A key change in my professional practice (Activity 8)

Since I undertook this Mind Lab journey, I have become more interested in the concept of personalised learning. I have always been a fan of learner agency, offering students the opportunity to sit tests when they feel ready, giving them choices as to how learning or assessment tasks are presented, and providing revision or extension activities as required.

So the design for learning criteria in the teaching standards fits in well with that, and challenges me to look further forward into how I can make my courses truly personalised.

For too long education in New Zealand has followed a “one size fits most” approach and while there will always be commonalities in how we educate our young I feel the time is fast approaching where reforms can now be implemented in our systems for education and assessment. Understanding each learner’s individual strengths, interests, needs, identities and cultures will lead to the best educational outcomes for that learner.

I have no control over what the new government decides to implement as its education policies for the future and I can only hope that they take advice from key stakeholders with vision, bravery and wisdom.

But I do have control over what goes on in my classroom, so that is where I must start.

For a start, I should stop making assumptions about my students and ask them their thoughts on how the class is going. It is easy for a teacher to make generalisations about a class or a particular cohort such being a noisy group, a studious class, or that “they” like learning with games or songs for example. Of course a good teacher is always monitoring the behaviour and engagement levels of the class during various kinds of activities so these judgments are not without foundation, but it can be easy to overlook those well-behaved students who are not loving an activity, but will go along with it in good grace.

When I surveyed my Year 10 class at the end of last year in a course evaluation, 50% of the students surveyed said their favourite part of Japanese class was the songs we listen to and sometimes sing, and 50% said the songs were their least favourite part of the course. Similarly, some students stated they enjoyed online games such as Kahoot! But others said it was pointless playing as the same people always won.

The feedback I gained from the course evaluation was valuable in helping me to plan for this year, but I wished I had asked for this earlier in the year so that I could have acted on it with that group of students. Reflecting on my practice has now become a much more regular and normal part of what I do, and I am determined to continue to reflect and ask for feedback from my students and peers so that I can design more personalised learning experiences for my students.

During the literature review part of the Mind Lab programme I learned a lot about gamification and I put an inquiry plan in place to see how gamification affected engagement with my Year 10 students. I am now in the process of implementing some of the ideas I have gained and I look forward to seeing what effect this might have on my students.

I feel confident that even if my ideas don’t work I now have the knowledge, skills and confidence to try different approaches or do further research into what might work. I have a large network of people who I could ask for help or ideas. And best of all I have rediscovered a love of learning in myself which had become buried under the mountain of mundanity that is involved in everyday teaching.

Thanks, Mind Lab.

Indigenous knowledge and cultural responsiveness in my practice (Activity 7)

At my current school we have students from over 50 different nationalities, as well as a high percentage of Maori and Pasifika students. This brings a richness to the school and the learning experiences of everyone that I had not previously experienced.

Some years ago at my school, it was noticed that student attendance (or lack of) was having a huge impact on educational outcomes. A policy was put in place where students with low attendance rates were unable to attend school functions such as the school ball, or represent the school in sports tournaments, production, Kapa Haka etc. The acceptable rate was set at 95% and for many students this was a huge motivator for them to turn up to school every day.

It had been noted that Maori students on the whole had a low attendance rate, and this policy was most definitely expected to impact on those students as several were rugby players, members of Waka Ama etc. But nowhere was it stated that this policy was targeting “priority learners” as for the school any student not attending regularly was a priority, regardless of ethnicity. By raising expectations for the whole of the student body, there was no deficit theorising but only positive messages to students that their achievement was important to us, and that to gain the results we knew they were capable of they first had to show up.

This approach was hugely successful and led to higher achievement rates for all, and particularly Maori students. Once we had students attending regularly we were able to focus on achievement, and setting goals to reach higher targets and to reach the “Mauri Ora” state (Potahu 2011) where students are motivated, engaged and committed to their studies.

Now we are in the position of having Maori student achievement similar to the rest of our cohort, and above the National averages for NCEA results at all Year levels. In my own classes the Maori students are often above the rest of the cohort.

Interestingly, a less successful initiative from the school involved “whanau meetings” where students who had identified as Maori on their enrolment forms were invited to bring their families to meet with various members of staff and other whanau in a fairly informal way. As a form teacher who was given these invitations to hand out to these students, I was able to witness their reactions. Most students seemed embarrassed to be singled out and just wanted to be treated like everyone else. While most of the experts seem to agree that making connections with whanau are important, it seems to me that we need to be careful of deficit theorising as noted by Bishop et al (2004).

I think that it is important to respect and value the culture, heritage and background of all students. I have found that treating young people with respect and expecting everyone to strive to achieve to their full potential is obvious and surely what all good teachers already do. Hattie (2017) found that teacher expectations were a crucial element in student achievement. Positive relationships between teachers and students as well as effective feedback also feature on this list. These are the many of the same factors mentioned by Bishop as being effective strategies.

As well as having many positive role models amongst the staff, we have had several student leaders of Maori and Pasifika descent, including our current Head Girl. Achieving success for Maori as Maori is natural and ingrained in our school, and I have every confidence it will remain that way.

References

Bishop, R., Berryman, M., Tiakiwai, S., & Richardson, C. (2004). The experiences of year 9 and 10 Maori students in mainstream classrooms. Hamilton and Tauranga: Ministry of Education.

Hattie, J (2017) Updated list of factors influencing student achievement. The Australian Society for Evidence based teaching. Retrieved from http://www.evidencebasedteaching.org.au/hatties-2017-updated-list/

Pohatu, T. W. (2011). Mauri - Rethinking human wellbeing. MAI Review, 3, 1-12. Retrieved from http://www.review.mai.ac.nz/index.php/MR/article/v...

Trends in Education (Activity 6)

Trends in fashion or music are a normal part of life and can define time periods in our life. However trends in education can have a huge impact on our children, leading to long-lasting changes in society.

One of the ten trends for 2018 as identified by Core Education is STEM, programmes targeting Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths. The intention behind this initiative is for those four areas to be taught in an integrated way with the skills taught leading to real life problem-solving and innovation. However, in many schools STEM is taken as being the promotion of those four areas, to the expense of all else.

After reading the article by the US National Intelligence Council (2017) “Global trends: The Paradox of Progress”, I felt quite depressed and slightly anxious about the future of our planet. I felt a sense of doom and disaster being laid out in front of us, and I am concerned about our collective ability to cope with what seems likely to happen.

I think there is a danger in embracing trends just for the sake of change without ensuring the bigger picture is taken into account. Scientists have identified areas of concern affecting our planet which will necessitate huge changes in the behaviour of many people. But if the next generation are not educated in the humanities they won’t have the skills required to negotiate these changes.

The OECD (2016) article on Trends Shaping Education emphasised the importance of globalisation now and for the future, and stated that education needs to provide the skills to cope with the changing economic and social climate as well as environmental issues now arising. I am concerned that initiatives like STEM will steam ahead while the Arts, Humanities and Languages are left behind in the dust. To create global citizens it is vital that our children are educated in a variety of disciplines to enable them to understand the future consequences of their actions.

“Innovation is built on the successes and failures of the past, and of the potential impact on society into the future — thus requiring knowledge of history and development of citizenship.” Core Education (2018) Ten Trends.

As a teacher of Languages, creating Global Citizens is a crucial aspect of my programme. Understanding why others feel and act the way they do and being willing and able to communicate with people is an important first step. As school and government policies and priorities continue to promote science over humanities subjects we risk producing citizens with a narrow world view.

The US National Intelligence Council (2017) article warns of the likelihood of increased conflict within and between societies, with more accessible technology creating more destructive weapons on a greater scale than ever before. If the focus of our young people’s education is on how they can build bigger and better technology rather than why they should, the consequences could be catastrophic.





I hope that current and future leaders in Education within New Zealand and overseas will fully consider the implications of these and any other trends they promote. No one wants to be eaten alive by their own creation.





References




OECD. (2016) Trends Shaping Education 2016, OECD Publishing, Paris. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1787/trends_edu-2016-en



CORE Education (2018) Ten Trends https://www.core-ed.org/research-and-innovation/ten-trends/2018



National Intelligence Council. (2017). Global trends: The Paradox of Progress. National Intelligence Council: US. Retrieved from https://www.dni.gov/files/images/globalTrends/documents/GT-Main-Report.pdf



Image: University of Utah, Humanities Department

Using social online networks in teaching or professional development (Activity 5)

I’m not a fan of social media. I hate Facebook, I don’t tweet and I have never instagrammed. I don’t want to see daily pictures of someone’s pets, no matter how matter how cute, and I don’t need to see pictures of what they had for breakfast. Even if it looks mouth-wateringly amazing. Especially if it looks mouth-wateringly amazing.

But to me professional networks are quite different to social media in their purpose and use.

For many years I have been a member of a Japanese teachers email group which communicates regularly whenever someone is need of advice, ideas or resources. This has been and continues to be a useful forum for Japanese teachers, especially as many of us are geographically isolated and most schools only have one teacher of Japanese.

In 2016 I started using a messaging app called “Line” to communicate with my students in preparation for our trip to Japan. This app allows group or individual chats, and we use real names so everyone knows who is saying what. Before we even got to Japan students were using the app to message each other and me about fundraising activities, what to pack for the trip etc. We found this so useful that on our return we created a group for our whole class which students used to communicate with each other throughout the year and while revising for their exams.

Other types of electronic communication have also been useful in my teaching. Yesterday my Year 9 class created this padlet to practice saying what they like in Japanese. Everyone contributed their ideas in a safe and non-threatening way.


https://padlet.com/barberj2/v4cgcp5a2kod

All of these appeal to me as I prefer to know who I am communicating with. Apps or websites such as Pinterest or Twitter have a multitude of materials and can be really useful to search for new ideas and find out what people are doing in other countries but without a personal connection they don’t hold my interest, and I find these quickly become time-wasting and distracting, although I know other teachers who find them invaluable.

During the uLearn conference last year I became aware of various types of social networking being used by teachers. Several primary teachers use applications such as Seesaw for communicating with parents and showcasing student work. Mention was also made of class and student blogs being used effectively.

The Innovative Pedagogy report from Open University (Sharples et al, 2016) gives some fascinating examples of how social media is being used to enhance teaching and learning. The idea of tweeting in Middle English is something I have never heard of but sounds like a wonderful way to engage modern day students with language, ideas and concepts from long ago.

Melhuish (2013) cautions that social networking by teachers is not particularly beneficial unless it can be measured by data and informed by inquiry questions and evidence. I would disagree with this as in my personal experience, many teachers have found the informal learning driven by their immediate needs to be extremely useful as they are quickly able to gain insights and advice from experienced colleagues in a range of contexts.

Use of social media by teachers to connect with each other can be very beneficial but care should be taken when engaging with students over the internet. Blurring of lines between personal and professional connections can easily occur. The code of professional standards for the teaching profession (Education Council, 2018) makes it clear that teachers are to demonstrate a high standard of professional behaviour and integrity, and to engage in ethical and professional relationships with learners that respect professional boundaries. It is important that teachers consider this before instigating online interactions with students or parents.



References


Melhuish, K.(2013). Online social networking and its impact on New Zealand educators’ professional learning. Master Thesis. The University of Waikato. Retrieved on 05 May, 2015 from http://researchcommons.waikato.ac.nz/bitstream/handle/10289/8482/thesis.pdf?sequence=3&isAllowed=y



Sharples, M., de Roock , R., Ferguson, R., Gaved, M., Herodotou, C., Koh, E., Kukulska-Hulme, A., Looi,C-K, McAndrew, P., Rienties, B., Weller, M., Wong, L. H. (2016). Innovating Pedagogy 2016: Open University Innovation Report 5. Milton Keynes: The Open University. Retrieved from http://proxima.iet.open.ac.uk/public/innovating_pedagogy_2016.pdf

Our Code, Our Standards (2018) Code of Professional Responsibility and Standards for the Teaching Profession, Education Council Aotearoa New Zealand retrieved from https://educationcouncil.org.nz/sites/default/files/Our%20Code%20Our%20Standards%20web%20booklet%20FINAL.pdf

A reflection on ethics in my practice.

A reflection on ethics in my practice.

The digital age has brought with it a minefield of potential ethical dilemmas, but with advance thought and planning to put procedures in place, the stress and angst for all can be minimised.

Plagiarism in Internal Assessment

My reflection follows the DIEP model as used by the University of Melbourne, and discusses an incident of plagiarism uncovered in my department last year.

Describe what happened

One of our internal assessments for Languages is to produce a portfolio of writing in the target language. The standard is very flexible allowing for a range of topics and text types to be produced. The criteria for the assessment of the standard is clear but the way in which it is administered is left entirely up to teachers and departments.

Some schools insist on all work being carried out in class under the teacher’s eye, with only print resources available for reference and not the internet or anything electronic. This is the way writing assessments used to be carried out years ago, and for teachers who continue to assess this way they can be sure the work handed in is authentic and chances of cheating are minimised.

However the Languages department at our school embraces the use of technology in our teaching and learning, and we also understand that some students do their best work at 2am in their own space at home. Some people really get into the topic they are writing about and they want to spend more time on it than we can afford to give in class. So we operate on a high trust model but we have robust schoolwide procedures that we follow to check for authenticity.

Unfortunately, on the odd occasion a student does try to copy something they have found on the internet. Last year a student from the Spanish class handed in a film review which was suspiciously good. The student had not submitted a draft for feedback and the teacher had not seen any of this work being completed in class time. The work was submitted in a google doc and the teacher could see from the history that it had been pasted as a whole block.

Interpret the events

So following the processes set out in our school guidelines, the teacher had a “conversational check” to see if the student knew what she had written.

When the teacher was not satisfied with the answers given she called me in as HOD and we questioned the student together. A confession from the student followed and as we had clearly defined processes in place we were able to follow these without having to angst over the personal situation of the student or the circumstances of the breach.

Evaluate the effectiveness

When the incident occurred I felt fortunate that our school had such robust assessment procedures in place. Our NZQA liaison officer has put a lot of time and effort into creating documents covering our policies and procedures which are shared with students, parents and teachers so everyone is clear on what is expected of them and what will happen should breaches occur. This makes occurrences of plagiarism rare, and when it did occur the pressure was off the teacher and myself as HOD when it came to dealing with the student and we were able to show our core value pono by acting in a respectful and fair manner, following a transparent process.

Plan for the future

Our department is already in the habit of going through assessment procedures with our students at the start of the year. However the student involved in this particular case was not a native English speaker, and she joined the class later in the year after the assessment discussions had already taken place. Our plan for the future is to ensure that whenever a new student joins a senior class we make sure she is given the assessment policies and procedures document and that we check that she understands it.

Our students are our most important stakeholders and while we want each individual to achieve highly, the integrity of the system and the fairness to all students means we need to consider the implications of any ethical decisions we make not just on the whole of the current cohort but on future ones as well.

References

Image - By Madhumathi S V (Own work) [CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

DIEP model - University of Melbourne - Academic Skills video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SntBj0FIApw

Education Council. (2017). Our Code Our Standards.Retrieved from: https://educationcouncil.org.nz/sites/default/files/Our%20Code%20Our%20Standards%20web%20booklet%20FINAL.pdf

Contribution of teacher inquiry topics to my communities of practice

Currently, I can identify two communities of practice I am involved in. Wenger (2000) describes a community of practice as having three main components: a sense of shared enterprise, mutual engagement and the development of communal resources. I think two of the communities I belong to fit that definition.

First would be the NZAJLT (New Zealand Association of Japanese Language Teachers) who don't meet in person often but do communicate regularly online. Our community contains a forum for problems and questions shared and solutions offered by members, building mutual trust and contributing to shared resources.

Second would be the eLearning Professional Learning Group I am involved with at school. This group meets about twice a term and our shared domain is to promote responsible and current eLearning practices within our school. Members of the group share best practice with each other and run workshops for staff which they can choose to attend.

I have yet to decide on a topic for my inquiry. Last week while thinking about personalised learning I thought that in future I should include more goal setting with students to build individual pathways to suit their needs, and this could become part of an inquiry. A wise friend who commented on my post pointed out that group goals could be more attainable, and I think she is onto something.

I had already been considering including gamification in my Year 10 course next year and I think following the steps I learnt about last week to make the learning more personalised, it will fit in well with a gamified course. I didn’t want to just separate tasks into “must do, could do” as I think some people would stop at the must do and not go any further. But perhaps if we work together to set clear, achievable goals for our learning and introduce the added incentives that gaming produces, it could keep everyone engaged.

Our school uses Schoology as a Learning Management System. It has a built in markbook and it also has the ability to assign badges to students for any achievement. If any readers are Schoology users and / or have experience with gamification I would love if you could share some ideas with me. This topic would be something I could share with my eLearning community at school.

My other idea was to look into how to use technology tools to encourage more quantity and quality in my students’ Japanese writing. This year we have had Dr Ian Hunter at our school to run workshops around the  “Write that essay” programme. He showcased the online tool they use which gives examples of types of sentences and provides scaffolding such as writing templates. This programme has enjoyed huge success in both increasing the output of student writing and also the quality of their work and I am interested in finding out if the same concepts can apply in other languages.

As part of this inquiry I would need to develop the templates and other materials such as help sheets for Japanese myself. I can see how some of the tools we have seen and used in the Mind Lab course could be useful here, along with some ideas from the ULearn conference I attended in October. This topic would be of more interest to my Japanese teaching colleagues so I could share my findings and related resources I create with my NZALT community.

Or maybe I’ll think of something else entirely! The great thing about teaching in New Zealand is that we have a lot of flexibility and freedom in our curriculum design so the sky’s the limit when it comes to inquiry.

References

Wenger, E.(2000). Communities of practice and social learning systems. Organization,7(2), 225-246.

https://www.writethatessay.org/

Write that Essay is a ground-breaking academic writing programme transforming writing outcomes in schools today.

Developed by educator and author Dr Ian Hunter, the programme is anchored in Dr Ian’s unique skill-based approach to the cross-curriculum development of writing ability.

Future Oriented Teaching and Learning

A Change in my practice towards Future Oriented Teaching and Learning:

Personalised Learning

I have always been a fan of learner agency, before I even knew it was called that. When I first started teaching, I quickly came to realise that not everyone learns at the same pace.

For as long as I can remember, I have designed and provided booklets for each of the Japanese alphabets that showed how to write the symbols and included a series of puzzles and activities that learners could proceed through at their own pace. To complement the booklet, a series of four graded tests were printed out and placed in boxes for students to attempt when they felt ready.

As advances with technology have been made and I discovered the flipped classroom model and other possibilities on my Mind Lab journey, I have become interested in finding new tools to help personalise learning to a much greater extent in other aspects of my practice as well.

To further understand the concept, I watched this video by Jill Pellegrini which gives a clear definition of personalised learning as opposed to individualised and differentiated learning.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKtr8BY65sM  

It also provides a series of steps which can be followed in a personalised learning model.

1. Know your learner
2. Set goals and plan together
3. Build individual pathways with students
4. Provide appropriate resources and assessments
5. Collect data, monitor progress, make adjustments as required

While I know my learners quite well and am good at finding and designing engaging and appropriate resources, I realise I usually skip steps 2 and 3. We set goals and plan together on a whole class level but not with each individual, and so I think they lack purpose at times and their pathways could be a bit haphazard.

This is something I would like to make an effort with next year, particularly with my Year 10 class as there is a wide range of abilities in that group and they are not so constrained with curriculum since they don’t have NCEA exams in Year 10. An idea to explore for my next inquiry project, maybe?

The report “Supporting future-oriented learning and teaching: A New Zealand perspective” published by the Ministry of Education (2012) states that personalised learning moves the focus away from the current “one size fits most” system and the existing assessment-driven curriculum to a system where the learner needs and interest are central, and everything else revolves around them.

The benefits given are many: to foster and encourage engaged and independent learners, support every person to develop to their full potential and to really own their learning.

The resource gives the metaphor of a “networked campground” as a personalised learning model. It has a central base where the teacher is available to help and various paths branching out from here along which a learner can choose to follow.

While I like the concept, the image that came to my mind is a train station.

Ueno Station, Tokyo, May 29, 2017

The train station is a busy but calm place. It is the central hub of every community, big or small. Everyone has a purpose for being there, with different destinations in mind. Some will spend approximately 3 minutes in the station before jumping on a bullet train and hurtling towards their destination at 200 k/h. Others will spend a lot longer in the station and will only leave it for short walks, and then with a friend.

I hope I will be able to get my students on board with personalised learning journeys as the destinations are almost limitless. I already have a huge amount of material available on our LMS so it will just take some thought and reorganisation to make this possible. I need to step back from always being the train driver and spend more time with my passengers to ensure they have a great travel experience.

However I have discovered there is only so far I can go as one teacher in a single cell classroom. Most of the research I have found on personalised learning took place in Modern Learning Environments or open plan classrooms where several teachers were available as learning advisors for small groups of students, with flexible timetabling and hours.

Wanner and Palmer (2015) researched a University Course using the flipped classroom model to explore personalised learning for their students. They found that students enjoyed freedom of choice but needed clear structure and guidance. Staff found preparing flipped activities time consuming and they realised assessment needed to meet the flexibility of the learning. A very valid point - how to assess when everyone is learning different things?

The Ministry of Education report (2012) describes ‘Unbundling’ as "a process in which innovators deconstruct established structures and routines and reassemble them in newer, smarter ways". It seems to me that while my school continues to follow the silo model rather than unbundle, it will be difficult for me to go the full distance with personalised learning.

But we all have to start somewhere, right?

References

Pellegrini, J  Differentiated vs. Individualized vs. Personalized (Youtube video) Sept 27 2016

Ministry of Education.(2012). Supporting future-oriented learning and teaching: A New Zealand perspective. Retrieved from https://www.educationcounts.govt.nz/publications/schooling/109306

Wanner, T., & Palmer, E. (2015). Personalising learning: Exploring student and teacher perceptions about flexible learning and assessment in a flipped university course. Computers & Education, 88, 354-369.