After such an amazing day yesterday - how can today possibly match it? Well -YES it sure can!
19 July 2011 – Day 2 – Keynote 1 – James Nottingham
Balance between nature and nurture!
“Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change those I can and the wisdom to know the difference.”
Problematic titles – clever, brilliant, bright, gifted, top of the class, by far the best.
Praise is an essential part of teaching but change it to be more positive.
Intelligence praise – show decline
Process praise – try – significant improvement – Wow – you must have tried really hard!
Control-group praise - slight improvement
Reasons for change – control over efforts! Intelligence praise can disempower!
We must avoid causing children to avoid failure!
If I am smart, I don’t need to try!
Don’t praise the child – praise the behaviour!
Focus on spelling – those who are getting them all correct – add some more words, getting about 5-7 out of ten, make the same list the learning for next week, those getting 1-4 – give additional coaching.
Retest – the retest score, minus the pretest score = progress score!!!!!!!!
Use for 100club! Highlight to show progress!
Celebrate and embrace the pit – the implementation dip!
Coming out of the pit – concept, conflict, construct – the eureka moment! Eureka means I found it – it doesn’t mean the teacher gave me the answer!
We should spend our time getting children into the pit – challenge them!
2nd Keynote – Jeni Wilson
‘Transformation not reform’ Ken Robinson
Personalised learning – what is it?
Delivering curriculum in different ways1
Personalising learning is tailoring education to ensure that every student participates actively and achieves to their highest potential.
Personal learning carers for individual interests, skills and holistic needs to ensure higher student engagement and achievement. Set own goals, ready for assessment, plan the assessment. Teaching is responsive, explicit, focused and targeted.
It incorporates the broader community.
What matters is that all children make progress.
Actions speak louder than words.
Treat others how they would like to be treated.
Customised learning in open spaces. Daily online quizzes with individual feedback and suggestions. Variety of learning – online, module, software, virtual mentors, collaborative and individual activities.
Mentor for school life – 15 minutes per week. How can I use this next year? Mentors of passion area???
Learners have choice of what, where, why, when, where and with whom they learn! A powerful challenge.
Personalised assessment!
Personalising the planning - the learning – the scope!
Workshops targeted and explicit to individual needs. Workshops chosen by teachers and learners.
Learning centres in class – discovery, spiritual, with support materials around….
Working spaces!
Goal setting sessions – learners choose how they will learn – discuss with mentors
Display must be learning progress, work in progress!
Passion projects!
Learning spaces – shouldn’t look like a school – should be all about learning spaces.
Richard Gerver – grungetown schools – education is much more than preparation for life. “Is this right for kids?” “Why can’t schools be more like Disneyland”
Gearing to prepare learners for their future! Student self management – flexibility, relationships, Mentoring, action research, vision and passion.
George Otero
The nine gateways to personalised learning
Listen to the learners. Be a learner, be flexible, take a risk, and persevere!
Would I like to be a student in my own classroom? Make sure I don’t tread on my learner’s dreams.
My work is my play – keynote 3 Wilson McKaskill – My work is my play
School is about stepping bravely into the unknown. The unknown is often uncomfortable. The braver you are, the more you learn.
Be brave – participate to progress! Poster this
It really is all about my ability to create a connection!
We can empower children to manage their emotions.
Our children have their answers – we just need to give them time to share it.
Just as we can’t make children learn – we can’t make teachers teach but we need to make them come to the water to drink!
Step into the pit of learning – go through the void to learn! The learning never stops!
We don’t come to school to be better than others. We come to school to better ourselves by being able to work with others. Pursue your personal best no matter who you work with. Poster this
Keynote – James Nottingham (intelligence and the pit)
Alfred Binet – asked by French govt to devise a method of identifying the children the curriculum did not suit! So that they could create an alternative curriculum. Test for 6-14 year olds. Test shows what has been learnt to this point only.
Why is IQ used differently now? A utopian dream??? For who? This test still stands today despite being proved to be a flawed test!
Mediation – refocus on the relevant.
By the time children start school with 500 – 6000 words in their vocab – recent research.
Gifted/ Talented Average Special needs
Above At Below
Advanced Experience Beginner
Where are our expectations – what are our self-fulfilling prophecies?
“WE LABEL TO LIMIT' ouch! We need to lift the lid and set various expectations! #iltconf
Challenge tables – with tasks for independent challenge for anyone who gets the concept first off! Model, support until learners are able to move off.
Not always the same who move.
Friday afternoon – brand new topic about ___________ What do you want to know about it? What questions do you have? Eg science – we are going to look at __________-- What questions do you have. Those who need more time to think or learn
Preview club – support for those who don’t have support at home – links on the wiki or blog! Note home – explaining what the learning is on the horizon….. “This will give your son or daughter an advantage next week!” Including this highlighted text in the note to get buy-in from home.
Blur the lines and allow more learners to move off onto independent tasks earlier.
What level of plasticity do our brains have?
Every hour we spend doing one thing is another hour we are not doing something else. How are our learners choosing to use their time.
WE have to teach skills, knowledge and attitudes.
Get rid of school rules – instigate school attitudes
Talk about what we want – we are curious, open minded, resilient…
Planning tool – put a cross on the line between skill and attitude – eg learning intention today ‘asking the best questions we can about __________________-
Second lesson might be ranking ____________ between skill and knowledge. Eg take questions and rank them – in the order that will help us to learn more.
Lesson 3 might be on the knowledge button – groups all develop a quiz!
Quiz – If qn is answered correctly a point each! If no-one can answer the question – then 5 points for the asking team. Dots should be all around the triangle to show a balance of learning,.
Identify key concept – choose concepts the children have some sense of.
Ready – our teaching
Aim –
Fire – learner’s attempt
Being in the pit represents cognitive conflict! Two ideas must conflict to cause more thinking. Eg of conflicting thoughts – Stealing is wrong conflicting with Robin Hood was right.
Instinct, impulse and intuition – what do they have in common?
There is not ‘one right answer’.
The root word for critical thinking is Kriticos – “able to make judgements” - are they making a judgement or giving us the answer we want!
AMAZING DAY!
