Communities of Practice ( COP)

I suppose we are all in some type of community of practice and until I started with the Mind Lab I had little understanding of them even thou I have spent all my life in one.

How would I go about setting up a community of Practice in my school?

Here is our idea to implement an innovative classroom that would change the way classrooms are set up and the way teachers teach.

Over the past six to seven years, I have worked closely with the teacher next door. Our teaching styles are different but our pedagogies are very similar so the change wouldn't be that hard. 

We both wanted the same end result, a classroom that was exciting for students to learn in and manageable workloads for teachers. Over the next four years, we discussed the commonalities we had in our teaching. Timetables and classroom management styles etc.... Finally, we came up with a plan that if we merged the classes from two groups into one and co taught the class. The student would get the best from each of us and our workloads would be reduced (somewhat reduced). We trialled the idea for six months and we have looked back in three year.

So looking back at the community of practice and E. Wenger say these are the things you need to make a community of practice

Domain - joint enterprise

Community – mutual engagement

Practice – share repertoire  

We also use a variety of these learning models – Behaviourist , Constructivist ,  Social learning,  as they are hard to get rid of but we do incorporate the ideas of Vygotsky, Bandura and Maslow as part of our classroom management.

So my next step is to introduce the community of practice to our target group by setting up our classroom to promote our ideas of making innovative learning environment student orientated and user friendly for all ( teacher included),  to show our colleagues workloads can be reduced when you co-teach.

The skills we needed in our, two teacher,  community of practice were learning to Improvise, Strategize and be Problem solvers within our small COP.

And this what we’ll show others - help when possible/needed and to be inventive by having lots of ideas that can help our colleagues succeed this

References

Knox, B.(2009, December 4). Cultivating Communities of Practice: Making Them Grow.[video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhMPRZnRFkk

Sweeney, R. (2015). Building collaborative Teaching as Inquiry teams using spiral of Inquiry. Retrieved from http://blog.core-ed.org/blog/2015/06/building-collaborative-teaching-as-inquiry-teams-using-spirals-of-inquiry.html

Wenger, E.(2000). Communities of practice and social learning systems. Organization,7(2), 225-246.

Wenger, E., McDermott, R., & Snyder, W. (2002). Cultivating Communities of Practice: A Guide to Managing Knowledge. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Business School Press.

Overview of Social Learning Theory   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i28IW_Odp_g

Social learning a framework https://youtu.be/qvighN3BDmI

A Change in My Practice Towards Future-oriented Learning and Teaching.

What changed in my teaching practice?  When I started teaching, I had already had an engineering career, a sales career –now a teaching career. Teaching was an option that I liked the look of. The more I look at it, the more I see it is an ever-changing profession that requires a lot of work and time. Building positive relationship is the key; this is with student, whanau and colleagues and having regular input from other liked mind colleagues.

Theme 1: Personalising learning

Therefore, did I make a change – I don’t think my approach to students and Whanau has changed but I’m always looking for ways to improve on creating a positive atmosphere and friendly inviting classroom. I have found this way parents and students feel welcomed and relaxed.

A philosophy of mine for personalising the learning is happy student - happy learner. When the student is engaged and happy in what they are achieving, they succeed. We meet the student where best they learning with our limited resources.

To personalise the learning for students, they are planned for and the learning activity and individualised to suit their needs and learning requirement.

Have the resources and opportunity, to work with others in the Mind Lab, has given me time to apply what I have learnt directly into the classroom and use this information/ resources or new thinking to help the students.

Theme 2: New views of equity, diversity and inclusivity.

As New Zealanders, we believe and promote, backing for the underdog and as citizen this is where the Treaty of Waitangi comes into play. We have the opportunity to stand up for; equity, diversity and inclusivity.

Theme 4: "Changing the script": Rethinking learners' and teachers' roles – I like to start at the front of the class in term 1 and slow work my way to the back of the class. I reverse the rolls so that by the end of term 3 the student are learning groups, making sensible decision, and self-guided learners. I help when they require it.  My goal is that by the end of the year these children are solving problems and gathering information to help them make the right choice or decision for their learning. It great to think the Mind lab assist teaches to think like this.

Building a culture of continuous learning for teachers and school leaders – what opportunities to participate in and build professional learning are afforded by technologies?

Bolstad, R & Gilbert J, et al. (2012)

References

Ministry of Education.(2012). Supporting future-oriented learning and teaching: A New Zealand perspective. Retrieved from https://www.educationcounts.govt.nz/publications/schooling/109306

Gilbert, J., McDowall, S., Bull, A., Boyd, S., & Hipkins, R. (2012). Supporting future-oriented learning and teaching — a New Zealand perspective. Report prepared for the Ministry of Educationve. Retrieved from https://www.educationcounts.govt.nz/publications/schooling/109306

Bolstad, R & Gilbert J, et al. (2012) 

http://elearning.tki.org.nz/Teaching/Future-focused-learning

Reflective blog - Part 2 A reflective teacher

Reflective Thinking - 2

Over the years, I have seen many models from a variety of sources and most of them do have their good points and some not so good.

Currently I am part of an teacher appraisal system called “ The Ariki Project”. This teacher appraisal model, constantly asks teachers to reflect on their practice and how to make positive changes in the teaching,  delivery, professionalism as a teacher and to be up-to-date with current practices and procedures. The Ariki project encourages teachers to be part of their own professional development.

Since any teaching strategy works differently in different contexts for different students, effective pedagogy requires that teachers inquire into the impact of their teaching on their students.

Ministry of Education, 2007b, page 35

"Good teaching and good decisions are based on high-quality information, not on taken-for-granted assumptions about the causes of children’s reading failure or the worth of new curriculum resources. The quality of information improves when everyone is open to the possibility that what they had previously taken for granted may not stand up to scrutiny. Teachers who are skilled in processes of inquiry can detect weaknesses in their own thinking about practice and help others to do the same." (Timperley and Parr, 2004)

So as a good teacher I have had learn how to reflect on my teaching and sometimes change what I am doing because it was ineffective for my students. Others times I have increase what I am doing because the student are enjoying the learning and I believe a happy student is a happy learner.

The model above is based on the inquiry process model and it is a reflective process, I have applied it to my journey in the classroom and as the saying goes, “If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get the same result.” Reflective thinking goes hand in hand with Reflective processes and change must occur  

References

Ministry of Education.(2009). Teaching as Inquiry. Retrieved from http://nzcurriculum.tki.org.nz/Curriculum-stories/Case-studies/Teachers-as-learners-Inquiry/Teaching-as-inquiry

Using Evidence in Teaching Practice (Timperley and Parr, 2004)

Finlay, L. (2009). Reflecting on reflective practice. PBPL. Retrieved from http://www.open.ac.uk/opencetl/files/opencetl/file…

Larrivee, B. (2000).Transforming teaching practice: becoming the critically reflective teacher. Reflective Practice, 1(3), 293-307.

Ministry of Education.(2009). Teaching as Inquiry. Retrieved from http://nzcurriculum.tki.org.nz/Curriculum-stories/Case-studies/Teachers-as-learners-Inquiry/Teaching-as-inquiry

Reflective thinking -

When first looking at Reflection the idea critiquing myself against myself was quite foreign to me, but the longer I teach the more i see and feel it is one of the ways I can improve myself and produce a better teacher.
Now self review and reflection has become part of the teachers habit- feedback and feedforward is all  part of the routine.
In, Finlay 2008 p4, the five level of reflection: Rapid, Repair, Review are commonly used in our daily teaching practice and this is on the sport reflection, the other two reflections, Research, Retheorizing and Reformulating are often the reflection processes left to when you as a teacher have the time to do so. These last two reflections are the ones that allow you to go deeper and confirm your OTJ's.
The in depth study allows me as the teacher to research the topic/ issues and find out the route cause or the effect and address it, plan for it, process it improve it. Ghaye, 2000, p7

I look forward to adding more as I go on reflecting over the weeks to come.

On a learning curve.

On a learning curve.

So 'The Mind Lab' course has start and I'm on the road to learning . 

Like climbing Mt Hector in the Tararua Ranges. I have made it to week three of this semester and the curve of learning has been steep to say the least. 

Listening and sharing to other members of community is very interesting as there are only half a dozen in primary school and the rest are secondary school teachers.

The big difference between secondary and primary school is that, one teaches a topic or two and the others teach all topics, that aside, the conversion is always interesting. 

My first week's video attempt was to say the least, simple, but that's why I'm here - to learn.

Week's two effort was better and  a collaboration of minds, ideas and hurry up you got four minutes left. It's amazing how fast you can do thing when the pressure is on you. 

About the collaboration side of the course - its great,  I am working with a colleague I have known and worked closely with for over fifteen years, so most of our idiosyncrasies are recognised, forgiven and then laughed at. This helps a lot when you both have help each other - a win win friendship.

After a long day and the help of my friend's son we put the Self Regulation  video clip together.

Then full of inspiration I raced home to greet my wife with, "Watch this - we finished. I need to make another video." she just looked puzzled.

This is something I put together to answer the question, " What would you put into a reverse time capsule. 2017 - 1997" 

My first thoughts were 'Back to the Future' and to focus on my main clientele ( primary school children) and to keep my entry light and humourous.

Here is our second collaborative production entitled " Real World Problem Solving",  which was done during our second weeks course,  a lot of learning in a very short time.  I think it's better than my first attempt. 

This is week ones Movie - the rolling ball is a symbol of how we see teaching and an every changing and moving learning situation for students and teachers.
I think our theory is correct but the execution needs a little more work. It was our first attempt and we had only meet a few minutes before the lecture said, " Right get into groups of two with someone you haven't meet or worked with before."

Great I thought - here we go and so much for collaborative learning but isn't this what we expect students to do?

I must says I'm learning lots of new words too. 

More blogging later ....Ma te wa.

Thinking outside a square 

Lots of ideas are whizzing around in my head and after the first meeting of Applied Digital and Collaborative Learning studies. Rethinking what you've been teaching for a number of years, does take a bit to get your head around. I believe there is a big push to get our children, teenagers and young people to look at different ways of doing things. 

So here are a few of my initial ideas ...

Is communication , the exchange of ideas or language, an important tool for all of us ?

Yes and it's evolving with each generation and technology is speeding this up. Take the telephone as an example - from a dial up , to a Nokia brick and on to the lastest Samsung or an Apple phone. I think my phone is more advanced than the computer system which put man into outer space and  a fraction of the size too. Cost wise I wouldn't even like to think of it. 

 

Is the model of learning, for teachers and students, past it's use by date?

I think no but there is need for changes, changes so all students regardless of age can contribute and learning. I don't think it's old fashion that all people need to have something to contribute to our society- we as educators just have to find the place, along with the learner, where they can be most effective. We all have something to give and for a healthy society we all need to receive. 

So follow my journey of learning and contributing in a digital context - and think outside the square.

What ever you do, do it with all your heart...

Col 3:23