Reflections and tweaks explained

 Explain the reflections and tweaks you have made along the way and the reasons why you made these changes. Share your evidence for these decisions.

This year has been interesting with my inquiry and I have found that I have needed
to be adaptable along the way. While my focus question has continued to look at reading achievement I have also focused on well being as well as reading for enjoyment. The reason for this change was looking at term 1 and all of the changes and interruptions we were having the most important thing for me and my class was student well being and trying to get all of my students to come back to school. I made this the focus for the whole of term 1 as it was a very uncertain time for everyone and I wanted to make sure that my students were doing okay and felt comfortable to come back to school. So I guess you could say reading took a bit of a back seat, we were still reading as a class just in more spaced out groups with masks on and it was hard to have those detailed conversations. 

Through this change in direction I also found myself thinking about reading for enjoyment and enhancing this. As it was a lot harder to have reading groups and being able to share it became really important for my students to want to be able to read by themselves and select books for enjoyment rather than just being told to read something. Social distancing meant that my students were working a lot more independently so therefor the change to my reading program came about. We started going to the library and students had a lot more choice. Reflecting on this has shown a really great outcome my students now love going to the library and ask for SSR (Super Silent Reading) as it is a change for them to unwind and explore what they are reading. 

I have continued to focus on linking reading and writing which was another thing that came out of the all of the changes this year. I think this has had a great impact on literacy for my class and I am finding that my students are able to link these together and begin to use different vocabulary in their writing. 

I have made all of these changes to ensure the best for my learners. I think by being able to be flexible and reflective at every step has helped shape my program this year and although it might have not been to plan for my original inquiry I have found some key things that I would add into my inquiry next time and would really like to explore this in a lot more detail again with my class next year.

Describing my evidence

Describe the evidence you have so far about the effects of your changed practices or intervention on desired learner outcomes and how you summarised and recorded these:

One of the key things that I have been looking at this week is the evidence that I am using for my inquiry and how I can best describe and show this looking at my data. Below I have outlined some of the key data that I have been collecting and how it has been summarised and recorded. 

• Spelling tests - I have been using spelling words that are related to our reading topic for the week and trying to link this into writing as well. In order to see if this is working and being used in writing I have been conducting spelling tests each week and looking at the students writing to see if these words have been coming up. Each week the class will have a pre test where I record down the results of the words they spelt correctly or incorrectly in a spreadsheet. I then complete a post test at the end of the week where the students have learnt the words and taken them home for homework and again I record down the words that were correct and incorrect and compare this with the beginning of the week. What I have noticed so far is that my students who have been working at home to learn these words as well as completing the weekly spelling tasks tend to spell more words correctly on a Friday as well as use these words in writing for the week. 
• Running record data - I have used beginning and mid year data to see how my students are tracking. This gave me a detailed indication of the next steps for my learners and what they need in order to progress to the next level. The running records show the levels that my students are at and can advised my next teaching steps. These also give a clear indication if my inquiry is working and any tweaks that I needed to make. Running records are something that I have continued to use throughout the year if I felt a student had made progress. 
• PAT reading and star data - I used this data at the beginning of the year as a base for where to group my students especially those who were not at school for the last part of 2021. I will use this data from the end of year testing and compare to the beginning of the year to see if there has been any shift. 
• Well being survey - I have stored this data in a spreadsheet where I can see how the students have felt with their well being at school. I will again conduct this same survey to see if there are improvements in the students well being. 
• Reading for enjoyment survey - I have stored this data in a spreadsheet where I can see how the students have felt with reading and their enjoyment. I will again conduct this same survey to see if there are improvements in the students student enjoyment for reading. 

These are a few of the ways that I have gathered data for my inquiry and the results from the data have provided insight into my implementation and I have made changes as I have needed.

Harness the digital

During one of our CoL PLG's we were asked about how we were going to harness the digital. Basically how am I going to harness the affordances of technologies to do the following things:

• Transform the way we learn
  
• Offer new experiences
• Offer new opportunities 

I have been reflecting and thinking about this lately and have come back to this question as I have been looking at my data and my next steps especially around implementation. Technology has transformed the way the students have access to vocabulary and the understanding on the meaning of these words. I have tried to utilise this in a lot of my spelling activities by exposing the students to dictionary tools and how they can find the meaning of a word they are unsure of at anytime using this tool. I think this is such a powerful thing that the students have access to as they can use it at any time in their reading with any word that they might be stuck on. 

This made me reflect on what we needed to do when we were at school to find the meaning of a word we would have to get the dictionary and this would take 5 to 10 minutes and you would have lost track of what you were even reading. I am going to try and use this digital tool as much as possible because I think it is really useful and it is something that I use when I am reading as well when I am unsure of a word or phrase. 

This is a very small way of harnessing the digital in my inquiry and I am sure there are other things that I will come across along the way. One really great thing about harnessing the digital is the access we have lots of research and readings digitally which has helped shape my inquiry and given me access to a range of different strategies and research that I otherwise wouldn't have access to.