead groups of students in setting them up.

This will promote student agency as students share evidence towards their learning goals (student agency, which we learnt a lot about in Karen Boyes' PD late last year)

Here is an example of one student's post:

Choir

Here are some of the songs the Choir has been learning

http://sjs-c-room5.blogspot.co.nz/2017/03/choir-songs-to-practice.html

Integrating RE and Science for Term 2

Our team met for planning on Wednesday 19 April. Together we have integrated the Holy Spirit Strand with Science for the coming term. Our focus is quite kinesthetic and links with a STEM approach.

Here is the plan

Holy Spirit / Science Term 2

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