Effective Lesson Design: Intentional Planning

Posted on May 13, 2015 by Jade Peartree

Week 4, Term 2, 2015. Curriculum Staff Meeting

Category: 1. Know students and how they learn, 3. Plan for and implement effective teaching and learning, 5. Assess, provide feedback and report on student learning, 6. Engage in professional learning,

Topic: Effective Lesson Design: Intentional Planning

I presented at staff meeting this evening about a course I’ve been on recently called Effective Teaching in English & Mathematics. The course has been designed by AISSA (Association of Independent Schools of SA) and delivered by Rosemary Kadow and Desiree Gilbert. Some of the references and resources have come from their course guide. The course runs for 3 days and I still have one more day left but thought I should reflect on my experiences so far and what I have shared with my colleagues.

Our school has been focusing on curriculum alignment. We are an IB school so we have been focusing on aligning ACARA with IB, making our planning intentional and clear for all to assist with informing our assessments and reporting.

Here is the Keynote Presentation we used at Staff Meeting:

Attached are the handouts provided to staff from the course booklet we received:

Intentional Handouts

Things I take away from this experience:

The reflective tools were useful and I have enjoyed using them with my class and other staff seemed to appreciate more strategies to try out in class.
I spent a considerable amount of time planning out this presentation and working with a colleague of mine to really dig deep. We reflected on why we should plan intentionally and how we can improve teaching practice by starting at the big picture and working backwards by design. Breaking down the objectives and curriculum standards to teachable and intentional lessons. Here is an example of an intentional planner in Mathematics that I made this term. Intentional Planner Maths T2 Money
Success Criteria. Our lessons should hold no secrets. Students should know what we aim to do, how they can achieve success and the purpose behind the task. This is all part of WALT (What Are Learning To), WILF (What I’m Looking For) & TIB (This Is Because). Shirley Clarke introduced the concepts of WALT, WILF & TIB, google her and images for each and you will find an abundance of resources.

I had some good feedback after the session from staff. One staff member (Paul Huebl) blogged about our presentation and noted the following:

Learning intentions must be explicitly clear for all students in the room. Intentions must be visible.
Learning intentions are not descriptions of an activity. They are directly linked to achievement standards.
There should be no secrets in the learning process –> this means success criteria must also be clear and explicit.
Success criteria tell kids “You can succeed at this and this is how you do it”. What does it look like to achieve the learning intention?
Along with WALT statements (We Are Learning To) and WILF statements (What I’m Looking For) you also need to address TIB (This Is Because) which links WALT and WILF to the students personal contexts.
To help with students engaging with WALT and WILF statements, these can be present on task sheets and blank work sheets. That way teachers can easily indicate how students have performed against them.
Students should be able to state learning intentions and success criteria. This is easier if displayed as above.
Don’t use the term differentiate. Say ‘make it accessible’.

If you wish to read more of Paul Huebl’s blog post please click on this link:

http://mrhuebl.edublogs.org/2015/05/12/deliberate-planning/comment-page-1/#comment-51

I will blog again about my final session and share some more strategies I have used in the classroom.

I hope you found this post helpful.

Thanks, please leave a comment.

Jade

Welcome back to school! Let’s play!

Posted on January 16, 2015 by Jade Peartree

IB: Play-Based Learning in the PYP

PAC: Wednesday 14th to Friday 16th of January 2015

Presenter: Jo Fahey & Workshop Facilitator: Heather O’Hara

It’s only a couple of weeks until the children come back to school and I’m trying to get my junior primary headset back and what better way to do that than to engage with play-based learning!

For the last three years I’ve been teaching in Year 6 in the MYP, prior to that I was teaching Year 2’s in the PYP and now I’m back! Very excited to be back too. My colleagues in year 6 would often say to me, “You’re such a JP teacher”, usually as I sat on the floor with my students, materials sprawled across the floor. I am generally a visual and hands on learner and I believe this way of learning is natural for myself and many children. This is also known as exploratory learning or play-based learning. Using materials, props, resources to make meaning and sense of our world.

We listened to Jo Fahey about the importance of socio-dramatic play. Research has shown that students are highly engaged and participate in an authentic and mature way whilst role-playing. These play experiences help students to make sense of their world and how it works. It also allows students to take on roles and responsibilities as global citizens.

We then went to our workshop with Heather O’Hara. As part of this course we explored the definition of play:

We then looked at the image of the child and what was at the core of what we do as educators to meet the needs of children. Why do we teach? What is the purpose behind what we do? What do we as educators do to support and develop the child?

Great read: Your Image of the Child: Where Teaching Begins by Loris Malaguzzi

We had some interesting discussions about the words inquiry, play and learning. Are these words interchangeable? We couldn’t come to an agreement but it was agreed that playing is inquiry and learning is a product of both.

I loved exploring learning spaces at PAC. We visited the ELC and Reception rooms. In particular I enjoyed looking at this writing space pictured below. It showed intention and purpose, involved sensory elements and tied in students prior knowledge and resources to further develop their understandings. It was an inviting and engaging learning space to assist playing with writing.

I have also been inspired by Reggio classrooms. Something I have been researching and trying to work on in my own learning spaces for the last few years.

Here are some links to my Pinterest boards regarding Reggio and Play-Based Learning:

https://www.pinterest.com/jadevidovich/reggio/

https://www.pinterest.com/jadevidovich/play-based-learning/

These images were in the PAC Early Learning Centre. I particularly liked the grass mat and wooden blocks and tree stumps. Things I have been on the look out for and am acquiring soon 🙂

We explored this Central Idea:

Respectful and careful consideration of space, materials and relationships infuse all aspects of early childhood instruction.

From here my group came up with these lines of inquiry:

•Developing Learning Spaces

Why is it important to change and develop learning spaces?

How can spaces be utilised effectively?

How can spaces be a provocation for learning?

•Materials for Engagement & Exploration

How important are materials and resources for learning?

What types of materials engage the learner?

How do we select appropriate materials for learning?

•Forming Positive Relationships

What does a positive relationship look like?

Why are positive relationships important to student well-being and their development?

How do we know that we are encouraging positive connections with self, peers, environment and the community/ wider-world?

It was great to listen to and discuss our own beliefs and experiences around these. We also had time to do our own research about each of these areas. Some other groups took us outside to explore how nature and the outdoor spaces around us can be learning spaces that engage students and activate inquiry and play-based learning. Visiting other learning spaces at PAC and this group time was probably the most enjoyable part of the course. I was also able to look at my current planners and think about how to set up my class as a provocation for our first inquiry. This was useful reflective time.

I’m looking forward to setting up my classroom for 2015.

Stay tuned for pictures of playful, intentional and purposeful learning spaces on my blog.

Thanks Heather O’Hara for running the course for the last three days. It has given me time to get my JP headset back and explore ideas for including more play in my learning space.

Lets start 2015!

Action Plan:

1. Set up my classroom with the ideas I’ve accumulated over the last 3 days. Post pictures on my blog.

2. Share these play-based ideas with my staff and encourage this to be resourced and funded by the school.

3. Keep contact with the group to share our play-based learning strategies. Do this via Twitter, Pinterest and the Wiki.

Playing Those Positive Records: How to make records work for you.

Posted on January 9, 2015 by Jade Peartree

In my holidays I have a lot more time to think and reflect on myself as an educator. A thought occurred to me whilst I was reviewing some parent feedback from 2014. I was discussing my experiences and feedback with a colleague these holidays and I questioned how educators use records and anecdotal notes to their benefit?

I don’t know about you, but I keep quite a lot of notes and records about my students each and every year. These involve individual goals, incidents, behavioural observations, records of achievements to track progress, records of meetings, conversations with parents etc. Usually these are all taken to provide evidence for reporting purposes and parent meetings and discussions, and to track student progress both academically and emotionally. But it occurred to me that I was lacking something…

Where are my positive notes about the interactions I have with my students, parents and colleagues? How am I showing that I am building healthy relationships with those I work with? Where is my evidence of this?

After reading lovely letters, emails and Christmas cards at the end of the year, educators are often given that feedback from parents. I also like to make sure that my students have a voice in this process, but I have never had these things written down or recorded.

Should educators be recording these positive moments? And if so how can this be managed on top of everything else we do? Is there a real need for this?

Well, I think there is. My perceptions of my relationships with my students and parents vary for each individual and when faced with difficulties, I’d like to be able to have evidence of the efforts and positive interactions I have had with my students, parents and fellow educators.

There have been times where I have received some negative feedback about myself as an educator, (I know it’s hard to believe!) It may sound easy to say, “You can’t please everybody, I’m learning and I’ll try this next time”, but quite honestly it isn’t. I receive more positive feedback and praise than negative, yet I still focus on that one negative statement or nasty email… I question my practises and think, where is the evidence that shows how I made the effort to resolve this issue? Was I doing everything from my end to make this experience a positive one for whoever was involved? Educators need to be backing themselves by recording those positive interactions and efforts.

Too often we play the record of negative feedback over and over in our heads, trying to figure out if we could have played the situation better… lets play the positive record and balance it out.

Three Positive Interaction Record Goals for 2015:

Start a positive interactions notebook/ file. This can be as simple as Date/ Time/ Name and Positive Interaction. These can be kept as my own personal records and used for interactions with students, parents and colleagues. I will aim to do one per week for each. This could also be used with students too, as a reflection tool about the positive interactions they’ve had with others in the week.
Give students a voice in positive feedback. Maybe a video message on the class iPad, or a letterbox of nice things to say to one another in class. This could work for everyone in the class, so one positive comment for each person, including the teacher, probably once a week. Or the idea of a positive interactions reflection journal.
An opportunity for positive parent feedback at frequent intervals throughout the year, not just those sentimental end of year letters and cards. This can be done via email, sharing blog posts with parents, communication books in class, or simply my taking notes of the verbal feedback given to me by parents etc.

I also found this website, which is a good read about how we can connect and bridge the gap between parents and teachers. I personally like “Have a Blast or a Blog” section. Check it out:

http://teach.com/teach100-mentor/parent-teacher-communication

Not bad for my first blog post for 2015! Lets start to play positive records for a positive start to a new year. All the best to all of my fellow educators.

ACEC 2014: Capturing the Hearts of Reluctant Writers by Chantelle Morrison

Posted on October 3, 2014 by Jade Peartree

Capturing the Hearts of Reluctant Writers

Chantelle Morrison

I came to this session as I am the Language & Literature teacher in the MYP Year 6 Program at our school and wanted to explore different ways to motivate my writers. To begin this session we did a “Drop everything and write” activity. This is something I have done with my students before but I particularly enjoyed participating in this activity today. I need to be more involved in this process and actively be a writing role model for my students.

Here is the drafting version and final copy of my Drop Everything and Write piece:

Coffee

Dear Coffee,

Work your mysterious magic.

Entice my eyelids to lift from their sleepy slump.

Awaken my brain with your bittersweet caffeine hit.

Warm my lips and satisfy my thirst for the awakening moment,

When I will be able to function at a somewhat ‘normal’ level.

Come on brain! Work with me here.

The coffee is not a sole awakener.

You need to participate in this challenge.

Wake Up!

Some notes I made during this session:

Questions to pose for students: What can I write about that would be valuable and relevant to someone else?

I enjoyed the writing Brainstorm activity.

What is writing?

What should writing look like?

What is one form of writing?

What is the purpose of writing?

What are the common writing blocks?

What is the first word that comes to mind when you hear the word writing?

Write one form of writing.

What is quality writing?

Everybody contributed to these brainstorms, they looked a bit like this:

I’m going to do this with my Year 6 students in Term 4.

Some thoughts:

I have always felt that writing requires motivation & purpose. Writing is a shared experience. Writing is shared even if it’s simply for yourself. I loved that idea of journalling and sharing with my past and future self. Always share.

How do we assess, mark, grade the creative pieces? Vocabulary, perspectives, structures. This is always the most difficult part. Writing is creative expression in many instances. Nice to explore all types of genres of writing.

Why go public? Publishing. Authentic audiences. Writer’s voice.

How can we make the writing we do more purposeful for our students? Blogging and creating an authentic audience for our students. Writing is a voice. Why is writing is important? I want my students to explore that question too.

Creation: The writing process

Writing Cycle

Resources to explore:

Cyber-dramas Google and use.

http://www.inanimatealice.com/

Videos: Up, a narrative without any words.

LendMeYourLiteracy: http://lendmeyourliteracy.com/

Switchzoo

Wild self

Inklewriter: Create your own adventure type of digital writing.

Storybird: https://storybird.com/

LookingGlass

Calemeo: Magazine making online.

Mahara: Digital portfolio, can be printed. FREE! Emaze/ Prezi

Poetry: Wordle/ Tagxedo, Voki, Vocaroo

I thoroughly enjoyed this session today. Refreshing, lots of ideas to explore in class and reaffirming in many ways. Thanks Chantelle.

Support or Questions to: @misscmorrison

End of Term Confidence Builders

Posted on September 17, 2014 by Jade Peartree

Towards the end of a term I find that many students are feeling a little run down and tired (as are the teachers!). The result of this tends to be students who are a little less tolerant of others. Small things that usually wouldn’t bother them before now really irritate them. So towards the end of the term I like to do a confidence building activity to boost the confidence of students and assists in developing an awareness of how they are interacting with each other.

Lesson Overview

Students brainstorm as a class as many Confidence Builders or (Boosters) and Confidence Busters we can. This comes from the You Can Do It Program (http://www.youcandoiteducation.com.au/)

Here is an example of the brainstorm the Year 6’s did today:

Students were then given this template and asked to write a Confidence Booster on everybody else’s page in their class.

The Confidence Booster needed to be specific, genuine and considerate. We discussed what each of these meant before allowing students to start the task.

I posted the following instructions on Edmodo for my students to direct them in the process.

Once each child had commented on each other’s pages they could decorate their image and post a reflection on their personal learning blogs. Some lovely examples:

The reactions from my students have always been positive ones. Faces light up when they read the comments made by their peers. Each comment is genuine, specific and considerate. It makes a real difference in attitudes towards each other at the end of a busy term. I noticed students being a lot kinder towards one another after this task.

I also think it is important to participate in this task as their teacher and comment on each page. I created a page and had my students give me some feedback too. Gave me what I like to call “Warm Fuzzies” meaning a happy feeling in my heart. I too hope my students experienced this feeling today.

So if you’re looking for something to do with your class to boost their confidence and build on positive attitiudes and interactions, you might like to give this one a go.

Maths Lesson: Properties of 3D Shapes/ Solids

Posted on August 18, 2014 by Jade Peartree

Reflecting on My Practice

As part of my PLP (Personal Learning Plan) I identified the need for me to focus on Mathematics, specifically Maths mental warm ups and Maths lesson starters.

I did a warm up for a lesson today which I thought was quite good and I thought I would share and document it.

The lesson outline:

This was the note I sent my students on the online learning platform Edmodo: (If you want to learn more about Edmodo go to this link: https://www.edmodo.com/about)

Warm up Activity: Revisiting Properties of Shapes.
You were given a 3D solid shape in class today. You need to describe the properties of that shape on your iPad (using the apps Explain Everything OR Educreations) and post your video to the padlet attached.
Thanks
PS. Remember to use the vocabulary we learnt in the last lesson. Key words I’m looking for are vertex/vertices, edges, faces, angles.

Below is the link to the Padlet with my student responses:

Properties of 3D Shapes:

http://padlet.com/wall/4bw0zr27be9z

The thing I liked about this activity was I was able to quickly collect my students responses and view them later in my own time. I was then able to assess their work whilst the students were off at another lesson. I was able to give them direct specific feedback about the content of their videos and assess if they were capable of listing the properties of a 3D solid shape using learnt vocabulary from the previous lesson.

The students seemed to enjoy the task too as it was recapping what was learnt in the last lesson and applying some of their creative skills to communicate their learning in a different way.

It was a fun Maths Warm up today and I’m glad it went so well.

MLATS Learning and Teaching Mathematics: Number

Posted on August 11, 2014 by Jade Peartree

MLATS: Mathematics Learning & Teaching for Success

Saturday the 9^th of August 8:30am-3:30pm

Presenter: Sarah Ratcliffe

The Rationale for MLATS

The teaching of mathematics is a complex business, and in the busyness of school life, teachers often do not have time to reflect on the teaching and learning cycle, on what is working well and on what could be improved. Additionally, many teachers have expressed a lack of confidence in their own mathematical knowledge, which in turn impacts on their teaching of mathematics.

The interplay between school mathematics and the development of numeracy is complex. MLATS core course offers a broad introduction to the teaching and learning of mathematics and numeracy, and seeks to help participating teachers identify the mathematical knowledge that students should be learning, and makes explicit the teacher’s role in supporting all students to be successful.

Our broad range of other workshops and short courses are designed to meet the needs and interests of teachers.

For information about MLATS and courses available please see the link attached. http://mlats.com.au/

We need to report to the achievement standards in ACARA and be mindful of IB curriculum too.

Sort and classify activities (newspapers, houses, categorise and sort houses by number/ patterns, relationships)

When/ How do we give our students the opportunity to:

Identify and describe attributes
Identify and describe relationships
Think logically to classify and order
Handle data

Thought: Being confused means that you are learning.

Being Successful means:

50% confidence

25% attitude

25% IQ

(I shared this with my students and they were so surprised and relieved!) This was one of my highlights.

I don’t need the answer I want the process.

Students need to construct meaning for themselves.

Students need the factual and procedural knowledge but they also need to know when to apply these in everyday problem solving tasks.

EMU: Extending Mathematical Understanding Intervention program. Something worth looking into at St Andrew’s School. http://www.ais.sa.edu.au/__files/f/133092/Extending

I am concerned with students whom I have worked with who have difficulty with number concepts and Sarah (Course leader) suggested that they might have dyscalculia. I had not heard of this term so did some brief research about it. Here is what I found.

What is dyscalculia?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyscalculia

http://www.ncld.org/types-learning-disabilities/dyscalculia/what-is-dyscalculia

http://www.dyscalculia.org/math-ld-books

Formative assessment: A discussion about how we assess mathematics formally came up in this session. We have one summative Maths assessment per term and base some of our results on testing and general maths tasks in bookwork, on iPads and through observations. I liked the idea of introducing Maths Journals, which is something we can do quite easily using the iPad in the 1:1 program currently running in Year 6.

Ideas for the Journal:

Prompt reflections in Mathematics. (Links to IB: Reflective & Thinkers).

I challenged myself by…

Next, I want to…

I worked…. Because…

Next time I will

An activity I thought would be great for our buddy class visits:

Write a procedure on how to draw a graph. If you had to explain how to draw a graph to Year 1 students what would you tell them?

Mathematics Inquiry Cycle:

Provocation and reflect

Investigation and reflect

Share ideas and reflect

Test, draw conclusions and reflect.

MLATS rules for working:

Choose to work alone, in a group or with a partner but everyone must do their own recording
You can choose to use concrete materials or work without them
You must seek to understand what you are doing
If you need help, follow the procedures to get it.

What do we mean by numeracy and mathematics?

Numeracy is the practical use of mathematics in context.

Developing Number Sense:

Counting

Estimation

Subitising (the ability to know how many are in a collection without counting)

Place Value

Part-Whole Relationships

Four Operations

How can we develop estimation skills?

Handful Grab Game. Estimate and counting games. Refer to MLATS booklet.

Mental Computation: Do this every so often but make sure to go through the processes afterwards. This is important for developing quick thinking strategies as well as going over different strategies each student has used and trying them in the next mental computation quiz.

I found this image about Adult usage quite interesting but not shocking. We as adults use calculators, estimation and mental computation strategies before written strategies. Yet we are getting our students to record and write their Mathematical thinking in their books all of the time. We need to create a balance here and make sure that we are giving students the opportunity to estimate, use calculators and solve mental problems.

My goals after this workshop:

I always like to set myself a few goals after a workshop and at least attempt one or two of them within that week.

1. Year level Maths Survey and Data Collection task. How are our students feeling about Mathematics? How do they prefer to learn? Ability Ranking data.

2. Maths Journals/ Reflections after the lesson. This won’t simply be a separate book but at the end of the lesson allow for reflection in their maths book or on their iPad.

3. Mental warm up strategies as per my PLP Goal (See Heather for demonstration lesson asap). Go through the mental guides in the MLATS booklet.

Resources:

The Van de Walle Professional Mathematics Series.

Two of Everything. (JP Book)

Open Ended Maths Activities: Using good questions to enhance learning in Mathematics. 2^nd Edition. Peter Sullivan and Pat Liburn.

Ontario

About Teaching Mathematics: Marilyn Burns

Origo: Thinking Caps

www.origoeducation.com

Maths Solutions: http://mathsolutions.com/about-us/marilyn-burns/

All Hands on Deck

Number Pieces Basic app.

DaVinci Decathlon 2014: Part 2

Posted on June 26, 2014 by Jade Peartree

The Race Around Sydney

The Year 7 students were full of excitement and anticipation as they participated in the Race Around Sydney. Each destination held a challenge. The students were required to answer questions, solve riddles and find landmarks to complete each task.

The first stop, The Botanic Gardens, where students were asked to find specific plants, answer a set of challenging questions and record their findings.

Next the NSW Art Gallery, where they were required to choose any piece of Art work to inspire them to write a poem and create an image to accompany it. There were also some questions to answer and pieces to find within the gallery.

Here is the piece that inspired our students:

Here is the poem that they wrote and submitted:

Henny and Henry’s poem

They were cornered, hiding, trapped

The enemy closing in

The regiment were silent

Not even on little rattle of a tin.

From my precarious perch on the mountain top

I saw it all unfold

So then I had a thought

Which made my blood run cold.

Oh how I wanted to help them

I heard their silent plea

But if I helped save them

What would become of me?

I would probably kill someone

I’d have blood on my hands

and they’d be six feet under,

lying amongst the sands.

I slowly climbed down the mountain

I had decided to fight

from safety I bought my rifle up

and focused throughout the sights.

I saw my target all alone

I was waiting for my chance

and that was when it happened

I caught a glance ,

Of his eyes, they’d changed, this was so strange

they’d gone from green to blue

for they had changed from green

And then I witnessed something

I’m still not sure I’d seen

It was my daughter, standing there

with her magnificent eyes of blue

Her face a stream of tears

Saying “Daddy how could you?”

Then we went to the National Museum, where students did a code breaking task. This was a wonderful experience for the students; they particularly enjoyed exploring the Dinosaur Exhibition, an impressive display!

After the National Museum we walked to the Powerhouse Museum, where students were asked cryptic questions and had to solve riddles. They thrived in this challenge.

The ferry ride to Circular Quay was a highlight for our students, who happily gazed at the Sydney Harbour Bridge and Opera House, all the while taking notes for their cartography task.

Here are some snap shots from that part of the day:

The final challenge was exhausting! The children ran from one point to the next finding the clues needed and managed to answer every question bar one. There was a little time left over to visit a lollie shop and buy some fish & chips before our train ride back to Knox Grammar School.

Once we had returned, students had dinner and then completed the Cartography Challenge, the final task for the day. I am still unsure how they managed to do this as they were so tired from the days events. They created a map of Sydney from their observations during the day. This was what our students submitted as their final task:

The Year 7’s were fortunate to receive three certificates for the event, 1st for the Legacy Symposia, 1st for the Creative Producers challenge and 2nd for English. We did not place overall, but we were very proud of their efforts over the four day Decathlon.

What a wonderful experience for our students and staff, who were able to engage with like-minded individuals. The students were ready for a challenge and eager to learn and solve the problems presented to them. We couldn’t be more proud of our Year 7 DaVinci Decathlon Team. Well done Henry, Henny, Le-Anne, Marlon, Milly, Hayley, Billy and Thomas. A fantastic effort by all.

Personally, I’m exhausted and I was only there to supervise and mark test papers, imagine how exhausted the children must be! Well Done St Andrew’s School.

The Da Vinci Decathlon 2014: Part 1

Posted on June 22, 2014 by Jade Peartree

I have been fortunate enough to accompany our Year 7 students to the Da Vinci Decathlon at Knox Grammar School, NSW.

Being surrounded by such intelligent students and teachers has left me in a state of awe and wonder. It has also given me the opportunity to connect with passionate staff who specialise in all subject areas

I have been observing a lot of the activities and assisted in marking some of the papers, but the highlight for me so far has been witnessing the enthusiasm of our students. They have already received two certificates, 1st place in Creative Producers and 2nd Place in English. They also won first place in the Symposia Challenge with their invention presentation about iSense. Very proud!

This afternoon students were privileged to listen to a guest speaker; Mr Mark Scott, AO Managing Director of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. http://about.abc.net.au/profile/mr-mark-scott-ao/

Key Notes from Mark Scott’s Presentation:

What kind of person leaves a legacy? How do you become the kind of person who leaves a legacy?

Key idea: It’s all about how you use your time.

Things we know: You can’t change what happened yesterday/ can’t change the past.

The future is uncertain, you don’t know what it may hold .

It is about living for today. Today, what can we do today?

1. Learn how to like a problem. Learn how to thrive in the challenges you face. To be great you have to have talent, but you also need to concentrate on improving your skills. Being talented is not enough. Learn as you go, show dedication. If you are going to master something, focus on the one challenge at a time. Multi-tasking is useful but its not the best way to learn. The answers that you are seeking won’t always come easily. Take your time to solve them and learn through the process. Stick with it, success doesn’t come easily it takes time and many mistakes and disappointments. Our failures help us to eventually succeed.

2. People who leave legacies work in teams. The team can bring together different skills, knowledge, insights etc. Thinking together helps us to get further in problem solving. Get involved in discussions, be a part of the debate, question your opinions and thinking. Challenge each other.

3. Have Goals. People who have goals want to achieve things. Be mindful of where you are, live in the moment on your journey because it’s not just about the final destination. Celebrate your successes along the way. Enjoy where you are today, the journey gives you just as much pleasure and success as the final destination or product. Focus on making the best in the present moments.

4. What legacy would you like to leave?

I would love to hear some of my student’s responses to this question, what a great reflective task to set after this experience. I would personally like to reflect on this question too, but that’s for another blog post, another time.

Tomorrow we have an exciting day ahead, a Race Around Sydney! Will blog about our next DaVinci Adventure soon.

Have You Tried Turning it Off and On Again?

Posted on June 16, 2014 by Jade Peartree

The 1:1 iPad journey has been one of huge learning curves for my students and myself. We have constantly been working out how to resolve technical iPad issues, and one of the most common starting points and our class tagline is “Have you tried turning it off and on again?”

This week in Genius Hour (http://www.geniushour.com/) a couple of my students created this clever poster display for our classroom. They like to be referred to as my Tech Support Team but I am also flagging the idea of Digital Leaders within Upper Primary at our school.

One of my goals will be to begin working with Digital Leaders within my ICT Club (Co-curricular lessons) to establish a team of students who can assist their peers, teachers and other staff members with their technical difficulties. This may also extend into students running mini tech lessons in classes. This idea was born after following Nick Jackson @largerama (http://largerama.creativeblogs.net/) , who I saw at a CEGSA Conference in 2013 promoting the idea of Digital Leaders in schools. Nick also came to our school to meet with leadership to discuss options for our school.

These are some exciting ideas, which have created high levels of student engagement. I also believe that this kind of learning is purpose driven, allowing students to take responsibility for themselves and others, and importantly it gives students the opportunity to develop leadership qualities.

For more information about Genius Hour:

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