Visit to Summerlands School

I was very fortunate to go on a school visit on Wednesday to Summerland School in Henderson.  We were welcomed by the Deputy Principal, Blair Giles, and then introduced to the Principal, Luke Sumich, who generously gave us his time to give us a tour of the school while sharing his knowledge and inviting us to interact with the children and teachers.  It was a highlight to spend time in Amanda Signal's classroom and meet the Tumeke 12 kids (as an NZ immigrant I must admit to Googling "tumeke" to discover the literal translation means "too much" but that it now commonly means "awesome" thanks to the Urban Dictionary for filling me in) and the Tumeke 12 kids were definately awesome as were all the Summerland kids I spoke to! 

I found the school organisation fascinating.  The teams, I believe, can be formed by teachers wanting to collaborate and/or sharing a similar philosophy.  Everyone is on-board with the benefits of eLearning but teachers have the freedom to be creative and integrate a wide variety of tools to support childrens' thinking: Bloom's taxonomy, double bubbble map, Habits of Mind, Thinkers Keys, Thinking Hats, Inquiry learning etc.  But the difference between Summerland and other schools is the teams consist of different year levels.  Luke explained this was to allow positive peer role modelling especially for the new entrants joining the school.  Having taught in Year 0/1 for the past three years positive peer role modelling is very powerful and effective and it is certainly something I encourage in my Year 1 children.  I often remind them that they can set an example for the younger children and they are equally able to empathise and remember how they felt when they were new at school.  At our school we encourage role modelling with all classes, with the exception of Year 2, being composites i.e Year 0/1, Year 3/4 and Year 5/6.  This gives the children an opportunity to be supported by their peers and then take on that role themselves the following year.

At Summerlands there is a really good vibe.  There is an atmosphere of mutual respect; committed people working together; children keyed into what effective learning looks like, sounds like, feels like for them; evidence of asessment and thinking about where to next and confident, independent eLearners everywhere!  I was keen to see Tumeke 12's Learning Links in action and I wasn't disappointed, happening upon a child sitting outside the classroom reading his book expressively into photobooth and then inserting it into keynote together with his self-reflection.  I like the idea that he will be sharing this with his parents at Conferences, how powerful for them to be able to see his level of achievement at the beginning of the year on a reading graph and then watch him reading at that time and then compare that with where he is now!

We left the school smiling, with lots to think about especially as we near the end of our Cluster Contract.  Luke mentioned recently learning what a wiki is and creating one for his school BOT and I think he made a lot of sense when he said that people need to have a reason for learning how to do something new.  I personally learned to create a wiki when I had a need to house digital resources for the young learners in my class.  But once I had done that I could then see more possibilities for wikis and when I created my Action Research wiki I found a use for the Discussion tab which is not relevant in my junior resources wiki!  The exciting thing for me about eLearning in Education is that there is always a new way of approaching things, new possibilities for capturing interest and engaging children and providing reasons for continuing to learn.

Here is a slideshow of the photos I took on the visit:

Cluster Share at Elm Park School

I found the Cluster Share at EPS yesterday really useful. It was encouraging to see we are on the same track as other schools. We seem to have a similar action plan to Botany Downs in particular this year. I was again very impressed to see the exciting and purposeful learning happening at EPS which is evidenced in their ePortfolios.

Belinda had a very inspiring video clip which set the scene for the afternoon. I tried very hard to find something which conveyed a message for the beginning of our presentation and I hope it spoke to people watching! Below are the clips and our presentation. Thank you to my friend and colleague Kathy for presenting with me. I always enjoy working with you.






Our presentation can be viewed at: http://eastnet.wikispaces.com/SPS+Cluster+Share+March+2010

Inquiry Learning

Pod 1 and 2 team leaders and I worked with Belinda last week to come up with a draft of our inquiry plan for Term 2. I have uploaded the current plan onto the Eastnet wikispace but tonight I changed it onto a new format which Kathy came up with which is a combination of the Junior and Middle school formats. Thanks Kathy. I have also just spent some time altering Kathy's inquiry Notebook document for us to use in the Junior school to support teachers and children. It still needs more work, I need to find some suitable photos to include and think about links I need from YouTube etc but I am getting there. It's exciting and inspiring to be planning on working on something you feel is really meaningful and purposeful to the children.

Lead Teachers 24.08.09

I am in the middle of my 2nd lead teachers day today watching a clip from Presentation Zen by Garr Reynolds. I can see a lot of myself in this when I think about my presentation slideshow for the cluster EXPO and there were definately lots of things I can take on board to make a more detailed handout and a less 'busy' slideshow! Unfortunately this means I can't just export the slides as the handout!!!! I enjoyed that shortcut. Great prep for the upcoming cluster share.

We have been learning about peer coaching - very interesting. Not natural for me yet as too tempting to slip into the instructional mode. Really good things to keep in mind. We recorded our ideas using scribblar which has potential as a good tool for the classroom but there are a few thing to be aware of: anyone who is a guest on the page can edit the postings, it's better to set up separate pages rather than multiple pages in the same document as when people are all editing the page if they flick to the next page everyone goes to it together! Very visual and lots of 'gadgets'!

We discussed the milestone report which our friend KP does for us! Loads of awesome discussions surrounding what we will do at SPS for our cluster share and we are keen to get going.

Really enjoyed teara too.

My first solo presenting experience!

Wow! I just presented a 45 minute workshop yesterday at the Eastnet Cluster EXPO 2009! It was my first experience doing something like that and despite initially being a wee bit nervous I thoroughly enjoyed it!

I shared some hints and tips for integrating ICTs into classroom programmes with Year 0/1 level children and it went well. Luckily I presented during the first block of workshops which got it over and done with and I could enjoy the rest of the EXPO and concentrate on learning some new things. I would definately aim to do something similar the next time I present but then again perhaps I will take it more in my stride and not need to go first?! Who knows!

For anyone thinking about doing something like this I highly recommend it. It was a lot of work preparing the presentation and making handouts to support people but I was really grateful so many people attended my workshop and I received some positive feedback which was very kind. I have made contact with like minded people in other schools which I am very excited about and hopefully spread the word about the benefits of blogging with some children at this level.

My next challenge is to present at a conference like learning@schools or TUANZ. It was also a real privilege to meet Rachel Boyd and Susie Vesper and also catch up with Amanda and Belinda from Elm Park. I also want to ackowledge the efforts of my colleagues at Shelly Park who also presented as I think, in the words of another colleague, we did our school proud with all our efforts. Well done girlies!