V = Vowel Teams
y** (two sounds)
/i/ - my
/e/ - bunny
Sentence level - Why did the bossy lady have candy in her rusty tin?
Tēnā koutou e te whānau. Ko Rovena Jackson ahau. He kaiako ahau ki Te Māhuri Mānuka, Hornby Primary School ki Ōtautahi, Aotearoa. Ko te piko o te Māhuri, tērā te tipu o te rakau! Some background - A polynesian teacher, working in an akomanga reorua (a bilingual environment), contributing to a digitally savvy school, within an ultimately pakeha education system. Aue! This is my space to mull over education from a possibly not so common perspective.
Recap - sequence of session
V=Vowel teams
Two or more sounds joined together to make a vowel.REVLOC
These are the 6 different syllable types children will learn.
84% of words fit a spelling pattern. Use Etymonline for explanation.
C = Closed syllables
Are the most common.
Closed - is there a consonant to the right of the vowel? YeS? It’s trapped/closed in, so can only make the short sound
O = Open syllables
Open - is there a letter to the right? No? It's free to shout it's own name!
FLOSS (This is a closed rule pattern)
Is it 1 syllable
Is it a short vowel
Does it end in f, l, s, or z
If there's 3 ticks then you double to last sound!
Eg hill
Ministry of Education -L1 and L2 provisions - Te kaupapa mō te wānanga nei.
There are 6 taumata for Māori Immmersion.
Funding no long involves verification visits to check taumata. This was not the right approach. Things changed in 2022 to a roll return. We now report on percentage of te reo being taught in the school.
There can be a conglomerate of levels within one setting. The pūtea comes into the general pool of funds. Tūmuaki and and BOT can ultimately make the decisions on how that pūtea gets distributed!!! Argh!! Very high trust model. Kaiako in akomanga reorua should be apart of the roll return (saying where children sit with their reo).
In 2-3 years time, ERO/Ministry will come up with another plan to work with schools to support them with roll returns/level/ percentage of reo being spoken. Check with Educational Advisor or MIS - Manager of Integrated Services- they will tautoko.
Old Ministry Message - Level 1 and 2 - needed to use Te Marautanga, Level 3-4a, 4b used NZC. Level 1 and 2 tamariki bring in more pūtea.
What does each level generate in funding? Check!
2023 is the first year of our Structured Literacy journey. It comes after many, many years of not quite feeling like we had a good grasp on what quality teaching of reading really looked like. We dabbled and we played. A little bit of this with a little bit of that. The 'and + and' approach whereby we wanted to do everything. 'Let's not throw the baby away with the bath water' kinda thinking. We believed that quality reading was a whole language approach, sprinkled with a little of that ever-controversial phonics teaching.
Today's symposium addressed why this approach is far from ideal. It was an absolutely invaluable session to attend. The day comprised of 3 wonderfully articulate wāhine who led us through some thought provoking stuff as follows.
My takings from these wāhine...
Keynotes speaker 1 - Emily Hanford
Keynote speaker 2 - Pamela Snow
Keynote speaker 3 - Dr Lorraine Hammond
Some interesting conversations around rewards and incentives at this session. There was a lot to think about coming off Marg's Restorative Practice PLD last week, and the difference in philosophies with PB4L, behaviour conditioning, and Ross Greene 'Lost At School'.
Thoughts from Restorative Practice and clash with PB4L (and IYT) Philosophy -'Hard Wax' children - challenging kids. Praise and attention might not be enough.
Take aways from the day -
Restorative Practice is a waka we're currently boarding at Te Māhuri Mānuka. As with any school, some staff are already seated and ready to go, others are tentatively finding their spot, and some are possibly hanging at the back of the line deciding if this is a journey they want to embark on.
Two day PLD sessions can be long and tiresome, often only made bearable with a good lunchtime spread and strong coffee. While the coffee on offer was devastatingly instant, the knowledge, skills, and absolute conviction with which this content was offered was the best I've seen in a long time.
Marg Thorsborne is the Restorative Practice guru, and an incredibly powerful facilitator. If ever you are offered the opportunity to listen to this wahine toa, take it. I was absolutely hooked from the moment Marg stood and acknowledged mana whenua, throughout all the quirky anecdotes from the coal face of her experiences, to the final moments when she sent us away to go forth and restore the ruptures.
CONNECT BEFORE CONTENT!
Basic Sequence
Use the scripts - don't be afraid to have them with you if you are facilitating. You can say, "there are a lot of important questions I need to ask so we can make sure we have all the information needed to restore this relationship. I don't want to miss anything out..."
Pre-conference InterviewI have been wanting to do this course for a number of years but the opportunity never really presented itself until this year. After teaching for 20 years some people were curious as to why I wanted to participate at this stage of my career.
My reasons - Why not!? I've heard great things about it for over 15 years. My brain can take a punitive stance at times and this is something I've worked hard to change. Being the parent of an almost 7 year old has also given me much to reflect on when it comes to managing a child's behaviour. I'm doing the course alongside a beginning teacher I am currently mentoring - I thought this was a great opportunity to work more closely with him and other professionals at different stages in their careers, and share our thoughts on effective classroom practice. We also have some challenging behaviours in our kura at the moment so I was keen to take on anything that might challenge my own beliefs about behaviour management help me to better support my team. With our change in tumuaki, we have recently introduced restorative practice - this seems to align nicely with what I knew about IYT.
Our first session covered Building Positive Relationships and Proactive Teaching - the bottom 2 tiers of the pyramid below. There were definitely some great reminders for myself here.
Some key takings from these 2 tiers -
During the Proactive Teaching portion of the day we looked at Behaviour Management plans. These covered what we know about the learner, how they might see themselves, their whānau support, their current needs, extra support they might need and steps/strategies that we know can help calm and de-escalate. They are for tamariki who are not in the top tier by any means, but who fall slightly below - they still need lots of support but don't attract funding/ta support. I thought these would be a great support system to implement for our tier 2 kids. How helpful would this be for a reliever to pick up, someone like myself or SENCO to be able to read to make ourselves familiar with these cherubs. I am keen to sit down with my team and look at creating these for tamariki who need in school support. I think sitting down and completing them as team brings another layer of support and understanding - everyone can be onboard in supporting the child. Watch this space.
Being new to leadership, I felt this was a really fantastic opportunity for me to be apart of. It is administered by Clifton Strengths Coaching and I would recommend it for people looking to investigate not only their style of leadership, but also anyone wanting to delve into their own personality traits, how they can be harnessed, and work successfully alongside the strengths of colleagues in their workplace.
The process was made up of 3 parts - an online assessment, individual coaching, and finally team coaching.
Online assessment - This was a series of questions that seeks to find 5 of your most dominant themes (there are 34 in total). The assessment took about 30 minutes. By the time I got to the end I was sure I had made a complete mess of it. I felt like I had over thought, under thought, guessed, lied... but upon consideration (and acceptance) many days later, I do believe they my results are spot on.
My top 5 strengths are...
Restorative You love to solve problems. Whereas some are dismayed when they encounter yet another breakdown, you can be energized by it. You enjoy the challenge of analyzing the symptoms, identifying what is wrong, and finding the solution. You may prefer practical problems or conceptual ones or personal ones. You may seek out specific kinds of problems that you have met many times before and that you are confident you can fix. Or you may feel the greatest push when faced with complex and unfamiliar problems. Your exact preferences are determined by your other themes and experiences. But what is certain is that you enjoy bringing things back to life. It is a wonderful feeling to identify the undermining factor(s), eradicate them, and restore something to its true glory. Intuitively, you know that without your intervention, this thing—this machine, this technique, this person, this company—might have ceased to function. You fixed it, resuscitated it, rekindled its vitality. Phrasing it the way you might, you saved it. Discipline Your world needs to be predictable. It needs to be ordered and planned. So you instinctively impose structure on your world. You set up routines. You focus on timelines and deadlines. You break long-term projects into a series of specific short-term plans, and you work through each plan diligently. You are not necessarily neat and clean, but you do need precision. Faced with the inherent messiness of life, you want to feel in control. The routines, the timelines, the structure, all of these help create this feeling of control. Lacking this theme of Discipline, others may sometimes resent your need for order, but there need not be conflict. You must understand that not everyone feels your urge for predictability; they have other ways of getting things done. Likewise, you can help them understand and even appreciate your need for structure. Your dislike of surprises, your impatience with errors, your routines, and your detail orientation don’t need to be misinterpreted as controlling behaviors that box people in. Rather, these behaviors can be understood as your instinctive method for maintaining your progress and your productivity in the face of life’s many distractions. Harmony You look for areas of agreement. In your view there is little to be gained from conflict and friction, so you seek to hold them to a minimum. When you know that the people around you hold differing views, you try to find the common ground. You try to steer them away from confrontation and toward harmony. In fact, harmony is one of your guiding values. You can’t quite believe how much time is wasted by people trying to impose their views on others. Wouldn’t we all be more productive if we kept our opinions in check and instead looked for consensus and support? You believe we would, and you live by that belief. When others are sounding off about their goals, their claims, and their fervently held opinions, you hold your peace. When others strike out in a direction, you will willingly, in the service of harmony, modify your own objectives to merge with theirs (as long as their basic values do not clash with yours). When others start to argue about their pet theory or concept, you steer clear of the debate, preferring to talk about practical, down-to-earth matters on which you can all agree. In your view we are all in the same boat, and we need this boat to get where we are going. It is a good boat. There is no need to rock it just to show that you can. Consistency Balance is important to you. You are keenly aware of the need to treat people the same, no matter what their station in life, so you do not want to see the scales tipped too far in any one person’s favor. In your view this leads to selfishness and individualism. It leads to a world where some people gain an unfair advantage because of their connections or their background or their greasing of the wheels. This is truly offensive to you. You see yourself as a guardian against it. In direct contrast to this world of special favors, you believe that people function best in a consistent environment where the rules are clear and are applied to everyone equally. This is an environment where people know what is expected. It is predictable and evenhanded. It is fair. Here each person has an even chance to show his or her worth. Empathy You can sense the emotions of those around you. You can feel what they are feeling as though their feelings are your own. Intuitively, you are able to see the world through their eyes and share their perspective. You do not necessarily agree with each person’s perspective. You do not necessarily feel pity for each person’s predicament—this would be sympathy, not Empathy. You do not necessarily condone the choices each person makes, but you do understand. This instinctive ability to understand is powerful. You hear the unvoiced questions. You anticipate the need. Where others grapple for words, you seem to find the right words and the right tone. You help people find the right phrases to express their feelings—to themselves as well as to others. You help them give voice to their emotional life. For all these reasons other people are drawn to you. |
Individual Coaching - This was a 90 minute session with a brilliant coach, Emma. It took me a few days to stew on my results and hearing an expert put them all in perspective was really helpful. My gut response when I saw my top 5 was - they're not leadership skills, you fraud! Emma was able to challenge these silly thoughts and blow them away. We talked about how they all fit together, how sometimes we need to turn them outwards not inwards, and how they can balance each other. I really wish I had recorded this session.
Team Coaching - The final part was a 3 hour team session with Emma where we sat down together, shared and compared our strengths, and how they guide our actions and decisions... we laid our souls bare so to speak. This was a great opportunity to see ourselves and the rest of the SLT through a slightly different lens. I was able to think, ok that's what drives that person, that's how a particular strength is playing out when they do that. They're not just being a ... (insert inferential judgement here).
My thoughts going forward
~ Equity guides the waka of education ~