Use Your Equipment Out of Hours!

Schools are full of equipment and resources for all lessons across the curriculum. Lots of ICT kit and of course the P.E. equipment. Schools are not occupied all day every day, meaning this equipment is not being used all of the time.

We've been looking at ways to make use of the equipment outside of school hours to make the most of the resources our school has. 

With the ICT equipment we have run events after school or on Saturday mornings for children and their families to attend to use digital cameras, laptops, iPods, Flip cameras and so on. This allows some families the opportunity use equipment they may not have at home, gives families some time together and allows children to teach their parents, grandparents, aunties how to use the various hardware and software. But most of all, gets people using equipment that the school has invested in that otherwise would have laid dormant.These events sometimes have a focus, for example music creation or photography, but have also been 'come and play' sessions where children and their families can use what they want, how they want.

So, that's got the children and their families using some equipment. Now for the staff. We have a games shed full of footballs, rounders kit, netballs and so on. Each half term we've recently started having a staff game after school one day. It again gets the equipment used, gets the staff together and it fun!

So, look at all that equipment in your school and ask yourself. Are you making the most of it after 3:30 and at weekend?

Lifelong Learning Part 1

One of the greatest assets that the best teachers have is that they are lifelong learners. The fact that you are reading this means that you are probably already one of these people. 

Until recently, I thought I was. Whenever I visited schools, for whatever reason, I would sneakily wander into other classrooms and look at displays. When I met teachers I would see what ideas I could pinch and I always went to training eager to learn. However, a couple of years ago I was lucky enough to take part in some training with the National College. Some of the training was fair, some was fairly self-evident and some was inspirational. More than anything else, though, the courses I went on showed me how closed-minded I was about certain things. 

I am a strong believer in the importance of education and come from a family of teachers. Therefore, I have some fairly vigorous beliefs about private schools, home schooling and the role of private enterprise in schools. I am not going to bore anyone about those. During my training with the National College I was surprised to discover that those beliefs had actually caused me to close my mind to some of the benefits that different industries can bring to education. 

One area I immediately looked at was pupil voice. Our children and parents are not clients or customers. However, that does not mean we cannot ask them what their learning is like and how we can help them learn better. Other industries can show us effective methods of gathering that information. We now use surveys (www.surveymonkey.com), focus groups and forums on our VLE to ask about improvements we can make. Of course we cannot follow up all of them but at least we know what they want and can try to make some improvements. 

Then I started looking around at examples of excellence in industry and how we can learn from them. So far, I have not wangled a trip to Pixar but, after reading a fascinating article about them in Wired, I read the fantastic book: Innovate the Pixar Way. Now, I have absolutely no idea whether or not the authors have links to Pixar or made it up as they went along but the book has some great ideas about getting the best out of colleagues. Then I looked at motivation by looking at NLP. Loads more fascinating ideas.

I started thinking about what else I was interested in at school. Not surprisingly technology came to the fore. With my colleague @thisisliamm, we set off on our Twitter adventure. Learning from people in education from around the world as well as people from other industries like @GeekDadGamer. I want to bring more gaming into the classroom so, to keep up to date, I started reading magazines such as Edge and Wired. Through Twitter, I discovered the amazing world of TED talks and delved into ideas far beyond that of education. 

It is a big wide world out there and I for one was too close-minded. Too quick to say, without even realising, 'that would not work in a school'. Thanks to the National College, I was able to widen my view and talk to occupational psychologists about focus groups and read about the importance of  failing in order to improve. The downside of this is I now have thousands more sources to look at. Recently I went to Disneyland: Paris and was stunned at the customer service there. As soon as I got back, off to the internet for my next read, Be Our Guest: Perfecting the Art of Customer Service. Even if I only get one idea about improving learning it will be worth it. 

Self-Differentiation

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You differentiate your lessons, we all do. It’s essential to pitch the lesson correctly so that all children are able to learn something from a lesson at their own speed and through a task appropriate to their ability.

But, who chooses which children complete which activity, worksheet or task? Usually the teacher. How’s about handing that choice to the learners? Introduce your lesson. Explain the differentiation. Then, allow the children to choose what they feel with offer them support while also providing sufficient challenge.

Who surprised you? Who went for a ‘more difficult task’ than you expected? Who chose an ‘easier task’ than you expected?

Not all displays are for children

I will let you in on a little secret, this one is mainly for NQTs or students. Not all the displays in my classroom are for the children. At the back of my classroom, high up where only I can see it, is a small display for me. On it is a picture of Jonah from Summer Heights High, a picture of a plus symbol and a sshh picture. These are reminders for me for every lesson.

Image credit: www.flickr.com/photos/96526303@N00/3908354646
Image credit: abc.go.com
Image credit: www.clipartbest.com/plus-mark

Summer Heights High was a fantastic comedy mockumentary from Australia. It was written by Chirs Lilley and, as far as I am concerned, is compulsory for all teachers. As well as copious amounts of cringe worthy and hilarious moments there is the character of Jonah, a dissatisfied, foul mouthed and disengaged boy from Tonga. As we follow his character through the short series we get to see school life from his point of view and, most importantly, share his sense of injustice at the world he has to work in. His picture is up there to remind me to never make assumptions about children and to give everyone a fresh start everyday. Something that I always want to do but, sometimes, without my reminder, gets lost in the midst of chaotic school life.

I have a deep voice that carries and, when wrapped up in the enthusiasm for my lessons, can sometimes get too loud. I have this reminder on the wall to remind me to check how loud I am being so that children three classrooms away do not start trying to do what I have asked them.

The plus symbol is easy. It is to remind me to use praise and positive behaviour strategies as often as possible.

Don't get me wrong, these reminders are not used everyday. After teaching this long, they are not even used every week I have had them on a wall at the back of my classroom since my NQT year and I like to have them just so that every so often I remember things that work for me and help keep my classroom a positive learning environment.

At the start of your career in teaching, there are hundreds of things to remember. This, tiny, display helped me to remember some key ideas I wanted in my classroom.

What would be on your display?

Manga High maths games

We were first saw Manga High at BETT a few years ago. Looking down over the balcony I could see an enormous manga style figure and wanted to know more. After the requisite sales pitch, we were impressed with what looked like fun games that could be accessed and, at the time, some of them were free.

Returning to school, we duly incorporated some of those games into our maths work.  A particular favourite was estimating by chucking penguins out across an ice flow. The children enjoyed this both because it was visually stimulating and challenging.

Image credit: www.mangahigh.com 

The challenge is one of the great things about Manga High. It seems to be primarily designed for secondary and therefore is usable as a genuine challenge for more able children. We have used these activities as a basis for homework for our more able mathematicians in Year Five and there are even more options available for maths groups in Year Six.

Recently, and rather amazingly, Manga High is now free to use when you register as a school and get some customisable options to work on. Whilst we have not made major use of it in class yet and certainly not explored the options that are available when you register, it is a great resource for teachers to direct parents towards for mathematically challenging home learning tasks. Our children enjoy it because of the style of the website and because of the challenge it offers and invariably move on to some of the other tasks that are available to play.

Learning New Vocabulary

"What's the most impressive word you know?"

I was recently told that a child needs to encounter a word in context fifteen times to gain an understanding of it and then be able to use it in their own writing. While I'm not sure where the 'fifteen times' came from I certainly do agree that children can't possibly fully understand and then be able to use a word after seeing it only once or twice.

Picture books are good for introducing new vocabulary to all key stage two children. In a picture book there are less words and the story can be completed quickly. The pictures often add to the children's enjoyment and certainly raise points for discussion and deeper understanding of plot. Then within the story there will be one or maybe two words that will be new to the children. I recently used 'Traction Man and the Beach Odyssey', from which the group I was working with selected the word 'crevice' as a word they did not know the meaning of. We repeatedly said the word aloud to ensure all could pronounce it correctly. Next, the group offered suggestions for its meaning. After that, I explained its meaning and gave the children the opportunity to try writing it in sentences of their own. To follow up all this, over the following weeks I highlighted opportunities for using our 'new word' and looked to see who was using it and then if it was in the correct context. Since time I have also used Meerkat Mail, Six Men and Princess Smartypants. Each one of these texts and proved useful in introducing new words.There are also many, many more useful picture books for all key stage one and two children.

After the new vocabulary has been introduced, it's essential to keep providing those opportunities for the children to actually use the word in context:

- Have a class word of the week.

- Ask for a certain word or words to be used in a written text.

- Display a word. Read some definitions. Children select the correct one.

- Display a word. Read it in some sentences. Children select the correct one.

- Read a sentence with a gap. The children insert a word they recently learned.

- In a book highlight some words. Children re-write replacing those words with synonyms. 

- Tally chart for number of times the class have used the new words. Spoke and written.

- Look at word up at www.visuwords.com.

- Look at a group of synonyms. How do their definitions differ / match?

- Display a definition. What's the word?

- Select a random word. Children put it into a sentence.

And of course praise and rewards always encourage! 

This process can be used in any subject. I have used this in literacy as a method of improving children's writing through their word choices. But, it will also be useful in maths, science and other areas for developing understanding of subject and topic specific vocabulary.

Sum up your learning for me...

At the end of a lesson it's useful to find out what children have learned during the time spent in that lesson. Here are some ideas for doing that:

1. Sum up this lesson in a Tweet. Ask the children to explain their learning from the lesson in 140 characters or less. This means the children need to be concise about what they write. These could then be added to a school or class Twitter account too.

2. Sum up your learning as a text message. Again requiring the children to be concise, but this time giving them 160 characters to work with.

3. Sum up your learning in 3 words. Give the children a word limit to explain their learning. Again requiring them to think carefully about their description.

4. Exit Polls. Give the children a question or task to complete on a slip of paper that they can put in a box as they leave the room.

5. Draw me a picture of what you learned today. Giving the children the opportunity to explain their learning in a different way.

6. Write down the 3 Key words from today's lesson. Could be particularly useful in science, maths or other lessons with subject specific vocabulary.

Just some ideas we've been trying recently that the children have enjoyed and have been a bit different to what we've tried in the past. We'd love to have some comments below offering other ideas you've used.