My achievements are a team effort

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Ehara taku toa i te toa takitahi, he takitini

My achievements are the result of working with people. The importance of working collaboratively in a team can never be underestimated. It requires a commitment from everyone, and in particular the nominated leadership.

Teamwork in teaching

As school communities we pride ourselves on working as a team. However, when I am working with kaiako (teachers), I find that they can sometimes be quite isolated in their classroom environment and, therefore, in their practice. The classroom seems to be their go-to zone — their security blanket — and everything in the classroom is driven by them, both the good and the bad.

Why not step out and observe good practice within other classrooms? Every school has staff who are experienced, innovative, and positive; observing good practice regularly is a great way to grow as a teacher.

Māori have always learned practical skills through observation. Fishing, hunting, gardening, weaving, carving, hangi — all those practical tasks were learned by observing, then pitching in and giving it a go. Then the knowledge and skills were passed on. Karanga, whaikōrero, and waiata were also learned through observation, listening, rote learning, and eventually performing those roles. These were the essential parts of the traditional Māori curriculum!

We, too, can learn from good practice, observation, listening, and asking questions. In this way we utilise the strengths of all those around us.

I have always been a big believer in mentoring. We identify those about us who we trust and respect professionally and personally. Then we meet regularly — formally and informally — to discuss a shared set of goals or outcomes. A key part of that relationship is that they come to observe our teaching practice to critique.

Teaching can be a lonely job if we don't work collaboratively. School leadership must encourage and lead this. E hoa mā karawhuia! Mahia te mahi.

Ehara taku toa i te toa takitahi, he takitini.

This post was originally posted on Whare’s blog.

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Using digital tools to build literacy skills across the curriculum

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Access to tools that can support literacy across the curriculum are increasingly at student’s fingertips. As part of a Universal Design for Learning approach, choices and supports for all students are built into the learning design at the outset. Consequently, students should have access to tools that personalise learning and match their needs and preferences across the curriculum. Here are three ideas teachers and students can use to support this approach.

1. Get familiar with Text-to-Speech

Text-to-speech (TTS) software enables a student to select and listen to text in a document or on a webpage. The software usually highlights a paragraph at a time as it is read aloud and often tracks each word as it is spoken in a second colour.  TTS software is usually free and built into most devices or can be enabled in a web browsers. It is also possible to purchase more sophisticated TTS tools bundled with other features such as word prediction.

Although the synthetic voices in TTS can take a little getting used to, students can use TTS to:

  • listen and read along to unfamiliar texts to develop fluency
  • increase comprehension and access to texts beyond reading level
  • rest tired eyes and access the text via audio
  • listen to the text whilst doing another activity such as exercise, travelling on the bus or walking home from school
  • listen back to written work to assist more accurate editing of text.

To get a sense of the potential impact of making text to speech available to students, take a look at this video of US high school students describing the difference having access to text-to-speech has made to their independence, their confidence as learners and to their increasing achievement.

2. Turn on the closed captions on YouTube videos

When using YouTube as a teaching resource, build in learning supports at the outset by selecting video that has closed captions, identified by the cc icon rather than machine captions “guessed” by YouTube. Using closed captions can boost literacy, reading speed, and vocabulary for readers who need additional support.

By turning on the closed captions, students can choose to:

  • watch the video, and/or
  • read the captions separately or at the same time
  • access the interactive transcript posted below the video.

The transcript is really useful when a student needs to find a quote or wants to scan a video to find a specific piece of information. Visit Media Access Australia for more information.

3. Demonstrate how to declutter web pages to support concentration

Introduce students to tools, such as Readability on the Chrome browser or the Safari Reader function on i-devices that strip away the clutter on web pages, so that students can focus more easily on a particular article.

Dig deeper

For more information on Universal Design for Learning and the tools above, check out the following links:

Universal Design for Learning (UDL)

Text to speech tools

  • Natural Reader download: Floating toolbar. Selected text will post into toolbar window. Text highlighted in short sections and read aloud. Can sync with Google Docs.
  • Natural Reader Online TTS: Upload document. Text highlighted in short sections and read aloud. Can sync to Google Docs.
  • Mac “Speak selection”: Built-in text to speech program. Speaks selected text in all applications including text on internet pages.
  • Read and Write for Google Docs: Toolbar opens at the top of a Google Docs page. Selected text highlighted yellow, each word tracked in blue as read aloud. NB Trial version has more features. After 30 days you are left with the basic TTS tool
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A year of YES: How the Young Enterprise Scheme unlocks a world of possibility for secondary students

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YES students

Where school failed me

The current scope of school subjects is very narrow relative to the number of career possibilities that exist. This is especially true for the 21st century student who, regardless of their geographical location in edge-of-the-earth New Zealand, will enter a global, connected, and varied job market. School as I knew it fell well short of preparing me to make a living in a world of such limitless possibility. Indeed, even if I had known this kind of world existed, how could I ever hope to contribute meaningfully to it?

Career is not the same as contribution

Sadly, “career” was a word more commonly heard during my high school days than “contribution” — what you were going to “do” when you grew up seemed more important than who you were going to “be”, and our future careers were so strongly tied to our school subjects that it was hard to see the possibilities beyond them. Most of us now know that the formula for success in life is much more complicated than “career choice = pharmacist = subject choice = chemistry”, but how can we teach young people to have work goals beyond a respectable job with adequate remuneration? How can we help to develop them as complete, confident, contributing citizens?

The year of the YES experience opened my eyes

It is only now, at the age of 28 and through witnessing the confidence of peers ten years my junior that I feel I am beginning to see the power in a year of YES.

To clarify, this is not about “The Year of Yes” as advocated in the memoir of author Maria Headley, who resolves, for an entire year, to say “yes” to every man that asks her out on a date (hilarity ensues). No, we’re not venturing into Carrie Bradshaw and Mr Big territory here. However, both my and Headley’s “Years of Yeses” do share one common theme: The power of possibility.

My year of YES (Young Enterprise Scheme) began in March 2013 when I first acted in a supporting role to Judith Tatom, regional coordinator for the Canterbury YES programme. Since then, I have seen what young people are capable of when someone says: “It is possible.” That statement was a seed from which little companies sprang forth — some are now saplings with a year’s worth of growth on them. In years to come these saplings could grow, cross-pollenate, drop their own seeds, and create entrepreneurial forests in abundance comparable to pre-colonisation Aotearoa. In other words (and before I leave the horticultural metaphor behind entirely): Cultivating entrepreneurship and confidence at a young age could cause widespread shifts in our future economies, societies, and communities.

Real-life skills at school can show a life-student possibilities and give permission to succeed

Young Enterprise Scheme

These companies, or “demonstrations in possibility”, could have an exponential impact on the number of people in society who feel able and encouraged to lead, voice their ideas, earn a living working from their passions, and contribute to a whole greater than themselves. Some of the companies I witnessed in 2013 had a very strong social or community focus: A team from St Margaret’s College started Surrounded by Love, a not-for-profit that supported the families of cancer sufferers; a team from Christchurch Girls’ High petitioned for free WiFi on city buses; another from Christchurch Boys’ High sold seeds and planters made from used wooden pallets to encourage people to grow their own food and recycle; Nothink Ltd from Hornby High developed a specialised pen-grip for sufferers of a rare condition which made holding certain objects difficult; and the New Plymouth Girls’ High team, Exposure, (overall winners for 2013) partnered with the Cancer Foundation to develop and sell UV sensitive wrist bands, which changed colour to let the wearer know when they needed to apply more sunscreen.

Often, teenagers are painted as a selfish and unruly bunch — hormonally insane, consumed by their immediate worlds, and probably not the first members of society you’d expect to, well, care. But many of these students already had a strong sense of “what was needed” and a willingness to “make it work”. All they needed was permission to succeed.

Companies that were more profit-driven still necessitated the same teamwork, commitment, knowledge of ethical practice, and most importantly, a belief in the worthwhile-ness of their product or service. Some companies fizzled, or “fast failed” in time to reinvent themselves, others continued to grow and thrive well past submitting their annual report for judging; but no one could complete the scheme without having learned valuable life lessons that just can’t be taught in Spanish or accounting class.

Why not learn some life-skills earlier than after we’re twenty one?

I feel I had a good education, from a good school, with good teachers, and good peers, but in retrospect, I can see there were things missing; things I would come across much later in life and say “Oh! How useful! If only I’d known that all along”. I would realise I had been inexplicitly told throughout my education journey not to think for myself until at least my third year of University. Fortunately, I was encouraged by some less precious first-year professors to take some risks and posit ideas at 100 level — but why not earlier? Why not always? And certainly, why not before the age of 21 when, as the tradition goes, we are finally handed the keys to an as-yet-unknown adult world? What does one do with a key that is given without the knowledge of all the possibilities it is designed to unlock? Just hang it on the wall?

The Young Enterprise Scheme is more than playing shop

The Young Enterprise Scheme is much more than just kids “playing shop” and mimicking their elders. It requires them to participate in the same world as the grown-ups. It is one way we can cultivate in our young people the kinds of life skills that school, family, and community can struggle to provide: How to get to work on time, willpower, emotional control — there are no school subjects specifically designed to teach these. After a year of YES, skills forged in the pursuit of a shared goal will prove more valuable than the products or companies themselves.

2014 is the YES year of Possibility and We can

I recently attended Enterprise Day, the first event in the 2014 YES calendar for participating secondary students throughout the country. It is when the first round of mentorship, coaching sessions, and start-up presentations take place. The word I most relished hearing from students at the end of this day was “can”. A close cousin of “possibility”, the word “can” was repeated as if the students had just happened upon something miraculous: “We can do this”, they said, “we can actually create a company. We can take our idea and turn it into something bigger”.

What is most exciting for me this year, is not imagining what kinds of products and services the class of 2014 will bring to the Dragons’ Den (although they are always impressive); it is imagining who these YES participants might become after this powerful lesson in possibility.

We can provide these early possibilities

The world as we experience it is expanding, and it is so easy to feel small and insignificant. We need to bolster our young people with small wins early on in their lives, so that they feel empowered to contribute later. We need to provide “fast fail” opportunities and demonstrate how to bounce back. We need to teach them, and allow them, to think beyond the confines of their classrooms and schools.

A year of YES addresses these needs in a unique, practical, and comprehensive way. It’s creating a braver, better New Zealand by teaching its young people just how valuable, powerful, and clever they really are.

 Examples, links, and further information

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Improvement vs transformation

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About this time last year I wrote about two agendas that are driving change in our education system — these are the improvement agenda and the transformation agenda. In preparing for an online course I'm about to teach I put together the short video above that is an attempt to illustrate the relationship between these two agendas, and how they need be working together, not viewed as 'either-or'.

The critical thing, however, is the notion of the 'third place' as the aspiration or goal we must have for our work to re-define schools and schooling, otherwise we simply get caught in the trap of continuous improvement, which sees us doing more of the same, but better.

The 'third' place is where we will achieve the practices required to operate effectively in a modern learning environment, where professional practice is de-privatised and collaborative activity becomes the norm, and where schools cease to be completely autonomous, competitive units, and become a part of a network of provision.

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Ten Trends 2014: Living in the digital now

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Ten Trend 2 – Living in the Digital Now from EDtalks on Vimeo.

CORE's Ten Trends for 2014 have been published. This post considers the second of these trends: Learning Agency. We shall be publishing posts on one of the trends approximately each month. You are encouraged to comment or provide supporting links.

The current digital revolution is probably one of the largest transformations to ever have taken place in human history. We’re all facing the challenge of living in the digital now and it only takes a quick look at the media to see that ideas of participation, identity, democracy, formal and informal networks are really being challenged. Where traditionally we might have looked to institutions of long standing or to well-established experts to solve problems for us, increasingly now we're sourcing information online, we're curating it, we're finding solutions, we're doing things digitally.

Drivers

The growth in technologies that allow people from around the globe to communicate and collaborate together have created a situation whereby previously disparate cultures have come together and new cultures have emerged. We’ve got a pretty well established set of principles, rules, understandings for what it means to be a really positive member of a community. What we don't have because it's been happening relatively quickly and recently, is the same set of understandings, rights, and responsibilities for living in the digital now. And so one of the things that we need to really do is work with our students to develop those expectations, those understandings.

Impact

Take for example EdChat NZ, which is something that runs once a week on Thursdays. People from all around the country come together and using the Twitter hashtag #EdChatNZ they discuss a particular topic. You ask questions, you provide opinions, you link to articles and research, you make opportunities for other people to be involved and to come in, and, really, the teachers that are involved in it model the kind of digital citizenship that we're looking for from our students when they are living in the digital now.

Another challenge that living in the digital now presents us with is centred on ownership and copyright. Traditionally, one person, or a couple of people, have created a piece of work. Now collaborative documents or file sharing tools mean that not only can more than one person work on a resource, but literally hundreds or thousands of people can work on it. So traditional notions of ownership begin to be challenged. We’ve seen the emergence of things like Creative Commons licenses emerge as a way for people to navigate around the tricky area of ownership, and as a tool to encourage others to edit, add to and build upon their work.

Implications

These new worlds are tricky for educators to navigate because, while we want to make use of these tools and opportunities, we want to do it in a way that ensures our students are safe, affirmed, and guided through the development of skills required to be good members of their communities. Some schools are involving the students in the process. So, instead of just having a digital citizenship lesson once a year, they are actually helping the students to identify what their own needs are in the digital world, and then using inquiry learning to help students to build resources, help videos, tutorials, and posters that other students can use to navigate through the digital world.

So you can see that a lot of parts of our culture, democracy, identity, leadership, the way that we work with others, are being challenged by living in the digital now. The only thing that's really clear is that in order to successfully navigate through these challenges, we're going to have to walk alongside our students and communities and be learners alongside them.

Challenges

  • How well do our schools and classrooms (both physically and in terms of the programmes and behaviours) model and reflect the ‘digital now’ that is the experience of students and staff outside of school?
  • Are you regularly reviewing what learners have access to and are using at home and in the community?
  • How is this then reflected in your curriculum and pedagogy?
  • What is the range of literacies we need to be considering? Cultural literacies? Maori literacy digitally? Pasifika literacies digitally? Digital and media literacy as well as technological literacies?

Examples and links:

For more about the Ten Trends:

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