Emma's Teaching as Inquiry

What achievement challenge are you considering as an area of focus in 2021 and why? Include in your WHY both evidence and your own passion/expertise As a school, our data shows that learners (particulary Māori boys) are not succeeding in writing. This has been my inquiry focus this year and I hope to continue with this further next year. I love teaching literacy and hope that my inquiries over the last 2 years have been helpful for other teachers. This year I have learnt a lot around challenges for these children such as limited vocabulary and engagement. I am working hard to build my knowledge about te reo Māori and I hope to inquire into whether integrating te reo Māori into writing lessons will give Māori learners more of a sense of belonging and purpose to the writing process.  What learnings from the 2017 - 2020 CoL teacher inquiries have informed or inspired your thinking. Jannie Van Hees research around oral language and all the inquiries that used her research. In my previo...

2019 was a huge year of learning for me! So many PD opportunities and rich conversations with other teachers and experts. My inquiry into increasing oral language strategies saw huge shifts in reading! Some reflections about my inquiry 2019:  What worked well:  Having the support of other teachers and schools to collaborate with, really strengthened my inquiry. I was very lucky to have a huge variety of PLD sessions to attend that related to my inquiry focus. I found the assessments such as running records and the oral language Combi Tool very useful in collecting and analysing the data of my learners.  Challenges:  I initially wanted to focus in on literacy as a whole - oral language being the foundation to reading and writing. Although I'm sure my inquiry impacted the data for reading and writing, I found it difficult to collect data and analyse it across 2 subject. Especially since I was not teaching some learners for both reading and writing...

Evaluation 1. Summarise evidence about key changes in teaching and other factors that influence student learning. 2. Summarise evidence about key shifts in the problem of student learning. 3. Write an overall evaluation of your intervention in terms of the causal chain you had theorised. i.e. To what extent was the intervention successful in changing factors such as teaching? To what extent were those changes in teaching effective in changing patterns of student learning? Quantitative Data: Running Record data: One of my main assessment measures for this inquiry was running record data. I was very pleased with the data shift with most of my target learners. There were 2 learners in particular who did not seem to benefit from my intervention.  At the beginning of the year my students’ on average had a score of 13 for their running record which was below for year 2 and well below for year 3. At the end of the year my students’ on average had a score of 18 which...

Learners are loving the oral language opportunities!  Feedback from learners: I've made a few more changes to my reading programme:  1. Must do/can do's that encourage talking and deeper thinking about the book before they see me. This is allowing learners opportunities to develop agency in reading.  2. Use of paper modelling books. They still have digital modelling books but I am seeing such a positive change in the way they are collaborating and engaging in their learning with these paper modelling books.  3. Recently my hub has been having coaching around how to make the wall displays in the hub more interactive and purposeful for the learning. I have attempted to create wall displays that encourage learner agency.  Progress of some target learners in reading:  T1 running record T3 running record level 8  Level 19 level 8  Level 19 level 8 Level 18  Feedback from learners about what has helped ma...

My Inquiry so far: Term 3 2019 Main changes I have made to my teaching:  1. Introduce a range of different oral language activities and strategies in reading and writing.  2. Allow time for reflection in reading and writing time The first change was easy, I implemented a huge variety of games into my morning routine. We spent the first 15 minutes of the day playing games and talking. It was fun and the kids loved it!  These activities were transferred into our reading programme. Learners were being agentic by choosing the activities that they wanted to do during reading time through this magical map:  I found that these activities were fun and engaging for learners. They were being agentic by choosing games and activities that they enjoyed. But.. I wanted more. My goal was for the learners to develop agency in literacy. I wanted them to have a better understanding of their learning and next steps. My student voice showed that my learners STILL h...

Blog post #10 Restate your inquiry question and your theory of action/chain of events ( so you keep your eyes on the prize ) Describe how you will collect information about the implementation of your changed practices/intervention ( so it is clear what you doing differently ) My Inquiry Question How might an increase in oral language opportunities support Maori learners to develop agency in literacy? Changes to my teaching:  I have increased oral language opportunities into my literacy programme. - Independent activities: - Time to reflect on learning by using learner qualities:  - Gifting vocabulary to reflect on own learning and peer learning:  - Creating a success criteria of what a "good speaker" looks like and sounds like. Reflection:  I am noticing a change in my learners oral language capabilities through the Combi tool data, as well as seeing good progress in most learners running record results. However, I would like to see ...

8 & 9: Explain the hypotheses about teaching that you decided were MOST woth testing and why. Explain how you will test it and what evidence would support (or refute) that hypothesis.  Learner Agency:  I chose this hypothesis because I feel if learners are able to be agentic in their learning then they will be more entitled to drive their progress in literacy. I feel that when learners have a deep understanding of what they are learning and the appropriate tools to support the learning then they will be more successful.  How I will test this:  I have taken some pre videos of my learners student voice and I plan to do the same in term 3 and term 4 to measure the progress of the learners understanding of their learning.  During each reading and writing lesson, I will co-construct a success criteria with my learners and make sure that this is often referred back to throughout the learning. These success criteria will align with the Stonefield's learning ...

7. Describe the process for developing hypothesis (What you read, who you talked with)  Professional conversations:  - Jannie Van Hees- We are fortunate to have Jannie working a long side our school supporting our 2019 oral language project. We discussed the importance of learners giving detail in their speech. This needs to be modelled and encouraged in all areas of the school day.  - Team conversations - We are noticing that our learners are often giving 1 or 2 word responses to questions and very rarely volunteering information without prompting.  - Dianne Ley (RTLB) - As part of the oral language project, my team has had coaching with Dianne. We have discussed ways to incorporate oral language across all areas of the school day. We also have a focus on supporting ESOL learners.  - Naomi Toland - We have been discussing the development of the brain and where there could be barriers for some learners to make connections to learning. We have discussed usi...