Collaboration

One of the biggest factors that contribute to the success of any business is whether or not its employees are able to perform together a team. 

What is Collaboration?

Collaboration is said to take place when two individuals or a group of people work together towards achieving a common goal by sharing their ideas and skills. Now thinking about that definition. Do you and your team(s) collaborate?
Benefits of collaboration

Collaborative Teaming gives opportunity for better instruction 
When class ends, the two of us quickly and briefly reflect about how the day went, particularly focussing on whether, or which, students understood the material ( particularly our Target students) . This brief reflection enables us to make decisions about the next lesson  and which teacher will do what during the next lesson.  Our teaming involves a continuous cycle of decision making, reflection, and feedback—bouncing ideas off each other in order to come to the best possible solution.

Come up with ideas we may not have had individually
Two minds are better than one. That saying exists for a reason. Brainstorming works better the more minds you have contributing on any project. By working together, it allows for us to plan more effectively and see things from a perspective that otherwise wouldn't have occurred to the other person and more importantly, I've found that working collaboratively has helped to inspire me to think outside of the box and explore the possibilities

"Unsuccessful attempts within the journey to a goal is actually essential to progression"

Are we always successful?... Nope. We realise that making sure all students are adequately supported yet appropriately challenged is an area in which we still need and continue to work on. There are success stories, however, we’re reaching students who not only seek help and guidance but also participate and show a true interest in the class. We both truly believe that our students are successful because of the co-taught/collaborative environment.

Another benefit to collaboration is being able to high five those on your team when success takes place!

#ittakesavillage

What does your school do to facilitate teacher collaboration? What, in your experience, is the biggest barrier/benefits to teachers working together and sharing ideas? Add your thoughts/comments  below!

Writing Moderation

We had a staff meeting around writing moderation today. We were looking at one piece of writing and deciding how to grade each area before giving our feedback in order to see how similar/different our marks were.
  It is good to hear the opinion of others who think different from you as it challenges your own thinking.

Do others offer a perspective that you didn't think of before which could possibly lead you to change your answer?

OR

 Do you have enough evidence to support your stance which others find difficult to challenge?

One of the challenges I notice sometimes is understanding what it means when the e-asTTle rubric says: 'May attempt to use words with two syllables' or 'paragraphs may have minimal development e.g. one sentence'.

Words such as 'may' 'some' 'a few'  'minimal' etc. also leave room for interpretation which is where some of our dialogue came from.  Does a few mean at least 3 times? Does 'may' mean that it doesn't necessarily need to be in the text?  When you are looking for precise detail,  how many precise details are sufficient to feel confident enough to move that student to an R5 rather than a R4?  If you know your student, do you use your OTJ's  to influence the mark you give them? or do you only go on what they presented in that particular piece of writing?


Why is writing moderation important?

• Brings together collective wisdom, resulting in greater consistency of judgment, and focused teaching.

• Provides greater confidence in teacher judgments, and assurance that judgments are consistent with those of other professionals.

• Leads to shared expectations of learning, and understandings of standards and progression of learning.

• Develops deeper understandings about content and progressions of learning.

• Improves quality of assessment.

• Aligns expectations and judgments with standards or progressions, and hence improved teaching and learning.

• Assures parents and others that interpretations of students' achievements are in line with those of other professionals

One of the areas that I sometimes find challenging is staying focused and not letting other perceived errors influence my thinking. For example, if you are marking a student on sentence structure, it can be challenging to not let the lack (or incorrect use) of punctuation affect your ability to grade only  their sentence structure.

It is important to understand what each area means i.e. what are you specifically looking for within the text and within each area what criteria qualifies an R1- R6? 

The dialogue that took place during our staff meeting helped me to think critically and learn when to try stay firm in my position and when to take on others perspectives that my differ from my own which can lead me to change my original decision. This wasn't a time to take things personally if others thought differently than me. This exercise helped me to look at the evidence and use that to guide my decision. This is helping me to reflect as a learner, and it is shaping my future professional needs as a teacher.

I am still learning...

Te Whare Tapa Whā

So True isn't it?!? 

Are we making sure we fill up regularly? 

Are we filling up twice as often to make up for the times we pour out? (or spill) 😜

OR...

 is it the other way around?

My cup runneth over. What comes out of the cup is for everyone else but what is in the cup is mine. It is important to keep my cup full ( or as close to full as possible).

I find my self burning the candle at both ends and still I find myself falling short. The real problem... as if falling short wasn't enough, is that I feel incredibly guilty for taking a break. Things that I LOVE to do, I don't do as much anymore but it is all in the name of being better at my job so it is all worth it ...right??? 

I was reading an article that spoke about opportunity cost. It is an idea often illustrated with the quote:  

“There’s no such thing as a free lunch.”

Opportunity cost means that everything we do, no matter what it is, costs something, even if it occurs indirectly. When someone takes you out for a free, hour-long lunch. Despite gaining the value of the lunch during that hour, you are still giving up all of the other activities you could be doing instead. So for me,  I give up that time at the gym, that time watching tv programs that give me joy, that time that I used to spend catching up with friends, spending quality time with my family, those extra hours of needed sleep - because let's face it, we are ALL a little less cranky and a LOT more alert and happy when we have had an adequate amount of rest.

Society regularly praises those who do exceptional things but often the nature of those exceptional things comes at high opportunity costs. Anything that is considered to be truly great requires some sort of sacrifice that may or may not be obvious to us at the time.

There are so many things I would like to do however,  it is becoming more and more difficult to commit all of my time and energy to any one thing without feeling some form of remorse or regret. I can't even tweet without thinking: ' Oh no, what if someone sees that I'm tweeting instead of working tirelessly to show how committed I am to my job?!?... That time I just spent trying to edit my tweet to 140 characters could have been spent on me organising my folders, making a more effective lesson plan, or becoming the 'Penelope Garcia' of the teaching digital world!'

......aaaaaand insert guilt here

Learning to have 'me time' and not feel guilty is what I need. Yep...that's right...need. My students have been learning about te whare tapa whā - the four cornerstones (or sides) of Māori health.

With its strong foundations and four equal sides, the symbol of the wharenui illustrates the four dimensions of Māori well-being.

Should one of the four dimensions be missing or in some way damaged, a person, or a collective may become ‘unbalanced’ and subsequently unwell.

Taha tinana (physical health)

The capacity for physical growth and development.

Good physical health is required for optimal development.

Our physical ‘being’ supports our essence and shelters us from the external environment. For Māori the physical dimension is just one aspect of health and well-being and cannot be separated from the aspect of mind, spirit and family.

Taha wairua (spiritual health)

The capacity for faith and wider communication.

Health is related to unseen and unspoken energies.

The spiritual essence of a person is their life force. This determines us as individuals and as a collective, who and what we are, where we have come from and where we are going.

A traditional Māori analysis of physical manifestations of illness will focus on the wairua or spirit, to determine whether damage here could be a contributing factor.

Taha whānau (family health)

The capacity to belong, to care and to share where individuals are part of wider social systems.

Whānau provides us with the strength to be who we are. This is the link to our ancestors, our ties with the past, the present and the future.

Understanding the importance of whānau and how whānau (family) can contribute to illness and assist in curing illness is fundamental to understanding Māori health issues.

Taha hinengaro (mental health)

The capacity to communicate, to think and to feel mind and body are inseparable.

Thoughts, feelings and emotions are integral components of the body and soul.

This is about how we see ourselves in this universe, our interaction with that which is uniquely Māori and the perception that others have of us.

I cannot give what I do not have. I need to learn to make time for my overall health without feeling guilty. 

This week I started to take some time for myself. Yes, I am getting up at 5am in order to do it but it is something I am doing to help me be better in other areas that are important to me. 

At the moment,  this sums up how my brain feels. If you ever saw my laptop you would see that it is not just my brain with heaps of tabs open. 

Learning to give back to ourselves as much as we give out to other people or  other things is all a part of the process.

I am still learning...