Student Voice & Planning - Under Construction

After reading Karen's post about feedback from her students at the end of a project, this encouraged me to reflect on my planning process and share how I too, am trying to include student voice in my planning.

Over the holidays I developed a brief unit outline for a Year 10 Exploring Substances unit, brainstorming the major topics I would like to teach . I teach six Year 10 Health classes, which are somewhat streamed, but I don't have time to develop six different units. I decided I would need to differentiate along the way with specific learning activities instead (such as adding in extension questions for the higher level learners, or changing word for the lower literacy learners). I also had designed the outline on my own, and really wanted the students current knowledge and interests to be included in the unit outline too.

Because I have around 140 students to cater for, I decided the easiest way to formatively assess students knowledge was through the use of a Google Form. As below, the Form asked a series of questions related to the topics I was interested to teach the students. From the students answers, collated into a Google Sheet, I could quickly see where the students had gaps in their knowledge (e.g. classes of drugs) and where students had greater knowledge (e.g. basic understanding of addiction). 

I then asked students to send me a personal email explaining what they would like to learn about during the exploring substances unit. I, like Karen, find it difficult to motivate students to share their thoughts honestly. Many of the students said 'anything' or 'whatever you want to teach', rather than taking this an an opportunity to have their say in their learning. This is something I am trying to change slowly.  I made the below Wordle to illustrate the most common words students used in their email requests, as majority of the students did flick me an email. 

After reading through student responses on the Google Sheet and reading each email, I used these to reshape my unit plan to suite my 140 learners in Year 10 currently. Although the unit is not individualised for every class, and definitely not for every student, the unit provides me with a skeleton to teach from, and is a great base for next year.

Similar to Karen, I will be sending out the same Google Form at the end of the term as a summative assessment of learning, and will also send students another Form to provide feedback about the unit. I am hoping by the end of the term (5 more lessons of Health), students will feel more comfortable to express what they would have changed/liked more of. Their feedback will support the Exploring Substances unit for next year, as well as their unit next term.

I feel it is super important for me to try and differentiate between classes and learners, but with so many classes this year my priority is trying to develop skeleton unit plans which can be built upon, with greater student voice in the future. As the unit plan is all over the place at the moment, I will share some of my skeleton units later in the term!

Our Muscly Bodies

As previously posted, in 11PE we are currently exploring human anatomy. After the skeletal system, we then learnt about the musculoskeletal system.

Last year I taught Year 12 and 13 PE, and throughout the anatomy units I realised the students had a considerable gap in their knowledge. Many of the students had taken Year 11 or 12 PE in the previous year, so would have learnt about the bones and muscles, but unfortunately could not recall much of the previous learning. As a result I knew I needed to spend lots of time building students confidence and competence in Year 11, in hope to support progress moving into Years 12/13.

I have been trying to include activities which encourage students to recall the bones and muscles, but also apply their knowledge so that they are thinking a little more in depth, and also hopefully activities which they enjoy! I found an activity on Twitter where students wear jumpsuits and draw on the muscles and bones of the body, so we gave this a go yesterday!

By having students work in small groups to create the musculoskeletal system, I could quickly see which students needed some extra support and who were more confident. I liked being able to work with students one on one or in their small groups, in a relaxed environment, where they were really learning! By actually seeing a life size version of the musculoskeletal system, which they created, students were actively engaged in the activity and asking one another lots of questions. The discussion and collaboration between the students was incredible to see!

After the tracksuits, we moved outside to build on knowledge of the bones and muscles, introduce movements and revise muscle pairings. Simplistically, for every movement, there are always two major muscles (minimum) that create this movement. These two muscles are called the agonist or the antagonist, the muscle is either shortening or lengthening respectively. Additional muscles which support the movement are called synergist muscles.

The class were given chalk and asked to 'chalk their sport'. I gave the three groups one joint each (knee, hip and elbow), and asked them to think of one part of a sport where that joint is used, then label the joint, the movement and the bones and muscles (including the agonist and antagonist). Like the jumpsuit activity, I was able to discuss with students what they were creating in their groups and could easily identify who was confident. To extend the students a little further, I asked each group to explain their drawing with their peers including which muscle is lengthening and which is extending. 

I really enjoyed this lesson and feel confident the students all learnt at least one new thing, and many felt more confident with the application of anatomy. Moving forward I am looking forward to starting biomechanics soon (e.g. Balance & Stability/Levers) followed by exercise physiology!

I was also observed by Anne Sinclair for this lesson for additional evidence towards my registration. To see Anne's feedback, please head here! Additionally, please visit my appraisal site if you would like to see any of my other evidence.