Anita's Teaching as Inquiry Blog

  See Video of teaching practise using the Learning Process By ensuring deliberateness of teaching the Learning Process it will give learners access to know what to do when they are writing. When I ask my target learners what they find hard about writing the majority to say 'what to write', 'how to write the words' and 'what words to use.' I am noticing that learners sometimes use word cards to help them spell a word, but don't know that the Learning process can help them. Learners don't know which learning rock they are working in or what thinking skill they are using.  Over the last term I have created the visuals of the learning process to be more visible. I am explicitly using the Learning Process in writing especially (see the video that shows this).  My next step in my Inquiry is to continue this deliberateness when using the Thinking skills. By making the thinking skills visual will help learners to know how to access them and use them when they a...

  I've had a massive reflect. After reading the BES (Best Evidence Synthesis) The Complexity of Community and Family Influences on Children's Achievement in New Zealand June 2003. There were a number of finding that were relevant for my Inquiry.  These are that: • Most parents want their children to succeed educationally and are prepared to help in any way they can. Many want their children to have a better chance than they themselves had. Limited facility in English is not an insurmountable obstacle. • The traditional view held by many Pasifika parents (particularly migrant Pasifika parents), that the teacher is the ‘expert’ seems to be changing. There is growing recognition that both school and family have joint responsibility for children’s education. • The process of partnership building should add to family practices, not undermine them. • Connections and partnership building can be initiated by teachers ‘reaching out’ to parents. It can result in teachers ...

Writing related to the Term 1 Concept of Well being From drafted to publised writing. Where learners are seeing the purpose and process of writing. The opportunity here to share this writing further with our Whānau for them to know where their child is at in their writing and what they could continue to support them with.  Some noticings are that learners are becoming more determined to write the sounds they can hear, knowledge of letter recognition and sounds are continued to be worked on.  The baseline data shows there are some gaps in knowledge of letter sounds and recognition. Which is a good to see where our gaps are in their phonological knowledge.  In School Talk we are a gap analysis shows there is a morning learning to do in all areas Deeper Features and Surface Features in writing.  DData and photo evidence is highlighting the opportunities and the content we can share with our whānau.

  "Although we are already in an undulating teaching and learning phase. I believe that keeping in communication with our whānau is going to continue to strengthen partnerships between home and school".  Anita Unka 2022 My area of focus is to strengthen whānau engagement so that parents and teachers have a shared responsibility to help their children learn and meet educational goals.  Last year was an interrupted year for our all teachers and learners.  It was a disruption of routine, emotions and our teaching and learning momentium. Connecting with whānau has moved from face to face to virtual connecting. The nature of the connecting has being more of an emphasis on the child's wellbeing, verses student achievement.  I don't want to loose momentium with my writing flexi connects this year. As I felt we were able to connect with families to share their child's progress of their writing. The conversation have been student led with the support of the teacher....

Considerations for my Inquiry focus in 2022   I am highly passionate about Literacy across all year groups, my Inquiries have certainly helped to upskill and grow in this area. Over the years I have flipped between both Achievement objectives 2 and 3. Raising student achievement in either reading or writing they are both strongly linked. Next year I’d like to continue to inquire into Achievement Objective two (lift achievement for boys in writing). I was on such a great roll creating a momentum building relationships with whānau and their child to improve their writing. I feel I have so many more avenues for effective feedback, while building whānau engagement. This year to build these relationships I created a series of Writing Flexi Connects where the child and I were on one end of the google hangout at school and parents would be on the other end either at work or home. Their child shared what they had been working on, their learning intention and success criteria, what their ...

Proud to be  part of the Manaiakalani Cluster within school Community of Learning, and presenting our our Bursts and Bubbles Celebration. What a year of challenges, opportunity and learning.   Tena koutou Katoua, Ko Anita Taku Ingoa. This is always my favourite part of being a Manaiakalani CoL within school leader, where we come together (virtually this time) sharing learning, feeling proud and privileged to belong to such a rich learning community. COVID has caused disruption to our learning this year, which has meant learners and whānau and have had to quickly had to adjust. It has certainly encouraged me to adapt my learning design. My Inquiry this year has focused on increasing writing achievement for students. I identified writing as my focus when I noticed there were gaps in learners' oral language skills, they had limited vocabulary and therefore lackinging in ideas when writing. To build a rich picture of my students’ learning I collected the following evidence: o...

  Surveying my parents based on the Writing Flexi Connects - Collecting Data For parents the experience has been worth while It’s useful for me to know how I can support my child and what they should be focused on improving. It’s been especially useful over lockdown It was a great opportunity to see my child's writing and hear them understand their next steps in their learning. It is also great to have this chance to regularly touch base with their teacher to see how they are progressing. It’s does work to improve **** writing and give him chance to express his thoughts to describe It creates the connection between school and my child. It keeps the routine almost the same. comments taken from survey Reflecting on how I have made an impact for these learners and their whānau The connects have enabled me as a parent to work with my child and assist in ensuring she in working on the right things. Charlotte’s writing has really improved recently with her using more interesting words in...