Writing Feedback

This year I started marking the kids writing books the way that I had seen other teachers mark in their rooms.   After a while, I found that it didn't work for me as it wasn't giving enough ownership to the children.  When conferencing with the children I found that they were waiting for me to give them all the answers. They didn't have any responsibility for the errors they had made and were not in charge of making changes.  After rereading, "The Writing Book" by Sheena Cameron, I decided to try the wish and tick system again.   This way of conferencing takes longer but instead of correcting all the mistakes for the children I instead write some things they need to check themselves.  A wish and a tick. One thing they need to fix and one thing I think they did well.  Sometimes, depending on the child, there might be more than one tick or more than one wish.  The wishes and ticks are added only after the children has had a go at correcting their surface features first (once again pushing the, "this is your writing and you're in charge of it," point).  The wishes are always related to our learning goal for the day or to the child's specific goal.  It took a while for the children to get used to this system.  Some still wait for me to fix everything but they are getting there.  For the children who at times have trouble seeing their errors or finding them, I will use a highlighter to show that there is something wrong there that they could fix.  I think the best thing about marking this way was seeing the pride in my kids after they managed to fix an error all by themselves.  Here are some pictures of books to show how I mark.  

Simple iPad Apps and writing

Yesterday some of the teachers at school presented ideas that they learned at uLearn 2014.  Being in the junior school I decided to attend the workshop that focused on creative thinking and the use of iPads in the junior school.
One idea I tried today following our workshop was using QuickVoice App (or any other voice recording app) to record children's ideas. I decided to try this idea on some of my students who have trouble with writing. Some have trouble with verbalising their ideas and others have trouble concentrating or just forget what they were writing about.
These children used the QuickVoice app to record their story after the initial planning stage. All the children went away to a quiet space (cloak room, library corner and our outdoor area) to record their story from beginning to end. Once the children recorded their story, they started to write. The benefit that I found from doing it this way was that the children could replay their story as many times as they wanted. Some of the children who frequently forget what they were writing about finished their stories in a logical sequence because their mind didn't wander. For others it was good practice verbalising their ideas prior to writing and listening to what they sound like when they talk. They saw the gaps in their ideas without my input. The best thing for me was that these kids achieved success and they were really proud of their efforts. They were proud that they stayed on task for such a long time, they were proud that they completed their work all by themselves and they were proud that they got to be creative without having to worry too much about the recording process.
A successful day I think :)

 Planning our

Techsperts

I often hear teachers say that they don't have the technical know-how to teach computer skills. I say that you don't have to be the expert! I was thinking today about how old my students are. They were born in 2008, that's 3 years after Youtube was invented and 12 years after the invention of Google. They were born 7 years after the release of the first iPod and the first iPad was released 2 years after they were born. Our students were born into the world of technology whether we like it or not. They are digital natives!
So why not use their expertise?
I was talking to a parent this week about how children just seem to know how to use computers. There are obviously skills that they need to learn and some take longer than others to pick up. The underlying point is that they pick these skills up much faster than adults. So why do we as teachers need to know exactly what to do on every device and in every situation?
I say that we need to employ computer experts. Mine are about 6 years old (some are 7). I have learned that to teach a new skill I can teach small number of my students when I can. These few children are usually one skill ahead of the class (and sometimes me). Once I'm ready to teach the rest I then have support staff on board to help me if I need them. Sometimes I don't know how to do something and I can go and ask my children how to change a background or if they have figured out something exciting they teach me.
This doesn't have to stop at technology, child stuck on a maths problem? Go find a buddy to help you first. If you still don't understand then come to me.
Don't underestimate the children in your class. They are amazing!

Here are my computer experts:

This is some of the the experts in action:

They were the first to complete the presentations below and then heeled the other children in the class finish theirs.

Control vs Choice

Recently I have been thinking about teaching in general. It has changed completely from what I remember happening in my primary classroom. It has even changed in the time that I have been working (that's only 7 years). I have always been a strong believer of moving with the times. If something didn't work I tried a different way. I have always been the type of person who jumped in the deep end and learned as I went. I tried, I experimented, I failed but most importantly I learned. Not everything was easy. Giving away some of the control in my classroom to my children was difficult at first. I have always been taught that I should be in control! Unfortunately I found that this approach was not sustainable for me. I think this also stopped me from giving the best opportunities to my children.
I think Modern Learning requires teachers to let go of some control. Giving ownership to the children teaches them to make choices that are right for their learning, it also teaches them that all choices have consequences (whether they be good or bad consequences depends on the choice made). Letting go of control I found had to be a gradual process. You can not give control over to the children without first teaching them to make good learning choices. Some children will be able to do this instinctively others need to be taught.
Moving year levels has taught me that giving children choice can be done at every year level (obviously with more or less support). My Year 5 student's weren't necessarily better at making good choices than my current Year 2 students. In both cases I had to introduce choices slowly. Giving two options for a particular curriculum area at first. Teaching the children which to use when. With time I was able to give a few more choices. I didn't have seating with my Year 5 students and I still don't with my Year 2s. They have to think about the best place for them to work for a particular task. My little Year 2s can now think about what they are doing and how they need to do it, whether they work on their own or in a group. They seek out experts to help them with tasks. Our philosophy is if someone asks a question then you show instead of just tell. These kids are able to pick the best app for the task. They know how to publish their work on Pages or on the blog depending on how they want to share it. I'm absolutely blown away by them! I didn't think this was possible with Year 2 students at the beginning of the year. Here are some spaces my children like to use for different tasks:

Our quiet working table. Favourite with the kids who don't want to be bothered for a particular task

Where the children like to get together to read books as a group

 

This has become the favourite quiet space for those who need to concentrate on something

Group space when children need some expert advice

The biggest lesson for me was to let my students make the bad choices as well as the good. How do we really learn? As toddlers we didn't learn when mum told us not to touch the hot jug but boy was that lesson painful when we chose not to listen. Same goes for the children in my class. If you chose to stop others from learning because of the choices that you made then there are consequences. You have to catch up on late work in your own time or you lose privileges.
Letting go of control doesn't have to be as scary as it seems to begin with. I think by making small steps at the beginning of the year we can educate our students to be responsible leaders of their own learning.
How do you get your students to take control?

Phonics course

A little while ago I went on a phonics course with some colleagues of mine. Being a Year 5 teacher for majority of my teaching career I didn't have a huge knowledge base of phonics and how they worked. At uni I was not taught about the importance of learning sounds and having a structured programme. Being Russian born and having a very phonetic language structure I found English difficult to learn. Russian letters have one sound, so if you see it, that's how you say it. English has too many sounds for the same letter. For every rule there is a list of exceptions. So I wish that I had been taught to read and write in English using a phonics system and I wish this was taught at uni so that I could pass that on to my students.
We took part in a course run by Yolanda Soryl. She is a primary school teacher who went through the same dilemma as most teachers in NZ. She understood that some children don't instinctively know the sound that letters make and need to be taught the rules and patterns that make up the English letters.
She took us through the importance of learning to distinguish sounds (drum, car, bird) as a toddler and how this knowledge can then translate to distinguishing between letter sounds. We then moved on to learning about the basic structure of teaching children the sounds of letters, progressing to beginning and end wounds of words. We finally ended with middle sounds and letter combinations to make spelling much easier as it became a system rather than a guessing game.
The teaching process for these was repetitive but effective. I found that the students in my class now use the techniques that we learned together (I was learning along with them as it was so new to me also). So overall I think this was a great experience for me and my future students.
Thank you Yolanda for a very stimulating lesson.

Are teachers really the best teachers?

I had the pleasure of observing this in my classroom the other day.

We have been working on rereading our work and checking for errors and then correcting some of those errors independently (refer to earlier post to read about our proofreading wall). The girl on the left had recently figured out how to use a dictionary to proofread and edit her work (with great success). She has now become one of our dictionary experts. When ever the children are stuck or don't remember how to use the dictionary then she is one of our go to people.
While I was working with a group I saw these girls engage in the above learning conversation. Thinking that this is gold I quickly grabbed my phone and started filming. I would have loved to have shown more but because I was trying to be sneaky one of children didn't see my phone on the ground and sat in front of it, thus ending this impromptu filming session. What you don't see, is the girls working together to find a number of words successfully. The little expert scaffolded her buddy, taking her through step by step and then slowly handing over control to let her achieve success independently.
There are times that we teachers just can not give one on one lessons to our students even though they need them. I think having class experts in a great way to give that one on one tuition to those who need it. This approach also helps the experts become proficient at the skill they are using.
In my view it's a win, win!

Giving kids the gift of independence

I know I've said this before, but being with Year 2s I'm always amazed by how quickly they pick up new skills.  The progress they make and the milestones they reach almost daily is so rewarding.  There are somethings that go outside the conventional curriculum that I thought would be worth teaching.  A little while ago I heard someone say that through teaching they don't prepare their students for the year level ahead, they prepare them for life.  I decided that this is a motto that I should live by.  I though about the skills that children (and adults) need no matter what path they choose... independence came to mind. Having the skills to independently solve problems when something goes wrong or just working through a process independently (just giving it a go) before asking for help.

Considering that I'm teaching Year 2s I couldn't just hand over the reigns completely but I could start giving them these skills in small steps. There are the usual put your book bag where it needs to go and put away your reading book, but that wasn't enough for me.  I decided to get them to start proofreading their writing. I don't mean just look at it and say yes I'm done. No I mean really proof read!

I sat down with my children and asked them about the things that I usually correct in their books.  We came up with the following list: spelling, fullstops, capital letters, adding missing words and asking questions to get the kids to add more writing. I then asked them, "which of these things could you try checking yourselves?" We came up with another list that then went on our wall. This is how the Proofreading Wall came to be.  The idea behind it is that the children can go somewhere quiet to read over their work and go through our checklist.  While they were there they could see other children who were working on the same step and swap books to read each other's work.  This is our wall in action:

At first (and on the odd occasion now) I had to remind my kids to read over their work.  In general though my students diligently check their work without me. They check their spelling words in dictionaries (another skill I had to teach them, and they picked it up really quickly), they add full stops and capital letters.  My expectation of them now is that they do not come to see me for a conference until they have gone to the Proofreading Wall and read their story with a buddy.  The results I'm seeing in their writing is pretty impressive.  They are not waiting for me to give them all the answers. Those who know how to use a dictionary teach the others. Those who understand full stops and capital letters coach their buddy.  They are being true collaborative learners.

This proved to me that we cannot underestimate our students. I went in with the mindset that if my senior had trouble doing this then how could my little people. Well guess what? I was wrong! They can do it, and they can do it well! If they can't, then it's because they haven't learnt how to do it yet.