Activity 3 - Contribution of Teacher Inquiry Topics to my Communities of Practice

In this reflection, critically reflect on how two potential and inspiring digital/collaborative learning related teacher inquiry (TAI) topics would contribute to my CoP (Community of Practice).
  

•    Experience

Communities of Learning work well if all participants are willing contributors and no one person alone is reaping the benefits. I have created sites which have been used as a repository for resources for teaching and learning, but I have done practically all the work and find that others have not found it a priority to contribute (all good intentions aside). I have been part of online Communities of Learning, but got so bombarded with emails and comments, that having become so overwhelmed with information, I have withdrawn. I feel, I prefer a smaller community to participate with and deal in less but more relevant information.

 •    What? (Reflection) Description

The topics I have chosen:
“How can the benefits of play-based or makerspace learning promote student engagement and achievement across the rest of the curriculum?”
and
“How do students learn basic skills by creating content compared with consuming content?"
relate to my issues within my professional practice because as the ICT leader in my school my goal is to have a positive learning influence in the school through the use of digital technology. Also, there has been a long-standing practice of using games to teach basic skills and I have been questioning this. I am sure I have seen the benefits of creating content exceeds the consuming of content as a learning tool.

•    So What? (Analysis) Thoughts and feelings

Our TAI is about improving outcomes for students. It is used by teachers to learn from our practice and build our knowledge. (Ministry of Education, 2009) I am looking to see where a CoP would fit in this process. I found a diagram that made sense to me and gave me some of the insight I was seeking. I can see a CoP being a valuable part of each step in the process.

(Dempsey, 2011)

By including my TAI in my CoP, I would be looking to work with people on a variety of stages of their own learning journey, including other ICT leaders. I would be seeking a reciprocal relationship with the other members in a safe environment. Being able to contribute ideas, hear ideas and having these affirmed or built upon, is what I think makes the CoP the most valuable. (Wenger, 2000)

•    Now What? (Planning) Action

We have a variety of Communities of Learning. These can include:
•    Curriculum Teams
•    Whānau Groups (Teaching teams)
•    Online community such as MindLab Google+, Messenger Group (MindLab Tauranga Group) or Facebook Groups.
I will be teaching students in 90 minute blocks with the learning intention to develop computational and design thinking using a variety of media and mediums. The aim is for these skills to be taken back into their classrooms and used across the curriculum. So, it would be valuable to be including my topic in a number of communities of learning so my work is mutually valuable for all stakeholders in my school as well as being able to share learning experiences with online communities to enrich our knowledge base.

References:

Dempsey, M. (2011). kuraiwa - Teaching As Inquiry Overview. Retrieved from https://kura-iwa.wikispaces.com/Teaching+As+Inquiry+Overview
Ministry of Education. (2009, August 26). Teaching as inquiry / Teachers as learners: Inquiry / Case studies / Curriculum stories / Kia ora - NZ Curriculum Online. Retrieved from http://nzcurriculum.tki.org.nz/Curriculum-stories/Case-studies/Teachers-as-learners-Inquiry/Teaching-as-inquiry
Wenger, E. (2000). Communities of Practice and Social Learning Systems. Organization, 7(2), 225-246. Retrieved from http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/135050840072002

Activity Two - Future-oriented Learning and Teaching

This week we are reflecting on how we have positively changed our practice during our postgraduate journey to address one of the themes or subthemes from the reading “Supporting future-oriented learning and teaching: A New Zealand perspective”. I chose Theme 4: "Changing the script": Rethinking learners' and teachers' roles.

•   Why did I make this change?

Our students were working in groups co-operatively but not collaboratively. This meant that some students who always wanted to “work in a group or with a buddy” needed to be redirected by teachers to participate in the group work.

• How was this change triggered during my learning journey at The Mind Lab?

Upon completing the Week Two session on 21st Century Learning Design, and Week Five on Growth Mindsets, it occurred to me what may be missing that would move our students from being just co-operative to collaborative.

• Are there any theories or literature that support my change?

According to García-Valcárcel, Basilotta, & Salamanca, 2014, p. 66, “Collaborative learning encourages students to see situations from different perspectives, creates an environment where they can practice social and leadership skills (social benefits), and provides a satisfactory learning experience that significantly reduces anxiety (psychological benefits). ITL Research Innovative Teaching and Learning. (2012), wrote about students were working collaboratively when they were having a shared responsibility, made substantive decisions and the work was interdependent. To understand the students who appeared to be opting out of their learning,   Dweck, C. S. (2006)  spoke about “low effort syndrome” and how this presented as a student who was reluctant to participate in the learning because of their fixed mindset and reluctance to risk take. So when reading Kozar, O. (2010) it provided us with the understanding that the students require a diverse list of possible means to be able to contribute to a project that would afford them success and ability to draw on their strengths. We also discovered that to personalise the learning, students like to be able to make choices about learning tools (Buchem et al., 2014 as cited in Thibodeaux, Cummings, & Harapnuik, 2017, p. 3). This lead to us brainstorming to list all the possibilities our students could think of to use as learning tools both digital and analogue.  We also drew on Roblyer, M., Edwards, J., & Havurulik, M. (1997) who wrote about Vygotsky and his work on the Zone Of Proximal Development. For our students age and the stage they are at, it was prudent to scaffold this change so they are able to work in that sweet spot between gaining success and being given a challenge. After the process, we wanted the students to reflect on the success of both the end product and the process of working collaboratively. Spiller, D. (2009) Eventually it would be ideal to remove the scaffolding and for students to be knowingly working collaboratively.

• What have I learned from implementing this change?

Working collaboratively for some student does not come naturally and can be emotionally and socially confronting. Some are still finding their strengths and getting to know themselves as learners. They all agree that they are able to produce a superior product for having worked collaboratively. It was a chance to bring the school values to life and to be actively operating in the learning environment. The reflective process needs to be used productively as a spiral, so the students are not starting from the beginning each time and have a chance to build upon their success in developing their collaborative skills.


References:

Dweck, C. S. (2006). The truth about ability and accomplishment. In Mindset: The new psychology of success (1st ed.). New York: Random House

ITL Research Innovative Teaching and Learning. (2012). 21st Century Learning Design Rubrics. Retrieved from Microsoft Partners In Learning website: https://education.microsoft.com/GetTrained/ITL-Research

García-Valcárcel, A., Basilotta, V., & Salamanca, C. L. (2014). ICT in Collaborative Learning in the Classrooms of Primary and Secondary Education. Communicar, 42(21), 65-74. Retrieved from https://www.revistacomunicar.com/

Kozar, O. (2010). Towards Better Group Work: Seeing the Difference between Cooperation and Collaboration. English Teaching Forum, 2010(2), 16-23. Retrieved from https://americanenglish.state.gov/files/ae/resource_files/forum_article_towards_better_groupwork_seeing_the_difference_between_cooperation_and_collaboration.pdf

Roblyer, M., Edwards, J., & Havurulik, M. (1997). Learning Theories and Integration Models. In Integrating educational technology into teaching (pp. 54-77). New Jersey: Prentice Hall.

Thibodeaux, T., Cummings, C., & Harapnuik, D. (2017). Factors that Contribute to ePortfolio Persistence. International Journal of ePortfolio, 7(1), 1-12. Retrieved from http://www.theijep.com

Spiller, D. (2009). Assessment Matters: Self-Assessment and Peer Assessment. Retrieved from Waikato University/Teaching Development Unit website: http://www.waikato.ac.nz/tdu/pdf/8_SelfPeerAssessment.pdf

Activity 1 - My Reflective Practice

In the past I have always felt too busy to be spending time to sit and formally reflect on my practice.
My formal reflective practice until reasonably recently has been as prescribed by factors such as our Teaching as Inquiry. Comparing my usual practice to  Zeichner and Liston's (cited in Finlay, 2008 Pg.7 ) five levels of reflection, I was using either:

Rapid reflection - immediate, ongoing and automatic action
Repair – decisions to make modifications in response to students’ cues
or
Review – thinking about or discussing some element of my teaching.

All these methods were internal and ongoing. 

It has only been in the past two and a half years when I have been involved in Post Graduate studies, that I have been involved in research and have had the insight to make use of:

Research – more systematic and sustained thinking over time, perhaps by collecting data or reading research.
Retheorizing and reformulating – critically examining my own practice and theories in the

My usual written reflection style is to use a PMI.

•    Trigger - Based on readings, viewings, professional development or teaching
•    What went well?
•    What was not working?
•    What other information is there? (readings, research)
•    Where to from here? or So What?
 A very descriptive method with lots of what, when, who and where and very little feelings and some thoughts about what is happening. But it was not only looking back and thinking about the event retrospectively, but there are ideas about how the ‘subject matter’ could be put into practice.

According to the reading (Finlay 2008) there needs to be more factors brought into a "self reflective" reflections such as “critically analysing and evaluating the actions and feelings associated with the experience, using theoretical perspectives;” (Finlay, 2008 Pg.7) So my PMI needs to be expanded to include how I was feeling at each stage. This was reinforced in the video Reflective Writing (2:23), they again talk about writing about not only your thoughts, but how you feel, the why, the how and so what. (University of Hull, 2014) The descriptive should be brief and the majority of the reflection should be about the thinking and feelings that were going on at the time.

After looking at the possible models for reflecting, I like the thought of something comprehensive and useful, but clean and easy to use so that regularly reflecting does not become burdensome. I like Kolb's Experiential Learning Cycle:

•    Experience
•    What? (Reflection) Description
•    So What? (Analysis) Thoughts and feelings
•    Now What? (Planning) Action

I can incorporate all the elements of a good self-reflection as well as incorporating any data, research and readings to inform future actions.


References:

Finlay, L. (2009). Reflecting on reflective practice. PBPL. Retrieved from http://www.open.ac.uk/opencetl/resources/pbpl-resources/finlay-l-2008-reflecting-reflective-practice-pbpl-paper-52

Non Formal Education Manual (Peace Corps). (1989). Theory: David Kolb: experiential learning cycle. Retrieved from http://www.nzdl.org/gsdlmod?e=d-00000-00---off-0envl--00-0----0-10-0---0--- 

University of Hull. (2014, March 3). Reflective Writing [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=367&v=QoI67VeE3ds

As part of my journey into coding, I have created a PSA (Public Service Announcement) for Tynker to encourage educators to go beyond the hour of code and integrate coding into their classroom as an essential literacy.

There is also an iTunesU course available with resources to support teachers to introduce coding, using age appropriate progressions from as young as 5 years old. There are links to off line options aw well as resources to create projects using online open source resources.

The main resource is Scratch, but there are many other resources to develop computational thinking as well as moving beyond using Visual Programming Language combined with a Graphical user Interface (blocks of code that snap together).

Coding is motivational and creative, both which the students enjoy and when used as a learning tool, it engages them with their learning in other curriculum areas such as reading, writing and math.