Thinking ahead to 2024...

What achievement challenge are you considering as an area of focus in 2023 and why? Include in your WHY both evidence and your own passion/expertise

Achievement challenge 3 lifting reading achievement. I believe that reading is key for our students to be able to do well as it opens access to all other areas of the curriculum. My passion is reading for this reason and I believe is one of the reasons that I enjoy teaching it as it is not just closed off to one curriculum area. The data that I have seen so far shows that many of my students have been reading around 10 years and this suggests that they are needing to develop that critical thinking and extended discussion during reading. From previous data I have found that students are struggling to read and comprehend the questions that they are seeing in PAT maths and Star along with reading. It can be seen that they are unable to infer meaning or apply knowledge. I have found that many students do enjoy reading while they are in a guided reading session and that extended discussion and critical thinking can come through. I am trying to build on that while they are completing follow up tasks and working independently. This group of students have started to show an understanding of inferring but are lacking the critical thinking skills to understand the text in greater detail. As a school we have also been talking about the importance of extended discussion and how we can make sure this is happening when the students are not with the teacher. A possible question could be how can I facilitate extended discussion to happen with my students when they are working independently? Another thing that I have been thinking about as I have been looking at my data is the students' understanding of maths terms and vocabulary which could be hindering them from answering questions correctly. 

What learnings from the 2017 - 2022 CoL teacher inquiries have informed or inspired your thinking.

Working with other CoL teachers this year and being able to share in the process of what is going on for my inquiry as well as the inquiry of others has been really beneficial this year. I have been extended in my own thinking which has made me think outside the box. Some key inquiries I have been inspired and interested in have been Robyn Anderson's inquiry from 2022 about the enjoyment and passion that students have for reading and to take ownership of choosing books to read for enjoyment along with what we are reading and learning about in class. Clarelle’s inquiry from 2021 where she looked at the critical thinking of students linked in with my 2021 inquiry using vocabulary to strengthen students' knowledge. Latini Ilaoa's inquiry around how we can better support students in reading who are ‘stuck’ in their learning (4+ years behind) and prepare them for college. Moving into year 6 next year with the same group of learners I have this year will mean it is even more vital for them to be ready to move from level 3 to 4 of the curriculum and ensure that they are not behind going into college. 

How would your work support Manaiakalani pedagogy and  kaupapa?

There are many ways that this work would support Manaiakalani pedagogy and kaupapa: 

• It reflects the value of learn, create and share. It reflects the focus of Manaiakalani schools next year looking into raising reading achievement along with how we can ensure that we are planning for and having extended discussions with the students. 
• Collaboration with other colleagues as well as students. 
• Supporting connected and empowered learners. 

Which elements of the extensive Manaiakalani research findings inform or challenge you as you think about this?

Manaiakalani observations have shown that extended discussion is an area that could have some development and be seen more in teaching. Manaiakalani research further investigates critical thinking and the use of generic reading tasks in order to focus more time and energy into planning as well being able to hopefully allow for that extended discussion of learners. 

How would you like to be supported in 2023 as you undertake this inquiry?

The opportunities for regular discussions with other colleagues around our inquiries and how we can help and guide each other. I have found this really useful this year. Regular release so that I am able to continue to focus on my target group and where we go next throughout my inquiry. Along with the support of other teachers as well as the Manaiakalani team. 

How would you plan to support your colleagues in your school with THEIR inquiries and/or teaching in the area you are exploring?

Being available for collaboration with others within my school with similar inquiries. Supporting other teachers within my own team with findings from my inquiry to help build on their own inquiries as well as the direction we are going in a team. Supporting my colleagues through the running of workshops, sharing knowledge and offering assistance and ideas where needed. Working collaboratively within my team and other teams in the school. Ensuring that at a team level we are spending time in our team meetings looking at our inquiries and how we can help each other as well as sharing our inquiries so that we can use these within our own classes as well. 

Mid Year Testing Data

 We have just completed our mid year testing which has been the perfect opportunity to have a look at my data in a bit more detail and reassess any changes that I might need to make coming into term 3. It was very interesting looking at my data as I can see that some of my target students have made some incredible gains during mid year testing. This has also made me have to rethink my data set a little bit and potentially add a new group of target students. This is something to ponder over the holidays and see what changes I need to make. Below I have outlined my data so far and what I have found for this inquiry as of mid year testing.

This is a break down of my June running record data. This year I have wanted to focus in on the comprehension part of the test and see if there are any trends in the data. 

I have then looked at my beginning of the year data to see if there has been any changes or shifts in the comprehension part of the running records. Below I have added the beginning of the year data. 

From looking at this data I can see that there was a shift in comprehension scores for some of the texts where they students were able to infer meaning better in our term 2 testing. I can also see that applied knowledge, vocabulary and inferring are key areas of interest to focus on. From looking at this raw data I wanted to have a look at the shift in levels as well as ages for this group of target learners which I have outlined in the graphs below. 

This graph shows the reading change in reading levels from November 2022 (end of year testing) and June 2023 testing for reports. As you can see from the graph there were 3 students who made no shift in level at all and then the rest of this target group were able to make gains of at least one level with some making progress of three levels with their running records. I like to look at this in levels as well as ages as sometimes the students can make progress but this is not reflective in reading age. Below I have added the graph of reading ages.

This graph shows shows the changes in reading ages from November 2022 to June 2023 testing. This is very similar to the reading levels graph and shows the progress and shift from the reading ages. There has been significant shift in some of these learners and their reading ages. 

My take aways from this data is that I need to look at my reading groups again and reorganise these according to the this data I have been looking at. I need to also decide if I will add in extra students to this data pool as I have some students who have moved to these levels that I have been monitoring. I need to have a look at the students who didn't make any shift and see what I can do to help these students and focus on areas that need to be worked on. I really like taking a look at the middle of the year as it is a good point to see what has been working and what might need some changes. So watch this space as I go into the holidays looking at this with fresh eyes coming into term 3. 

Stocktake so far

For our CoL PLG we have been asked to have think about our inquiry so far and to stocktake what we have done and where we are going. I have gone through each of the key parts of my inquiry so far and have taken a stocktake on what I have done and what I need to do in order to progress on CoL inquiry. Check this out below.

Tools and evidence

I have used a range of different tools in the classroom and have gathered a lot of evidence about my students to be able to really understand the needs of this group of students. When we have our parent interviews later on this term I will have conversations with whānu to ensure that I have some whānau voice in my intervention. 

Some of the tools that I have used are 

• Running records data from last year. 
• Running records from start of term 2 to gauge where the students are at and what areas of their reading needed work. 
• PAT data - I have looked into the PAT data of my students fro reading and have pulled out some key information that I will be able to compare with at the end of the year. 
• I have also taken anecdotal notes of my students while they are reading to be able to understand where each of my learners are at and what their individual work ons are. 

I will also be using our mid year running record data to see if my students have made any progress with their reading as well as look at the key areas that we need to work on. I have been having conversations with my students about reading and I would really like to complete some student voice surveys to compare from now and at the end of the year. 

Strengths and development

As we have been having guided reading sessions I have been taking notes of what my students are really good at and what their strengths are in reading. Most of my students are very good at being able to use clues from the text to answer literal questions well and in detail. My students also have really great decoding skills and are able to self correct if what they are reading doesn't;'t make sense. I will be able to use these strengths to help with the areas of development that these students need to work on.

Resources 

I have had some really rich conversations with colleagues around what I think I am seeing with this students and have been given some really great advice and next steps that I can work on with these students. This has also lead to research and reading that I have been recommended and looked at which given some very sound theories.

Measures

As I have stated above I will use a range of data for pre and post to compare students learning these include:

• Running record data 
• PAT data
• Teacher notes from guided reading sessions
• Student voice surveys

There may be some other key things that I look at in time as I have been looking into using the "Key into inference" tool that I could also use as a way to measure progress.

Opportunties

I have tried a few other little bits and pieces with this in the classroom as I know inferencing is something that needs a lot of practice and guidance. So it will be interesting to see if some of these little things have had an impact as well. I will continue to collect this data in guided reading sessions as well as recoding students completing their follow up activities to see if there are continued rich and extended discussions.

I am really excited to think about the changes that I will implement and see where my students can grow from there, watch this space!

 

Questions and wonderings

 During our last CoL PLG we were asked to think about our classes and what they are looking like this term and this year. We were asked some key questions to get us thinking about our inquiry direction while also thinking about the current climate of the world and what our new sort of normal looks like. These questions have been very thought provoking and have lead to some create conversations with my colleagues and what direction I could take my inquiry. As I have already discussed I believe reading is a fundamental element to all subject areas which is why this is a passion and focus that I want to keep inquiring into with a new lens that includes engagement, wellbeing and enjoyment. Below are some of the questions we were asked to think about during our PLG along with some of my pondering about each one:

What is is like coming back to school for you?

This year has already had many changes with students being in and out with covid and then moving to a hybrid type of learning which I have discussed in my previous blog post. I feel like we started the year (well I know I did) ready for it to be back some kind of normality. However I don't think any of us knows that this new normal is going to be like! It has been really great to be back in the classroom this year, the masks have been hard but it has a nice feel about it. The changes can be challenging at times but I feel like the last few years have taught us to just roll with it which makes it a bit easier to navigate these constant changes in the classroom. 

What is the vibe in your class?

I have found that the students are really excited to be back at school and being able to see their friends and learn face to face. The social aspect is really great and it is so nice to see all of the children being about to talk and share with their peers again. The way we have set up hybrid learning has been great for that as well as students who need to isolate are going home, jumping online and completing the same work as the students at home and when they come back to school they are all on the same page and can get back to talking about their learning. The transitioning has been working really well in my class and it is now just our new normal. Welcoming the children back has become a normal new reality for us as well and the students are just taking it in their stride and getting on with it. 

What have you noticed about whānau- what is it like for them right now?

The communication that I have had with whānau of my students has been positive and they are all wanting their children to keep learning at home while isolating and coming back to school to learn once that isolation period is over. I feel that because we have been going in and out of school for the last few years our whānau are now used to the way it works and are happy to help out in any way that they can. I have had the privilege of being able to contact all of the families in my team as I have been running the online side of learning and most whānau I have spoken to are in good spirts and understand that the isolation periods are short and are comfortable to send their children back to school. A lot of whānau I have spoken at are really happy that we are able to keep schools open and in general just roll with it themselves. 

What excites you about this year?

I think the biggest thing that excites me about this year is being able to keep face to face learning happening. The last few years it has been great with the online learning and attendance of my students but it does limit and change the way we build and develop relationships with our learners. I am excited to be able to teach the core subjects in the classroom with groups and most importantly being able to have conversations and discussions as a class where everyone is able to talk freely without having to mute and unmute a microphone on a chromebook. I think as changeable as things are going to be this year the most important thing is being able to keep the learning and wellbeing of our students as normal as possible in order for the students to get the best out of their learning and experiences this year. 

Final Blog Post - MIT 2019

This year has been one of many ups and downs with trying to decide what is the best way to go about my inquiry and also the best way to create a tool for my learners. My tool is now officially complete and ready to use. All of the activities are now available to be used in the classroom. The link to my site is here. Please feel free to use this in your own reading program, you can either link the site directly from your own page or I am able to send you a copy of the site which you can use and modify how you would like. 

Success?

Looking at my class data I can see that my target learners for this inquiry have all made at least 6 months progress with some making as much as 1.5 years. My learners have really taken on this challenge this year and have focused hard in their reading which can be seen in their results. I am so incredibly proud of each and everyone of my learners. 

Where to next?

1. I am still having a slight problem with getting my learners recorded readings to work on the site so unfortunately this is unavailable at this point in time but I have linked each of my learners blogs to their names and the recordings can be reached from there. I am going to work on making sure that these are accessible in the new year.
2. Continuing to use this in my class for next year as well as sharing it with others in my team. I will continue to monitor these results next year. I would also like to continue to add activities to the site as they are created as this will add to the resource bank. 

Looking ahead to 2020:

Next year I would like to look at how I can implement something similar to this in my writing program. I would like to see how I can help my learners to make significant shift in their writing as well as their reading. 

Thank-you:

I would like to say a huge thank-you for the opportunity to be apart of the MIT19 team. I have learnt so much over this year and I think that it has strengthened my knowledge as well as helped me better my teaching practice. It has been an invaluable learning experience and I am extremely grateful for this opportunity.

Term 3 Update - MIT 20!9

Term 3 Update - Raising Reading Achievement

This term I have been working hard to try and get my site up and running to the class so I am not double handling my work as I am currently putting this on my class site as well. I still haven't had this go live to my class BUT they have been using many of the activities that I have been working on after guided reading sessions. So I am making progress! This will be a school holidays top priority so that I will have it ready for day one for term 4. Although it is double handling of work for me at the moment I feel that this is the best way to see how the activities work in my classroom and I would rather that than having a half finished site in action from my students. 

Data:
Last time I posted I talked about my data making improvements which has been great to see. I have added a graph of my students data and how much progress they have made this year. 

This is from my mid year testing which has shown an increase in reading age for my target group of students. I am hopeful that this trend will continue with my end of year data as well. 

Highlights from the term:
One big highlight from this term has been the attitude of my students towards their learning. I had one of my students ask to have a reading test as she felt that she had made progress in her reading. She had intact moved from reading at 8 years to 8.5 years which is great progress. However the biggest highlight out of that whole thing was this student taking ownership of her own reading and wanting to see how she was going. She has been working really hard and it has been great to see that her hard work is paying off. 

How is my reading site going?
It is getting there it is still under construction and I do have a little bit of work to do over the holidays to make sure that it is up and running ready for week 1 of term 4. Here is a little look at one of my pages that is complete and ready to go:



This is for comparing and contrasting. My overall vision is that I will have this as a guided reading session in class and we will learn how to compare and contrast as a group. Then instead of having to come up with a task that is directly related to the story or article that they have read they will be able to pick an activity that they will enjoy and be able to continue the learning from our guided reading session. 

The comparing reading log is one that can be used across the term and is an activity that can be used every week to strengthen the reading achievement objective. So that leads onto my where to next which is adding more activities to this site and having it ready to roll in class next term! So watch this space to see when I finally go live with my site! 

EdTeach Summit Day Two - MIT 2019

 I came into todays sessions very excited and eager to learn again. We started the day off with a session from Kim Pollishuke which was incredible. Her session was titled Lets build an elevator to the moon. This session was very powerful as it showed that there are no limits in what we are teaching our learners and we should be empowering our learners to feel the same and that their ideas and aspirations should have no limits. This session inspired me as a classroom teacher to show my learners that their learning it limitless as well as what they can achieve which is something that I will definitely being taking back to my classroom.  I want my learners to be encouraged and excited about their learning and know that they possibilities for their education and what they can learn is what they make of it. I learnt how to use many tools in this session to engage my learners and make them feel excited and empowered. 

The next session that I went to was one of Kim Pollishuke's as well. This session was titled DocAppender for Descriptive Feedback Organization. In this session we learnt how to use Google Forms in order to be able to write continued feedback about our learners after sessions or observing them in the classroom. I think this is going to be an extremely useful tool that I am going to be able to use in my classroom. During this session as I my inquiry is around reading I created a from that I can fill in for my learners around literacy and the gains that they are making. After this session I reflected on how we could use this tool in our maths sessions for my team to track progress. I have worked on a basic template which I am very excited to share with my team when I get back to Auckland. 

The second session was one in which I presented again with Hannah West. This was on how to set up a new google site for beginners. This was a smaller turn out but it was great to see a handful of people from the session that we had taken yesterday. In this session we focused more on the create part as gave the people in our session the chance to create a site with the opportunity to ask questions and have support from myself and Hannah. This session again went really well and was nice to be able to share our own knowledge with others. 

The last session that I went to was with Kim Pollishuke and this was titled Putting Stories on the Map. This session appealed to me as reading is my focus and I wanted some extra tools to help it become engaging and exciting. This session was great as I have been using google my maps in the classroom with my learners which showed that it is a great tool to use. This session showed me some new ways of using this tool and how I could use this to locate each learners culture in one single map that everyone could have access to. I also learnt about many new great map tools that can bring reading to life for my learners. 

Today again opened my eyes to the number of tools that I can bring into my classroom and share with my learners as well as my colleagues. I have learnt so much in these last two days which I cannot wait to share with others when I get back. I am so grateful and thankful for this experience and cannot wait for term three to being. I hope that I have inspired others as much as I have been inspired over this conference.   

Term 2 Check in - MIT 2019

Term 2 Data 

This term we had testing and reports and I was able to use running records to see how my learners were getting on and to see if the things we have been doing in class have been working. With the testing I found that all of my learners managed to pass one reading level and most made progress of 0.5 - 1 year in reading. This was huge for some of my learners who have not made much shift in reading. 

What did I find out?

From completing these running records I found out that there are two main areas that need work in order for my learners to progress. One of the big things was vocabulary what I am finding is that they are able to read these words from sounding out and looking at blends but they are unsure of what these words mean. Another main thing that needs work is inferring as well as applied knowledge. These will be the focus of what we will be working in order to continue to raise reading achievement. 

What is working?

• Screencastify:
• Still really engaged with this activity and listening to themselves reading. 
• Listening to the story again:
• Listening to the story after we have read to look out for those new words and see how they are pronounced. Gives reading mileage as well.
• Reading tumble:
• Having a reading tumble in place so that each of the students knows what they are supposed to be doing and when. 
• Assigned seats:
• Having a set place to sit and complete work is helping with focus and completing work. 

Where to next?

• Focus on vocabulary:
• Spelling lists every week.
• Silent reading every day.
• Vocabulary tasks every week as part of guided reading.
• Spelling practice part of the reading tumble
• Reading activities:
• Screencastify (continue on with this)
• Follow up activities that require the students to create and use the text they have read to answer questions and find information. 
• Recording some of the stories that we have read that aren't available on TKI - maybe have students reading these. 
• Link to inquiry:
• Information fact sheets - needing to look up new vocabulary
• Front load vocabulary and have this accessible on the wall.

MIT where to?

Over the school holidays I am going to be creating a tool for this group of readers as a space where they can find all of the things that they need to work on. I am still not 100% sure what this will look like but will be something that is beneficial for my learners and will help engage my readers and also at the same time help to boost reading achievement. So again watch this space!

Term 2 Inquiry Update - MIT 2019

This term has been one of trial and error and trying to figure out the best way to use digital tools in the classroom with reading. This term is report time so I am currently underway with completing running records. Hopefully this data will show some shift so watch this space as I will update this as soon as I have all of this data.

Text to type:

Text to type has been working with some of my learners with their reading. I found learners were able to find the words they had said incorrectly while they were reading however they weren't really doing much with this after. This is still something that I will continue to use in the classroom throughout the year as an extra activity. I liked the idea of the students going away and reading the text again and being accountable for this reading. I wanted something along these lines that would also be something they could revisit so I decided to try something else.

What is the something else?

I decided to try and use screencastify and record themselves reading the story or article again after they were reading with me and their group. Along with this they needed to listen to themselves reading while following along with the journal that they had read. The results so far have been fantastic. They students are very engaged and loving this activity, they are also loving the ability to listen to themselves back. I have been using this for a few weeks now and have very engaged readers in my classroom. This idea has evolved over the weeks as I reflected how it was presented to my students and this might have been too much. They were having to reflect what their reading was like which was a challenge so what I have changed it to is answering a few questions about how they thought that they read. There are examples of this in the slide deck below. One is a completed screencastify recording and the other is a completed text to type presentation.

Where to next?

I want to continue to try and use these types of activities into the reading session. One thing I am trying to start is that the learners are then able to go and listen to the story read by someone else. On TKI many of the newer school journals level 1 and 2 and junior journals have this feature. This allows the students to pick up on the words that they may have got wrong both during our guided time and their time reading and this helps confirm the new words and make sure they are reading them correctly. This is another activity that they are enjoying. This is meaning that the learners are exposed to the text in three different ways and they are always needed to use the journal to follow along. This is something that I will continue to work for the rest of the term and into next term. Other work ons are to complete my site where the students can have access and these extra activities. I would like to have this ready for my learners to be working on by the end of this term. So watch this space!