Category Archives: Prof Development

Wednesday Week 7 Term 3

Posted on by under Prof Development, Teaching 2014

An incredibly busy time of late. The Science Faculty put on a great event for Science Week. We looked mostly at sustainable food with a few food preparation things thrown in and had all the 8s, 9s and 10s through during the one day. I didn’t take any photos because I was flat out. My own contribution involved fruit but the highlight was seeing students eat some of the roast crickets etc that Sally, Leah and Kirk had orgainsed. I tried a few too. All in all the student response was positive and the staff seemed to enjoy it too. Well done to Sally who marshaled us all and kept us on track. I know how much hard work that is as I organised events when Astronomy was the theme.

I’ve had to send the last couple of tasks back with my stage 1 Physics class as they were just not up to standard. I rescaffolded one to give them a clearer idea but most didn’t come back in. A little disheartening. An unusual bunch this year.

With my year tens we’re recycling some copper. We’re through the two dangerous parts of dissolving in nitric acid and then using conc sodium hydroxide to form copper hydroxide. I did the dangerous parts for them which they seemed quite happy about. They are coping with the level of questions so far.

My year 8s are still creating good slides. Stained onion and cheek cells over the last two lessons and we’ve been looking at the parts of the cells and their functions. Next up we’re going to create a stop motion animation about mitosis. I have used stop motion with other classes but I haven’t done mitosis so it will be interesting to see the results.

The year 9s finished off a very scaffolded report into energy in an ecosystem. We looked at energy transfer by carrying water in leaky cups – well done to Zoe for finding and modifying the investigation. Most of our classes thoroughly enjoyed the activity. We had to weed out a few who thought throwing the water was the best thing to do with it.

Last faculty meeting we all demoed various activities we do with classes. Of course we didn’t have any special time to prepare. I showed the inertia demos I do like a magic show where the students think I’ll hurt myself by pulling a 2kg weight on to my hand or fling a 10 g weight across the room (there are some others too). My favourite was Prear’s starburst rock cycle. A must do with my year 8s.

I’m planning a big set of year 9 excursions to Hallett Cove Conservation Park – great geology there. My plan is that they won’t carry paper but will do a variety of tasks at stations including video making with iPads, large scale drawing, arguing with the teacher on that particular station and so on. The instructions will be on a series of videos which I’ll make and upload to the school iPods and make available to anyone with a smart phone if they want to use their own device. This weekend I’ll be doing some of my own video making at the park.

Tournament Of Minds

Posted on by under Prof Development

Sort of accidentally I’ve ended up being part of the team to run TOM at Wirreanda. So tonight I’m at Flinders in the City for some insight into how to do it.

Resources not on the portal yet ….
Sample challenge and other documents going up ASAP. Can get a copy of sample challenge on memory stick.
Old CDs of old challenges available for $35 but old now.

Most people won’t have teams organised until week 1 Term 3
Worthwhile doing spontaneous stuff.
It’s catered at Flinders.
Email …. If can’t get on the portal etc.
sa-director@tom.edu.au

Put time into the who should be in the team.
Pick a team that will get on really well with each other and with you.
Set tasks to complete overnight on the weekend … If they bring it back they want to be in the team.
See hand out for more ideas.
They have to be able to work collaboratively. See hand out
Go with teams of 6 if you have to do so.
Drama presentation skills need to work on. Where to focus, use of space wisely. Practise at the front of the space, deliver from there. Really get into it. Don’t do accents. Be prepared for the worst to happens……
Get to watch a performance before theirs.
Spontaneous bit is important. Can the students make up questions for this part?

Circle game as judges… What is this what it could be used for? And other creative questions around it. Spontaneous is the only bit we can help them with. Can do think quickly activities at lunch time (we might have to go into lunch times. Everyone has to be involved in spontaneous so think about where they sit… Put the boss in the middle to keep bringing the others in.

Things to do this term … Top right second page. Quick thinking, quick answers.
Box of bits they have to put together.
Brainstorm an object eg friendships sponge up individual catastrophes is an example of question and answer.
One step away, two steps away, three steps away.
Play scatagories
Build on each other’s sentences to make a story.
Being positive in group how do you phrase it. Have to be positive together in Spontaneous … They get no feedback from the judges so can you talk to a person who is not going to rspond
No magic etc out of answers … Won’t get many points.
Do lots of past challenges…. Timekeeper one of the most important people.
In the six week problem write down every idea you have. Scribe in turns etc….
Talk about what the judges are looking for
How to elaborate. Use the whole time add more you can get more points.
See William’s taxonomy.
Go through the process before the six weeks see last few slides of presentation.
I’m going to have to use lunchtimes there is lots to do or after school encourage them to meet on weekends.
Important to fill in forms correctly.
Emergency kit with sticky tape, etc… In case of problems.
Map and know where to go.

Hints have a pizza night straight after school for hours let them work through.
Organise a decision making policy?
Stay away from things that are not acceptable in school.

Prof dev day 7/5 Literacy, Numeracy, Innovative Pedagogy

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I spelt literacy correctly good start to the day.

Asked to post literacy aspects we’re good at doing and those we would like to get better at. Needless to say I didn’t trouble the scoffers on the first one. Contributed lots on the second. (I always start PD days negative about my own skill set.)

I have to put a photo in for the next part … Identifying literacy components of subject. As it’s Science all of them got a yes.

Okay, first change brought about by today … Year 8 Chemical Changes I’m taking out some of the practical work to do explicit teaching of report writing as a large number of the class struggle with the organisation, they’ve got roughly how to write particular bits but using headings and which bits need to sentence style etc I need to improve on. So the extra time will be built around the assessed practical investigation.

Photos of literacy planning goes here.

IMG_1886[1]IMG_1887[1]IMG_1888[1]

Numeracy
This was a little more straight forward as we were looking at year 10s and most of the year 10 Science curriculum is mostly numeracy.

Mostly planning this session similar documentation to last time so Photo goes here. IMG_1889[1]IMG_1890[1]IMG_1891[1]IMG_1892[1]

Third session on innovative pedagogy looked at project based learning. I’d already signed up for the site after a previous PD used it to create a project based learning task that I will run with my year 8s later this term.
Here is the plan on google drive

Professional Development 6/5

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Inquiry based learning
Handing over the learning to others. Student centred.
Development of a question followed up by investigation response and discussion.
Students are active I their learning based on their own questions. Cyclic approach.
Based on student’s curiosity eg Hover board activity just did with 8s.

Question word. Who. Action. For. — to create question.

Students thinking about own learning process – looking to engage some self motivation.
Students make links from collected learning, make links and connect.
Discuss share ideas with each other to acknowledge the community nature of knowledge …. Leads on.
Students reflect and consider … Have they achieved can they go further?
See graphics for inquiry poster. (Something for me to find).
Scaffold to think about learning.

Questions to ask
What have we been doing to find out about this?
What have been some of the most effective sources?
How might we go about organising this information?
If we wanted to get another point of view about this what should we do?
What will we need to think about before we get started on this?
How are you feeling about what you have learned/done so far?
How are your idea about this changing?
What has been the thing that has most changed your thinking? Why?
What kind of thinking will we need to do to achieve this?
What are you noticing about your thinking?

There are some small parallels between this and the task my 10s are currently creating. They have chosen a general area to look at about car crashes and are creating their own questions to ask. I need to scaffold the creating questions part better.

Presented by Rhoni McFarlane I’ll post the power point when it arrives.

Strong match to some just in time learning.

Team Teaching.. Presented by Sally N.

Active participation planning how we would put a different method into place to teach a skill. I’ll put copies of summary hand outs up.

Did a lot of this in my Middle School past.

Project based learning. … Presented by Gabbi R.

bie.org (think I’ve been there)

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