Rangiora New Life November 5, 2008
Posted by mrsuds in School Visits, strategic.2 comments
It would be fair to say I haven’t had a big presence in Rangiora New Life School this year. That’s mainly because they already have their own LMS – MyClasses and an eLearning Co-ordinator of their own. This means they are quite a way ahead of many of the other schools in Cantatech, so they haven’t needed me quite as much. They still have an interest in where the Moodle environment is going though and my visit yesterday proved extremely productive.
I had a good discussion with Gregg, their principal who was keen on many of the issues we discussed. These included – Sorting out Cantatech courses for 2009, Collaboration, Gifted and Talented, and eLearning.
We have strong numbers for L2 History next year, so it was good to get confirmation that Adrian (their Cantatech teacher) was available to teach that course next year. Adrian is an experienced VC teacher, who has impressed me with his enthusiasm. I didn’t realise he is 62! So it’s good to see someone in the twilight of their career still wanting to trail blaze.
One of the major challenges for me in this job is to facilitate collaboration amongst all staff in our cluster. I will post somethig on this soon, so I won’t elaborate here, but needless to say it is no easy task. Like any school, RNLS staff are members of various communties and have established their own networks. I very much doubt they are at the scale we are aiming for, but many teachers feel comfortable with what they have.
This is very much the situation at RNLS. Gregg thinks the senior staff are more willing to meet with other staff in Cantatech, than the junior staff. He said that senior management certainly had a vision for online communtities as being one form of professional learning, but we both agree that it needs to be very well planned and have a purpose. He suggested NCEA moderation as an easy hook and one I hadn’t thought of is the Specialist Classroom Teacher (SCT). This position is new to many in the cluster so it would be an obvious one to target for collaboration and networking. So some productive discussion there.
Gregg was very keen on a cross cluster gifted and talented programme for 2009, as all the principals seem to be. This is something that the other eLearning clusters either have already or are planning – so it would make sense to discuss what an effective approach would be for this. A couple of years ago I wrote a research paper on this subject for my postgraduate studies, so it is something I feel I have some knowledge on at least. Gifted and Talented Programmes vary from school to school, but many run a withdrawal programme, which is not my favoured way of meeting the needs of these students. In this case though, I can’t see how a cross cluster programme can’t run this way – so I will have to bite the bullet on that one (unless I, or someone else, has a brainstorm). I would guess that it would be the favoured approach by principals though. It is also notoriously difficult to correctly identify gifted and talented students. Most students in these sorts of programmes are merely talented. A truly gifted student comes along fairly rarely. Anyway, after the seniors are gone I am going to meet with the people responsible for any sort of GATE programme in each school and see what we can put together. I’m sure there will be a discussion on this amongst the ePrincipals as well…
The final issue of discussion was on eLearning. We decided (with Hans, their eLearning Co-ordinator) that I could work with Hans on some eLearning workshops run in the school next year. I could offer some hands on stuff with web 2.0 which they haven’t really touched with their staff yet. I have tended to steer clear of hands on PD, because I don’t see it as my role, but I think it has huge benefits in raising your presence in a school. It’s all about balance in the end. How often to tavel? When to VC? When to get hands on? How much time to spend on strategic stuff? Because it is a new role all the ePrincipals have taken slightly different roads, and we have all probably changed our thinking on how to approach things a few times during this year. I know I have anyway.
The New Zealand Curriculum and Assessment November 2, 2008
Posted by mrsuds in PD, strategic.2 comments
New Zealand Curriculum and Assessment
One of the best workshops I attended at Ulearn during the holidays was not even directly related to technology. It was a presentation from Rose Hipkins from the NZCER, on the New Zealand Curriculum and assessment. I have been wanting to touch on a few of the issues it raises for soemtime, so here goes…
I have embedded Rose’s PPt above, which she kindly gave me permission to do. Have a good look through it as it is very good and is a nice sequel to Rachel Bolstad’s presentation in an earlier post.
The main thrust of Rose’s talk centred on how we provide coherence in curriculum design and the implications for how we assess. Much of the focus was on the key competencies which Rose sees as integral to providing the links betwen the front and back end of the curriculum. The back end of the curriculum is nothing more than a condensed version of the pervious curriculum, with AO’s relating to the different learning areas. It is the part of the curriculum that most teachers are familiar with. The front end is a totally different beast and it is here that we see the possiblity for transforming schools (especially secondary). Rose suggested that the key competencies “might be the glue” that ties these two together.
One of Rose’s major questions was one that many educators are asking – Should we assess the key competencies? In short the answer was no, but the outcomes of these comptencies might be assessed. I am in toal agreement with this – it makes little sense to try and assess the competencies themselves. Many will probably want to, but we already have too much of a focus on assessment without adding to it further. And it would be extremely difficult to asses them anyway. How do you quantifiably assess “participation” for example?
Earlier in the presentation Rose talked about how a holistic approach was need to curriculum design and that a coherent curriculum was vital. I was interested in her ideas about how this coherence might be achieved (check slide 7). At the top of the list of possibilities was ICT and how ICTs could be used to foreground an aspect of learning and/or knowledge construction, not just for information retrieval. Another that I had already considered was the use of future focussed themes, such as citizenship or sustainability. To me if you are going to build a coherent curriculum then you need to pull the learning areas together. You need to contextualise learning for the students and build this context across subjects. I am a big fan of thematic learning and I hope that more secondary schools start looking it as a way of building a relevant curriculum.
Slide 17 was an interesting one for me. It was a snapshot of the results of the NZCER’s recent engagement survey. An article featured in the Press recently commented on the same thing. What it shows is that the majority of year 9 and 10s admit to often being bored in class. This is a worrying statistic, though it doesn’t surprise me in the least. This is one of the big reasons schools need to change. If a student isn’t engaged they will find it difficult to learn. And engagement doesn’t mean they have to be entertained. Engagement is about being sucked into learning, it’s about relevance and its also about challenge. Schools need to develop a curriculum which is relevant to students and to what learning means in the 21st century – not sitting them down in rows, facing the front, and ramming content down their throats. Fortuntately many schools have already begun making this change.
Now where does assessment and NCEA sit with all this? Well first, we need to start including students in the assessment process far more. Get them assessing themselves and each other. In fact, if a student is going to become self-managing they need to be able to evaluate their own progress. I know many teachers and schools use self assessment in their programmes, but how much of it is actually meaningful? Is it a quick check-list or it a tied into their learning on an ongoing basis?
Secondly, despite much of the media and some teachers views, NCEA is not the root of all evil in secondary schools today. In fact NCEA provides enormous flexibity in assessment. Teachers are no longer tied by traditional programmes, and can provide flexible pathways for students. Unfortunately many schools haven’t grasped this opportunity, but the NZC means that it will be difficult for schools to avoid it.
NCEA shouldn’t be about rigidity, it should be about flexibiltiy. Sure, many of the standards will need to change, but that is all part of the alignment process which is going on at the moment.
As I have said before, these are exciting times, but it is up to schools to grasp the opportunity…
Presentation time July 28, 2008
Posted by mrsuds in strategic.add a comment
Tonight I gave a presentation to Boards of Trustees from Cantatech schools on where we are going over the next two years.
I personally get very bored with long presentations using powerpoint with endless bullet pointed slides. I have gone off PowerPoint in a big way and only reserve it for special occasions. I used to use it heavily in face to face classrooms as a way of going over material once students have completed work, but found it was starting to turn me into the sort of teacher I didn’t want to be – at the front talking a lot. it is very good for showing visuals though and I try to make any presentations as visual as possible now.
Anyway I gave what I hope was a succinct overview (you can judge for yourself) of what Cantatech is and where things are going. The best part was at the end where I got lots of excellent questions which resulted in very exciting and productive discussion. There was major interest in the future of things and some excellent insights into how this sort of technology can change the approach schools take to learning.
Lots of thanks to Eddie Reisch at the Ministry who came along and chimed in when needed. He ended get some very curly questions…
Oh and thanks to Rachel…hope you don’t mind me stealing a slide from one of your presentations – liked it.
Where are we at? June 23, 2008
Posted by mrsuds in Uncategorized, strategic.2 comments
So with the end of the term fast approaching, where are we at in terms of progress?
It has been a frustrating term for me I must admit. We have an amitious plan for the two years and I knew challenges would come our way. It’s amazing how trivial these can be, but also how much impact they can have on my job. One of the biggest challenges has just been getting prompt email replies from principals (or any reply at all). I don’t think they realise how much this sort of thing slows me down (and it has) and is something to be discussed in our meeting on early next term. I am finding ways around this and as I become familiar with who does what in each schooll, I have been able to bypass the principals to some extent.
So, what has been achieved this term and what is on the agenda?
- Our first goal is all about the Distance Learning Progamme and we are making good progress there. The eTeachers are starting to feel more like a group. We have had a couple of meetings which have gone well and there is a generally a lot of enthusiasm. They all seem willing to develop professionally and we are currently putting together an appraisal system. I have set up some draft eTeacher guidlines which I am getting them feedback on through a forum and wiki on our Moodle. The feedback has been slow coming, but we are getting there. I am not going to rush this through. It is important that we get buy in from the teachers, otherwise it will be meaningless. They are very keen to learn about Moodle and most will be involved in the PD day next term
- In terms of elearning, we have a team of teachers representing every school in the cluster, who will learn how to use the new Cantatech Moodle site. Some have already gone on and had a play around. A couple haven even got their students on which is great. The actual PD day kept getting pushed back, because of, either, the birth of my son, or it clashed with other events. Eventually we decided to set it for the 24th of July – Week One, Term Three. This week I am going around a couple of schools (Oxford today) to give some enthusiastic teachers an hour long intro to Moodle – so at least they know how to go on and do the basics. Look forward to more of this next term. We will release it to all staff around week six perhaps.
- The collaborative side of things has taken a back seat to the elearning, but is something I have been focussing on over the last week or so. I am talking to Rachel Bolstad at the NZCER about the possibilty of doing a presentation on the curriculum to all schools through VC. This will kick off a series of sessions on the same topic run by the UC advisers for the learning areas (and other groups). At the moment I am establishing what the focus will be. Hopefully I will get plenty of feedback from Principals and staff about this. We will be getting a Scholarship Programme up and running next term, when everyone is sure who is doing what. Also looking at some Gifted and Talented collabaoration – maybe get some sessions runing for students.
- The last goal is a work in progress!!
Surveys, surveys and more surveys June 14, 2008
Posted by mrsuds in gathering information, strategic.Tags: survey
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As someone new to this job I had to be spend a considerable amount of time gathering information. One of my favourite methods for doing this are surveys. I primarily use Surveymonkey for this as it is very user friendly. The only things is I don’t subscribe so the data is not downloadable, but there are always around these sorts of problems. Why some people continue to use paper based surveys anymore I really don’t. The amount of data you have to collate when you can get technology to do it for you.
Anyway, earlier in the year I surveyed all the distance students on what their learning experience had been like so far. The results were overwhelmingly positive, although it was completed quite early in the year, so must be qualified. It will be interesting to see what is said in the next survey. Although I think most students are having a very positive experience.
Recently I surveyed all staff in each Cantatech school. One of our goals this year is to increase the use of online technologies amongst all staff. Before doing this I wanted to ascertain the knowledge and experience of teachers with elearning. This was so I didn’t go in to each school blind. The results have thrown up two major points. The first is that, while most staff are inexperienced with any use of technology, the majority are keen to learn. The other is that is some school’s staff percieved one or two major barriers to learning more. We will certainly have problems pushing elearning if teachers can’t readily get their students onto computers.
The creation of the Cantatech Moodle site is directly related to this goal. This will be the centre of online learning, and from there we can branch into web 2.0 technology. Each school has at least one (and some times up to five) member on an elearning team that will learn how to use Moodle. The difficult thing is getting these people together face to face for PD (and it does need to be face to face first up). We were scheduled to meet June 19th, but this has had to be postponed. One, because of a certain late baby (a week now). Two, because many teachers are stressed from exams and reports so the timing was particularly bad. We are now looking at the first week of term three, which is later than I wanted, but c’est la vie.
I will spend the last three weeks of this term trying to get some collaboration off the ground.
A new term… May 11, 2008
Posted by mrsuds in strategic.1 comment so far
This term is a biggie for me. I have been doing lots of planning and talking, but it is now time to put that into action. A focus for the term will be setting up and elearning team of teachers. One or two from every school will be enough. Enthusiastic people who have the respect of other staff who will be the ‘early adaptors’ for the new Cantatech Moodle environment. I will be travelling around for 2-3 weeks visiting schools and gathering the list of people together (and hopefully meeting them). We will then bring the team together for some PD. After a term or so these people should be able to show what they have don to the rest of the staff and hopefully help interest them in online learning.
Another real focus will be looking at what opportunities there are for our primary school students to use VC. This may be a simple as sharing projects or as involved as setting up a gifted and talented programme.
A Big Meeting April 11, 2008
Posted by mrsuds in OLE, Principal Meeting, strategic.add a comment
Today was probably the most important day of the year so far for this cluster. For the first time we brought all the Principals’s together. This meeting was extremely significant in that we discussed the strategic plan and made a decision on an LMS for the cluster. Lots of positive and constructive feedback was given and it seemed as though everyone was happy to buy into it. I think we all recognise that the plan is ambitious, but also challenging and worthwhile because of that. We will take small steps initially and first on the agenda next term is putting in place a shared OLE for the cluster.
This led to the final point of discussion. What LMS to go with it. I presented a few options with costings as well. The decision was made to go with Moodle. There are various reasons for this including: cost, philisophy, functionality, felixibiltiy and sustainability. So onward and upwards. Time to get this thing in place and working!
For me it was a bit of a relief when it was over, just because it seems I have been waiting for it for most of the term. Now we can get things moving.
The planning stage is almost over! (Well, sort of)
At the beginning I used two little video clips that I felt were thought-provoking and relevant to what we would be discussing. One I have put in a previous post. The other I have put below. It is Sir Ken Robinson speaking about creativity and schools. It is very well known, but if you haven’t seen, I strongly recommend you watch it.
Goals April 2, 2008
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Well, from the management meeting some time ago we were able to put together our main goals for the next two years. They are only draft at this stage, but are deliberately broad and ambitious. There are four:
1. Ensure the sustainability and growth of the distance learning programme.
2. Broaden the delivery of elearning within the Cantatech cluster
3. Promote collaboration and innovation between Cantatech schools to ensure quality learning outcomes for all students
4. Further develop professional links with other elearning clusters and educational institutions
After a few weeks of plugging away I have finally put together a Cantatech Strategic Plan for the next two years…enjoyable experience it was too. This plan will be discussed and developed at the Principal’s meeting in a week or so, which I am looking forward to. It is vital that all stakeholders buy into this plan otherwise we will make no headway. I am hoping that the plan might change quite a bit as a result of discussion – this would mean we have got a collaborative plan rather than something I have come up with.
In terms of meeting these goals we have only just begun, but links have already been firmly established between the clusters care of the week in Rotorua.
