New Zealand Educational Trends
The New Zealand Education Review Office in 2012 has three areas for priority learners that we should all be focused on if students are to be at the heart of learning.
- Shifting the focus to student centred
- Responsive and rich curriculum
- Using assessment information to know about, and plan for students' learning
I am going to focus on shifting the focus to student centred as I believe I was doing that until I read the article from ERO and realised there were many more elements to being student centred, which is great for my thinking and classroom practice.
Many educational environments are shifting the focus of their classrooms to being student centred but there needs to be an understanding from the staff involved to how this may happen. To what this looks like and sounds like, to what this is like for the children and their families as this shift involves the students to become a partner in their learning. This is a beneficial shift for Maori children as this helps provide good opportunities for them to bring what they know and their ways of knowing and making sense of the world. (ERO, 2012) In my situation our school community comprises of 24% migrant children therefore the same philosophy applies to them.
It involves the students taking on Leadership Roles with their learning. They need to be involved with the planning process of the next steps, their goals, reporting on their progress to their parents. We do discuss the next goals but I know I need to develop their learning rubrics so the children can identify their next learning step.
Teaching as Inquiry ERO, (2012) shows the connection between deliberate teaching and learning is not yet well developed. It states the teachers are creating opportunities to learn and leaders are advocating this, many are not focussed the deeper more critical element of the relationship between achievement, progress and teaching. To have this would be promoting accelerated learning opportunities. A fine example to me was when I undertook the ALiM ( Accelerated Learning in Mathematics) programme in 2016. I had always thought I was competent in teaching maths but I did struggle with how to get through to those children who historically weren't succeeding as they were coming through the years. After the professional development we received and critically analysing our teaching practice, we were able to then develop a programme which was rigorous, stimulating and ultimately successful for our target group, of which were 20% migrant children. Accelerated learning works best when teachers and learners try different approaches to teaching and learning which might benefit the students.
Many of my questions and thoughts relate around the idea that if we could be less obsessed with academic standards and qualifications and place more emphasis on values and attitudes to problem solving and life(Hood, 2015), would this create learners who are more equipped with life after school and make them reflect more on their passions to find success from different avenues?
References -
Education Review Office. (2012).
ERO (2012) Teaching as Inquiry: Responding to learners. Wellington: Education Review Office.
Hood, D. (2015) The Rhetoric and the Reality: New Zealand Schools and Schooling in the 21st Century Fraser Books.
I am a great believer in developing learners who can take control of their learning. It can be such fun to work with them when they are so engaged! I'd be really interested in your rubrics when you make them. I have successfully used some with Y3/4 students. When I had a go a couple of years ago for my Y6 the end result we so 'full' that the children were overwhelmed by them and found it hard to identify what they could already do and what was their next step. Shamefully I haven't got around to revising/simplifying these.
ReplyDeleteI know ALiM is a huge amount of work, so it is good to hear it was worthwhile.
Thank you Sharon for commenting. Yes over time I have tried creating rubrics with my children and they love the ownership of having a go at them but I also used to use my 'creative license' and make them user friendly in the final copies. The children were happy about this as they still had a part in the creating. Yes ALiM was a lot of work but it certainly helped transform my thinking about maths delivery to those children who are always "stuck".
DeleteI connected with your comments around developing student leaders. We often talk about 'Teachers as Leaders' of their own practice so why can't this also be the case for 'Students as Leaders' of their learning? I think this could have many strong possibilities and your learning rubrics will be a helpful to guide their journey.
ReplyDeleteI too undertook ALiM last year and agree that it led to me critically analysing my practice both in mathematics and in other areas. Having the time to try deliberate and targeted teaching techniques with a set group of children on such a regular basis really showed the difference it can make. Those children took ownership of that time and were so engaged and now I see them becoming leaders in my class this year and becoming "Keachers" (Kids as Teachers) trying to pass on their new learning to others. Such a powerful thing when you see their attitudes to their learning completely flip around. Surely it's these kind of skills we want to keep developing in our students.
Thank you for your comment. I love your idea of 'Keachers'. As we start into this year I feel the children that were in my target group have grown in confidence and now with trying to teach those skills to my other children, it has made me realise how far the target children have come. I think we need to keep developing these skills to develop our children for the future.
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