The level 4 covid-19 lockdown has proven to be a success for Oruaiti school in a time of relative instability. We have managed a high level of communication to whanau and students both in terms of learning, feedback and resolving questions and queries. We have been prompt and precise with our communication and it has been a credit to our teachers' dedication to the well being of their students and their whanau.
That being said, we can all make improvements. Over the past week few weeks I have asked for and received some really constructive feedback. Whanau Kauri feedback form
Some of the biggest challenges have been getting whanau up to scratch with what we are doing. After all, kauri class have been doing this for most of term one on their own devices in school. I also noticed that, just like in Whanau Kauri after school groups, parents bring a certain amount of fixed mindset. For example, spelling online lessons that focus on sounds are difficult for parents to grasp. Therefore, I began each day in google running through a mini lesson and success criteria, aiming the instruction at parents more than students. It worked! I then did the same with writing and saw a big jump in quality and output.
One thing that I am trying to change is the level of parent competition in our shared writing docs. I noticed that the spelling and punctuation started to improve and that meant that parents were doing more of the work than the students. I parked it for a bit as I considered the benefits of their support massively outweighed the negatives.
The other thing that I have become aware of is that some parents find it difficult to just stick to the success criteria when giving feedback to their children. For example, in a writing lesson focussing on first person pronouns a handful of students had their spelling underlined. These are things that we have been addressing in Whanau Kauri and I have to let go and not sweat it I guess right now!
It has been really cool sharing each day in google meets with everyone. I think that the support from whanau has been exceptional and has made a world of difference. One example is Clive Walden asked if I could add text boxes to the slides where a response was required. It meant that students saved lots of time and focussed on the task rather than the format. It was a really easy fix that took me no more than 5 minutes each day.
These are the things that I will miss when we get back to normal. In this reflection I have weighed the pros and cons of distance learning as I have seen it so far; the loss of teachable moments against the advantages of timely parent feedback. Its a no brainer, this is a formula for success across the board. Korbin is a great example of how distance provides opportunities to shine.
I agree that the input from whanau has been amazing throughout this process. Your idea of getting feedback from them early on in lockdown helped you and the rest of staff when planning subsequent lessons. Your reflections on individual learners have been great. It is amazing the things we learn about children when they arein a different environment. I wonder how much this will change the way we relate to them when we are back in the classroom.
ReplyDeleteI have been thinking about this quite a bit. I hope that we can keep this high level of agentic dialogue with students and whanau moving forward. I hope that our teacher/student relationships have been enhanced sufficiently that behaviour management doesnt creep in and change what we have currently.
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