It's not the end, it's just the beginning ....

“Change is a process begun not by learning a new idea from an expert but by recognition that something is not exactly “right” in one’s own professional practice” (Osterman & Kottkamp, 1993). I began my Mindlab journey 32 weeks ago not because I was struggling, or felt that I didn’t know what I was doing, but rather because I knew that I could be doing more.

Registered teachers in New Zealand are required to “Demonstrate commitment to ongoing professional learning and development of professional personal practice”(Education Council of Aotearoa New Zealand, n.d.). While I was a part of regular professional development at my school I knew there was a world of new ideas, technologies, and strategies that couldn’t be covered in an hour and a quarter on a Tuesday afternoon. I knew that this was particularly true in regards to the use of technology/e-learning tools and in order to effect real change I needed to commit myself to an intensive overhaul of my practice.

My learning at the Mind Lab has opened my eyes to the world of possibilities in education. One aspect of the course I felt was invaluable was that not only were we given the e-learning tools to enable our students to create, connect and collaborate but that we also spent an equal amount of time learning about effective pedagogies to support the use of these tools. The fact that the assignments for the course were focussed on our classroom practice meant that we were challenged to incorporate these tools into our own programmes.

The amount of new information I was exposed to was exhausting, and at times I felt myself losing energy and motivation. However, throughout the course the fact that change is neither easy, nor instant was reiterated to us and this knowledge, along with the collaborative nature of our learning helped me to handle the workload. As Osterman and Kottkamp (1993) state “Reflective practice is a challenging, demanding, and often trying process that is most successful as a collaborative effort.”  

The collaborative learning style I was exposed to at the Mindlab demonstrated the value of working on and discussing difficult tasks with others and collaboration became an area of interest for me. Consequently this has been the area of my practice that has undergone the most radical changes. This area of focus aligns with another component of the Practicing Teacher Criteria in New Zealand; the promotion of a “Collaborative, inclusive, and supportive learning environment” (Education Council of Aotearoa New Zealand, n.d.) Through my assignments I have examined, trialled and established collaboration as the norm for students in my class. I have discovered how e-learning can transform collaboration. I have also formed stronger connections with my colleagues (we now teach collaboratively for half of the day) and learned how collaboration with fellow ‘Mindlabbers’, teachers and experts around the world can support my ongoing professional learning.

My teaching career will be temporarily put on hold next year as I take on my next big challenge…. parenthood! However, the Mindlab has left me hopeful about the future of education, and optimistic about the world that my son will grow up in. When I return to teaching I hope that I can continue to work on using technology to transform learning in my classroom, in particular I want to expand on my learning around collaboration by taking this concept outside the walls of my classroom and helping my students to form meaningful connections with other students, teachers and experts worldwide.

References:

Education Council of Aotearoa New Zealand. (n.d.). Practising Teacher Criteria. Retrieved October 20, 2016, from https://educationcouncil.org.nz/content/practising-teacher-criteria-0

Fullan, M., Cuttress, C., & Kilcher, A. (2005). Eight forces for leaders of change: Presence of the core concepts does not guarantee success, but their absence ensures failure. Journal of Staff Development, 26(4), 54–58.

Osterman, K. & Kottkamp, R.(1993) Reflective Practice for Educators. Retrieved on November 18, 2016 from http://www.itslifejimbutnotasweknowit.org.uk/files/RefPract/Osterman_Kottkamp_extract.pdf.

Learning Partnerships

When completing the readings for this week's blog post this quote from Kuban and Mulligan (2015) reached out and grabbed my attention, “It seems that, as educators, we recognize the globalization of society and the overlapping nature of most occupations, and we want our students to have diverse, interdisciplinary experiences—thus it seems prudent to adopt a similar mindset for our own scholarly endeavors. We should set an example for our students, valuing efforts to “reach across the aisle” and emphasizing interdisciplinary opportunities”

While this quote was made in reference to a tertiary context it has significance no matter which sphere of education you apply it to. The divisions we place between subject areas at school are artificial and generally lack this concrete distinction in the real world. In order to best equip students for success in the future we need to provide them with authentic experiences across different content areas “Instruction should focus on integrated, interdisciplinary activities that revolve around a set of important ideas” (Barton & Smith, 2000).

In order to make learning more authentic and meaningful for students we not only need to integrate different learning areas but also facilitate the creation of ‘learning partnerships’(Fullan & Langworthy, 2011) or connections between students, teachers, parents and the wider community. Modern technology has meant that the term ‘community’ is now a global one, rather than being limited by geographical location.

When reflecting on my interdisciplinary connection map I was pleased that most of my connections or partnerships listed were highlighted blue (indicating a strong connection) or orange (indicating a developing connection). However, there was one area of weakness that stood out to me immediately; while I am working hard on developing connections with whanau/family and other community groups I have spent only a minimal amount of time forming connections with experts, e.g. scientists, sportspeople, doctors etc within the local and wider global community.

Developing this area is crucial for me because forming partnerships with experts not only provides me as a teacher with sources of knowledge and experience that I do not personally possess, but more importantly helps to make learning more authentic and meaningful for students.  

This term I hope to strengthen my connections in this area through engaging with relevant experts on our overarching topic of ‘Growing’. This key idea encompasses a wide range of curriculum areas and connections/partnerships could potentially be formed with scientists, conservationists, gardeners, farmers, doctors, nutritionists etc.

Plan for engagement:

Revisiting key ideas:

One of the most common challenges with interdisciplinary learning is ensuring that the key ideas are not lost so it is important that these are outlined within the initial unit plan (Jones, 2009) before it is shared with experts.

Sharing unit plan with experts:

In order to  form connections with these experts and enable them to make meaningful contributions to our learning I would share our unit outline with them, then attempt to formulate a plan for how they could offer support and engage with the students.

Setting up tools for communication:

After engaging with these experts during the initial stages of learning and helping the students to form connections with them it would be useful to set up a means of communication that the students could use to contact them to answer questions as the students follow their own learning paths. Time and scheduling may be an issue in this but with a myriad of different forms of communication available to us I feel that these barriers could be overcome with time and commitment.

Through facilitating connections between my students and these ‘outside’ experts I hope to engage my students more deeply in the subject matter through helping them to see real-life applications for their learning. As Leslie Kreimer states in Barton and Smith (2009) “If they’re doing an activity that’s meaningful, and they know why they are doing it, and they see the application, they’ll learn from it”.  Helping students to develop relationships with outside experts is not only important for their learning, but also for their character development. Through interacting with others outside their normal sphere students develop greater empathy and a deeper understanding of others “As an educator one of our main roles is to educate and enable our students to see the world through many lenses, from different perspectives” (Thomas McDonagh Group, 2011). The earlier we engage students with the ‘real world’ , the better we prepare them for life within it.  

References:

Barton, K. C., & Smith, L. A. (2000). Themes or motifs? Aiming for coherence through interdisciplinary outlines. The Reading Teacher. Retrieved from http://myaccess.library.utoronto.ca/login?url=http://search.proquest.com/docview/203275592?accountid=14771\nhttp://bf4dv7zn3u.search.serialssolutions.com/?ctx_ver=Z39.88-2004&ctx_enc=info:ofi/enc:UTF-8&rfr_id=info:sid/ProQ%3Aeducationalumni&rft_val_fmt=inf

Fullan, M., & Langworthy, M. (2011). A rich seam how new pedagogies find deep learning. Journal of Bodywork and Movement Therapies (Vol. 15). http://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbmt.2011.01.017

Jones, C. (2009). Interdisciplinary Approach - Advantages, Disadvantages, and the Future Benefits of Interdisciplinary Studies. Essai, 7(2009), 75–81.

Mulligan, Laura and Kuban, A. (2015). A Conceptual Model for Interdisciplinary Collaboration. Retrieved October 17, 2016, from http://acrlog.org/2015/05/14/a-conceptual-model-for-interdisciplinary-collaboration./

Thomas McDonagh Group. (2011). Interdisciplinarity and Innovation Education [video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDdNzftkIpA

Making Connections

This year I returned to formal study after eight years and have been stunned by the immense changes that have occurred over that time. Facebook and other social networks were in their infancy when I was last spending late nights puzzling over an essay question or pondering the definition of a new term or buzz word. The ability to engage and collaborate with other teachers has transformed the professional learning experience for me, adding a whole new layer of feedback, support and instantly accessible knowledge that simply didn’t exist in 2008. My online interactions with other course members and members of the wider educational community have given me the opportunity to construct knowledge, consolidate my understanding of difficult concepts and connect with the expertise and experiences of others in ways that previously weren’t possible “A social network site can afford members the opportunity to create, share and curate the knowledge in a shared space, and members’ thinking is mediated and developed by the thinking of others” (Melhuish, 2013).

While I primarily use Mindlab’s ‘Google Plus’ community I have also started to become more active on Twitter and Facebook and am endless amazed at the speed at which I am able to engage with others around the world. When researching the iPad app ‘Book Creator’ I took to Facebook to discover how other junior teachers were using it in their classroom and within minutes received examples of work, links to apps to use alongside Book Creator and solutions to common issues, e.g. only having a small number of devices. This information would have taken me a long time to locate if I had been researching myself and the fact that it was being provided by fellow teachers who were actively using the app in their own classrooms meant that, to me, it was far more authentic and useful then reading a research article or instruction manual.

While there are many critics of social media and definite privacy and professional issues that can arise through its use I feel that its benefits greatly outweigh any costs. I believe that treating online interactions in the same way that one would treat conversations at a meeting or conference, and quickly removing oneself from networks that do not operate in this fashion is an effective safeguard against most issues.

Despite being a prolific user of social networks for my own learning and development I feel that I am yet to fully master their potential for transforming learning in my classroom.
This year I have had some success using the online brainstorm tool ‘Padlet’. I use ‘Padlet’ to provide my students with a forum where they can anonymously post questions about our topic for the term either at school or at home. To post a question the students need only to double click/tap and write. We log in every day to see where the students thoughts are taking our learning and their questions drive our learning for the following week. The students love being able to answer the questions they have asked and often access Padlet at home with their parents. In the future I would like to expand this further through connecting and collaborating with other students worldwide by posting our Padlet questions on Twitter or other social forums.

Another area I am working on developing is the use of social media for sharing learning with whanau. Parental engagement is a crucial factor in both the academic and personal success of students (Education Council of Aotearoa New Zealand, 2011) and the immediate nature of social media makes it the ideal tool for sharing learning with parents. The ease with which it can be updated and accessed offers parents a unique and timely insight into their child’s learning. As Ward (2014) states “Social media with its possibility of constant small updates and opportunities for response represents the "pulse of a school".

A challenge I am currently facing is finding a social media tool to use that requires only minimal teacher assistance. Because of the young age of my students and the fact that most of them possess only basic literacy skills this has been somewhat difficult. For social media to truly have a transformative effect on my students I know I need to take a step back, and let them take ownership. Ironically it has been social media that has lead me to a possible solution; after discussing my challenges with others on Google Plus and Facebook I am currently experimenting with using the iPad app ‘Seesaw’ in my class and am excited by the potential this offers, not only as means of recording the students work and progress but also through inviting parents into our classroom through the screens of their laptops and smartphones. It’s ease of use means that even the youngest students have been able to operate it with relative ease and I look forward to exploring this further in the future.

When used responsibly social media has the potential to bring teachers, parents and students closer together, while at the same time giving students the opportunity to engage with, and share their learning with countless others around the world. I am excited about the potential it has to expand my students' learning experience and hope to continue to develop my expertise in using it to transform their learning.

References:
Education Council of Aotearoa New Zealand. (2011). Cultural competencies for teachers of Māori learners: Tātaiako.
Melhuish, K. (2013). Online social networking and its impact on New Zealand educators’professional learning, 1994, 219. Retrieved from http://researchcommons.waikato.ac.nz/bitstream/handle/10289/8482/thesis.pdf?sequence=3&isAllowed=y
Ward, L. (2014). Talking to parents in 140 characters: how are schools using social media? | Teacher Network | The Guardian. Retrieved October 13, 2016, from www.theguardian.com/teacher-network/teacher-blog/2014/jul/16/talking-to-parents-how-schools-using-social-media