Student Success in Sexuality Standard: Small Steps

From the 2018 Year 12 Health students, there was lots of feedback around workload for assessments. Many found there was a significant amount to do, and as a result some became demotivated. This was particularly evident in the Sexuality and Gender assessment, because many students did not hand in the assessment at all, or did not complete it (reducing their potential grade), and this was mentioned several times in the end of year feedback.

The assessment had 3 tasks in 2018. 3 tasks that required lots of evidence to support their explanations. SO. MUCH. MARKING. Using student feedback, and my desire to decrease teacher workload too, this year I reduced the assessment to 2 tasks, with less questions than previously. I cannot recall actually creating an assessment task before, aside from during uni, but by using examples from other schools, TKI, and NZQA exemplars/clarifications, I felt confident the students had the potential to meet any levels of achievement to demonstrate their learning, even with less than 2/3 of what they were previously asked to do. As a safety barrier, and a confidence booster, I asked Rachael Dixon from NZHEA to have a read through, to double check the task was suitable before the final step of the standard moderation process. 

Not surprisingly, there was an increase in the number of submission of assessments, as well as the motivation to complete the assessment tasks this year. With less to do, and the same amount of time (as well as emphasising they were lucky to have 2 tasks instead of 3), I feel overall the reduction of workload for the assessment made a positive difference. This is from my own interactions with students; the conversations I have with them, as well as as the below data (see another post with data/results comparison here). 

There has been a considerable increase in the amount of students who are passing with an Achieved, rather than Not Achieving when compared to last year. This is a win for me! The next step is to increase depth of understanding to encourage more students to achieve with Merit or an Excellence. To do so, I would like to spend time getting students to mark exemplars from previous years, and justifying why they gave that mark with the marking criteria. I didn't do this in class for gender and sexuality this year, but I did do peer marking with a practice scenario (the kids struggled grading their peers though, in case they hurt each other's feelings). Students marked and justified grades for the external, and were really engaged, as well as accurate with their grades and justifications, so I think this may help with understanding of what to do to meet each level of achievement for the gender and sexuality assessment next year.

Interestingly, when I compare the feedback from 2018 students to 2019 students, majority of students said their favourite topic and assessment was gender and sexuality last year, but this year the favourite topic was spread evenly across the 4 units/assessments. So even though many rated the unit lower for enjoyment than last year, there was still a greater pass rate. I'm looking forward to seeing next year how the cohort engage with the content, and seeing whether the results continue to grow!

Hanging With Healthies

This post is a very long time coming (even though it's pretty short!). Words cannot begin to describe how many times I have tried to sit down to write this post, but other matters have popped up during the end of year madness! Hoping to get back on the blogging roll over the next few weeks. 

In the October holidays, I attended the inaugural New Zealand Health Education Association (NZHEA) 3 day conference - #empoweringhealthed, which made me walk away feeling incredibly inspired. Prior to the conference I was feeling rather flat, like I had lost a bit of passion and excitement about teaching. I just needed a break and a few days learning with some awesome, like minded educators from around NZ. 

I am grateful for this opportunity, including being asked to share some of my 'go to' relationship activities (see presentation slides below - if you would like more information about the resources or activities, feel free to comment below or contact me through Twitter). I was considerably more nervous about 'presenting' this time compared to last year at PENZ, but had positive feedback from those who were present.

I attended a variety of workshops, but the three that left me thinking were; Health Scholarships, Senior Health Courses, and Integrated Learning. Next year I hope to be involved more with HPE Schols, as I have tried to learn more about them this year, and have a few students interested. Alongside this, I want to give our Level 2 Health programme a bit of a change, based off of student results and student feedback (post about this to come post exams). Attending a session about Senior courses was helpful to understand the Level 1 & 3 courses, as well as discuss with other teachers what they include in their programmes. Finally, Orewa is heading towards a huge shakeup in 2020 with integrated learning, which I am incredibly excited about, so thought getting the juices flowing now would be helpful in the long run. I now have several ideas to put into action over the next few months!

Two activities I enjoyed participating in, and want to share as they could be used in several Health settings were The Deal Of Life resource and a Character Strengths Test. They are both very engaging and enjoyable, with teachable moments. 

These three days were full on, but I left feeling full in my heart and my mind, and excited for next year's classes. I really enjoy teaching PE, but there is something quite special about teaching Health. This conference, the organisers and the attendees reminded me of this. Reminded me that there is always so much more to learn, to give, to create, to share, so I need to continue to challenge myself to be the best I can be for my students.