Ideas for group work in the high school classroom: Wāhanga Rua

Part Two:

I am ready to roll out my groups tomorrow! I feel I know the students well enough and have enough data to group them appropriately. I have decided I will need to review these groups over the rest of the term. I will be satisfied if they are fully established by the start of Term 2.Here is the written instruction I will provide students tomorrow, after I have told them their groups.

Groups groups groups!

Your first project as a group!

1. Choose an abstract noun that will be a goal for your group to work on. You need to find out the English, Maori and any other relevant translations of the word. I will discuss this with your group over the coming week and will help you decide. Think of this as your core value, like Trident's core values of manaakitanga, kia manawa nui and whaia te iti kahurangi. Once you have made your selections Ohinemataroa [our hapu] will potentially have TWENTY core values to strive to fulfill!!

Then either:

2. Suggest a 'patron' of your group. Think Harry Potter and patronuses except different. They must be: a New Zealander and creating the kind of thing we might study in English. So they could be a lyricist, director, author, actor, illustrator... Again, I will help you choose. Our hapu's patron will be Lorde.

OR:

3. Design a flag or sigil for you whanau. Remember that your whanau has up to 30 members across four different classes. How can you best represent those 30 people? Hint: perhaps you could ask me what your other group members have chosen as their core value.

I will be there to help with all of this - it's not a test!

I have also created a poster that will be on my door and probably on the whiteboard. And duh, on my computer's desktop! So the kids will now see this whenever there's no Power Point, video, etc on my projector screen. I'm a genius.

I can take no credit for the creation of the poster. I used the website Canva, literally didn't choose the fonts, found the image on Google Image Search and that's about it. The only thing I came up with was splitting into five. So I'm hoping one of my more artistic students decides to create a more snazzy poster for our hapu. Visual and verbal text credits? Yes please!

I'm sure you can gather from the poster that I have chosen my hapu name as well as the five whanau. Ohinemataroa is the proper Maori name for Whakatane River, and the other five are the surrounding rivers from this region. Some words are supposed to have macrons but unfortunately this font wouldn't recognise the macron-ed symbols.

I'm a little nervous about how the roll out will go, but I think I'll have enough buy in to make it work.

You may have seen my creative writing starters posts and be wondering what that's all about. I plan to talk about them in my next post or so. Suffice to say, my participation in the writing starters seems to be increasing student participation - yay for bribery!

Whāia te iti kahurangi ki te tūohu koe me he maunga teitei

Pursue excellence – should you stumble, let it be to a lofty mountain

Ideas for group work in the high school classroom

Kia ora all! This blog post is a real train of thought, work in progress entry. I have a lot of ideas about using groups in my class and I'm sure this plan will be refined over the coming weeks. I really look forward to hearing your thoughts, suggestions and questions!

I have mentioned before that my department is invigorating our junior program and that these plans are ongoing. A key part of this change is that we are guided by four Kaupapa or themes throughout the year, one in each term. We are starting the year with Papatuanuku and I have explained to the students that we will be considering our texts through this lens.

I have also started the year with my desks in groups for the first time, having never had room before. And that's what this blog post is all about - how I am going to use these groups in the classroom.

Here is the plan:

- I will name the five groups of desks (six desks per group) after a local body of water or landmark: Ohiwa, Rangitaiki, Tarawera, etc. To be confirmed.

- As Trident is our iwi, I will refer to my classroom as a hapu and each group of desks would be a whanau (across classes, for example, there will be at least three groups of students who are "Ohiwa" across at least three different classes)

- each group, in each class, will decide upon an abstract noun that they will aspire to demonstrate. For example aroha, manaakitanga, perseverance... This idea comes from my husband's plan to integrate the qualities of a good teammate into his Sports in Education class.

- somehow, each group of desks will end up with a flag or sigil, a couple of abstract nouns (from the different groups in different classes) and most excitingly, a patron of the arts. Ideally the patron will be a New Zealand author, director, screenwriter, lyricist or actor.

I have two Year 9 classes and a Year 10 class so I'm not sure how to divvy up the research and decision making when it comes to the flags and patrons, but I'm excited about how these decisions can be part of my classroom teaching about visual and verbal texts as well as the context of New Zealand art and literature.

Some decisions I am yet to make are:

- will these groups be flexible? Might I have to jiggle students throughout the year, or is the point to work through any issues with each group by falling back on their core value, as well as my school's core values?

- how will I determine the groups? I will certainly not be splitting them into curriculum levels from lowest to highest. The next obvious choice is to spread each level of ability across each group of desks. Alternatively I could base my decision initially on personality, and subsequently on reshuffling if I notice a predominance of a certain curriculum level at one table. While one of my classes is technically 'streamed' the students do cover a range of two or three curriculum levels, the other two are definitely mixed ability due to their special interest nature (Great Barrier Island group and BYOD class).

- I am also keen to get my seniors to buy into this, but as my Level 1 class is tiny and my Level 2 class is strong willed and very 'cool' I may struggle. They may dismiss the whole thing as very primary school. One strategy might be to not even mention it to them and see if they react to the posters and values going up around the walls.

What do I hope to get out of this?

- accountability, enthusiasm, belonging

- bonding within each group

- I hope that awareness of the other groups who occupy your set of desks will encourage more responsibility as a citizen of the classroom: less graffiti, rubbish and gum under desks.

- More interest in wall displays and therefore other students' work

- behaviour management through positive peer pressure

- more opportunities for peer teaching

- an increase in student progress (hopefully this is the overarching reason why we do anything in the classroom!)

I will see how Term 1 goes and if these ideas are not enough on their own to achieve my goals I may look at introducing some form of inter or intra (or both) group competition. Thankfully we have a fantastic PB4L system of core value certificates and of 'coffee club' stamps that are a simple way to acknowledge and encourage positive behaviour and work ethics. I'm not big on competition in the classroom, but my boisterous junior boys may require that kind of motivation

As you can see I am very excited about how this will work. I'm already thinking about the future and whether I would keep the names the same across the years or whether I could branch out and use different kinds of philosophies, names of novels, international authors, past successful students, the options are limitless...

I would love to hear your ideas, suggestions and advice. Do you use groups in the classroom? Do they stay the same all year? What do kids like or not like about this approach?

Whāia te iti kahurangi ki te tūohu koe me he maunga teitei

Pursue excellence – should you stumble, let it be to a lofty mountain

My visit to Te Wharehou o Tuhoe: Te Uru Taumatua

This week I had the pleasure of visiting Te Wharehou o Tuhoe: Te Uru Taumatua, located in Taneatua. The context of the visit was unusual. Our local Rotary branch had organised to have a tour, dinner and a talk delivered by treaty negotiator and New Zealander of the Year finalist Tamati Kruger. Unfortunately Tamati was unable to attend at the last minute, but the warm and articulate Kirsty Luke, General Manager of Te Uru Taumatua, was able to take his place.

I am not a member of Rotary so it was quite strange to be in this ethereal building, with the first non-Tuhoe group of people to use the space.

Kirsty took us on a tour of the facilities and explained the decision making behind many aspects of the building. The images below, from the Tuhoe website, outline the iwi's thought process behind the building. We got to see the small library and archive space, cafe (which opens next month), office space, work areas available for use by the public and the main function space at the front of the building. The whare is striking with timber used throughout, always sourced from within a 100 kilometre radius. Te Wharehou is a 'living building' and it was apparent from our visit that this has just as much to do with the people as it does the materials used. Pride and mana radiated with every word Kirsty spoke about her surroundings.

Following dinner, Kirsty spoke about the past, present and future - no mean feat! She acknowledged the timing of our visit, given that this week is the signing of Tuhoe's treaty settlement, as well the Police Commissioner's visit to Ruatoki to apologise for the treatment of members of the public, including children, during the Ruatoki raids of 2007. (It only took 174 and 7 years...) Before visiting the whare I assumed this building was purely for Tuhoe use, but Kirsty took the opportunity to emphasise that it has been built to be used for the good of everyone in the area from knitting groups to youth groups. That's when I started to think about my students and how we could benefit from this wonderful space. The biggest impression I left with was the emphasis Kirsty placed on raising a new generation of positive and optimistic Tuhoe.


So, why am I writing about this? Firstly, many students at my school are Tuhoe and I feel I know a lot more about the history of this area after visiting Te Wharehou. Tuhoe are often assumed to be proud, stand-offish and radical. Like with any group of people, it doesn't help to buy into such assumptions. After hearing Kirsty speak, I would not describe her as proud, stand-offish and radical but passionate about Te Urewera, warm and aspirational.
The second reason I am writing about this experience here is to encourage teachers to engage in their students' wider world. We hear this kind of thing a lot, and often it is a challenge to make the time, especially when you are not involved in sport. I know feel like I have made a connection and I am thinking about how I can utilise Te Wharehou o Tuhoe for my students next year. I said 'yes' to this dinner on a whim, not really knowing what it would be all about, and it has turned into a hugely valuable experience for myself and my fellow colleagues who attended. One is a graphics teacher and will now take students to Taneatua so that they can discuss the design of the building. Another runs Gateway and has already contacted Kirsty about a work placement for one of our Y13 students. A third is a Social Studies teacher from another school who intends to re-write a unit that involves looking at Te Wharehou. He would also like to see departments from all around the area create a cross-curricular range of programs that Tuhoe could use with visiting classes. There is the maths in quantity surveying, art in the sculpture, drama to be done in the amphitheater, science in the water treatment facility...

What are some surprising ways that you have connected with your students' world?

 Whāia te iti kahurangi ki te tūohu koe me he maunga teitei

Pursue excellence – should you stumble, let it be to a lofty mountain

Teacher-only day reflections

Teacher-only day: Friday the 4th of July, 2014

Managing social media
Tatiako: where to from here?
Registered teacher criteria
Special interest groups: cross-curricular learning, authentic learning contexts, BYOD, literacy diagnostic assessment
Department meeting: to stream or not to stream?
Deans with form-teachers

Registered teacher criteria

Having only recently renewed my registration I feel fairly confident about the registered teacher criteria. However, my colleague did introduce us to this infographic which explores our the RTCs connect to teaching as inquiry. This will be very useful for refining my portfolio for future submissions.

A visual guide to the registered teacher criteria as 'teaching as inquiry'

Cross-curricular learning

This 20 minute session was what excited me the most during the day. Three staff members (an art and design teacher, graphics teacher and hard technology teacher) spoke to us about their plans to create a generic plan for teaching students in a cross curricular method. This is something I am really interested in as I do believe the future of education is 'subjectless' - just as real life is. The teachers leading this session spoke about their desire to support students across many curriculum areas, then opened the floor to our thoughts and concerns. Some of the interesting points raised were:

• does this kind of teaching require a modern learning environment, or just a different approach?
• who would be ultimately responsible for managing an individual student's progress: the student? Their form-teacher?
• how might a platform like Edmodo, Hapara or Schoology play a part in this process?

The reason I came away buzzing was the overwhelming enthusiasm demonstrated by those who participated in the discussion. From what I can see, this is what most teachers want to happen. I think we are lucky that there is so much enthusiasm about the future of education.

The next step for me is to read more about cross-curricular learning. Just a quick scan of this blogpost highlights that flipped learning and BYOD connect closely with this style of learning as both flipping and BYOD lend themselves to mastery learning.

Department meeting: to stream or not to stream?

A big chunk of our department meeting was dedicated to a review of our current streaming practices. Our discussion focused on the junior school which is especially pertinent as we are re-designing our junior program in preparation for 2015.

In both 2012 and 2013 I taught a Year 9 Advanced class and I cannot deny this was an absolute pleasure. On the whole these students were engaged, enthusiastic and eager to please.

They were also easy to teach. 

During those two years I also taught low ability Year 10 classes. Compared to my Year 9s I thought they were hell. 

But I had it all wrong. There was no comparison. And I did the students and myself a disservice by seeing them that way.

This year I have my BYOD class at Year 9 which is not streamed. There are two students in this form-class who spend their English line in the Whare Akonga (learning centre) as they learning needs are very specific. Across the remaining students there is a broad range of ability. And although it is challenging, this is what feels right to me. I have students who need extension and students who need extra guidance, and the iPads enable me to do this more effectively.

Meanwhile, in my Year 10 class of around 15, the students who despise that they are in a class together. Sadly, they look around at each other and have strong opinions about why they are all there: they are 'cabbage'. While they are there because they performed poorly across all assessments in English last year, for some of these students this has no connection to their ability and every connection to their attendance or work habits or behaviour.

There are many arguments for mixed ability classes, but this is the one that I believe is the most important: although they may require more work from us in order to differentiate effectively, they remove the socioeconomic segregation that is so glaringly obvious to the students themselves.

 Whāia te iti kahurangi ki te tūohu koe me he maunga teitei

Pursue excellence – should you stumble, let it be to a lofty mountain

How to teach creative writing

Ha ha! I fooled you! I know nothing, John Snow. But after hearing about the Radio New Zealand National Creative Writers Panel this idea has been cogitating in my mind.
Interviewer Wallace Chapman invited questions from the public to be put to Eleanor Catton, Robert Sullivan and Daren Kamali, and I emailed in the following:

I am a secondary school English teacher at Trident High School in Whakatane, Eastern Bay of Plenty. As a teenager I wrote a lot of fiction and attended classes at The School for Young Writers in Christchurch. I have only one friend from my teenage years who wrote as a teen and has become a professional writer. I know so many people who loved to write but lost their zest for literature and language arts, possibly as a result of their experiences of English in the classroom.

Nurturing creative writing in the secondary school setting is a challenge, especially when trying to work within the bounds of the NZ Curriculum and NCEA. I would like to ask Eleanor, Robert and Daren how they feel secondary English teachers can nurture our young writers in a constructive way that will not stifle their creativity.

I was obviously thrilled that they answered my question because my name was said on air (!!!) but I also found their thoughts to be incredibly helpful.



'The Manukau Institute of Technology has just opened its new campus which will see students learning in a fully cloud based environment.'

If you don't have time to listen to the interview (although my question is in the first 15 minutes so...) then I will gladly paraphrase what these authors have wisely suggested:


When teaching creative writing, remember that...

1. There are no rules
2. There are no right answers
3. Work should not be assessed

Let's assume we can handle numbers one and two. If you read and engage with a broad range of texts you will know that the 'rules' of the English language can be bent and broken. And if you encourage creativity in your class then you will know that (while what is deemed to be creative by one may not be by another) a dichotomy of right and wrong does not fit in the English classroom.

It is number three, Catton's suggestion, that English teachers could struggle with, and for obvious reasons, but I think it is a worthwhile suggestion. 

At this point I think it is important to bear in mind the difference between work being 'assessed' and receiving feedback. Assessment for Learning encourages the use of feedback as opposed to grading work, and there is a vast repository of research that shows providing formative grades such as B+ or Merit can hinder students' growth. Sylvia Plath knew what she was talking about when she wrote "The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt."

So here is my compromise. Not only should we continue to provide constructive feedback on students' work, we should also provide the option of having the finished work assessed. If we stop talking about students' creative writing in terms of assessments and credits, they may actually embrace the creativity more readily. Given that AS91101 is now a portfolio assessment that students work on throughout the year, I think this approach is not only beneficial for the students but for us as markers. Steering away from NAME grades at every draft will enable us to forget about the marking schedule for a while and focus on guiding students to learn and grow as creative beings. Some students may fear that a piece of work they have poured their heart and soul into will only earn an Achieved or Merit due to their ability to spell or correctly place a comma. If we allow them to 'withdraw' a particular piece from summative assessment we are protecting their very fragile self esteem, and for good reason.

And yes, I can already hear you say "what about the student who never bloody hands in anything? Surely they can't be allowed to opt out of having work assessed!" Well, I have two responses. Firstly, perhaps this new approach might encourage more submissions from our reluctant writers. And secondly, I'm the first to admit that some students just need a good kick up the bum and commonsense would dictate that kids who submit the bare minimum aren't going to have much say in what does and doesn't get summatively assessed.

I would love to hear from those of you who write creatively (whether you share it with anyone or not!). What could your secondary teachers have done to encourage your creative spark? Did they ever do anything that stifled your voice?

Here is a kitten so you don't have to look at my giant face on your Facebook feed.

Whāia te iti kahurangi ki te tūohu koe me he maunga teitei

Pursue excellence – should you stumble, let it be to a lofty mountain