Its about how we start the day

It is now week 3 and I'm starting to feel like we are getting there with my class. Last week and Monday this week were challenging. The children were really testing the boundaries and seeing where I might cave. I could see that with some I was beginning to get into a negative cycle and I didn't want that for them or me.
Last night I began thinking about what the causes could be. After a while, I realised that it all came down to self-esteem. Today I started the day by playing the following clip to the class. After it finished I asked the children why I might have played it to them. I had a few ideas ranging from, "it's a cool song!" to, "they're good singers." We discussed the article in more detail. Why did these people gather to sing the say they did? How do you think they felt singing with such passion? At the end, I told them that I think we as a class are an amazing bunch and that we are capable of some great things if we put our minds to it.
After a start like that their attitudes were completely different! We had a fantastic day (even though it was wet and muggy). We achieved heaps and we got along. I didn't feel like I was in a cycle of constantly growling. I think the next step for me will be to continue to develop self-confidence in my students. I want to look into working on growth mindset and mindfulness with them. I am hoping that when they leave my class they can hold their heads high knowing that they put everything they've got into the day. I want them to feel proud!

Expectations!

Once again I am forced to think about expectations. I wasn't sure what to expect from a Year 1 class when I started. Naturally, some of the work that I set was too hard and other work was too easy. I had to adjust my expectations to fit what the children were able to do. I was, however, reluctant to make the hard tasks too easy. I want to keep my expectations high. I find that at times, we lower our expectations too much. I have always believed that when adults expect more, then children rise to the challenge. Not everyone gets there the same way. They all have a slightly different way of achieving what is set, but they always end up doing better than they, themselves, expected.
In my second week in my new class, I didn't let one of the girls hand in a sentence for writing. I told her that she was capable of much more, that she was doing such a fabulous job of sounding out and that I thought she could complete her story to describe one of our class activities. She walked away, looking a little sulky, but when she returned she had completely described our class activity. On another occasion, I had a young gentleman completely change his attitude to reading. He was reluctant to start with, and would happily wait for others to read out the tricky words for him. In three short weeks, he has become my star reader!
I realise that the children were probably trying their luck with their new teacher. But imagine if I had lowered my expectations to what they were saying they could or couldn't do? What would I be getting from these children? I think by keeping my expectations high, but also praising the children for their efforts I am able to achieve much better results that I first thought. Becuase at the end of the day, all they really want to know is that they have done a good job and that we are proud of them.

Back to it!

Well, it's official! I'm back in the classroom after taking time off with my little madam. Today was my first day back at school in a class that will be shared between me and a colleague. I will be in the class from Monday until Wednesday, which seems like a perfect compromise for our little family.
I will be in a year 1 class (this is the youngest I have ever taught) and I'm looking forward to the challenges ahead. Starting at a new school is exciting because I have never taught outside of Point View. It is a strange experience not only, start at a new school, but also at a new school. There are so many routines and procedures to get my head around. My first port of call is to establish routines in my classroom. I will be doing things slightly differently to the previous teacher so the children will take some time to adjust. As always my aim is to create independent people so I would like to start putting systems in place where these children can start to take some ownership of their learning and their choices. I believe that even from a young age, children are capable of being independent, we just don't give them enough credit.
So watch this space. I will be bringing more news of my adventures this term.

David Anderson PD Learning Talk

Today we revisited some PD that we did at the beginning of the year at our syndicate meeting.
At the beginning of the year we had David Anderson come to school to talk about professional conversations. We discussed the importance of relationships in a working environment and the culture of learning conversations. Today we discussed some of these aspects again.

We discussed Learning Talk in some detail as a team.
The aim is to create a culture where professional conversations make learning the core purpose. David Anderson spoke about the purpose parrot. To ask your self what the purpose of the lesson, conversation or process. If you can't answer that question then maybe you shouldn't do it. If something you are about to do doesn't have a purpose then what's the point?
So here is where we started talking about our appraisal process. What is the purpose of this process? We have been talking about how we can make this process more meaningful to learning. How are the conversations that we are having during our appraisals going to effect the learning experiences of our students. Because at the end of the day the point of our appraisals is to raise student achievement.
One change that I think that is working well in our school is the constantly evolving goal document for teachers. It is a working document. We have made it a requirement to take some time out every term to collect evidence of how we are achieving our goals or what we are doing in order to achieve our goal. This has made me think about what I'm doing much more regularly. I have become more reflective. I have also started thinking about my parrot of purpose.
How is this effecting my students achievement? Is this really going to make an impact on student learning? What is this idea going to add to my teaching?

At the end of the day I don't want my student to just survive. I want them to thrive, to contribute and to be critical thinkers. So how am I going to make it happen? What are the steps that I'm taking that make that a reality?

First Attempt In Learning

I have just read a blog post by @traintheteacher about being someone's worst teacher. I would have to agree with this thinking. Our failures are the best lessons! We don't want to put ourselves into that situation again and so we take all we can from it and try to adapt. How many times have we as teachers tried something in the classroom that was a disaster? I think we have those moments often but we are constantly reflecting and wondering how we can make the next attempt a success.
These are things that we are doing on a regular basis. So why is the word failure such a negative?
We try and get our students to make mistakes and learn from them. I don't know how many times I have told my students that mistakes are a great thing, as long as you learn from them.  I think we have put so much pressure on ourselves to get everything right that we stress when things don't go according to plan. I think it's time we took a leaf out of our own book and relax about our failures and looked at them as lessons rather than a personal criticism. I have recently heard +Anne Kenneally  @annekenn talk about the word fail and I have decided to take on her philosophy.

First
Attempt
In
Learning

Let's celebrate our First Attempts In Learning, share them with each other and learn from them!