tamaki students

Creating an innovative learning environment in a single-cell classroom

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Not all schools have a budget to rebuild or make big changes.

What can you do in a single-cell classroom to develop an innovative learning environment?

An ILE is:

  • learner-focussed
  • emphasises learner valued outcomes
  • flexible – allowing the needs of a diverse range of learners to be met
  • enables collaboration and inquiry

Ministry of Education, ILE website

Recently, I visited Noelene Dunn’s classroom at Tamaki College and talked to her and some of her students about:

  • the changes they had made in their classroom
  • the reason for those changes
  • the difference it made for student learning.

Noelene began with her students’ comfort. She thought about how her students preferred to learn, what furniture was needed to create a comfortable environment that enabled flexibility and collaboration, and what she could do in her room on a tight budget.

She then involved her students in creating a flexible space that worked for them.

“You do more work when you’re comfortable”
Taylor, Year 10 student Tamaki College

Creating a physical space that enabled collaboration was the first step. Noelene then developed systems to encourage and facilitate collaboration. Students in her classes can collaborate physically and virtually. They can sit and work together, or use the online tools available, such as Google docs, to work together.

Noelene developed a Google site, Mrs Dunn maths, to flip the learning in her classroom. It provides flexibility for when and how students learn. Students can personalise their learning and work at their own pace. There are a wide variety of resources to meet the different learning needs of each student.

These changes may look small from the outside, but they have made a significant difference to the students and to Noelene’s teaching approach. I saw three different classes of students who were all very focused, experiencing success, and had complete control of their learning.

You can create a successful ILE on a small budget!

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COOLs

What’s cool about COOLs?

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COOLs
Among the changes being proposed as part of the Update of the Education Act 1989 is the introduction of a new form of education provision to be known as a COOL (Community of Online Learning) enabling students to learn via online programmes instead of in regular classrooms.

On the whole, the reaction to this announcement has been less than favourable, with a majority of opinion in the press focusing on the potential pitfalls and shortcomings of learning in this way. Another well-known New Zealander added her voice of concern about the proposed cyber-schools referencing the experience in the US where the Walton Family Foundation has admitted their online public schools have been a “colossal disaster”. Details of this are also reported in the 2015 CREDO report

So, what are we to make of this? How could such a political decision have been made when the evidence is so compelling that it doesn’t work? Or does it?

The reality in New Zealand is that online programmes of learning have been available to students for nearly twenty years through the virtual learning network and, more recently, the VLN Primary. These programmes cater for the needs of learners who cannot access the full range of curriculum options they want at their local school, and have a very successful track record in doing so. The case for students requiring attendance at a physical school where they can develop social and emotional skills is not argued — indeed, they get the best of both worlds.

Of course, there are other students for whom the option of attending a physical school isn’t available to them — these include those in remote and isolated locations, those who may be school-phobic, and those with special health needs. Students like this have also had their educational needs met through online programmes for some years now.

So, why decry the efficacy of online learning? It seems that in the response to what has been announced, the debate has failed to focus specifically enough on what is of concern, and, instead, galvanised a lot of sweeping assumptions and generalisations that exist about online learning as an option. It also brings into question the sorts of ‘evidence’ that are being used to defend people’s positions in the debate.

As with any form of debate like this, there is evidence that can be used to defend any position. Take the case of charter schools in the US. There are some reports claiming they are failing and letting children down, while others highlight the successes where they outperform regular schools. The truth is, of course, that both are correct — there are both successful and non-successful charter schools as illustrated in a recent report in the Economist Magazine that identifies a huge variation that exists among charter schools in the US.

In making claims about the efficacy, or not, of any alternative education system, it is important that one is familiar with the broad range of evidence available. It shouldn’t be simply a reference to a single piece of evidence that happens to support the stance being taken, particularly if the evidence itself lacks sufficient rigour in terms of reliability and validity. I saw a senior educator in New Zealand recently reported as saying ‘there’s a truckload of research that says online learning doesn’t work’. As both a practitioner and researcher in this area, I agree that there are a number of reports that point to failures in online learning — but equally, there are lots that demonstrate its successes. Each report must be understood in terms of its context and how generalisable the findings are based on that. Sadly, we’ve become very influenced by the media sound bites that seem to suggest it’s okay to be selective in terms of the particular sections or even sentences we use to quote in support of our position.
In formulating a response to a new policy such as the COOLs, it is important to be clear about the things that are concerning us. It is evident that there is a significant amount of concern around two aspects of the policy:

  1. First, is whether the intention is for some students to do all of their learning online, and whether this will create systemic issues regarding accountability and monitoring of students, and whether this will also be detrimental to their social and emotional development. The debate around who might benefit from access to online learning programmes and under what circumstances certainly needs to be clarified.
  2. Second, and perhaps most debated of all, is, who will provide these online learning programmes? The policy, as reported, appears to leave things very open in terms of who may set themselves up as a COOL, and while there is reference to a rigorous accreditation process, details of what that might look like and what the criteria will be are yet to be determined. This is certainly another area where informed public debate is required.

As the debates around COOLs continue, it is important that, as professionals, we:

  1. Ensure we are clear about what it is we are debating (or objecting to) and not confuse the issue by casting aspersions on the very things that can work and are working for some students, and
  2. Are thoughtful about the evidence we use to support our case and take time to locate and understand the body of evidence that can be considered reliable and valid in terms of what it represents.

For further reading:

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Cynefin framework

Making it safe to fail as you build your Community of Learning

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col meeting

When a group of schools and/or early childhood leaders get together to collaborate, they bring their existing experiences and beliefs about collaboration with them into the kaupapa and mahi. As a result, there are some common issues that can emerge, or re-emerge, for a cluster or Community of Learning (CoL) over time. For example:

  • How does a Community of Learning work in partnership with whānau, iwi, and communities towards desired outcomes?
  • What does it look like if we genuinely collaborate so that ECE and/or Māori medium/bilingual settings are genuinely involved in working towards the desired outcomes with schools?
  • If we decide to collaborate towards a common goal, how do we make room for that?
  • Everyone tries to protect their staff from more work. How do we move CoL actions and ownership beyond the leadership group?
  • Why do I get that feeling when I come to CoL meetings that I have to protect the status quo back at my school, kura, or ECE?
  • The same people volunteer to do things. How do we decide fairly on who does what in the CoL?

You’re on the right track to addressing the above issues if your CoL is explicitly working on the following four key areas for effective collaboration:

  • a clear, inclusive vision and related aspirational goals
  • a robust layer of teaching as inquiry informing your progress and next steps
  • a culture where everyone can safely challenge and critique each other’s practices
  • role clarity and trust between all members.

There are two challenges not included in the above list that often frustrate CoL leaders more than others. They are:

  • Sometimes, it feels like we are getting nowhere, going around in circles, or doing too much. What is the right pace for this work?
  • It feels like we are doing the same old stuff. We talk the talk but we don’t walk the walk.
  • We have a large CoL plan with too many projects and activities, but there’s no room for new, innovative ideas to be seeded.

If those issues are still real for you as a CoL, in addition to the four key areas, you could also look at ways to slow things down, or get things moving. A large, unwieldy plan can be an indicator that you are moving too fast. Many leaders are focused on actions at the expense of clarity of purpose. A slower pace is important while building a CoL vision and implementing any change, but, sometimes, things can get too slow! This is where Safe-Fail Experiments might come in.

A number of Aotearoa-New Zealand educators recently took part in the #edchatnz MOOC. This was a free online course developed and facilitated by Danielle Myburgh, the founder of #edchatnz, which has grown from an energetic hashtag on Twitter into a dynamic, energising group of educationists who self-organise conferences and online events for themselves to empower educators through knowledge and connection. The MOOC introduced me to Dave Snowden and his thinking and experiences in relation to Complexity Theory. Snowden talks about the Cynefin (pronounced Kunevin) Framework. This is a sense-making model that enables exploration to help groups to work through complex problems.

Snowden talks about three domains or systems:

  • ORDERED (complicated and simple): simple — cause and effect exists — sense, categorise, response = best practice | complicated — cause and effect exists but is not self-evident — sense, analyse, respond or call in experts = good practice
  • COMPLEX: cause and effect only visible in hindsight, unpredictable, emergent outcomes — probe, sense, respond — conduct safe to fail experiments: define amplification and dampening strategies up front for success and failure = emergent practice — a new way of doing things
  • CHAOTIC: act, sense, respond — move fast to stabilise

(adapted from Dave Snowden)

Which domain would you say your CoL is in?

Snowden points out that you could be in a state of disorder if you don’t know which of the domains you are in. Perhaps you are acting on a plan that is full of activity but has no overarching vision. Perhaps you keep adding to that plan in response to stated needs as they emerge from the voices of many different CoL members.

A CoL could sit in the Ordered domain; if it were a group of schools and/or services that have some clear cause and effect issues to address or that need to bring in some experts to address some more complicated issues, where cause and effect are not so obvious. In that case, you probably already have robust inquiry processes showing the cause and effect of the challenges that you have identified.

If your CoL is in the Chaotic domain, Snowden points out that you should ask…what actions do we take now to stabilize the situation? Are we going to impose order (shift the problem to simple) or create enough stability so we have time for experiments (shift the problem to complex)?

Safe-to-fail experiments

Your CoL may be in the Complex domain, having built a robust vision and, perhaps, now working on a related and coherent plan that is aligned to that vision. You can’t yet see the cause and effect of your challenges, and it is getting difficult to maintain momentum with your vision because you don’t yet have the inquiry practices that can support you to identify clear next steps. While you build your inquiry capability across the CoL… How might you move forward and manage the tension between taking time to build a clear vision while sensing the urgency that something must be done now about your challenges?

Safe to fail experiments can’t rely on the well-worn grooves in your reasoning; if these complex challenges could be solved using conventional methods, they’d be fixed already. Instead, we have to force new ways of thinking about old problems. This is the promise—and the peril—of complexity
– Jennifer Garvey Berger

There are some key parts to designing safe-to-fail experiments that leaders must follow in order to find a path forward in relation to a complex challenge:

  • Probe: know your CoL and how it works. Map it and all the things around it.
  • Sense: play with your map — understand how things and people connect, identify what you’d like to see more or less of (link to your challenges).
  • Respond: design some simple safe-to-fail experiments or probes, encourage the creation of experiments to address the challenges.

What does this mean for leadership in CoLs?

For leaders, Snowden and Boone explain that this involves:

  •  letting a solution emerge from the materials at hand
  • taking on a more experimental mode of leadership and management
  • resisting the temptation to fall back into traditional command-and-control actions of leadership
  • tolerating failure
  • sitting back, allowing patterns to emerge, then determining which ones are desirable.

All of this allows for innovation, creativity, and new ways of working (Snowden and Boone).

Tools for leading in a complex context:

  • Open up discussion: enable more interactive communication.
  • Set barriers: enable others to self-regulate within boundaries.
  • Stimulate attractors: find out what resonates with people and try using these to gain momentum — see what takes off.
  • Encourage dissent and diversity: foster critique of ideas between teams.
  • Manage starting conditions and monitor for emergence: support the conditions for people to innovate, then get out of their way.

(adapted from Snowden and Boone)

Want to find out more?

Book now to attend the CoL-focused programme at uLearn 2016

Read & Watch
Dave Snowden – video: How to organise a children’s party
Dave Snowden – video: The Cynefin Framework
Snowden & Boone – article: A Leader’s Framework for Decision-making
Dave Snowden: Safe-fail Probes blogpost
Jennifer Garvey-Berger: Why the best plan might not be a good one
Jennifer Garvey Berger: On not finding the heart of the matter blogpost
CORE Ten Trend: Networked Communities

 

Acknowledgements:
Feature Image: Cynefin Framework with all five domains labeled by Snowden under CC

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sea of words

On the path to literacy through a pair of shoes and smelly socks

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sea of words

Last week I had the privilege of watching something very special; an early childhood teacher helping a two-year-old to put on her shoes and socks in preparation for going outside. Yes, I can imagine what you are already thinking, ‘so what was so special about that’? A fair question and one I will attempt to answer through this blog post.

Firstly, let me share some of what I observed in a little more detail. The teacher, Kelly, sits down facing Ngaire, who has brought Kelly her shoes and socks to be put on.

Kelly: Ok what do we put on first? (curiosity in her voice)
Ngaire: (holding one sock) Shoes.
Kelly: We put our shoes on first? Ok then let’s put our shoes on. (She reaches out to start doing this).
Ngaire: (Holds a sock close to her face and looks inside)
Kelly: What’s in your sock? Let’s have a look.
Ngaire: (Puts the sock up to Kelly’s nose)
Kelly: (playful and expressive) POOOOOH! What’s that smell?
Ngaire: (Laughs and puts the sock to Kelly’s nose again)
Kelly: POOOOOH!
Ngaire: (Laughs even louder and returns the sock to Kelly’s nose again)

This back and forward interaction goes on a further three times, each time with Ngaire’s laughter getting louder, until Kelly stops reacting and switches back to the business of putting on the shoes.

After further exchanges in which Kelly protests nicely at having to do all the work of getting Ngaire’s shoes on, she asks Ngaire again to help her. All this time, Ngaire is looking at Kelly, smiling, laughing and responding. She is clearly totally engaged and enjoying this back and forth exchange.

Kelly: (Holding shoe for right foot) Where does it need to go? (The tone of her voice and facial expression suggests this is a game)
Ngaire: (Presents left foot – no sock – for Kelly to put the right foot shoe on)
Kelly: (Puts shoe on and then sock over top of the shoe) Is that right? Is that how we do it? And then we put the sock on, eh. There we go.
Ngaire: (Laughter. Pauses, looks concerned)
Kelly: What’s wrong with that?
Ngaire: (Pulls the sock off) Wrong feet.
Kelly: Ahhh, wrong feet! You show me. I don’t know. (Shrugs)
Ngaire: (Undoes shoe and attempts to put it on right foot) It goes there. (Looks up at Kelly with a big grin)

This was an interaction (among several I have observed) in which Kelly was a responsive partner in a conversation that had a definite ongoing ‘serve and return’ pattern to it. In the case of Ngaire, who is still learning to string words together, gesture also played a key role in her contribution to the conversation.

What made this interaction so special and memorable for me was not that Ngaire knew a bit about putting shoes on the right way, although that was impressive too. It was the skills and dispositions that Kelly demonstrated as a facilitator and teacher of oral language. She used several strategies that are known to encourage interaction and communication, yet in my experience are often overlooked by teachers.

Here is a summary of the qualities I observed in Kelly’s practice:

  • She makes time to turn a fairly routine task into a fun-filled, engaging experience by joining in the play.
  • She positions herself face-to-face with Ngaire to show she is present
  • She doesn’t simply follow Ngaire’s lead; she adds to it.
  • She uses playfulness, expression, surprise and curiosity to sustain the talk and conversation.
  • She gives Ngaire more reasons to communicate by putting the shoe on the wrong foot and the sock over the top of the shoe.
  • She helps build Ngaire’s vocabulary by imitating and expanding single words to full sentences.  For example, when Ngaire says “Shoes”, Kelly comes back with, “We put our shoes on first? Ok then let’s put our shoes on”.”

So, what has this episode got to do with literacy — as the title of this post suggests – when there is not an alphabet or a writing instrument in sight?

I think James Britton 1, answered this eloquently and accurately back in 1970 with his proposition that, ‘…reading and writing float on a sea of talk’ ( p164). What he was suggesting, and what has been confirmed over and over again by more recent studies 2, is that to be a confident and competent reader and writer you first have to become a confident and competent talker and listener. Aside from the obvious social and emotional benefits, talk introduces children to the words they later learn to read and write. Importantly, talk is the outward expression of thinking; it is also how we process and remember information. This last point comes with a caveat though. Without opportunities to speak as well as listen, the development of this all important thinking is limited.

Despite the overwhelming evidence that talk and conversation are the best predictors of later success during the school years, oral language remains the neglected Cinderella of the components (oral, visual and written) that are necessary to become literate in any language. To illustrate this here are some examples of what I often experience in my travels around early childhood services.

  • I see plenty of planning for activities and experiences, far less for the new vocabulary that could be introduced alongside these.
  • I see teachers reserving stories, songs, chants, rhymes and word games for large group mat times when informal, spontaneous small groups for these same activities would give children richer opportunities to participate actively.
  • I hear teachers saying they feel guilty if they spend too much time talking to one or two children, not appreciating that these conversations are probably the best gift for learning they can offer.
  • I hear and see teachers responding to parent expectations for literacy learning (often expressed as alphabet knowledge) with exercises and worksheets when they could be doing so much more towards achieving this outcome by adhering to James Britton’s notion that reading and writing ‘float on a sea of talk’

The philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein once said, ‘The limits of my language mean the limits of my world’. We have a situation in New Zealand now where new entrant teachers are telling us that many children are starting school with insufficient oral language competency to successfully begin the formal reading and writing process. Importantly, the negative impact of this on learning and social competence is frequently cumulative as children move through the schooling system and beyond. While, the reasons behind new entrant teachers’ concerns are often multi-faceted, it is worth considering that early childhood teachers, in particular, are in the very privileged position of teaching the age group most receptive to language learning.

If there is one message I hope you will take from this blogpost, it is that you grasp this privilege firmly with both hands so that children aren’t confined to a limited world both now and in their future. A starting point for doing this would be to give at least as much attention to the quality of adult-child talk and conversation in your practice, professional learning and discussions, as you give to things like alphabets, narrative assessment and planning activities.

Acknowledgements:
Kelly teaches at First Steps Everglade Babies Childcare, Manukau, Auckland.

1 Britton, J. (1970). Language and learning. Coral Gables, FL: University of Miami Press

2 van Hees, J. (2007). Expanding oral language in the classroom. Wellington: NZCER.

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