Wow, I Really Have Learnt A Lot!

I currently have a Pre Service Teacher under my wing, and she asked me some questions to ignite her thinking. They actually encouraged a lot of reflection of my own practice, and really demonstrated over the last (nearly) 5 years how much I have actually grown as a teacher, especially reading through my blog posts I have written. 

The questions asked were;

- When you teach your HPE lessons how do you get your students to demonstrate student agency (choice and ownership) of their own learning?

- How do you encourage students to problem solve and critically think?

- How do you acknowledge students' prior knowledge and experiences?

- What interesting learning activities/experiences do you provide when designing a unit plan?

- How do you embody/apply the principles of inclusion and/or biculturalism in your teaching practice?

- How do you include digital technology in your teaching practice?

I would encourage everyone to take the time to answer these questions irrespective how long you have been teaching. They really got me thinking, and shows me the knowledge I have developed over the last 5 years, and helps my student teacher!

Classroom Management: More Than A Waiting Game

Over the last three years, I have volunteered for Physical Education New Zealand, specifically the Auckland branch. See more about this in an earlier blog post. Usually we (the Graduate Mentoring team) run three face to face sessions for beginning teachers throughout the year, but this year have held off and decided to host two online sessions. On Monday, our session was focused around behaviour and classroom management strategies, using the below scenarios to create discussion. 

Although the session was designed for new teachers, it was a great reminder of all of the different tools and strategies we can use in the classroom, to help with behaviour management. Put yourself in the 'walls' of these classrooms, and think about how you would respond. 

- Do you think your response has changed the longer you have been teaching? Why/Why not?

- Do you think your response would be the same if they were Junior students or Senior students? 

- Have you considered restorative practice, before jumping to punitive measures? (See this post and/or this post for information about restorative conversations)

- Should you respond to the scenario immediately, or a little later? When? Why?

The inspiration for this post came about when I met my student teacher this week, and we were discussing her goals for her practicum. One of the Learning Outcomes is to Apply a range of strategies to manage student behaviour, clearly aligning with the scenarios! So I have given these to my student teacher, for her to reflect on how she would respond now with no teaching experience and then once she has some teaching under her belt, we will have another look. I think this simple activity will ignite great reflection and discussion, and is an activity any teacher could do regardless of their experience.

I found the below visual which explains some strategies that can be used in the classroom, here. In addition to these, there are sooo many other strategies/tools that can be utilised such as; 

• Tone and/or volume of voice
• Physical placement and proximity to students
• Countdown verbally and/or with fingers
• "I've noticed you aren't yourself lately..."
• Observations of students in other subjects
• Whistles
• Music
• Differentiated learning activities
• Student choice
• Challenge and competition
• Discussions and plans made with other teachers
• Activities including student interests/hobbies
  

Ultimately, every teacher, every class, every student and every situation is going to be different. One day one strategy may work and the next day it may not. But that's the beauty of teaching - we have to be flexible all the time!

Highlights & Challenges: A Visual

Throughout the year I have volunteered again for Auckland PENZ, helping with the Graduate Mentoring Programme supporting beginning teachers and undergraduate students (see last years post here). At one of our sessions, Sarah Loomb from Alfriston College showed us this reflection tool - draw 9 things that have stood out for you so far this year including highlights and challenges. I thought this was a great idea for an end of term 3 reflection, and a great visual. I ran a session with the first and second year teachers at Orewa, with the focus around the practising teacher criteria and registration, then used this to discuss what criteria it may give evidence and reflection for. So what do they mean to me?

Snow Camp

I was lucky enough to attend one of the Level 3 Outdoor Ed trips to Mt Ruapehu in August. I learnt more about risk management, including preventative measures and responses when things do happen. On our first day up the mountain, there was an avalanche that made the news and we went into lock down with kids as a precaution. This is a once in a lifetime experience, and one that I will never forget. The biggest thing I took away from this trip was the importance of everyone being prepared for the outdoors and to stay calm!

Associate Teacher

As previously blogged about, I was an associate teacher earlier in the year. This was both a (positive) challenge and a highlight, because I learnt a lot about myself but found it hard to leave him to do his thing! Trying to teach someone how to teach, but also ensuring the students were still learning/achieving what I wanted them to achieve was difficult, but great for my own development. 

Integrated Unit

I am getting very very excited for the 2020 integrated curriculum. I think it’s going to be incredible for the kids, but I’m also starting to feel a little anxious about how everything is going to pan out! Creating a unit with 5 other people has been hard. Very hard. We all want what is best for the kids, and our subjects, but sometimes these wants don’t align. The group I’m part of though, have all been quite flexible and accepting of these differences and tried to make it work. We are quite lucky we are somewhat compatible with one another! 

The one thing I don’t like about this process though, is that we aren’t guaranteed to teach the unit we’ve developed next year. There will be 75 students with three subject specialist teachers - but these teachers could be anyone from the department! So it may not be the other person or I in our integrated group, which will be disappointing after investing so much time and effort into creating the unit.

Teaching with Adam 

This year Adam and I share a Level 3 PE class. We don’t co-teach like I did in first year, we have half of the periods on the timetable each. I was really nervous to see how this would work for a variety of reasons; Adam and I teach quite differently, he is much more experienced than me, Level 3 students may be hard to motivate and the time we would need to plan together. Don’t get me wrong, it’s been hard, but not for most of these reasons (the kids have certainly been hard to motivate!). I believe we’ve worked well together, trying to find a balance between what we both want in the lessons as well as what we want the students to learn/achieve. Our communication between each other has thankfully been our strength. 

What I’ve actually struggled with is the content; what I need to teach to ensure all the kids have the possibility to achieve an Excellence. Adam is knowledgeable and experienced, so he knows the course in and out, but I don’t. Throughout the year I’ve tried to ask lots of questions, and read lots of information, but I never felt like I fully grasped the big picture of what the kids were learning, what the purpose was. As a result I feel guilty that I didn’t give all students the chance to achieve an E, purely because I didn’t fully know how to support them to get there. If I was to teach this course again, with the baseline understanding I have now I feel I could minimise the risk of this happening again.

11PE Class

I have drawn angel emojis because that is how I refer to my Year 11s - my absolute angels. I have been really lucky to have a class that enjoys learning, are actively involved and supportive of one another. I look forward to teaching this class because they are a dream. Many still struggle with learning difficulties and we still have P.E. is not P.A. chats from time to time - but the culture of the class is incredible! To paint a picture - during the last period of term the kids were all working peacefully on their assessment and there was only one passing comment about wanting to have a practical. This felt like a massive win!!

Working with new people 

I’ve touched on this briefly above, referring to snow camp, the integrated unit, and sharing a class. Additionally I’ve been in charge of a course (below), and taught courses alongside some different people and some the same from last year. Without going into too much detail, I’ve found some professional relationships really hard this year. It can be challenging to have some conversations with other teachers, when they are more experienced than you, have been around longer than you and/or have positions that you don’t have. I have quite a loud personality; I’m opinionated and happy to stand up for what I think. This can be problematic. I’m having to learn when to bite my tongue and how to change my tone of voice to ensure my intentions are clear, are positive and are not treading on anyone’s toes. Because every challenging conversation I have, needs to be approached differently.

Strike Day

A momentous occasion that’ll be part of NZ history. I felt proud to be a teacher walking down Queen Street, but also immensely sad how the negotiations played out. This was an emotional roller coaster for me, having to constantly remind myself how I teach for the kids not money, but how overworked and undervalued I feel. The process certainly reminded me why I love teaching, but I also noticed I felt deflated and reduced the amount of time I invested in schoolwork at home.

Teacher In Charge of 12Health

Being in charge of a course has meant I’ve learnt more about moderation procedures, planning senior units, facilitating meetings and adapting the course from student feedback. I plan to write an entire blogpost about this later in the year!

Certificates 

I’ve previously blogged about what the Miss D is proud certificates are here, and student feedback here. This has been a considerable highlight of my year. I get warm fuzzies when I send the certificates home, and look forward to it! I decided to send them on Friday mornings, which has been a great way to end each week - particularly when I’ve had a stressful or horrible week. 

Overall this visual has been a great way to reflect on many things throughout the year, and recommend others to do the same! One term to go...

Associate & Student Teachers - Partners in Growth

Last term I was an Associate Teacher for a student teacher for 4 weeks. Because of being involved with the MDTA, I was observed and given feedback regularly. As a result I feel I grew quite quickly and gained confidence in my practice and my appreciation and ability to use criticism/feedback to grow. I was excited to have a student teacher because this was a great opportunity to continue to grow, as well as reflect on how far I have come in 3 and a bit years. 

I feel, like a student teacher, I was completely thrown in the deep end as I was given no 'how-to' guide or suggestions of how to actually be an AT. Of course this has disadvantages, but I tried to embrace it. Using the information from the university handbook and discussions with my student teacher, I feel I did pretty well to support him in his first placement, even though he was only with me for one Senior class. He had already identified goals for himself, and had actually already taught a couple of years overseas, so we decided straight away he would join me in the deep end quite quickly - this is something upon reflection he said he was grateful for, to just get in there as soon as possible and actually teach. This was something I also appreciated when I was a student teacher - AT's who essentially handed their classes over but were supportive in the process.

He also said he appreciated the honest feedback and feedforward I gave him. After each of his lessons I took time to comment on his strengths and identified possible work ons. I felt proud when he took the feedback on board and strengthened both his strengths and weaknesses in future lessons. If I were to have a student teacher again, I would like to have these post lesson discussions as more of a conversation. I feel I could have facilitated a conversation, by asking probing questions to encourage further reflection, rather than the student teacher listing their strengths/work ons and then me doing the same. Next time, I would like to guide the student teacher to consider additional work ons than they initially identified and then we could discuss how and why that area could be adapted (as opposed to me describing how and why). 

I think only being with him for one class was quite difficult, as this meant we didn't have many opportunities for conversations unless they were planned. Having more time with a student teacher would have supported me to give feedback on their growth, see them teach in different lights, as well as further possible impromptu conversations. I also think it would have supported the student teacher to develop a closer relationship with their AT, which may have encouraged more open/honest questions and discussion.

Observing his teaching really made me notice everything I have learnt along my journey so far. Things I take for granted that I consider naturally, and have forgotten that I do (albeit how well!). Transition times between activities, the use of open ended questions, and the use of student names for instance. The biggest thing I realised, was the understanding about and of NCEA I have - I should have spent more time explaining what NCEA actually is, and the importance of assessments and hand in protocols for example (I certainly did not understand any of this information as a first year teacher!). I certainly still have a long way to go as a teacher myself, but having a student teacher increased my confidence in my own growth and was a great reminder of some of the basics. I can't wait to have another in the future to support this growth further, and not to mention learn further activity ideas and resources!