next stages of araako

It has been a while since I did any work on the learnpath(ara ako). I think part of it has been the change of nature of hub. Moving away from habits through to students inquiry. I guess I am still trying to work out how the inquiry functions for my students and what evidence is required.

I am still getting students to focus on their weekly reflections on a friday. While many of the hub see the purpose in the reflection, Others still do surface reflections or work out how to try an do little reflections at all.

Is the issue that they cannot see what they have done? I have thought about how to get the image feature of the reflection really helping. But I still need to think about what is the actual benefit of the work to help?

Does anyone have reflection templates that they find 13-17 years, it could be scaffolded that is still needed for some students.

finding instagram as a help to develop ideas

Week eleven

Leadership Camp, up the top in the farmland,
The mist comes out after the heavy rain.

Eleven week first terms are long, they create a huge amount of stress. I look back to what was happening to me around week 7 and 8 and they are when pit falls happened.

However, I probably spent less time in the classroom this week, due to leadership camp. 50 students away for an overnight camp on the night that cyclone cook entered New Zealand. A 20 minute massive downpoar of rain, the rest just wind.

The camp showed the students in different ways, developing new teams and communication were two very big components of the camp. How do we communicate with others what we want, our ideas. This is something I paid particular attention to, as in my role of Learning Design Leader of Technology is something that I need to keep developing.

When the bus didn't turn up for nearly two hours, the weather turns on us, when things don't goto plan. Having to work through problem solving and changing decisions on the fly is something that you have to get used to at camp, while things are planned, outside factors do impact.

The same in school.

How have things gone this term.

Hub, I started off doing well, however, I have let things fall away slightly, araako.com/learn worked well to help students input there goal, I need to work on the next phase. The curriculum checker as well as the habit indicators.
Getting students to up their reflections took some work, however they now seem comfortable writing 150+ words. It seems that the majority of them enjoy reflecting on their week and how things are going. The ones that struggle to do the reflection I am thinking about how to work with them, is it that they are unable to reflect as they feel they haven't done anything during the week?

WOTPOINT Technology/Social Sciences
This module has put me outside my comfort zone, getting students developing drawings of the building that they are creating, I am thankful for the work that I did at Secondary School as well as having a graphics class earlier in my teaching. I must say I am impressed at what the students created and so were others at the show time on Thursdays Professional Learning morning. I look forward to next term and the ideas that we are going in with. The struggle has been working through inclusion for some students. Working at lower curriculum levels than I am used to, as well as I wish that I had rewritten the project brief for some of our students so they could see some success.

WALLE Technology using EV3 robotics
Developing a robot to meet a certain set of conditions. I went outside the normal create a robot to follow a line idea, getting a robot to from one side of the classroom to the other, students tested, refined, developed constantly. Though some students were still developing there robot on the last day was of concern. I need to look at this next time so we have all teams running. Students did do well working together and collaborating, sharing their ideas.

DESIGNW - web development
Developing students to understand the code that the web works by, many of these when faced with challenges embraced them and have develop some great pages through simple design. The one that gets me, is when a students doesn't want to try. This is a struggle, without knowing the tags of HTML you cannot do the create stuff later on. There needs to be a natural development of understanding knowledge to develop skills.

HWMGHTWE - technology
Students have developed a good understanding of database management through khan academy, I was not sure if this was going to be the right move, but students would be able to do the requirements of NCEA level 1, level 2 and level 3 database management. It is the next part that we need to work on, which is the database integration into another program.
Building on this has been the brief development, getting students to think about what they are going to develop. I need to make sure that this cane get down to 2-4 pages. Something that will need to be the focus of the beginning of the next term.

I have started to think about how to support a student that may be finding this too hard. Though this also could provide an interesting brief for a level 1/2 course. Building a website that records the amount of water a students drinks daily. Simple enough, but how to do you develop the marketing behind it.

Where are things going?
3DSPACE PLA - the 'engage' part of our innovate. engage. inspire. engage through powerful partnerships. Working with an outside company on this has provided some interesting opportunities. To be able to develop NZ Mountains through 3d printing.

To start to think what terms 3 and 4 SPINS will offer, one will need to be a programming SPIN, the other, I am still thinking...

Wellbeing...

Has anyone got students developing projects around wellbeing?
I saw one earlier this year this around helping a student manage their NCEA credits and homework. http://www.getblueprint.co.nz/

Looking at other aspects of wellbeing, "the state of being comfortable, healthy, or happy."

Getting students to think about how these aspects can contribute to their life.

Apple have been working on their wellness within business. The Close the Rings Challenge v1.0
https://www.macrumors.com/2017/04/11/apple-close-the-rings-employee-challenge/

However, not all students have apple watches, and probably cannot do the standing within their day. Thinking about other ideas, like removing the soft drink to the 2 litres of water a day challenge, how could this be tracked?

Week ten reflection

Success through failure. This weeks reflection is based around this concept. In Technology it is outcome development and evaluation. Refining ideas when trialled and trying something different. The WALLE robotics class has been one of great interest to me this term. Watching students see success when trialling ideas, and then failure when they have been put into practice. Challenge of time has also been one, managing to meet the requirements. To put you robot onto the street and run it three times. Most managed to do this, however a couple of groups did not manage this, it could be a good reflection to read about where things went wrong.

Back to the photos,
Auckland Secondary Schools Orienteering finals were last weekend. The four students did well with the challenge of the other schools. Making sure you check the control number against the control you are in front of is something that will need some work. Getting used to the map scales is another.

On Monday I did a checkin with a student in the WOTPOINT class, she had missed the time where students went out to look at their structure/building. After the meeting that night I went down to go and take some photos, this allowed for here to complete the missing work, it also allowed me to check out where the come fly with me event will be happening this weekend.

The track for WALLE. Get from point A to point B while avoiding obstacles.

Wednesday, project day. Helping student manage there resources. Two groups required time to get resources for the come fly with me event this weekend. While waiting for the groups to finish I was talking with a couple of business men behind me who asked what the students were doing. Explaining the project, how they have to come up with an exhibit, plan, explore, budget and deliver a result. They were amazed at what they were up to and wished that they had that opportunity when they were at school.

The game of awesome, I used this in hub this week as a creative talking activity. The students had two cards and were required to tell a story that included the words from the cards. This was a fun and exciting activity that made a few people stop and watch. I think I may have to look at some other rules to help develop the ideas a bit more. With 17 people in hub I believe I could have two games running.

Time in the day... shakespare festival and mountain biking were on at the same time this week. I took time off mountain biking to keep my cultural kete full. Something that I have thought about more since leaving my previous school. Academic, Culture and Sport. I also need to be making sure that I not just photograph sporting events, but also cultural.

Exploring and engaging in different partnerships through the school. I use mindkits gear a fair bit in my classroom. Electronics, but now also 3d printing. They have developed a partnership with printlab, who have just released a mt everest module that allows students to develop skills in mathematics and technology. The 3d printed object is just one of 16 tiles of the contours of Mt Everest. Throughout this I have also been in contact with them about how the experience has gone as well as possible future ideas for the students. How do we do this with New Zealand Mountains? I await the response next week.

The runner box, this little box has had a few experiences this week, through the STRIDE class which do a 2km run, as well as the Adventure racing time trial. It was also presented as a independent project that one of the students has been working on since October last year when I asked him to have a look at some of the code.

Student council election week this week, rather than getting the students to do a prepared speech,
how do they deal with the pressure of a game show style event.

Starting to come up with things that I want to achieve over the holidays. See fablab in christchurch. Have a chat with a teacher from Rolleston College. Talk to an HOF about rubrics. Plan for a day or two at Rototuna next term and put a proposal to management.

Week nine reflection

This week has been getting 3Dprinting up and operational in a more sustainable format at school. Placing them in the library means that they are always under some watchful eye. The difference has been incredible with print and quality. Will need to get the login working for the library staff so that they can remotely print as well. Just looking at getting the camera operational now so we can watch what is happening when starting a job at night when we are now able to see if the bed is clear. I have even written a blog post around what the ideas I am looking at with that and how students have help provide the opportunity and context.
Thinking about 3dprinting

Getting students to do WALLE research, the WALLE class is run around developing an autonomous robot that can get from point A to point B while avoiding obstacles. While it might seem a simple task, it is not for an individual, it is a group. Developing the 21st century skills early on.

My first drawing for a while. This is of the field cottage that used to be at Hobsonville. It was demolished when the highway 18 went in. My first use of the markers that our DVC teachers use.

StoryHui, as part of our thursday morning kitchen table series we were asked to draw what the other person was talking about their teaching, how students could see us. Here is teh story that Justine made about what I was talking about.

Mountain biking, 19km ride with the mountain bike team and Adventure racing team on Wednesday Night. Was not ready for the distance or climb. So lucky I had a decent light.

Planning for next term around personalised learning a bit more within the WOTPOINT module. Using the friday professional development time to give opportunity to do combined planning.

Happy to see this number grow.