CoL Inquiry Thoughts for 2024

What achievement challenge are you considering as an area of focus in 2024 and why? Include in your WHY both evidence and your own passion/expertise

Achievement Challenge 3 - Lift the achievement in reading for all students.

This was my inquiry focus for this year. I did a lot of learning, research and trialling before working with my inquiry group on the intervention. We focussed on a very particular piece of research to support, which was materials research. This meant that the actual intervention time was quite short. I would like to start next year using what I have learned this year straight away. I can then use this time to work with Marc more to learn more reading support methods. He has talked often this year about skimming and predicting. I want to know from him if this is something we can do with the research we have to do about artists and design eras.

I will be able to try. any new learning next year in two different curriculum areas - Design and Visual Communication and Visual Art.

In both areas, the students need to do a lot of reading about designers, artists and design eras. Their knowledge of these things is then used in their own work so a solid understanding is needed.


What learnings from the 2017 - 2023 CoL teacher inquiries have informed or inspired your thinking.

While listening to Robyn Anderson talk about how she gifts words to her students and they have to use these words in contexts throughout the session, it got me thinking about the very specialised, subject specific words that the students come across in all their subjects at secondary school. I must be quite overwhelming at times when they are coming in to secondary school behind where they should be in terms of words that they know then to have all these really specialised words used in lessons all the time. This has got me wondering how I can think about this in DVC. I had started this year to pull out some of the words that were in a specific reading and we looked at them in advance but I see that i need to be much more purposeful in my use of technical jargon. One of the things that the HOD English said to me at the start of the year was to have a focus on subject specific "jargon"


How would your work support Manaiakalani pedagogy and kaupapa?

There is a Manaiakalani wide focus on literacy,  reading and writing so my inquiry focus would fit in well with this. Trying to have a more cross curricular approach will help the students learn how to apply approaches across all of their subjects and not just think that is an "English" thing.

Which elements of the extensive Manaiakalani research findings inform or challenge you as you think about this?

The first thing that my Year 11 and Year 12 students do when they start DVC is a research project. They have to do a lot of reading. They are coming out of the junior school with lower than the national average PAT and asTTle scores so they are not in a position to cope with the demands of NCEA Level 1 then Level 2. The Manaiakalani research shows the increases that the students have made in Manaiakalani schools compared to non Manaiakalani schools but it is still hard for them. when they get to NCEA below where they should be.


How would you like to be supported in 2024 as you undertake this inquiry?

I would like to be able to work collaboratively with other teachers to create reading activities and could benefit more subjects areas. I am thinking this could be within Tamaki College and across different schools.

How would you plan to support your colleagues in your school with their inquiries and/or teaching in the area you are exploring?

This year, the CoL teachers at Tamaki College have been presenting our inquiry every term to the whole staff. During these sessions, we have been trying to get the staff to think about inquiry in a more open and unthreatening way.

All my planning work goes onto a public website and all my inquiry findings go onto a blog.

Inquiry 2023 - What teacher learning is needed to move forward?

 My inquiry focus this year is going to be literacy with a specific focus on reading. I broke down my thought about this at the end of last year when we were looking forward to what we could do in the following year. Blog post here. So far this year, I have looked at the data for my Year 11 class - know your learner 1 and know your learner 2. I have also talked with members of staff here at Tamaki College to see where they think that my inquiry focus sits in the big picture for the school - blog post here

Before I even think about what I will be doing with the students in regards to this inquiry focus, I need to look at myself and what my needs are.  

What have I done in the past?

• I have given links to where certain items of information is on the internet for students to click on and read them selves.
• Put specific information on my class site (either directly or on documents / presentations) for students to read.
• Supplied physical books on a particular subject for them to read.

Has this worked?

• These methods have not been successful as I was not taking into consideration the reading levels of the students and the information on the internet especially can be intimidating to them.
• Students have not been opening emails that I have sent them with the information / links etc in so they did not get chance to read what I have sent. (this was especially true of the Y9 food tech class)
• This was expecting a level of self motivated reading that was not supported. 

What I have put together in this diagram is a plan for me as the teacher to follow before I try anything new with my students.

Link to Google Drawing

CoL Inquiry Thoughts for Next Year

What achievement challenge are you considering as an area of focus in 2023 and why? Include in your WHY both evidence and your own passion/expertise

 Achievement Challenge 3 - Lift the achievement in reading for all students.

 The projects that my senior students have to do involve a lot of literacy work. They don't realize this when they sign up for DVC as they think it is all about drawing. They have to write a lot of analysis of their own work and read a lot to do the required research. To be able to apply what they have learned in their reading to their own designs is where this falls down as we have not been reading for understanding.

As a department, we have started working with Marc Milford, our school literacy specialist, on reading strategies. I had started trying them out a couple of times in my Y9 class, to get them to read the recipe for the following lesson’s practical session. I would put the resources together on the class site and send it out to them to access before the lesson and they would come to the practical session not knowing what they were going to do as they had not read it. Since working with Marc, we have been using the single session on a Friday afternoon to do the reading exercise to prepare for the following week. I have been taking the method from the recipe and breaking it down into an information transfer table as Marc showed us. I have also tried this with my senior classes with one of the materials research activities that they had to do. I combined it with the work on SOLO taxonomy that I have been doing for a long time. 

 Blog post about Year 9 reading information transfer

Blog post about Year 11 and Y13 reading information transfer using SOLO

 

What learnings from the 2017 - 2022 CoL teacher inquiries have informed or inspired your thinking.

 Robyn Anderson’s Reading for Enjoyment this year was great. It took the emphasis off the reading and put the focus onto enjoying what they were doing. 

It got me thinking that if I made the focus of the reading activities a more supported one, then they would get more out of it as it will be fulfilling a purpose and helping their project. I have been guilty of thinking I was being helpful by giving them links of where to do the research and readings but not supporting them in getting the most out of what was there.

 

How would your work support Manaiakalani pedagogy and  kaupapa?

 There is a Manaiakalani wide focus on literacy and especially reading at the moment so I think that it will fit in well, with a slightly different emphasis on reading for research purposes.

Which elements of the extensive Manaiakalani research findings inform or challenge you as you think about this?

 The fact that the students are coming out of Year 10 with a lower than average PAT reading score than the mean / norm for the country does not set them up well for attempting everything that NCEA throws at them. My students coming into Y11 next year will be below where they need to be in terms of their reading ability and understanding so everything that I give them to do in regards to research will be extra demanding for them. The first thing that my Y11 students do is a research standard where there is a lot of reading of information found about a chosen designer. I give them links to read through but this research has made me realize that is not enough support. They will need me to structure how they are reading this information so their understanding of what they are reading grows.

 

How would you like to be supported in 2023 as you undertake this inquiry?

 I always get a huge amount when I visit the classrooms of other teachers in Tamaki College and the classrooms of other schools in the CoL. Watching how literacy elements are approached by specialist teachers, both in the TC English department and intermediate schools. I have visited Robyn Anderson in the past when she was specifically doing literacy elements with her class.

Here are all the blog posts that involve Robyn's class.

The support that I would like would be the ability to visit a wider range of schools and age groups as they go about reading activities.

 

How would you plan to support your colleagues in your school with THEIR inquiries and/or teaching in the area you are exploring?

 All of my inquiry work always goes onto my blog so it is available for anyone to read and access all my resources. We are doing literacy / reading work within the department so my experiments and findings will be shared weekly in the department meetings. Sharing to all staff via emails of blog posts and presentations will be done throughout the year.

Acknowledging that while literacy is not the main focus of the subject it is an integral part of reaching those higher achievement levels. We all need to work together to help the students to realise that literacy / reading / writing is in every aspect of school / work / life.

Reading - The Writing Book

I have just started working through my copy of The Writing Book, by Sheena Cameron and Louise Dempsey.

I am in one of the first sections of the book where they are breaking down a modelled approach to writing. They are balancing the level of teacher support and structure to the level of independent student writing.

It is split into what the teacher does, what the teacher does with the whole class and smaller groups then what the students do by themselves.

Modelled writing

They are keen that you plan what you are going to say here, which I don't think will match with how I do things. I am more of a "wing it at the time", kind of presenter on the day ( but I am organised with what I present about !! ). What I liked though, was the planning to make sure you are covering the criteria of the specific task.

Also, they are wanting you to let the students know what the criteria are that the piece of writing is aimed towards.

My questions on my pink sticky note - when we I do the product analysis activities all together with my Year 11 class, should I have one completed (about a different product) to show them before we start so they know what we are aiming for. I do this when I an doing drawing activities - I always do the activity first and have these examples that I have done to show them before we start. Why did I think it would be any different for writing?



Shared Writing

I was pleased when I read through this section as it seems to fit quite nicely in what we do when we sit round the front desk and do product analysis all together.
I started doing this last year as an experiment and am continuing with it this year 

What I need to include more of when we are doing this is the actual structure of how to write the sentences. Do one example and instead of just allowing them to shout out the words and disjointed parts, get them to say exactly what we are going to write in a more structured way. It will take longer but it will be worth it.

I need to look more into "think, pair, share" to see if I can use it to any advantage.






Guided Writing

My thoughts here, when I am focussing on my Year 11 group, is "chunking" up the analysis and helping small groups / tables of students with each chunk. I can do this while they are working on their drawings. We can look at more analysis examples in smaller groups, talking about them together.
These chunks are based on the SOLO levels that we follow when working all together on the analysis.

• Identify and label
• Describe and list
• Explain and analyse
• Evaluate

Independent Writing

This is what i want them to do when they apply what we have been doing all together on their own design work. Now i am thinking that the exercise time might be extended into them having more products to analyse like this but on their own as practice.

I liked what I read about "peer check" as this is what I saw happening in Robyn anderson's classroom when I went to visit last term. Blog post here.


Just reading this small section at the start of this book has given me loads to think about and do so I will definitely be spending time working my way through this book.

What am I leaning from AsTTLe marking PD?

I have had another short session of going through an exemplar from the AsTTle marking moderation that the English Department have been working through. I had help making my way through each section of an exemplar, seeing what level I thought it was for each of the sections and comparing it to the supplied examples for that particular level. We looked above and below to see where it was sitting.
While I am not doing this with the intention of ever being responsible for any ACTUAL AsTTle marking, it is proving a very valuable experience in understanding what criteria the students have to fulfil in their writing in order to gain a level.

How can I use what I am learning?

Ideas - We can discuss ideas for the topic as a whole class or in small teams before they start to write.  We can put all our ideas together on shared docs or drawings. This can then support the students in their individual writing that they have to do and make sure that they are covering a range of ideas in their work. I have been building a lot more team work into tasks recently so this will fit in well with what I have already started doing.
How this fits in with SOLO taxonomy? - this fits in the multistructural level where the students are using information from multiple sources.

Structure and language - most of the time, the writing styles that my students are doing are description, analysis and reflection. In SOLO, this takes us from multistructural to relational through to extended abstract, depending on the depth that they do it.
I need to give them a support structure to write to where they can lay out their ideas, show development of the ideas and give reasons why. Some of the ideas that I got from my visit to Robyn's class will help here. Link to blog post about this here.
Guiding them to start with an introduction and end with a conclusion.

Organisation - Giving them a structure to write to to provide an organisation will help them get their thoughts in a meaningful order. Using some of my SOLO thinking charts will be a starting point here for my own planning but I need to make topic specific support material for the students to use. The more they use structures like this in their projects, they will get more used to writing this way as a normal thing. Guiding them to use paragraphs to layout their ideas so what they are saying is clear.

Vocabulary - I have been working on building more activities around subject specific vocabulary and I will continue with this as a high priority. The students need to hear and use the words on a regular basis if they are to get used to using them in their work.

Sentence structure - Having exemplars for them to read will be helpful here so they can see how to construct what they are saying and how to say it. I can get the project exemplars for them to look at from the NZQA website. This will keep it in the same context as they are working. We can also use the peer checking ideas that I saw being used in Robyn's classroom.
Going through exercises together to describe and analyse other products will help them to practice before doing this in their own projects.

Punctuation - The main punctuation that my students will use is the basic ones - full stops, capital letters, question marks, quotation marks, commas etc. Peer marking will help this as will ongoing feedback from the teacher as the project is progressing. These are things that can be corrected as the project goes along so it is not left till the end.

Spelling - My students get the choice of writing in their sketchbooks or typing up on the chrome books, so spelling is very dependent on these two things at the moment. The auto underline / correction of Google Docs is helpful when online. more use of the subject specific terms will get them used to spelling them. Having them available / viewable on the classroom walls will help too.

Planning for Literacy

My inquiry for this year was mainly focussed on using SOLO taxonomy to improve the depth of analysis of design work. As we have worked through this I have come to realise that a major stumbling block for my students is their lack of vocabulary skills. This is stopping them from confidently managing the describe element of product analysis. I mention this in a post about my inquiry spiral here and we have been working on building some skills during the class onair lessons here.

My next step was to have a long discussion with members of the English department to plan some strategies. The first thing that we discussed was getting the students to do more READING about design and pulling out the key words and terms that have been used. This was an interesting approach to me as I would not have thought of getting them to read more before we do our own writing.

I have a new Year 10 group on the Technology junior rotations, and this new class have low literacy levels. I still want to do the same project that the rest of my Year 10 groups have done (we design a portable speaker to be 3D printed), so I thought this would be a prefect opportunity to try out some literacy strategies. What I learn form working some strategies with this group, I can build into my planning for NCEA next year (and Jump Start next term).

The work I have started putting together is on a Google Drawing that the students can make a copy of and work on. The description of the product is mostly taken from the Harvey Norman website with a few additions from me.
After another chat with the English department about this today, I have included a table where they take out the vocabulary, write what they think it means and then use Dictionary.com to find the definition.
I will see how this goes today and then tweak and adjust this to improve the plan.

Link to the Google Drawing here...

Update - after the lesson

For a first try doing this, I felt it didn't go too badly. They students were focused on what they had to do and tried hard with the activity. It involved me doing quite a bit of one to one work with the students, talking over their individual work with them as they were doing it. This is a good thing, as more one to one time is premium in a classroom.
I am including a couple of screen shots of student work on the day.
Where I need to focus is making sure the students read the definitions they are finding on Dictionary.com, not just copying and pasting the first thing they find as some of them don't match what we need. Ongoing feedback down the side of the work in comments helped them in the lesson so this needs to happen more often. It did not put them off when I was correcting them with what they had put on their sheets.

Where am I in the Inquiry Spiral ???

I have been looking at my inquiry spiral / cycle. I started looking at using SOLO taxonomy to increase the depth of the work being completed. As I have been doing this work with the students, it has become increasingly clear that they can not do the lower elements of SOLO, for example, describe a product using Design Elements, very well as they lack the subject specific vocabulary needed to do it. I have decided to spiral into two branches for my continuing inquiry as these two things will complement and support each other.

July CoL Meeting - The Good the Bad and The Ugly....

Today, in our CoL meeting, we had to analyse at what we were doing and share in our inquiry groups. Our groups for this meeting were based around the Achievement Challenges so we could compare what was gong well and what wasn't with colleagues working on the same goal.

Out main feedback session to each other was to highlight parts of our inquiries that was a success and which parts failed and where they can be improved.

This was my main feedback about this :-

The working together as small groups worked really well and they had a lot more confidence with their research. 

What is not going well is that now they think they can help each other with their drawings. This would be ok but it has branched into them doing it for each other rather than helping!!
I am trying to model how to help each other like this by doing drawing work with individuals and letting them do it the same way but not letting them have mine.

I was surprised when we worked together on a design analysis exercise that the hard bit was the describing. After talking to other teachers, I realised that this was due to lack of vocabulary. This has led me to put together the beginnings of a vocabulary collection especially for describing design work - link here

We all worked on a Google Drawing to plan our feedback first, so we could structure it correctly.

The outcome of this for me is that I have organised to go and visit +Kyla Hansell  ( her blog is here ) to talk about the students working in groups and how she does it.

Inquiry Update - End of Term 2

It is the end of Term 2 so it is time to assess where my inquiry is in relation to the Manaiakalani Inquiry Structure.
I have been linking the blog posts that I have done against each element of the structure to see where I am across the big picture. I have been doing this as I have been going along onto a Google Doc so it has been always up to date.

	Inquiry Item	Explanation	Evidence
Learn Focusing Inquiry - “What is important (and therefore worth spending time on) given where my students are at?”	Gather evidence	Student achievement data eg. standardised tests, OTJs, internals and externals Anecdotal evidence eg. observations, formative assessment tasks, student voice,  parent voice, previous teachers, surveys,  learning walks and reciprocal visits	Student Input into planning Post 1   Post 2 NCEA Results Analysis for 2016 2016 inquiry focus for Year 12 students (change committee) Student voice about how they like their lesson instructions Planning to include Kia Eke Panuku Know your learners Nothing is ever all good news.... Talking Self Assessment Updates to Year 11 Priority Students Student feedback on making own resources What happens when students choose their own projects?
	Scan	Wider perspective on learning not just aspects that are easily measured eg considering perspectives of our young people and their whānau. How engaged are they with learning? Can they describe what they are learning and why it is important?  (AfL) Links to Key Competencies	Nothing is ever all good news.... Talking Self Assessment Student feedback on making own resources Making rewindable resources with the students
	Identify Trends	Looking at all the evidence, thinking hard about its “shape”. Noticing where there are cohort trends that extend out beyond the class, to the team or department, maybe even for this school across schools in the CoL Clearly identifying the common learning challenges or problems. Looking for and identifying strategies that are known to have the greatest impact on on this/these challenges	Student voice from the first Year 12 standard - how is it going Standard breakdown for the first Year 12 project Personal Goal setting sheet for 2017 2016 inquiry focus for Year 12 students (change committee) Woolf Fisher Research Feedback Talking Self Assessment CoL Meeting Term 2 - Focusing Inquiry and Teaching Inquiry Updates to Year 11 Priority Students
	Hypothesise	Analysis and interpretation often take place in the mind of the teacher, who then uses the insights gained to shape their actions as they continue to work with their students. These theories for improvement should connect with the inquiries related to the Achievement Challenge of the Department/Team, the School and the CoL.	My inquiry outline CoL Meeting Term 2 - Focusing Inquiry and Teaching Inquiry
	Research	“This involves asking questions about how well current strategies are working and whether others might be more successful. Teachers search their own and their colleagues’ past practice for strategies that may be more effective, and they also look in the research literature to see what has worked in other contexts.”	Using learning from past inquiries Reading - Analysis of asynchronous online discussion using the SOLO Taxonomy Woolf Fisher Research Feedback Teacher only day - 27th March 2017 Reading - First Steps with SOLO Taxonomy Talking Self Assessment CoL Meeting Term 2 - Focusing Inquiry and Teaching Inquiry Dr Graeme Aitken presentation
	Reflect	“Inquiry into the teaching–learning relationship goes hand in hand with formative assessment, in the cyclical evaluation process that goes on moment by moment, day by day, and over the longer term.” Assessment-in-the-classroom/Teaching-as-inquiry	Using learning from past inquiries Inquiry posts on my blog Is there enough instructions and support Nothing is ever all good news.... CoL Meeting Term 2 - Focusing Inquiry and Teaching Inquiry
Create Teaching Inquiry - “What strategies (evidence-based) are most likely to help my students learn?”	Make a plan	What can I already do and  what do I need help with? Who are the learners? Group/class What are the goals for my practice and student achievement? Set up processes for capturing evidence about whether the strategies are working for my students.	Personal Goal setting sheet for 2017 Organising NCEA classes for the year Credit totals and Termly Standard Protocol Reading - First Steps with SOLO Taxonomy CoL Meeting Term 2 - Focusing Inquiry and Teaching Inquiry Updates to Year 11 Priority Students Using SOLO to structure Final Evaluation Questions
	Try new things	It is a constant state of action, monitoring, reflection, and adjustment - and then more action. Failure may occur. Feedback from learners - how will I engage them with new learning? Do they know we’re trying something new?	Student voice from the first Year 12 standard - how is it going Student voice about how they like their lesson instructions Visible Teaching and Learning - Using Calendars CoL Meeting Term 2 - Focusing Inquiry and Teaching Inquiry Making rewindable resources with the students What did I learn from my Year 12 class? What happens when students choose their own projects? Design Development Analysis
	Innovate	Are we capitalising on the affordances of the technology to support the Five Affordances of Learn Create Share (Engagement, Teaching Conversations, Visibility, Cognitive Challenge, Scaffolding) identified by the WFRC	Blog posts about using SOLO Taxonomy Google Plus Communities Year 10  Level 1  Level 2  Level 3 Class OnAir Posts Using SOLO to structure Final Evaluation Questions Design Development Analysis
	Implement	Just do it!	Updates to Year 11 Priority Students
	Reflect	“Inquiry into the teaching–learning relationship goes hand in hand with formative assessment, in the cyclical evaluation process that goes on moment by moment, day by day, and over the longer term.” Assessment-in-the-classroom/Teaching-as-inquiry	Main Blog - links to topics across the top Is there enough instructions and support What did I learn from my Year 12 class?
Share Learning Inquiry - “What has happened as a result of the changes in teaching, and what are the implications for future teaching? ...We need people to provide us with different perspectives and to share their ideas, knowledge, and experiences.”	Publish	What happened as a result of the changes? Share evidence (artefacts of student learning, DLOs) and effective strategies.	Main Blog - links to topics across the top Google Plus Communities Year 10  Level 1  Level 2  Level 3 Making rewindable resources with the students Planning for Learn, Create, Share
	Co-teach	What if my plans didn’t work? Are there different approaches?Who can help me? Peer observations, video analysis of my practice.	Class OnAir Posts
	Model / Guide	How can my findings and experiences support my peers? How is this shared?	Main Blog - links to topics across the top Staff presentation about blogging Toolkit - Blogging for Teacher Inquiry Presentation at Manaiakalani open Day Ed Tech Auckland - Presentation on Higher Order Thinking Skills Toolkit - Higher order thinking using SOLO Taxonomy and Google Drawings Planning for Learn, Create, Share Teaching as Inquiry - A short Introduction
	Feedback / Feedforward	What are my next steps? How will I sustain effective practice? Learner feedback? New goals?	CoL Meeting Term 2 - Focusing Inquiry and Teaching Inquiry What did I learn from my Year 12 class?
	Reflect	“Inquiry into the teaching–learning relationship goes hand in hand with formative assessment, in the cyclical evaluation process that goes on moment by moment, day by day, and over the longer term.” Assessment-in-the-classroom/Teaching-as-inquiry	Main Blog - links to topics across the top