Inquiry One - Monitoring (Teaching Inquiry Phase 2)

TEACHING INQUIRY PHASE 2 : MONITORING

What needed to change?
We decided things needed to change. We wanted to streamline and more effectively monitor children's learning to ensure that children were completing set tasks and allow a way for us to easily access their learning.
The move from being in a single cell classroom with one teacher accountable for 30 children, to having 60 children between us in multiple spaces (MLE), meant that it was harder to identify who was monitoring who.

We identified that this change could help us to use time more efficiently and hold children accountable for managing their own learning.


What strategies will help to make this change?
We attended the GAFE summit in Auckland during the Term 1 School Holidays which inspired us to make a change to a fully digital monitoring tool. We observed many different planning and monitoring templates during our conference. We had also seen tracking tools on Point England's website and during our school visit to Russell Street.

We decided to move from Google Docs to Google Sheets. The children had some prior knowledge using sheets from their Home Learning logs. Sheets seemed to be the most appropriate GAFE to allow us to set up one place to instantly monitor all of the children's learning. Thus 'Fast Track' was born.


The process:
As we wanted the children's learning to all be in one place to allow us to instantly monitor their learning, and hold them accountable to manage their own learning.

We developed a 'Sheet' with a heading for all the tasks for that week in columns. Each child had a row to paste their learning under each heading.

Fast Track Week 2 Term 2.

Teaching and Learning:

Children learnt to:
-  Access the Fast Track (that was shared with them in Drive)
-  Get the 'Shareable Link' that we could edit from their learning
-  Copy the URL link
-  Use 'Google URL Shortener' to shorten the link
-  Copy the shortened link
- Paste the shortened link in the correct cell in Fast Track

Reflection 1:
After one week of using Fast Track we noticed that we needed to make some slight adjustments.
Problems we encountered:
- Children pasting links into the wrong cells
- Children deleting links
- No place for us to comment or see whose learning had been conferenced.

Changes Made 1:
 - We 'protected' each child's row - so that only they could paste links into their row. This stopped the children accidentally deleted other children's work and pasting into the wrong row.
- Children were encouraged to remember 'their' row number - to ensure they were pasting into the correct row.
- We added a 'grey column' next to each task, so that as teachers we could add any comments/ next steps about the task and see who had been conferenced.

Reflection 2:
After a successful first week we acknowledged that whilst Fast Track allowed us to access all of the children's learning in one place and for them to monitor what they had and hadn't done it needed something else. We needed a place for the children to go to access their learning tasks. This is the point where we linked Google Classroom with Fast Track.

Changes Made 2:
- We set up a Google Classroom for the curriculum areas; Writing and Integration as well as a GRi11 Home Page (already had one for Shared Reading).
- In each Google Classroom we set assignments for the week in that curriculum area.
- In Fast Track we added the TASK and which CLASSROOM to find it in.

The BLACK Rows show the task and where to find it; e.g. 'Matrix Indicators'  is the task and underneath shows that it is found in the 'Integration Classroom'.

Fast Track became the 'Map' for learning; directing children on what they needed to complete over the week and where to find the learning tasks.
By incorporating Google Classroom, we needed less whole class teaching time to explain the learning for the week as children could find the instructions for each learning task in Google Classroom.

Sharing Our ELS Journey

Today we had the opportunity to share our ELS journey this year with our Syndicate and Leadership Team. We spoke openly and honestly about the good and the bad we have experienced this year. 

Our Presentation.

Putting this presentation together we discovered just how far we had come in one term. Our children are managing themselves, working collaboratively, thinking flexibly and learning new skills in a variety of GAFE. 

Inquiry Two - Feedback

Inquiry Two: How can we provide meaningful and individualised feedback using technology?

Inquiry Goals:

1. Feedback will provide learners with next learning steps.
2. Feedback will link to resources to support new learning and reinforce previous learning.
3. Children will be able to access the feedback through a variety of media, anytime and anyplace.
4. Provide feedback to children through a multimodal approach.

Background:

Upon starting using Google Docs for writing we identified that giving feedback would require some change in our thinking. In 2014 Clive experimented with giving feedback on writing in google docs using the school wide approach of pink (tickled pink - something good) and green (green for grow - next step) highlighting. He then started using the comments feature to add written feedback. Problems started to arise here as children were resolving the next steps and deleting the comments.

We chose to look into more effective ways of giving feedback utilising google apps. Katie attended a workshop that introduced her to the Kaizena app and she has started to look at ways this may assist us with giving more meaningful feedback to the children.

Focusing Inquiry:

What do my students need to learn?

To read feedback.

To understand pink & green highlighting.

To use google apps that are chosen by teachers to give and/or aid them in giving feedback.

To follow links to resources.

To receive feedback through a variety of media.

How to respond to feedback.

Assessment Information:

• Google Form:

Ask children:

- How do you receive feedback?

- What do you do when you receive feedback?

- Who do you receive feedback from?

- Why do you receive feedback?

- How do you think feedback could be improved?

Student voice / Interviews:

Through google forms (see above).

Provide a summary of the google form.

Video children asking them to explain what feedback is and how we give it to them at present.

Professional reading around my inquiry:

Find articles about ‘What is effective feedback’ and ‘How technology can aid teachers in giving feedback’.

Reflections or current thinking:

Teaching Inquiry:

Inquiry One Monitoring

Inquiry One: How can we develop effective and efficient ways to monitor children through the use of technology in an MLE?

Inquiry Goals:

1. To develop an efficient way to access children’s learning.
2. To ensure children are managing and are accountable for their own learning.

Background:

At the start of the year we planned out what we as teachers would need to introduce to allow children to manage their own learning. Having both previously taught using a self-managed literacy block we decided that this would be the perfect starting point.

In 2012 we both used Literacy Contracts in which children choose what learning activities they completed and then filled in the work they completed each day in a paper copy table (glued in their book). Whilst this allowed the children to monitor and track their own learning, as teachers we still had to search through their books in order to monitor their learning.

In 2014 Clive was involved in trialling Google Drive, and thus the monitoring of children’s learning became an even harder process. Children continued to manage themselves and fill in a paper copy Literacy Contract, however now their work was spread across books and their Google Drive. The children did a fantastic job tracking their work but as a teacher Clive struggled to effectively monitor their learning. He would spend a long time searching for their work in Google Drive, as they hadn’t saved it correctly or shared it with me.

Problems we have observed in monitoring children who are managing their own learning:

• Time. It takes a long time to monitor children’s learning when they are using a multiple tools (google drive & books).

Focusing Inquiry:

In 2015 we started working in a new space (with breakout rooms), 60 children and 2 teachers we knew we would have to be on top of monitoring the children. We decided to use a Literacy Contract again to allow the children to manage their own learning, however this time they would fill in a table on a Google Doc. In Term 1 we will also trial using Google Classroom, to take away the problem of searching for children’s work in Google Drive. As we are blended classroom, with 24 Apple Macbooks, BYOD Apple devices and books we predict that this won’t solve all our monitoring problems.

What do my students need to learn?

How to fill in a literacy contract in a google doc.

How to make a copy of a google doc.

How to share a google doc.

How to join a class in google classroom

How to ‘turn in’ work .

Student voice / Interviews:

Professional reading around my inquiry:

In November I attended an introduction to Google Classroom course at TTS. This covered the basics of the app and possibilities for using it.

Google Classroom readings:

https://www.google.co.nz/edu/training/get-trained/classroom/introduction.html

http://ditchthattextbook.com/2014/05/15/10-ways-google-classroom-will-make-learning-better/

http://googleforeducation.blogspot.co.nz/2015/01/A-Classroom-mobile-app-and-new-teacher-goodies.html

https://www.google.com/edu/training/get-certified/?utm_referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2Fedu%2Fresources%2Fprograms%2Fgoogle-teacher-academy%2F

(We are looking at becoming Google Educators to further assist us with teaching in our ELS).

Modern Learning Environments:

http://www.core-ed.org/sites/core-ed.org/files/Modern-Learning-Environments-v.1.pdf

http://marshland.school.nz/2014/05/12/qa-about-flexible-learning-environments/

http://mle.education.govt.nz/assets/Uploads/MLE/Case-Studies/AucklandNormalIntermediateCasestudy-July2014.pdf

http://evolutionandimagination.blogspot.co.nz/2015/04/modern-learning-mindset-practices.html?m=1

Reflections or current thinking:

Teaching Inquiry: What do I need to know and do?

Before sharing the ‘Literacy Contract’ with the class we had to work out how children would share it with us. We decided to start this process by having them complete the first week on a paper Literacy Contract. Our thinking was that the class needed to understand more about the managing self process and how the Literacy Contract could allow them to monitor and record their learning.

We then had to learn how to make a copy of a doc and share docs with multiple users. We set up a class google account that allowed us to share docs with them without having to individually add their google accounts. We then had to learn how to make screen recordings using Quicktime and write up basic instructions to inform the class.

Clive had some prior knowledge of Google Classroom so he would set up the Home Learning class. We had to learn how to use Google Sheets so we could make a Google Sheet to use as the children’s Home Learning log.

Teaching/Learning:

We started the year by introducing the children to 'Managing Self' through a Traditional Teaching Style Emotional hook. From here we shared the Literacy Contract with each child via Google Drive for them to make a copy. We taught them in small groups how to 'make a copy' and 'share' the doc in Google Drive. We also made short screen recordings of how to do this and shared it with the children for them to look back at if they had problems.

Children were required to fill in the date they completed each activity and share it with us.

Once the Literacy Contract was up and running we introduced Google Classroom to the class. We set up a class called 'Home Learning' and showed them how to join the class. In this class we shared with them their weekly Home Learning Tasks and they were required to 'turn in' their Home Learning Log.

Google Classroom showed us who had 'turned in' their work and who hadn't. 

We chose to use Google Sheets for the Home Learning Log to expose children to another Google App. 

We uncovered some problems in using Google Classroom on an i-pad. Children struggled to 'make a copy' of docs and turn in their Home Learning tasks. We managed to figure out how to do this although we found little or no help available online.

Once the class were up and going with using Google Classroom for their Home Learning we introduced a 'Shared Reading' class and trialled a 'Reading group'.  

We found Google Classroom to be an effective tool to share learning tasks with children and to monitor who has completed the tasks.

Learning Inquiry:

As Term 1 came to a close we realised that whilst our current monitoring systems helped us monitor children’s learning but it still involved us searching for the children’s work. We would spend a lot of time looking at children’s individual ‘Literacy Contracts’ and then checking their work in their google drive or their books.

The systems we put in place allowed the children to manage and track their own learning. They can now all fill in the “Literacy Contract’ in google docs, make a copy and share it with us correctly. This has given the children a method to record their work however it still requires a lot of steps for us to effectively monitor each child.

During an audit of the children’s ‘Literacy Contract’s we discovered three boys who had only been doing the online (Studyladder activities) learning activities and work in google docs/classroom. These children hadn’t been completing any of the tasks that were set for their books. Whilst this was partially because these boys were struggling with managing their own learning it was also because our monitoring systems weren’t efficient or effective enough.

We held a whole class discussion on managing self and the importance of completing all the tasks not just the online work. However upon this discovery we decided we needed to change the way we were monitoring children and they were recording their learning.

As a result we are moving back into the Teaching Inquiry phase.