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My journey with the Mindlab is at an end with regards to this postgraduate programme, but my journey as a practicing teacher feels like it is just beginning as I continue to research, reflect and put into practice my learnings from this course.
The practising teacher criteria as set out by the Ministry of Education (nd.) states that there are 12 Practising Teacher Criteria and e-learning areas, which are listed below. For the purpose of this activity I have highlighted 3 of the criteria that I have met well , together with two of the criteria that I feel I need to plan for, to aid in my future development. 12 Practising Teacher Criteria and e-learning areas: Professional relationships and professional values
Professional knowledge in practice
The criteria that I have met well Criteria 5 Fully registered teachers show leadership that contributes to effective teaching and learning. Key indicators:
I have always been the ICT leader within the school but it was not until I carried out the ‘Leadership in Digital & Collaborative Learning’ module that I really began to understand what it meant to lead, what model our school was based on and what a complex area this was to study and try to get right. I have used my new found knowledge of the distributive and transformational models to help guide me in my role as ICT leader and feel that I am leading the school in a more positive way. I feel that I have the backing of the staff more than I ever did before, as I try to lead by example, motivate, inspire and distribute the decision making more fairly as well, all the while guiding. I has also joined the virtual learning network, seek help and support from social media sites as well as interacting with others from my professional connections as I try to steer our school on its e-learning journey. Criteria 7 & 8 Criteria 7 Fully registered teachers promote a collaborative, inclusive, and supportive learning environment. Key indicators:
Criteria 8 Fully registered teachers demonstrate in practice their knowledge and understanding of how ākonga learn. Key indicators:
Through my studies at the Mindlab and my subsequent readings I became very aware of just how important ‘student centred learning’ was seen to be. In all of the modules, student centred learning and student/teaching learning partnerships have been referenced by either the course notes, the lecturer, myself or the research. Although aware of these terms before the course ( I had been trying to incorporate ‘Locus of Control’ into the classroom), it was not until the Mindlab studies that I became more knowledgeable and aware of just how important these pedagogies or philosophies were, to replicate in a school environment. I most certainly had not given the Key Competencies much recognition before this course either, and can only reflect back with incredulity as to the lack of importance that I gave to them. Through the use of the above new found knowledge I have been able to set up collaborative learning environments through the use of Google Apps which I integrated throughout the school. I am now more readily able to tap into students interests using Google Forms to survey them and then set them work based on their interests. I am unafraid to learn alongside them and have learnt what vast knowledge and skills that they have. We use Class Dojo, the key competencies and newly formulated literacy and maths progressions to track our behaviour and learning goals. Through the Applied Practice in Context unit I have read and learnt about reflection and have been working with the children on how to better reflect on their learning. The learning partnerships have fostered trust between the students and myself. The children have a much greater level of input into what they want to/need to learn, which enables them to feel motivated and engaged more than they ever were before. This sounds like an idyllic classroom with a perfect teacher. It is not. However, I now have more tools and knowledge to integrate into my classroom, and more skills to transfer this knowledge into new learning areas. I am able to reflect with more depth and meaning and feel that I have used both digital and traditional methods and skills to meet the points highlighted within each of the criteria above, with at least a small measure of success. Future Goals Criteria 1 Fully registered teachers establish and maintain effective professional relationships focused on the learning and well-being of all ākonga. (Ākonga is inclusive of all learners in the full range of settings.) Key indicators:
‘Developing relationships with parents/whānau and the wider community’ is the area of importance that I wish to concentrate on when looking at one of my future focussed goals as I already feel that I am on track in the area of ‘developing relationships with my students’ using e-learning tools’, that this criteria also mentions. Establishing on-going relationships and interaction between home and school is a vital component in a child’s learning. In the past I have relied on telephone calls and parents evenings/meetings to discuss a child’s progress but there are so many tools now available to meet this need and I am only just start to utilise these. I am currently developing a class website which I intend to be used by both students to support their learning and by parents to understand how best to support their child’s learning at home. It is in development. As I mentioned in a previous post, I have also started using Class Dojo as a way of keeping my parents abreast of the learning and contacting them all in group emails when I have to reach all of them at once. However, this is the tip of the iceberg. I need to research into how to use blogs, wikis and other forms of social media effectively to reach all parents more effectively. I then need to transfer this new knowledge to other teachers and areas of the school so that we have a consistent way of communicating with our extended community rather only having maybe one or two classrooms working in this ‘e-learning’ way. E-Portfolios are also high on my agenda to integrate into the school environment. My vision is to have all of the students evidence of meeting the standards available in digital format, to which all teachers (and parents) can access, as they move up through the years. Currently this is largely paper-based and is not conducive to keeping parents in the loop and teachers appraised of the academic history and evidence of work, as students move up into new classes year on year. Criteria 10 Fully registered teachers work effectively within the bicultural context of Aotearoa New Zealand. Key indicators:
How can I better meet the needs of my Maori and Pasifika students through the use of ICT and e-learning? This is probably my weakest area as a teacher and the most important challenge that I need to meet as I move forward with my teaching career. This criteria looks to have several important resources that I wish to plunder in my goal of better understanding how the indigenous students in my class learn and how best I can communicate effectively with my indigenous parents and draw them into their child’s learning effectively. I need to understand how the New Zealand education system performs for my indigenous students, what motivates and inspires them, how they learn best and how e-learning solutions could facilitate their learning. This criteria references how the use of creating ibooks and how blended learning can be used for these students. It also seems to provide a wealth of resources online and suggests how the Virtual Learning Network (VLN) can be used to help support my journey in catering for these students and their whanau. Conclusion I hope this final blog post has demonstrated to some degree the new found knowledge I have gathered while studying this course and am utilising in the classroom to help support my children as 21st century learners. I also hope that I have made clear the two areas that I feel the most important to focus on when referencing the ‘Practising Teacher Criteria and e-learning’ guidelines’, as I take the next step in my teaching career. It is an exciting journey and one that I relish as I continue along this path with both my students and extended community.
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My own understanding of indigenous knowledge and which is defined by UNESCO is that it is ‘the knowledge that is unique to a given culture or society’ Home Teaching and Learning for a Sustainable Future. (n.d.). However, until now I had not really given it any more deeper reflective thought than this.
As I have inquired further into this area though, I now understand that it is a knowledge that is passed down through the generations through word of mouth and cultural rituals, ‘ and has been the basis for agriculture, food preparation, health care, education, conservation and the wide range of other activities that sustain societies in many parts of the world.’ Home Teaching and Learning for a Sustainable Future. (n.d.). Looking at the word ‘indigenous’ in its own right, I have to admit to never really knowing what constitutes an indigenous community. When I think of this word I think of the Aborigines, Maori, Inuits or a tribe of people living in in a hostile environment. I have since inquired into this further and found a UN fact sheet called ‘Indigenous People, Indigenous Voices’(Pacific, Islanders, & Zealand, nd.) which explains the definition very succinctly. It states that Indigenous peoples ‘Practice unique traditions, they retain social, cultural, economic and political characteristics that are distinct from those of the dominant societies in which they live. Spread across the world from the Arctic to the South Pacific, they are the descendants - according to a common definition - of those who inhabited a country or a geographical region at the time when people of different cultures or ethnic origins arrived. The new arrivals later became dominant through conquest, occupation, settlement or other means.’ The document also states that there are approximately 370 million indigenous people in the world living in roughly 70 different countries and identifies the Maori as part of the indigenous peoples of the world. This leads me on to talk about my own views of being culturally responsive in the classroom and the pedagogical approaches I take when teaching these students. Pedagogical Approaches I teach in quite a diverse school and my current class is made up of the following cultures: Filipino, Egyptian, Korean, Chinese, Indian, South African, Samoan, Maori, NZ Pakeha, Japanese, Sri Lankan, Russian and Russian. The one Maori child I have does not know any of the Maori language and the Samoan boy joined my class last week having come straight from Samoa. The reason I mention these two cultures in particular is because they are the only indigenous students I have in my class, (according to the UN definition mentioned above) and they are representative of the two cultures that the Ministry of Education has determined as failing at an ‘academic level’ in the NZ education system. So how do I currently cater for these indigenous learners as well as all other cultures I find in my classroom? Well in the article ‘Building on the strengths of Maori students at the university of Waikato’ (Barkat, 2002) the following quote is referenced and is a quote I have heard on numerous occasions within the classroom “What is good for Māori is good for all.” The article goes on to quote that the common response from respondents to an interview, was that students ‘found that having teachers adapt their practice to take cognisance of the special abilities and strengths not only of Māori, but of all their students, has boosted the engagement, retention and frequently achievement of most students.’ The trouble is I still do not understand how Maori learners learn and until I do, I feel somewhat troubled by my lack of knowledge in this area. However, with the knowledge that I do have at my disposal I have draw up the following table of my perceived strengths as well as areas that I need to work on. What I do well
What I need to work on
How my school addresses cultural responsiveness Community Evenings One of the ways in which our school addresses cultural responsiveness in a positive way is through our community evenings that are held throughout the first term of the new school year. Each week, all of the teaches host an evening targeting a specific culture. This year we have so far held the following evenings:
Before the end of term we will be hosting the following evenings:
The format of the evenings this year is working with the parents to devise a cultural afternoon celebrating their particular culture. The evening is hosted by our community cultural leader and we think of activities that we could do with the children that will highlight and teach them about their culture. At the end of the evening we have a meal with the parents who have bought along food (specific to their country) that they have cooked. We recently had our first cultural Filipino afternoon where the teachers split off into groups with the parents. The children, (in their houses) rotate to each of these different activities. The following activities were performed last week:
The afternoon is initially kicked off with a Filipino lunch which the children have ordered and paid for beforehand, so they get to experience Filipino food too. It is a fabulous way of bringing our community into the school for an authentic experience and shows them a glimpse of how the teachers work, interact and teach the children within the school. It is very much a bonding experience as well, and the teachers get to work closely with the the parents in a relaxed and fun way. On the day in question I was working with one other teacher and two parents to learn the number system, basic greetings and naming the body parts through song. The parents and teachers thoroughly enjoyed the experience, as did the children. I personally think that this is a great strength and original idea of the school that demonstrates our commitment to be culturally responsive. Understanding our Maori and Pasifika Indigenous Cultures At our recent leadership meeting I brought to the table this latest assignment and chaired a discussion on the ways in which we were not addressing cultural responsiveness so well. After reflection we all agreed that we still do not understand our target Maori and Pasifika children as much as we would like, and are very concerned as to how we can accelerate their concerning lack of academic progress to date. We agreed that we do not fully understand what enables Maori and Pasifika students to learn and why they are not progressing as well as we would like them to and this is an area that we have collectively agreed needs to be addressed. At this point we went into discussing ideas on what we could do about it. The following suggestions were made:
I hope that in this post you have gained an understanding of what my views are on indigenous knowledge and cultural responsiveness and how I regard what, as a school, we are doing well and not so well. This activity has again highlighted areas that we need to address to provide equal opportunities for all of our cultures within the school. Bibliography HomeTeaching and Learning for a Sustainable Future. (n.d.). Retrieved March 20, 2016, from http://www.unesco.org/education/tlsf/mods/theme_c/mod11.html United Nations. (1986). Who are indigenous peoples?, 1–3. Retrieved from www.IndigenousPermanetForum.com Barkat, J. S. (2002). Building on the strengths of different approaches. Negotiation Journal, 18(4), 359–362. http://doi.org/10.1023/A:1021006323520 Strategy, O. R. I. E. (2017). ACCELERATING. Ministry of Education. (2009). Teachers as Learners : Improving Outcomes for Māori and Pasifika Students through Inquiry, 1–8. In this post I am going to talk about an incident that occurred at a school that I worked at related to the misuse of Facebook and how myself and the school dealt with it.
Firstly I would like to draw your attention to Facebook’s policy on the age at which a child can legally sign up to and use Facebook: ‘Facebook requires everyone to be at least 13 years old before they can create an account (in some jurisdictions, this age limit may be higher). Creating an account with false info is a violation of our terms. This includes accounts registered on the behalf of someone under 13.’ The incident in question refers to a 10 year old girl (from another class), speaking to me in confidence about a 10 year old boy in my class who was ‘Facebooking’ her requesting that they become boyfriend and girlfriend. The girl in question was not interested in this boy's advances and had Facebooked the girl stating this fact. The boy’s mother from my class had also become involved in the messaging and had started Facebooking the girl as well, stating that she should not be mean to her son and should not be rejecting him like she was through social media. It was at this point that the girl had told her teacher who in turn had told her to tell me, as the boy and mother who were harassing the child were from my class. I am also the ICT lead at the school. The girl was feeling embarrassed, distressed and confused as to why she was being ‘cyberbullied’ by this mother and child and wanted the matter resolved. This was the first time as a teacher that I had been involved in such a case but I was aware that the child from my class had a history of using social media as well as playing inappropriate computer games (such as Grand Theft Auto 5). Through my subsequent conversations with this child it was very obvious that he was relatively unsupervised in the virtual and game playing world, to do as he pleased. Policies & Procedures Our school has constructed policies around the appropriate and inappropriate use of the Internet and its safety using the National Administration Guidelines (NAG’s) to aid in the writing of the policies. Internet safety falls under NAG 5 which relates to health and safety. Having rigorously gone through the Internet Safety guidelines as a result of this activity I have determined that it needs to be updated. We are now using ‘School Docs’ who are a Policies & Procedures’ service and we will be ensuring that all of our policies meet legislative and best practice requirements, and we will be consulting with them and other schools to ensure that all possible eventualities surrounding inappropriate use of the Internet have been met. We have nothing in our policies surrounding guidelines to deal with the ethical dilemma such as the one set out above. This is due to the fact that this incident did not occur using school computers or within school but was directly affecting a student within the school and being perpetrated by a student and their parent from within my class. Within our NAG 5 Internet Safety procedure we have the following policies which I can refer you to:
It is important to note that this incident falls under the category of ‘Cybersafety’ which DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY: Safe and responsible use in schools (Schools, 2015) state as: Cybersafety: Involves conduct or behavioral concerns. Examples include cyberbullying, smear campaigns, accessing inappropriate content, creating spoof websites or sexting. Due to this beinga clear case of Cybersafety for which we have no clear policies and guidelines surrounding this type of scenario, it was dealt in an acceptable way but it could have been dealt with better. It was resolved in the following way:
What should have been different? The issue was resolved. It did not occur again within the school, (while I was there) and as a result of the incident we ran a series of lessons school-wide on Internet Safety; the culmination of which was a Cybersafety evening for the parents hosted by a professional organisation and concluded with children presenting their own findings to the parents. However, what we did wrong was the following:
It also made us aware that we could only deal effectively with issues that occur on school premises. However, referring again to DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY: Safe and responsible use in schools (Schools, 2015) it does state under ‘School’s responsibility and authority to act’ that “In general, a school’s responsibility to maintain a safe-educational environment justifies a measure of authority over off-premises and student after-hours conduct.” Quite what this looks like in regards to this scenario and quite how we are expected to police what goes on after hours is something we are still not sure about though. In conclusion, we felt that we had robust policies and procedures in place surrounding Internet Safety and the ethical dilemma's the use of the Internet and digital technologies can throw up. This scenario also showed us that we had not thought of and covered every eventuality and that without proper guidelines a delicate situation can be handled inappropriately despite the best of intentions. Perhaps there should also be some more specific guidance from the Ministry as to how one justifies a measure of authority over off-premises and student after-hours conduct as well? Bibliography Schools, A. G. F. O. R. (2015). DIGITAL. I have never been an active social media user. I have a Facebook account without really knowing how to use it in any great depth. I have it locked down so that it is completely private. I do not post to it but merely use it to keep track of a couple of personal groups that I am interested in. Up until recently I did not have a Twitter account. I had a POND account but did not really use it. I have a social account called Strava which is how I keep in contact with my running friends. I tell you this as it is important to know that I have never been an advocate or serious user of social media and I find it hard to relate to people who seem to relish describing every single detail of theirs and their families personal life to a global audience. However, within the teaching community I am beginning to see the benefits of social media to enhance my own personal development. As a tool to teach Primary School children however, I think we have to be very careful with what social media applications we choose to expose them to. Social Media in a Primary School Setting The mainstream, popular social networking tools such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Google + etc) are not an appropriate tool to allow students to use in the classroom. The reason for this is based in large part to the age restrictions of these sites. You will see in the following diagram that these accounts have different age limits commencing from the age of 13:  Quite simply my views regarding primary school children are that if you are under the age of 13, (which all primary school children are) then they should not be taught to use these applications. The legal age limit is there for a reason and if we are teaching our primary students to use social media platforms within the classroom then surely aren’t we giving them the message that it is ok to break the law? An example of underage children using social media illegally can be found in the following video title ‘Using Social Media in the Classroom’. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=riZStaz8Rno. (Cassidy, 2013) However, despite my best efforts to educate my primary students regarding the dangers of social media at their early age, some do still access and use these sites. I have had children in my class that have Facebook accounts and I have seen first hand the bullying that can be carried out through these sites both by children and parents. I have also had many students that have said they have ‘friends’ on these sites that they have never met and who have no understanding that they may not be who they say they are. In this regard it is important that a CyberSafety and Digital Citizenship program is in place in a primary school and that these issues are modelled, taught and discussed with both children and the wider community. My use and understanding of Social Media Platforms I am still learning about which applications fall under the umbrella of ‘Social Media’. Having researched this topic further, I have found a definition from the The Educational Council of New Zealand. Their website states that ‘Social media embraces web-based and mobile-based technologies to facilitate interactive communication between organisations, communities and individuals.’ The infographic below also encapsulates pictorially what social media is.  With this definition I can acknowledge that without realising it, I am currently using a number of social media sites within my classroom. These are:
ClassDojo - A behavioural tool and an easy and convenient way to keep in touch with the parents both individually, through all parent emails and through sharing our learning using a simple blog interface. The children are engaged with it and the parents feedback that it is a fantastic way to understand what their children are doing at school and an easy way to keep in contact with me. Weebly - The students have created a personal website with a blog attached so that they may share their learning - (Password restricted and not made public). This encourages reflection, interaction with parents at home and feedback/forward with their peers as they read each other's work and comment on it. Google Sites - Site of my room with a list of resources to help the students and parents. Here both students and teachers can post comments (Only if you are a member of the glenfield.school.nz domain). Pobble - A child friendly website based in the UK where children from around the world can comment on others work. All work and comments are mediated to ensure safety for the children. I have partnered with a school in the UK. The children from each school publish their writing and then comment on it. This gives the students a global authentic audience where they can safely publish their work and gives the teachers access to a limitless supply of models and ideas to use within the classroom. When I have decided on the use of a social media platform that I wish to use in my classroom I will always seek the feedback from my Principal once I have outlined why I wish to use it. I also ensure that I receive written consent from parents. If they have questions, I invite them to talk to me about them and I ensure that I never allow a student to use a platform if the parents have not agreed for them to do so. All of these sites I am now using successfully everyday in my teaching. I am come across more of them all the time and evaluate them on their potential merits to aid the children in their learning. I am also starting to use social media applications more, to develop my own professional learning, as seen in the section below. The Use of Social Media in my own Professional Development As I have become more open to the use of social media as a learning tool so I have realised the many benefits they have on me as a teacher. Until the Mindlab course I had never considered that Twitter and Facebook could enhance my own professional learning due to my ignorance of them and my own hangups on the use of social media. However, I am now starting to reap the benefits due to my more open nature and better understanding of how they can aid me in my own learning. Just taking Twitter alone I now belong to several groups such as:
I am also connected to several individual educators and teachers through Facebook and Twitter, whom I keep in contact with on a regular basis. Below is a list of the social media sites that I am now using for purely developmental purposes:
However, I am finding that the ideas, provocations, news articles and general wealth of information that I am exposed to through these sites can be both a blessing and a curse due to the wealth of information that I am bombarded with on a daily basis. I would have to say at this point that Twitter and Google + are the two sites that are best supporting my professional development as they are simply the two sites that I am using the most. I have talked about some of the groups that I belong to with Twitter and how easy it is for me to connect globally to teachers and educational organisations around the world but Google + is also a platform that I am using constantly at the moment. I have only used it for the purposes of connecting to my Mindlab course and my fellow students and have not delved into it any deeper than this at the moment but will do so once I have completed this course. However, the benefits of interacting with my peers, discussing current trends, seeing what other people are up to regarding assignments, posing questions and receiving answers has helped me immeasurably during this course. Finally, I created a Google Form survey of how other teachers in my ICT team view and use social media. It is something that we have never discussed and I was somewhat surprised by their answers in relation to how much they use social media along with how they use it. I will now use this as a starting point to gain a shared understanding of how we should be sharing our experiences with each other and the rest of the school, how they use social media in the classroom and how we should use social media within the classroom. I hope this post has allowed you to understand the journey I am currently undertaking in the world of social media, the concerns that I have over it, the overwhelming amount of information that I am having to contend with and ultimately the benefits that I am gaining through connecting with a global virtual network of teachers and learners. Finally, this activity has made me aware of the need to discuss this school-wide amongst the teachers, so that we may forge a collective pathway on how best to use social media both with our students and on a professional developmental level. I am already thinking of creating a social media group whereby the teachers meet informally to discuss the latest trends that we are reading about together with how we are using social media within our own classrooms. Bibliography [Cassidy, Kathy]. (2013, May 21). Using Social Media in the Classroom [Video File] Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=riZStaz8Rno [New Zealand Education Council] What is Social Media. (n.d.). Retrieved March 13, 2016, from http://teachersandsocialmedia.co.nz/what-social-media The two contemporary issues that I identify as being most relevant to my practice that are influencing or shaping NZ or international education are:
Student Centred Learning Student-centered learning could be defined as shifting the the focus of instruction from the teacher to the student and was identified by the Education Review Office in their paper ‘Evaluation at a Glance : Priority Learners in New Zealand Schools’, (Education Review Office, 2012) as one of the key aspects that the New Zealand education system needs to address. More care and attention needs to be paid to our classroom of students who come to us from increasingly diverse cultural and socio-economic backgrounds and learner needs which results in the teacher needing to be highly skilled in the area of inclusive practice. This is where student centred learning plays such a vital role in the New Zealand and International education system and basically means providing a system of practice that puts the student at its heart. (Brandes & Ginnis, 1986) state in their book ‘A Guide to Student Centred Learning’ that the following principles need to be practiced in order for an effective student centred learning environment to exist:
These principles correlate with the points made within the ERO report mentioned earlier in this post when discussing what good practice typically looks like within the classroom. Namely that students should be able to:
(Education Review Office, 2012) The reasons why I feel that student centred learning is an issue close to my heart are because:
I and my school have already taken steps to address how we change our practice to a more student centred system. Below are the steps that I/we have already taken:
It is my hope and belief that my own and the school’s practice is going through significant change to address this issue of ensuring that the student is at the heart of the learning. We still have much to do regarding this issue. It is not a quick and straightforward process to move ourselves into this new way of thinking, teaching and learning. Equally, it is imperative that we should be seen as adapting, not adopting to this process of change. Local schools working together The second contemporary issue that I feel is relevant to my practice is the need for my school to be more closely affiliated to other local schools in the area. In ‘Political consensus in education - the way of our future’ (“Political consensus in education,” 2015 ) the need for local schools working together is highlighted as one of the issues that needs to be addressed from the political level. Based on the highly successful Finnish educational system of local schools working together ‘The Finns see no merit in the children in one school achieving educational success while the children in other schools around it struggle’. (“Political consensus in education,” 2015 ) In my previous post ‘Activity 4 - Your Professional Community’ I identified within my wider educational sphere that our local cluster schools were a representation of one of my main bodies of my community. And yet while there are some curriculum leaders in communities of learning (Kaipatiki Learning Cluster), I feel that on a personal level I have no association with them whatsoever. A document by the Ministry of Education titled ‘ Investing in Educational Success... A Community of Schools’ (Success, 2014) details an initiative that brings these schools together. It describes how communities of schools are groups of schools and kura that come together to raise achievement for children and young people through:
The full document can be found at the end of this post but the most pertinent points to me are:
Looking at these two points together the document highlights that students will benefit from their school and their teachers being part of a community and that teachers working together will share best practice throughout schools. Expertise that teachers and principals have could be shared and that schools will then be able to learn from each other on how best to raise the quality of teaching and learning. This document seems to me to be highlighting the obvious, yet I personally have a feeling that there could be a degree of competition rather than togetherness that is currently stopping this from happening. I feel that this issue needs to be addressed and I can see that through closer collaboration within our community of schools that my own practice and expertise could be enhanced in the following areas:
I feel that just writing this blog highlights my desire to know just how exactly other schools are operating. I feel that I could learn so much from having closer ties to our local schools both in growing my own expertise and imparting my knowledge to others and it is an exciting prospect. In summary, I feel that this is such an important contemporary issue that needs to be addressed so that we as teachers feel less isolated and can build our expertise and align more closely with other schools, which will ultimately be of benefit to our students. I have spoken to several other teachers within my school who seem to share the same sentiments as I do. I will now be bringing this matter to the attention of my principal to find out more about this issue and what seeds we can plant to initiate a change that will see more communication and collaboration between our local schools. Bibliography Education Review Office. (2012). Evaluation at a Glance : Priority Learners in New Zealand Schools August 2012, (August). Brandes, D., & Ginnis, P. (1986). A guide to student-centred learning. Oxford: Blackwell. Political consensus in education "" The way of our future. (n.d.). Retrieved March 9, 2016, from http://www.ppta.org.nz/issues Success, E. (2014). Investing in Educational Success ... Communities of Schools Guide for schools and kura, (August), 1–3.  I have identified the following two professional connections that I have in my map that have had a significant impact on my practice:
My Principal My principal and I started at Glenfield Primary School at roughly the same time. I was just embarking on my new role as teacher and she had just taken over her new role from the acting principal having come from a South Auckland school. Without a doubt my principal was and continues to be the most influential connection I have in my own practice and within my professional community. Her impact has been enormous on me as an individual and as a teacher. She has been driven to make each and every one of us teachers the best that we can be so that we can teach the students in the most effective way possible. With an open door policy, her support, guidance and trust in me, my abilities and my learning has allowed me to flourish as a teacher. I feel that we have a common interest in keeping abreast of the latest global trends in teaching. We talk freely about these trends, she motivates and inspires me to try new things and not to be afraid to fail, as long as I learn. She provides me and my community with current and engaging professional development, she listens, she provokes and she supports me as I am learning how to be an effective 21st century educator. She has been excited by what I have learnt with the Mindlab, helping me with assignments, reading my work and making comments and suggestions on how I can improve what I am doing, always giving me pertinent feedback. As ICT leader she trusts implicitly in the decisions I make, the technology we purchase, the support partners I choose and the digital pedagogies that I utilise within the classroom. This support has helped me become a more confident and effective ICT leader. My principal leads by example and it is her qualities, work ethic and determination to do what is right that will leave a lasting impact on me throughout my teaching career. The Mindlab It would have been an obvious choice to reference my students as having the greatest impact on my professional practice but it is the Mindlab that has also had a huge impact on my practice in a relatively short period of time. The exposure that I have had to such engaging, motivating and inspiring tutors (and fellow teachers), coupled with the hands on learning, interaction with others on the course, videos, course readings, assignments, provocations and discussions has been profound. I have learnt so much from my tutors and peers, made many new connections and have been exposed to so many thoughts and technologies and I feel so motivated and inspired to be a teacher in these fast and exciting times. My practice has changed as result of this course; with the two areas of leadership and student-centred learning having had the most impact on me. It is interesting that it is not the digital element of the course that I mentioning here! The learnings from this course and the new teaching methods that I have applied is slowly changing my teaching program and the way that I teach, interact with the students and interact with my community. Not only this but my peers have seen what is going on in my classroom and are inquiring themselves into their practice and partnerships with their students. I have also reflected on areas that I might not necessarily would have done, read and criticised literature that I might not have done and asked questions about my own and others practice that I may not have done. Plus of course, I have been exposed to a wealth of applications and websites that are gradually making my way into the classroom and across the school much to the students, teachers and parents excitement. A community of practice is a group of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do, and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly. Communities of practice are formed by people who engage in a process of collective learning in a shared domain of human endeavor. (Wenger & Trayner-Wenger, 2015)
When defining my community of practice in regard to Wenger’s concept of community of practice it is important to note that this has been clarified further by his summarising of community of practice as being ‘groups of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly’. Working in the education system I feel that my community of practice is ‘ a complex social system that can be viewed as constituted by interrelated communities of practice’ (Wenger & Trayner-Wenger, 2015) and is far reaching. However, the core of my community, the heart of my practice, as you will, should be defined by recognising my immediate stakeholders; these being my students, my students parents, my fellow teachers and principal (within my school), the Board of Trustees and my ICT support partners and vendors. All three of these groups I identify as constituting my domain, one of three characteristics defined by Wagner to describe a shared interest - that of learning. Wenger goes on to further define two further characteristics of a community of practice, that of community and practice. The former (community), which would refer to my stakeholders engaging in joint activities and discussions, sharing information and helping each other. The latter (practice), whereby my stakeholders ‘develop a shared repertoire of resources: experiences, stories, tools, ways of addressing recurring problems—in short, a shared practice’. This can be broken down in the following way: Students: If I am a committed and reflective educator then my students and I will create positive student-teacher learning partnerships. Teachers: My fellow teachers and I will be in constant pursuit of upskilling ourselves through the wider community (see below), and from each other to enable us to become more effective educators and collaborators. Parents: My parents will wish to learn about their students, their progress and how they can be supported at home and within school. They should also be actively involved with school life. Board of Trustees: The board of trustees is responsible for setting the overall policies of the school, the budget and ensuring that the overall needs of the community (the students, teachers and parents) are met. ICT Partners: Being the ICT Leader I am constantly liaising with my third support and ICT vendors to ensure that the school network together with the hardware and software is up to date and running effectively. Within my wider educational sphere of practice I would identify the main bodies of my community to be the cluster schools in my area, specialist education centres such as Team Solutions and the Mind Lab and then the virtual global community - Social Networking sites, Pond, Google + and the many other professional development websites and resource sites. What Is My Specialist Area of Practice? My school-wide responsibility is that of ICT Leader. Below are a few of the responsibilities that I am accountable for:
My specialist area of practice relates very closely to the current shift in practice in relation to the broader professional context. In ‘Supporting future-oriented learning & teaching - a New Zealand perspective’ (Bolstad et al., 2012) the following points are of note:
My specialist area is vital as we learn how to incorporate existing and emerging digital technologies into the classroom as a way of creating new learning opportunities and ways of learning and as we connect locally and globally with an array of communities (defined above), both within my immediate domain and on a global scale. This is easier said than done however, as we look to address the current issues within the community and the challenges that I face in my own practice. What Are The Current Issues In Your Community? It is beyond the scope of this post to reflect upon all of the community issues that we currently face but I have identified that of ‘communicating effectively with parents so that they become more aware of their child’s learning and more aware of school life and activities’ as one of the most important, and an area that I/we feel that can be improved upon. One, of the ways the we are looking to address this is through the use of ICT. We are looking at the ways that technology can be used to communicate more effectively with parents. Specifically:
We are also now looking at developing e-portfolios that can be accessed online by the parents so that they are more aware of their child’s learning. We are addressing these issues currently amongst the staff, not our parents, which, as I am writing this, feels like something we should be doing and I will bring it to my principal's attention. As a staff we are each trying different things. Some of us are trialling Class Dojo, some are blogging, some are using Google Docs and Classroom, some are not using anything, which needs to be addressed. We will meet back shortly to discuss what is working, not working and the challenges we are currently facing. We are also going to meet with the BOT to discuss the use Facebook as a tool to communicate more effectively with our community as we feel that the type of demographic that our school resides in would be susceptible to this form of communication. What Are The Challenges That You Face In Your Practice? The greatest challenges that I face within my specialist area of IT is: (in no particular order):
We are addressing all of these issues on some level at this stage and it is important to clarify that since carrying out the leadership module from the Mind Lab that I feel that I am doing this more effectively than I was before. I have created an ICT team that covers all year levels and teacher expertise and we meet to discuss current issues and concerns that are detailed above. We have created a digital citizenship and cyber safety program, we have had a student/teacher/parent community evening where we have presented and discussed the inherent dangers of being online. We have started talking to the board about the possibility of using social media as a better method of communication. We have conducted staff surveys through Google Forms on teachers perception of ICT and how it is used within the school. We are soon to start a coffee club where teachers can come and discuss the latest websites and applications (both locally and globally), that are available and how they are using them within the classroom. As mentioned above, this post has only highlighted what I feel are the most important issues and challenges that I and my community face in my specialised area of practice and these can only be achieved through effective leadership and collaborative efforts within my immediate local domain and in the wider global community. References Wenger, E., & Trayner-Wenger, B. (2015). Communities of practice: a brief introduction. April 2015, 1–8. http://doi.org/10.2277/0521663636 Bolstad, R., Gilbert, J., McDowall, S., Bull, A., Boyd, S., & Hipkins, R. (2012). Supporting future-oriented learning and teaching - A New Zealand perspective\n. Retrieved from https://www.educationcounts.govt.nz/__data/assets/pdf_file/0003/109317/994_Future-oriented-07062012.pdf Before reading Reflecting on ‘Reflective Practice’ (Finlay 2008) my definition of reflective practice mirrored that of (Boud et al 1985; Boyd and Fales, 1983; Mezirow, 1981, Jarvis, 1992) being that ‘reflective practice is understood as the process of learning through and from experience towards gaining new insights of self and/or practice’. I could not have worded the definition as succinctly as this but this has been my understanding. However, after reading the article I was both interested and surprised at the depth of analysis that reflective practice involves and what it’s connotations (both positive and negative) can have on myself, my peers and my Year 4/6 students. Below I have highlighted some of the points that within the article that I can relate to in my my reflective practice.
The Reflective Model that I am Adopting - The Spiral of Inquiry |
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