yay!!!
Q: How does Good King Wencelas like his pizza?
A: Deep pan, crisp and even!
Here's more and more and more. All cringeworthy!
Don't forget to ask Santa to look after all those people who ended up on EIP or who were on fixed term contracts and are still looking for work.
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
Sunday, December 6, 2009
Developing rapport with difficult students
Some students spend large amounts of time out of class. Some are ratbags that deliberately seek to be excluded, generally are of low IQ and are very difficult to help. Others purely lack social skills.
Each year the maths team adopts a few of these and attempts to help them through to graduation.
I find the students lacking social skills easier to help - sometimes a little intervention is enough to get them performing in a normal classroom. One student that fit this criteria just graduated (yay!), I lost contact with my candidates from last year (as I only taught the top year 11 classes this year). Sadly they have gone off the rails a little.
This year, my approach for the students is different. One student is being encouraged to seek approval and success from teachers in more than just my class, to learn how to tolerate negative behaviour of others and has improved out of sight from the truanting ways earlier in the year. Another, I've spent a lot of time playing games with and getting to sit still and paint miniatures for me. If I can teach how to behave in a group, be a little more patient and share an affable nature in a social way, we would of gone a long way to finding a way to integrate into society.
After all, these are the real success stories that kids remember well into later life.
Each year the maths team adopts a few of these and attempts to help them through to graduation.
I find the students lacking social skills easier to help - sometimes a little intervention is enough to get them performing in a normal classroom. One student that fit this criteria just graduated (yay!), I lost contact with my candidates from last year (as I only taught the top year 11 classes this year). Sadly they have gone off the rails a little.
This year, my approach for the students is different. One student is being encouraged to seek approval and success from teachers in more than just my class, to learn how to tolerate negative behaviour of others and has improved out of sight from the truanting ways earlier in the year. Another, I've spent a lot of time playing games with and getting to sit still and paint miniatures for me. If I can teach how to behave in a group, be a little more patient and share an affable nature in a social way, we would of gone a long way to finding a way to integrate into society.
After all, these are the real success stories that kids remember well into later life.
Labels:
engaging students
Building group capabilities
Working in year 10, the opportunities for working in groups can be fairly limited - students rarely come ready for groups, so we need to train them how to work in them.
Step 1. Firmly establish the rules.
a) The teacher is the arbiter, no correspondence will be entered into.
b) Misbehaviour of one member of a team penalises all.
c) Performance of a group is measured by the whole group's performance
d) The teacher decides who is in the group - groups will change so get over it.
Step 2. Identify key tasks that need to be achieved. Explain what needs to be done clearly.
Step 3. Pounce on those deliberately stretching the rules, give warnings then penalise the group).
Step 4. Make achievement explicit (Eg. write down scores or give instant reward).
So... Here's what I did. There's a problem in the class with decimals and how operators fit within decimals. I garnered a mental maths book and put the students into teams of four.
In the first round students had to gain a group answer. The groups with the best students tended to do best, but I had made some effort to distribute these amongst the groups. They were given 5 minutes to find the answer to the questions written on the board. Answers were exchanged and marked by the students. The mean mark of all students was recorded.
In the second round students had to exchange desks and were not allowed to sit with students in their own group. A similar set of questions was given to the students to complete individually. They had thirty seconds to find a seat. Teams that did not find a seat quickly were docked a point. At the end of the round thirty seconds was given to give the answer sheets back to their designated marking group and get back into their own group tables.
By the third round students started to realise that they had to help each other to win. Although they were not allowed to use calculators, they could use any notes in their workbooks. Students started getting off task, so I started deducting points. Funnily enough these students were pounced on by their own team members.
It took 45 minutes to get through 4 rounds but the next time I anticipate it being a lot faster.
The next time we focused on a rules based setting. The idea was not only to win, but to do it within the rules set. In this instance we were doing "United We Solve" type activities (well worth getting for yrs 8-9) where each student gets a clue but cannot show it to anyone else - nor can the clue itself be written. If a team broke the rules, they were given 0 points, once the first team solved it, the other teams had two minutes to find the solution or gain no points.
The next time we focused on logic puzzles. I set a page of activities that were worth five points each but needed time to complete and set a puzzle every 5 minutes on the board worth one point. The students loved this and we really motored through a lot of puzzles. I loved asking the kids how they reached their answers.
Next class is the standard build the bridge to span two desks and withstand a 500g weight from the centre of the span (I usually do it with bamboo and skewers but this time I'll do it with straws and sticky tape and see how it goes).. I might also do the build a tower activity using the same resources.
Needless to say some extrinsic reward was necessary to get it started - but now I think they may just play for the fun of it.
Update 9/12: Had troubles today.. some of the students decided that they wanted to just sit and do nothing. So, we all did bookwork instead. Very sad students. We explored the fairness of failure to follow instructions and timewasting. Lesson learned I hope.
Update 13/12: After a few days, the 'cool' kids all of a sudden think that board games might be ok. Here's a link to local suppliers of board games not made by Parker bros.
Step 1. Firmly establish the rules.
a) The teacher is the arbiter, no correspondence will be entered into.
b) Misbehaviour of one member of a team penalises all.
c) Performance of a group is measured by the whole group's performance
d) The teacher decides who is in the group - groups will change so get over it.
Step 2. Identify key tasks that need to be achieved. Explain what needs to be done clearly.
Step 3. Pounce on those deliberately stretching the rules, give warnings then penalise the group).
Step 4. Make achievement explicit (Eg. write down scores or give instant reward).
So... Here's what I did. There's a problem in the class with decimals and how operators fit within decimals. I garnered a mental maths book and put the students into teams of four.
In the first round students had to gain a group answer. The groups with the best students tended to do best, but I had made some effort to distribute these amongst the groups. They were given 5 minutes to find the answer to the questions written on the board. Answers were exchanged and marked by the students. The mean mark of all students was recorded.
In the second round students had to exchange desks and were not allowed to sit with students in their own group. A similar set of questions was given to the students to complete individually. They had thirty seconds to find a seat. Teams that did not find a seat quickly were docked a point. At the end of the round thirty seconds was given to give the answer sheets back to their designated marking group and get back into their own group tables.
By the third round students started to realise that they had to help each other to win. Although they were not allowed to use calculators, they could use any notes in their workbooks. Students started getting off task, so I started deducting points. Funnily enough these students were pounced on by their own team members.
It took 45 minutes to get through 4 rounds but the next time I anticipate it being a lot faster.
The next time we focused on a rules based setting. The idea was not only to win, but to do it within the rules set. In this instance we were doing "United We Solve" type activities (well worth getting for yrs 8-9) where each student gets a clue but cannot show it to anyone else - nor can the clue itself be written. If a team broke the rules, they were given 0 points, once the first team solved it, the other teams had two minutes to find the solution or gain no points.
The next time we focused on logic puzzles. I set a page of activities that were worth five points each but needed time to complete and set a puzzle every 5 minutes on the board worth one point. The students loved this and we really motored through a lot of puzzles. I loved asking the kids how they reached their answers.
Next class is the standard build the bridge to span two desks and withstand a 500g weight from the centre of the span (I usually do it with bamboo and skewers but this time I'll do it with straws and sticky tape and see how it goes).. I might also do the build a tower activity using the same resources.
Needless to say some extrinsic reward was necessary to get it started - but now I think they may just play for the fun of it.
Update 9/12: Had troubles today.. some of the students decided that they wanted to just sit and do nothing. So, we all did bookwork instead. Very sad students. We explored the fairness of failure to follow instructions and timewasting. Lesson learned I hope.
Update 13/12: After a few days, the 'cool' kids all of a sudden think that board games might be ok. Here's a link to local suppliers of board games not made by Parker bros.
Labels:
group work
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
Developing a school vs developing teachers
When I entered teaching, my aim was to make a lasting difference in whatever school I was in. This meant contributing to the school, not just my own personal knowledge and skills. To do this I was always on the lookout for ways to create things that could exist long after I had left. Being a bit of an idealist this is still my aim, but at this time of year you always feel a little jaded.
My first efforts at lasting difference were failures as I started out by looking for people with similar aims. Sadly I didn't find any and fried myself trying on my own.
Then I found a few people that were willing to try. .. and we started a few things. We were successful and used these things we created to better our teaching. Better recording and analysis of data, better learning environments, better access to past tests and assignments, better teaching resources, better systems, better programming. We shared ideas freely, had open door policies and observed each others classes, team taught in term 4 when load reduced, developed practicum teachers. Things that made a school a better place to learn and teach.
...but sadly, the education system does not value these ideas. Long term ideas that might take years to bear fruit are subsumed by the immediate need for NAPLAN success, staffing ratios, student graduation figures and the like (and when success comes, credit is claimed by those with no evidence of involvement whatsoever!).
Why is personal knowledge king and information sharing rare? Why is systemic improvement or ongoing curriculum improvement not a priority? Why is the absence of issues an indicator of good practice? How can curriculum be lead by those that do not teach, are out of learning area, have not taught or do not like to teach? How is being good at something a great reason for promotion into something you have no experience in, especially where experienced people do exist to fulfil the role? Why are good young staff undervalued and are being replaced by teachers less qualified and/or unable/unwilling to maintain full load due to EIP? Why does capacity building take a backseat to growing and protecting fiefdoms? Why is there a growing gap between middle school performance and upper school academic requirements? Why is communication so poor between teachers?
Why are the answers to these questions seen as too complex to attempt finding solutions?
This is wrong.
By focusing on building strong vibrant supported teams, we can create learning environments that do wonderful things for our kids. We can build schools that we are proud of, that kids are proud of, and that the community is proud of.
This is right.
It is that black and white.
My first efforts at lasting difference were failures as I started out by looking for people with similar aims. Sadly I didn't find any and fried myself trying on my own.
Then I found a few people that were willing to try. .. and we started a few things. We were successful and used these things we created to better our teaching. Better recording and analysis of data, better learning environments, better access to past tests and assignments, better teaching resources, better systems, better programming. We shared ideas freely, had open door policies and observed each others classes, team taught in term 4 when load reduced, developed practicum teachers. Things that made a school a better place to learn and teach.
...but sadly, the education system does not value these ideas. Long term ideas that might take years to bear fruit are subsumed by the immediate need for NAPLAN success, staffing ratios, student graduation figures and the like (and when success comes, credit is claimed by those with no evidence of involvement whatsoever!).
Why is personal knowledge king and information sharing rare? Why is systemic improvement or ongoing curriculum improvement not a priority? Why is the absence of issues an indicator of good practice? How can curriculum be lead by those that do not teach, are out of learning area, have not taught or do not like to teach? How is being good at something a great reason for promotion into something you have no experience in, especially where experienced people do exist to fulfil the role? Why are good young staff undervalued and are being replaced by teachers less qualified and/or unable/unwilling to maintain full load due to EIP? Why does capacity building take a backseat to growing and protecting fiefdoms? Why is there a growing gap between middle school performance and upper school academic requirements? Why is communication so poor between teachers?
Why are the answers to these questions seen as too complex to attempt finding solutions?
This is wrong.
By focusing on building strong vibrant supported teams, we can create learning environments that do wonderful things for our kids. We can build schools that we are proud of, that kids are proud of, and that the community is proud of.
This is right.
It is that black and white.
Labels:
teaching
Monday, November 30, 2009
IOTY candidate Peter Hill
Hot on the heels of the last effort to cause prejudice against indigenous students by Julia Gillard, another well meaning idiot tries to load up the curriculum with ill advised nonsense.
http://www.smh.com.au/national/schools-to-teach-aboriginal-culture-20091126-juq7.html
Peter Hill suggests that we embed indigenous perspectives into all learning areas and force the indigenous agenda displacing topics with natural and seemless fits. When will these idealists realise that kids can spot an agenda a mile away? Ideas like this cause resentment against indigenous students in the classroom.
If we were talking about increasing indigenous content in History, Geography and English, I could imagine a number of synergistic fits.... but in Maths and science the fit typically is artificial and forced. Can you imagine exploring the chemical composition of the witchetty grub or exploring the physics of the boomerang? How about the mathematics of the dreamtime or health studies on indigenous foods?
Forced topics make poor topics.
In a time where we are trying to free the curriculum of modern agenda's and focus on basic performance, ideas like this should be left behind.
Peter Hill you have earned yourself an Idiot of the Year nomination.
http://www.smh.com.au/national/schools-to-teach-aboriginal-culture-20091126-juq7.html
Peter Hill suggests that we embed indigenous perspectives into all learning areas and force the indigenous agenda displacing topics with natural and seemless fits. When will these idealists realise that kids can spot an agenda a mile away? Ideas like this cause resentment against indigenous students in the classroom.
If we were talking about increasing indigenous content in History, Geography and English, I could imagine a number of synergistic fits.... but in Maths and science the fit typically is artificial and forced. Can you imagine exploring the chemical composition of the witchetty grub or exploring the physics of the boomerang? How about the mathematics of the dreamtime or health studies on indigenous foods?
Forced topics make poor topics.
In a time where we are trying to free the curriculum of modern agenda's and focus on basic performance, ideas like this should be left behind.
Peter Hill you have earned yourself an Idiot of the Year nomination.
Labels:
indigenous education,
IOTY,
national curriculum
Thursday, November 26, 2009
NCOS and consolidation of knowledge.
One criticism of senior school and mathematics in general is the lack of consolidation of topics - especially when the course is prescribed as is the case with NCOS. Funnily enough, the NCOS has brought about an opportunity for consolidation that did not exist under the old courses.
The new courses allow for repeating of yr 11 subjects - which makes sense under an outcomes approach where learning speed is not being measured, just knowledge and skills gained (this is an issue in itself that needs investigating if TEE scores are to remain a predictor of university success).
Students that cannot withstand the pace of the course in year 11 have in year 12 the option of consolidating (by repeating the course), remediating (by completing a lower course) or advancing to the next course. This approach allows teachers to make more aggressive subject selection recommendations in year 11 that promotes striving for excellence without fear of being locked into advancing and failing the yr 12 course. The recent trend of conservative subject selection could be broken!
For example, a student doing yr 11 3A MAT has the option in year 12 of doing 2C (remediating) 3A (repeating) or 3C (advancing).
I doubt this was the original intent (in other subjects teachers must teach another context - but only one context really exists in maths/science courses).
I fail to see the issue in repeating or remediating although I know some humanities teachers think it unfair - students that repeat will have the option to gain a deeper understanding at some level and a further opportunity to apply their skills - having a second bite at the cherry.
It will be interesting to see if the old adage that 'repeaters don't succeed' will bear true next year. For the lazy student - repeating/remediating will not work, but for those that have good work ethic but need more time logic says they should succeed (more time better results!).
My prediction is that (when counselled and supported correctly) repeaters and remediators will do far better than advancers and scaling will be applied to these students (compared to advancing students) in future years. It will be interesting to see if the scaling factor of 10% between 3AB and 3CD will be enough to compensate (I can't see how having two years to master a course can't cause better than a 10% increase in low/mid performing students between the two groups). The scaling may already be heavier for repeaters - but I'm not aware of it.
The new courses allow for repeating of yr 11 subjects - which makes sense under an outcomes approach where learning speed is not being measured, just knowledge and skills gained (this is an issue in itself that needs investigating if TEE scores are to remain a predictor of university success).
Students that cannot withstand the pace of the course in year 11 have in year 12 the option of consolidating (by repeating the course), remediating (by completing a lower course) or advancing to the next course. This approach allows teachers to make more aggressive subject selection recommendations in year 11 that promotes striving for excellence without fear of being locked into advancing and failing the yr 12 course. The recent trend of conservative subject selection could be broken!
For example, a student doing yr 11 3A MAT has the option in year 12 of doing 2C (remediating) 3A (repeating) or 3C (advancing).
I doubt this was the original intent (in other subjects teachers must teach another context - but only one context really exists in maths/science courses).
I fail to see the issue in repeating or remediating although I know some humanities teachers think it unfair - students that repeat will have the option to gain a deeper understanding at some level and a further opportunity to apply their skills - having a second bite at the cherry.
It will be interesting to see if the old adage that 'repeaters don't succeed' will bear true next year. For the lazy student - repeating/remediating will not work, but for those that have good work ethic but need more time logic says they should succeed (more time better results!).
My prediction is that (when counselled and supported correctly) repeaters and remediators will do far better than advancers and scaling will be applied to these students (compared to advancing students) in future years. It will be interesting to see if the scaling factor of 10% between 3AB and 3CD will be enough to compensate (I can't see how having two years to master a course can't cause better than a 10% increase in low/mid performing students between the two groups). The scaling may already be heavier for repeaters - but I'm not aware of it.
Labels:
mathematics,
nCOS
Monday, November 23, 2009
Don't forget to vote in the new poll!
There's a poll on the right hand side asking how we found the new courses - are they better than the ones they replaced?
For parents who are interested:
The harder parts of Intro Calc / G&T / Applic / Calculus (for strong science/maths/engineering bound uni students) was replaced by 3ABCD MAS (with some changes)
The easier parts of Intro Calc / G&T / Applic / Calculus (for capable science/maths/engineering bound uni students) was replaced by 3ABCD MAT (with some changes)
Foundations / Discrete (for capable Uni bound students) is now 2CD 3AB MAT
Foundations / Discrete (for weak Uni bound students) is now 2ABCD MAT
MIPS /Modelling (for students needing some maths - TAFE/Uni bound) is now 1DE2AB MAT
MIPS /Modelling (for remedial maths students - work or TAFE bound) is now 1BCDE MAT
No real maths course under old system (for Ed support or struggling maths students) is now PA PB 1A MAT
Now don't forget to vote on the left!
For parents who are interested:
The harder parts of Intro Calc / G&T / Applic / Calculus (for strong science/maths/engineering bound uni students) was replaced by 3ABCD MAS (with some changes)
The easier parts of Intro Calc / G&T / Applic / Calculus (for capable science/maths/engineering bound uni students) was replaced by 3ABCD MAT (with some changes)
Foundations / Discrete (for capable Uni bound students) is now 2CD 3AB MAT
Foundations / Discrete (for weak Uni bound students) is now 2ABCD MAT
MIPS /Modelling (for students needing some maths - TAFE/Uni bound) is now 1DE2AB MAT
MIPS /Modelling (for remedial maths students - work or TAFE bound) is now 1BCDE MAT
No real maths course under old system (for Ed support or struggling maths students) is now PA PB 1A MAT
Now don't forget to vote on the left!
Labels:
mathematics,
nCOS
Sunday, November 22, 2009
3B MAT/MAS course review
The 3B MAT course finished spot on 13 weeks (I used the remaining 6 weeks for revision and consolidation), which bodes well for the year 12 students moving into the course next year. The second semester is longer to cater for combined year 11/12 classes.
The 3B MAS course ran right down to the line finishing in 17 weeks and the vectors course was barely completed. It is quite full with Trig Identities and Vectors taking up large wads of time to do properly.
Some of my yr 11 3B MAS students are repeating 3B MAS in year 12 (with me again) and I need to lift the pace a little to make sure there is a little more revision time.
3B MAT exam
We used an external exam and the students were able to easily complete the project networks, correlation, linear programming, moving averages, optimisation and simple differentiation questions. Next year when teaching 3B MAT we will need to focus on interpreting graphs and their derivatives, conjectures and applications of differentiation. I'm happy with the two results over 80% (out of 10 students), but kicking myself that I missed one of the students that fell under 30%. I should have picked this one up sooner.
In particular I would find an alternate text to teach problem solving/conjectures with as the Saddler text is a little short on this topic.
In general I am pleased with their results (pat on the back guys) as I gave little in the way of exam tips (I didn't do the exam beforehand for fear of giving too much away!) and there was a 6-8% average increase across the class.
3B MAS exam
Urgh! The lack of revision showed, compared to the MAT paper. The exam also showed that working consistently through the year can work, with marks between the most gifted student and the conscientious student closing to just 3 marks in the calculator section. More work in vectors is required for the three students repeating next year to improve their C&D's to higher marks. They showed great improvement in the calculus sections of the test. With a bit more experience, they should be better able to identify what methods to apply to what questions. My results are skewed to the left with more C & D's than A & B's, but with 5 students, it would be a surprise to get a true bell curve (I would have liked it skewed more the other way!).
The MAS paper was a bit narrow compared to the MAT paper.. I would have liked to see more opportunity to show what they knew - rather than the imbalance of an overly large number of marks for questions that only an A or B student would be able to complete. Some questions were very misleading in their no. of marks compared to the actual work/knowledge required to complete them. Yet this is the price to pay for using external exams to judge how well the course is being delivered.
On to reports now!
The 3B MAS course ran right down to the line finishing in 17 weeks and the vectors course was barely completed. It is quite full with Trig Identities and Vectors taking up large wads of time to do properly.
Some of my yr 11 3B MAS students are repeating 3B MAS in year 12 (with me again) and I need to lift the pace a little to make sure there is a little more revision time.
3B MAT exam
We used an external exam and the students were able to easily complete the project networks, correlation, linear programming, moving averages, optimisation and simple differentiation questions. Next year when teaching 3B MAT we will need to focus on interpreting graphs and their derivatives, conjectures and applications of differentiation. I'm happy with the two results over 80% (out of 10 students), but kicking myself that I missed one of the students that fell under 30%. I should have picked this one up sooner.
In particular I would find an alternate text to teach problem solving/conjectures with as the Saddler text is a little short on this topic.
In general I am pleased with their results (pat on the back guys) as I gave little in the way of exam tips (I didn't do the exam beforehand for fear of giving too much away!) and there was a 6-8% average increase across the class.
3B MAS exam
Urgh! The lack of revision showed, compared to the MAT paper. The exam also showed that working consistently through the year can work, with marks between the most gifted student and the conscientious student closing to just 3 marks in the calculator section. More work in vectors is required for the three students repeating next year to improve their C&D's to higher marks. They showed great improvement in the calculus sections of the test. With a bit more experience, they should be better able to identify what methods to apply to what questions. My results are skewed to the left with more C & D's than A & B's, but with 5 students, it would be a surprise to get a true bell curve (I would have liked it skewed more the other way!).
The MAS paper was a bit narrow compared to the MAT paper.. I would have liked to see more opportunity to show what they knew - rather than the imbalance of an overly large number of marks for questions that only an A or B student would be able to complete. Some questions were very misleading in their no. of marks compared to the actual work/knowledge required to complete them. Yet this is the price to pay for using external exams to judge how well the course is being delivered.
On to reports now!
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