 Our Term 2 TeachMeet brought teachers together who were keen to explore thinking so far related to the new History curriculum. It was facilitated by Kathryn Hutchinson, History teacher at Wellington High, and all our schools were represented :)
While we noted it is currently in draft, this was an opportunity to share thinking, ponderings and progress. This built on the Term 1 TeachMeet held at Pukeahu Education Centre. The resources from the Ministry to help kura plan into this space were useful. Our notes were captured in this shared doc, including the slides. There will be further opportunity to keep mapping and exploring, as the new curriculum comes to light.
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 The focus of this session was to acknowledge the common language we share in the NZC, and the varied ways in which in-school contexts are vehicles for the key competencies (capabilities) and student agency. Building on our community of practice from last term, we began by taking a deep dive into the ‘thinking’ and ‘managing self’ key competencies. It was interesting to think about the many different ways in which we think. We then used the knowledge about the key competencies to notice how they were being taught in the context of inquiry/project based learning. Each school presented an example of the teaching at their school. There is great value in sharing our practice across schools and the morning tea break provided an opportunity to continue conversations and find out more from each other. As we listened to each other’s presentations, we noticed how the thinking and managing self competencies were being taught both explicitly and implicitly through the project based/inquiry teaching. And to finish we began mapping the teaching of these competencies across our learning pathway from year 0 to year 13. Our intention is to continue building on this record as we explore different contexts. Next term’s context will be science.
A small but enthusiastic group of teachers from across the Kāhui Ako interested in Universal Design for Learning met on Thursday 10th June from 4-5 pm to share their practice and knowledge of UDL. We discussed the difference between differentiation and universal design and considered where our own practice fits in the model below. Justine Henderson, DP from Newtown School reminded us there is a progression from the green to the red box, with the goal being student agency.  We decided to make this a regular catch-up and will meet again for an afternoon next term. Anyone interested in UDL would be welcome to join us.
Mā mua ka kite a muri.
Mā muri ka ora a mua. Those who lead give sight to those who follow. Those who follow give life to those who lead. Our whanaungatanga activity for this session involved everyone taking a whakatoukī and putting actions to it and sharing it back. It was great to see the collective creativity of our rōpū. Today’s session was framed with two stories - a huge MIHI to Tony and Ben for sharing your journey with us. Tony’s story was in relation to his response to hearing about the Doctrine of Discovery and Ben shared his journey in restorative practice and how this related to the culturally responsive space. Ben also led us in a session to unpack the new website from the Teaching Council called “UNTEACH RACISM”. This is a powerful and challenging website and well worth taking the time to work through the modules - these could also be valuable PLD. The rest of our session was our deep dive into aspects of our practice. Some of us looked at whānau engagement, some looked at how to respond effectively to resistance, and some looked at next steps for either their classroom practice, or whole school practice. This Community of Practice is research-based and the teachers who are attending are investing their time and energy into making a positive difference for their Māori students - thank you to everyone for your hard work, vulnerability and willingness to share! We are learning great things from one another! Nāku te rourou, Nāu te rourou. Ka ora ai te iwi. With my basket, and your basket the people will be fed.  It was fabulous to connect with a group of our ECE teachers around our transitions and learner pathways. The group contributed an ECE perspective to our Kāhui Ako Transitions document which documents the transition practices in our Kāhui from ECE right through to Year 13. We are beginning to get a rich picture of our learner pathway which is exciting. We then took some time to unpack and rank the Te Whāriki Online resource on transitions. This has given us great insight into what is important for our ECE Centres and where best to allocate resource and professional development. A huge thank you to Newtown Kindergarten for hosting us so well - we enjoyed having the opportunity to meet in your beautiful space!   Poipoia te kakano, Kia puawai!
Nurture the seed and it will blossom. There is nothing more inspiring than bringing a group of innovative teachers together to talk about ways in which they have connected and built relationships with their Māori learners and their whānau. This was the take-away from our session in Term 1, and some great insights were gained as teachers took time to really engage with their Māōri learners and share what worked, what they found out and how they knew they had been successful. We worked on what critical questions remain for us in this space, and will be looking at how we can continue to deepen our practice. DEEP DIVE - know better, do better! We spent some time digging deeply into case studies and research in order to inform our next steps in relation to our teaching practice = praxis. We then created a visual image to show the journey and our thinking - an example from Houghton Valley School is included. Here are links to some of the materials we were looking at - you may like to take some time to check these out yourself, and think about how these could impact your own practice:
Link to the page with questions and key content. Link to the video about Jane’s Story. Ruth’s story - ako Link to the page with questions and key content. Link to the video about Ruth’s Story. Tu’u’s story - students leading in the classroom Link to the page with questions and key content. Link to the video about Tu’u’s Story. |
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