Pass the kiwi!

After the return to school with the observance of 1 metre spacing it was important to keep the children engaged and active as they were seated at their tables for longer times than usual throughout the day. Here is a snippet of a game called "Pass the beanbag" which we adapted by using a soft toy kiwi!

ENGAGE games with Mrs Carter.

Team 2 Literacy recount of My favourite ENGAGE game! Today we played "Pass the beanbag" and we used Mrs Carter's soft toy kiwi to throw around to a friend. It was so much fun!

MIT Hui: Feedback on website design thinking

Today I was brave enough to share my prototype with my teaching colleagues from MIT:2020! They all made some worthwhile suggestions about my newly designed website to share online. This prompted me to think back to my original "Achievement Challenge" which was: Teachers need a digital tool for the ongoing collection, analysis and sharing of ENGAGE data. This research project has been designed to support other teachers who will be using the ENGAGE games in their classroom with students on a daily basis. So in my introduction I included parents, this has now been deleted as I need to solely focus on teachers. I had also included other videos of my story telling and creating science experiments (during the lockdown) which was off the topic and have since been removed. However, these are still available to view on the Team 2 site at PES. https://sites.google.com/s/1EUBYK8aQdRkpBXasd5QHqXVb1q2hb9Uk/p/1gvleo_u7KxkZkP-6hiWkKEXILMEqnV0k/edit I now aim to add new videos of children participating in the ENGAGE videos at school and include a tutorial video for teachers on how to use the data collection spreadsheet on a weekly basis. This will help teachers to identify next steps in regards to children's key competencies and self management skills within a school environment. I would also like to include some more relevant research to support the idea that children's well being and holistic/emotional development needs to be nurtured and encouraged in a social setting. You can view the comments made below that influenced my decision to change my prototype and refine it accordingly.

T2 Week 6: ENGAGE face to face!

My reflection looks at the impact of being in lockdown for 7 weeks that has had on our students. The high level of engagement of learning from our Year 2 learners returning to school has been incredible. The children have increased their knowledge and understanding of story writing for meaning and this has included sight words as well as using correct punctuation. Some of the children were participating in an online daily journal during the lockdown period which I think has contributed to their overall literacy skills and comprehension of writing sentences. This rapid increase of language accumulation is significant due to the fact that only some of the children were continuing to read books such as (Sunshine online) from our Team 2 site that was less structured than core curriculum school subject areas such as Reading, Writing and Maths... My main focus throughout Week 6 was to carry out daily ENGAGE games with all of our Year 2 learners as a whole (approximately 40 children aged 6 - 7 years old). The session began with a simple relaxation breathing exercise (Pick a pretend flower from the garden and smell it with your nose, now breath in and out 3 times...). Then I introduced an ENGAGE game such as "Simon Says" and outlined the instructions before it started. All the children joined in enthusiastically and had lots of fun! They didn't mind missing out, or not being the winner and there were no issues of non-compliance. We didn't have any incidents of emotional outbursts or tantrums, and there were no behaviour challenges. These children have shown how resilient they are despite all of the upheaval and changing circumstances they have found themselves in due to COVID - 19. They have adapted well and coped with a change to their inside environment such as being seated in a new and different place and not physically touching anyone else! I feel that having this in place as a consistent approach became an expectation that the children became used to and therefore did not reject. After about 10 minutes the children were verbally disappointed to stop the games and continue with other learning in the day. I know that there have been other Junior teachers doing ENGAGE games with their Year 1 students in single cell classrooms, which I would like to collate data and reflections from as soon as possible. My only regret is that I completely forgot to ask another teacher to record this, which is what I aim to do in Week 7 (next week). Our children have shown so much resilience and adaptability of their environment, due to the fact that our Team 2 roll was only 50%, we decided to plan and teach collaboratively every day. Writing in the morning, followed by Reading and Maths after morning tea. The afternoon block was scheduled for Art/Science/PE sessions. My final thoughts are that children in "Our Space" have been happy, engaged in their learning and kept safe in their first week back at school.

Lockdown reflections after 7 weeks!

I have been teaching in an ILE for 3 years, so myself and three other teachers continued to plan collaboratively during the lockdown period. We redesigned our Google class site specifically so that it was less structured than the prescribed NZ Curriculum of Reading, Writing and Maths and included a more child -friendly, interactive approach. Our school value for this year is aptly named Hope, and the focus that has arisen out of the lockdown has been tremendous. The Inquiry focus for this term is Planet Earth. We chose to use the following areas to focus on; Literacy, Patterns and Shapes, The Living World and Creative Arts. Each teacher took the responsibility to plan and share a slideshow presentation that could be carried out over the course of one week. Each area had a range of activities and a Google Form to complete based on watching short videos, listening to visual storytelling, completing online tasks, test revision, science experiments and cooperative games. We also set up a daily journal with responses viewed by teachers to add to their individual blogs. As we already are a 1:1 digital based school, transferring the teaching and learning was easily adaptable to the 7 week timeframe. Children who were taking part in distance/home learning were using their own devices, or sharing siblings school Chromebooks that were distributed before the lockdown commenced. We also set up 2 Google Meets everyday for our children to participate in with their peers and teachers for half an hour duration. This has been a valuable opportunity to stay connected and ensure children's well being and emotional needs were met throughout this strange time in their young lives. The children delighted in sharing their home learning experiences, birthday celebrations, fitness and family activities such as cooking. I would say that approximately half of the children in our team have participated in online learning and have also completed their Home Learning packs from MoE. There are only 5 students from my class that I have not been able to account for their learning during the lockdown, despite numerous attempts to contact their parents and whanau throughout this extensive period. Three students from my class returned to "Bubble School" in Level 3 as their parents were deemed to be essential workers. One thing that I have observed overall is that children are far more capable of learning independently in their home environment. Perhaps this is due to the fact that they are less distracted by their peers? Some children have really thrived on the ideal to completing set tasks and gaining new knowledge in "unconventional" ways. It has been interesting to note the friendly competition and sense of comradeship amongst students, despite being separated for a significant time in their education. Finally, I would never have imagined this event to occur in my lifetime, the resilience that the students from our school have shown is incredible. The teaching staff are so proud of them and are so grateful to their parents for supporting them with Home Learning. This has been a huge learning curve for everyone involved, both mentally and emotionally and one that we will never forget.

Visual storytelling about Floating!

Floating and Sinking

Getting creative at home!

Catherine and her big sister Finau have been busy playing their own ENGAGE game at home called "Cops and Robbers" which is very similar to "The Giant's Treasure" ENGAGE game. This is a great way to stay active and keep fit during the lockdown...

Joining in daily Google Meets with Team 2!

It has been awesome watching the students confidence grow learning how to be Cybersmart online whilst enjoying each other's company and staying connected during the lockdown. Its hard to believe that 6 weeks has passed already! This snapshot is taken from the Blue Bubble to teachers and children's homes.

Making frozen iceblocks!

Someone else's words of wisdom about Hope...

My faith leads me to Hope...

Taken from the Bible found in the Old Testament: Psalm 62:5-8 "Yes my soul, find rest in God; my hope comes from him. Truly he is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress. I shall not be shaken. My salvation and my honour depend on God; he is my mighty rock, my refuge. Trust in him at all times, you people; pour out your hearts to him for God is our refuge." Hebrews 6:19 "We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure." It is these messages of hope that can help us through these strange times of being in lockdown and help us to move forward each day.