Teacher Inquiry Blog Post 5

This week we presented our teacher inquiry to our staff. 

My questions was :

"What impact on reading comprehension will implementing the RPI strategies have on my learners when Time Point 2 PAT and running record data is collected and compared with Time Point 1 data in T4?"

When comparing my time point 1 data to my time point 2 data, I can see there has been an overall improvement in each students' comprehension in PM Running Record data. However, when looking at their PAT results, 1/5 showed improvement, 2/5 did not progress and 1/5 showed backwards shift. This is interesting as their individual running record showed an improvement in all of the students. This could be due to my learners being more confident in conversation. This is something I can look at for next time.

Overall the presentation went well, I enjoyed listening to and sharing my own experiences with the RPI programme this year. It was interesting to hear other colleagues' teacher inquiries for the year and I was able to take in some ideas to trial in my own.

RPI Day 9 - Sharing Reading

Sharing with a range of communities is essential for learners to connect to not only other learners but the world around them.

Sharing a range of tasks on their blog also keeps the learners engaged in their learning and blogging. Changing the create tasks and giving them agency over their blogs can help learners keep up with their blogging.

By providing opportunities to give feed back and feed forward on their blogs, this can give learners goals and next steps to improve their blogs. 

RPI has taught me so much. I have felt my overall knowledge regarding developing my own reading programme has improved. It has been very beneficial to reflect on my programme each session and speak to my mentor regarding this. I have had so many recorded observations which have enabled me to rewatch and adapt to improve my lessons. 

My favourite session was Day 8 - Create. This had so many simple yet effective ideas I have since brought into the classroom. It was also such a fun session, that Toreka and I shared back to the staff meeting.

I have thoroughly enjoyed my RPI sessions and look forward to the next Reading PD.

Teacher Inquiry Blog Post 4

As part of RPI we started to include different create tasks. I previously would stick to posters and Google Draw, however I started to add videos, animations, AI creations, advertisements, fact sheets and more. I have been giving my learners more agency over how they want to present their work. This has skyrocketed engagement for my learners. They are thriving with the option to choose their work presentation. Below are a few examples from one week of work.

Another create activity we did was working on collaboration games. I found our learners struggled when it came to listening to others. As a way to combat that in reading, we did a listening game. The goal of the same was to draw exactly what your partner described and compare the two drawings. They were back to back to ensure they couldn't see what the other was describing. This was not only fun but taught them to listen to each small detail others said.

What didn't work? The RPI programme brought the Teachers Workbook for us to trial. I tried it out for a few weeks to keep track of my learners work, progress, planning, etc. However, I didn't find it effective for my teaching. It was a lot of extra work that was placed in my other paperwork. For example, the guided reading was all on my site in the group slides. I found the learners were getting too confused with all the links. So I adapted a few things that were already in place. I also changed the way my slides were set out, it included a few tasks to do before the guided reading lesson. 

Teacher Inquiry Blog Post 3

This year I focused on implementing my RPI course into my reading programme.

I have managed to complete my RPI and continue to improve my understanding of an effective reading programme. This has been evident in my learners self efficacy especially. They have become more confident in their learning and are understanding more about comprehension. By using a specific guided reading format (example) my learners are getting word work, comprehension, prior knowledge and follow up tasks in one place. I have found that my learners are able to be more independent and start their work prior to coming to the session. This has helped with pre-loading knowledge and collaboration. Learners have been able to comment on the guided reading format and learn from each other. I included them commenting on the one document as opposed to having their own copy. This enabled them to collaborate more.

I found that occasionally my learners were becoming overwhelmed with a lot of activities in each lesson. This wasn't working for my learners so I made the change to use my original guided reading and adapt it to included all of the needed adjustments. By cutting this down to small simple tasks, my learners were a lot more successful in their work.

I have also started doing more small create tasks instead of one large one at the end. As well as doing different create tasks using a variety of apps. This has brought up engagement with activities and many of my learners have been completing more tasks.

Successes:

• Sharing my progress on my blog
• Sharing our findings at a staff meeting - effective create tools
• Seeing confidence and self efficacy improve in my learners
• Looking over the google form results based on my learners thought around reading

Changes to practise

• Continue to develop my reading skills
• Adapt and make changes to my weekly programme such as including more word work in each lesson
• Taking advantage of many smaller create tasks as oppose to one large create at the end of the week
• Giving more student agency in their reading programme

Link to RPI blog posts

RPI Day 8 - Creating

Creativity is a huge part of learning. By engaging learners through creative tasks and getting them to share what they have learned helps solidly their learning. With this comes agency, we should give our learners the opportunity to make choices about their learning.

These tasks don't need to be long. They can be short smaller activities throughout the lesson that keep learners engaged and having fun.

Linking tasks such as creating something and then using that to create a labelled diagram. There are two forms of design, tighter and looser. Tighter refers to constraining their create in some way such as giving a template or stencil to use. Verses looser, which means allowing them to have more agency in their learning.

Creating a One Shot Film

I thoroughly enjoyed today's lesson as it was engaging and fun. We made small videos, created illustrations for poems and reflected on our goals. Creating is not only engaging for teachers but for learners as well. By giving multiple creative opportunities for learners, we will engage the learners and allow them to show their learning. 

My goals are:

• Allow for more creative opportunities in lessons (short create tasks throughout).
• More collaboration tasks
• Change the types of create tasks and incorporate a wide variety of platforms to use (ie. video, voice recording, plays/skits, animations, etc).

RPI Day 7 - Thinking

There are multiple levels of thinking; evaluative, interpretative and literal. The higher order thinking skills (HOTS) are both evaluative and interpretative. 

Thinking in an abstract way doesn't come naturally to our learners. Often everything is literal to them. It is necessary to teach them how to identify when to think in an abstract way. Comparing things require thinking about unusual comparisons and why author’s use these comparisons to portray ideas, emotions, and other features like mood and atmosphere. The four types of comparative speech are metaphor, euphemism, simile and idiom. 

Critical thinking

Systemically analysing the text to challenge it and evaluate the information to be able to look at differing perspectives. Using extended discussion to agree and disagree with perspectives can be a great way to do this. In class we use the "disagree" card which is given to someone in the group work to bring a different perspective to the discussion. This has been successful as even if they agree with what others are saying, they need to think critically about why someone may disagree with the point. 

My tasks for the next three weeks

RPI Day 6 - Vocabulary

 This week we are focusing on vocabulary. Vocabulary is a huge part of literacy. Learners need to learn topic specific words to understand particular topics.

Using the spotlight activity will help gauge where learners are with their knowledge around certain words. They can fill in the table before reading and then again after reading. This helps learners see their progression.

Another activity to do is the traffic light system. The learners have to highlight the words depending on their knowledge of them. These are two activities that I think will be beneficial to my learners in reading.

Word wall displays allow words to be visible around the classroom. The bucket below, is used for learners to place their own words in it. There is a competition between the two groups which brings a competitive and fun element to words. Reusing these word walls allows them to be added to over time.

Rebus puzzles are simple yet effective ways to include vocabulary into fun activities. Riddles are also great for this and are very engaging for learners. They challenge the learners and by practising this they develop more abstract thinking.

Morphology - Best to start in year 2. Focusing on the base/root word first. The affixes or suffixes change the meaning of that root word.

I'm going to add more fun and engaging activities such as riddles and rebus puzzles. Keeping the work engaging is essential for my learners as they struggle to stay engaged. There has been a large amount of great activities that could help with this. I'm also going to add a word wall to my classroom so that I can ensure those words are visible and rewindable for my learners.