Exploring the habit of creativity

Over the past week, we have been exploring the habit of creativity.

While my students have been looking at the habit, I too have been thinking about what creativity means to me.

I am not an artist, I cannot play an instrument. I used to make stop motion videos when I was younger, I was part of the scouting gang shows, I could paint by numbers, I enjoyed the classes where we would go to Elizabeth park and draw the landscape. I too graphics and design at school and had a great time coming up with ideas of what could be developed through the project briefs.

I am a coder, a digital media creator, mainly around the back end coding side of things, I know what I like, and what I don't like. I can see the purpose of design principles within computer science, know as human computer interaction http://www.csfieldguide.org.nz/en/chapters/human-computer-interaction.html, very must looking into heuristics, https://www.nngroup.com/articles/ten-usability-heuristics/ and how these deal with design.

One of the ideas I took onboard from another teacher last year was the sketch a day in may https://stevemouldey.wordpress.com/2015/04/30/sketch-a-day-in-may/ through this ideas I have introduced hubsketch, to see the drawings from me and my hub students check out http://instagram.com/hubsketch

A number of years ago I decided to do one last big purpose, a dslr camera and macbook air. It has allowed me to capture some awesome shots of sporting events, time with family, landscapes and a personal favourite, Canteen - run for a life. the following are a selection from what I could quickly.

Reid shooting

Raven exploring creativity

Tekapo - Church of the Good Shepherd

Lake Pukaki looking towards Mt Cook

Relay change

Mackenzie country

Run for a life - Mt Cook team

Chainsaw in a crowd

It has allowed me to get and about, geocaching has also given me opportunities to get to places I would never had gone before. Which has allowed me to explore what creativity within an EOTC context may look like with our EOTC week and at previous school with Project 72. Being able to find puzzles in nature and well as urban environments. No matter where I go now, I am looking for that next mission for my next EOTC week.

I have also had to think about what creativity is in thinking, I don't buy in assessments, many of the assessments are created to suit the students needs and have meaningful contexts. 

I sit with an a4 visual diary most days to allow me to draw, write and develop different ideas.

One thing that I have found that has me thinking about whats next was some drawings that I have seen in the last week

This one is of the pop up globe that has been Auckland over the summer, doing some more reading I found this blogger http://www.aucklandsketchbook.com/, through the blogger I have found some books that could be of interest to me.

I have also been researching creative ideas, I found this website, http://vorkspace.com/blog/index.php/13-top-team-building-activities/ which had me thinking at the creative ideas that are already a part of hub. To which I started watching some more ideas. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_L9HicURfA&list=RDi_L9HicURfA#t=0
The zoom, and re-zoom books have now been ordered.

And I will end this blog with a video that I gave my hub students on Friday.

http://www.ted.com/talks/adam_grant_the_surprising_habits_of_original_thinkers

Learning Hub - edsketch or hubsketch

One thing that I have been working on this year is my ability to be a better hub coach. This is something that is next level form class tutor stuff.

I think I need this as a chart on my wall in the office,
Being a Learning Coach

What Learning Coaches do:   The Hub and our role as Coaches allows us to make  learning relevant, connected and personalised for ALL our learners. Never stop finding ways to get to know their learners. Develop sustainable connections with whanau / family. Warm – demanding relationships, built around learning conversations and high expectations. Track learners journey through dispositions (Hobsonville Habits) and build academic and personal excellence. Support students in telling their learning story through narratives, conferencing and IEM’s.   Grow learners to be inquirers and self-directed learners. Create structures and resources that ensure rigor, but allow for flexibility and personalisation. Negotiate / co-construct Learn Paths to ensure exposure, coverage and passion Never give up!

In some ways this is almost a check off of how to reflect about learning hub each week.

For the next two terms we will be inquiring about a habit, the first one being creative. But that is not this blogpost. This one is about ways of getting to know the learners.

Last year one of the teachers ran an edsketch https://stevemouldey.wordpress.com/2015/04/30/sketch-a-day-in-may/ in May, this was to promote creative thinking and sharing about what you are doing each day. This was reposted this year to do the same.

I continue to think about new ways to get my hub students to share ideas, sometimes they do not like talking in groups, the like the share with a peer and also the one on one checkin's with the hub coach. I am also looking at different methods of communication, rather than just the normal two. Talking and writing. Why not look at others ways of sharing ideas, visually.

Often in my notebook are drawings, sketches, shapes. Not just words. They provide a visual cue.

So, rather than linking in with the edsketch16, creating hubsketch. Every school day students will do as part of there checkin a sketch. I realise that it may not be a great sketch every day, but I think it does link in with what some other hubs are doing in the school. 30 day challenges. Could this become a 30 day challenge?

The scene:
I would like to encourage everyone to sketch something they have been reading, thinking about, trying out, observing, questioning, exploring, reflecting on, working on that day.

Sketches are great for that purpose, they don;t take any writing. The quality of the sketch doesn't matter, it's not our drawing talent we are showing, it is our ideas and thoughts.

If you are worried about what your sketches will look like, perhaps this task will help you develop more creative confidence over the month.

The best way to get started on a challenge like this is to not hesitate. Just start, sketch something that has been in your head over the holidays and share.

Just a thought

One of the ideas that this could support is the development of a students learning story, not everything has to be written.

Tau16

Stepping outside the bubble these holidays has been one of interest and learning. I was luckily enough to make time to attend an unconference held at Albany senior high school. This has been one of the first opportunities I have had to go in and visit the school since one of the first gafe summits that were held in New Zealand.

I must say that I went in initially looking at the use of space, but I realized soon on that this is not what I should be looking at. 

It is about the learning,

Day one looked at big picture ideas, sharing experiences from our schools, I wanted to find out about the journey thy Albany senior has gone through, they were  interested in the journey that Hobsonville point is going through. 

One thing hit me has I spent the two days there, what was the learning design model? 

Another thing that hit me was the amount of push on assessment. Talking to the teachers and looking at the data, it was a surprise to see that there seemed to be the "get as many credits as possible approach", I may have missed something, but the data was showing a level one course that looked around 120-150 credits.

Talking about the impact projects as well as learning advisory were two things that I was most interested in. As these are big changes for me in what I am engaged with at Hobsonville Point. I realize that I need to be providing better support in the impact projects, getting students to show evidence of planning and attachment to their work. Some of the ideas that I have come away with may allow for this.

Learning advisory is similar to our learning hub, sustaining the fire http://www.ashs.school.nz/assets/Uploads/PDFs/Tutorials-to-sustain-the-Fire.pdf provides some of the big picture thinking around this. This is something that we are still developing through our hub curriculum with the focus on dispositions.

Getting to talk about the experiences has been rich learning, as you realize and understand that you have a good grasp on the learning thy has gone into this within the school.

As always, people were keen to learn about the way Hobsonville is looking at its qualification pathway. 

It was a great unconference and and changed as it progressed. I found the small chat sessions informative and challenging. This is something that I sometimes wonder if it would happen under a larger group situation? Would all the voices be heard. I know when I sat in the first session I was very quiet and it wasn't until I was asked what my opinion was about smashing SILO's and what Hobsonville Point was doing was it that I found my voice.

Learning Hub - peace poppy project

One of the activities that looks to be part of our year now, is the peace poppy project. This is to support an installation at Hobsonville Point around anzac day. We have been asked to make around 300 poppies at school. This is a great initiate as it gets students talking to each other, as well as supporting each other in the development of their poppy.

Putting the poppies together.

http://www.peacepoppies.com/

What 2000 poppies look like.

What does innovation look like in your school?

This is a response to a post on the vln.school.nz network.  http://www.vln.school.nz/discussion/view/951392

Innovation in schools of any type needs to start with the idea that the goal is not to force kids to abandontheir passions and interests for our curriculum.

- Will Richardson, Stop innovating in schools. Please.

 Dictionary.com defines innovation as:

1. Something new or different introduced
2. The act of innovating; introduction of new things or methods.

There is so much innovation going on in our schools. Leaders and teachers are coming up with new ideas, and new ways of doing things all the time. But what innovation looks like to one school could be completely different for another as each school has different goals and philosophies.

George Couros states in Innovation and best practice, that his “belief is that innovation in teaching and learning starts with empathy; truly trying to understand those that you serve.” He expands on this to say that it’s “not only a starting point, but a continuous part of the process”.

As with all things in schools, we need to ensure that student learning is foremost on our mind. This includes in how we innovate. Will Richardson made this very clear when he says,

To put it simply, innovation in schools today is far too focused on improving teaching, not amplifying learning.

I have been asked to develop a response,


What does innovation look like to you?
This has been something of a journey for me in my years of teaching. I suppose being in the technology learning area with what is now digital technologies innovation has been at the centre of my thinking.

Adaption and Innovation are at the heart of the technological practice. The course planning and ideas I have looked at what new technologies I could include in my development. However, there has been other things that I have looked at about what innovation is, that has been around course structure and assessment.

The other has been I have been lucky to be in departments that looked at changes within education. Moving away from unit standards to offer achievement standards. This has allowed a better understanding and access to the professional learning that was available at the time. Something which is now lacking for teachers that did not move at the time.

Project based learning has been a big part of my courses and changing assessment from tki.org.nz to new contexts such as developing historical websites for heritage places, pokemon trading cards and nzta crash analysis mapping. These have allowed students to have a meaningful context to showcase their learning. Students have also been able to develop their own projects which have allowed for a spelling game to be created for younger students, an information website about parkour teams as examples. Also looking at competitions to allow meaning contexts for learning and assessment, brightsparks, codeworx and kiwibots vex as examples. Rather than just being an extra thing.

Then there is innovation within teaching, the use of Learning Management Systems to help students rewind learning as well as develop tangents for learning. The use of the LMS has been a big part of the change of my teaching, it allowed for better feedback around a students work. Then came the online apps changes, this has allowed commenting within students work, and better feedback -feedforward. 

Working with other departments to help make learning and assessment easier to manage. Developing systems to assist to help the learner show evidence, as well as for the teacher so assessment is not so onerous. 

To me its being agile within my teaching, working with other teachers, not just in your school, but also in other schools. Developing partnerships. It is through these partnerships where you challenge the current thinking that you get to work with industry and dare I say the Ministry of Education. 

What does innovation in your school look like?
Innovation at HPSS, this is part of our schools motto, Innovate. Engage. Inspire.

These are also the goals that our appraisal is around.

This year you will be constructing three personal professional learning goals based around our principles:

Innovate through personalising learning

Personalising learning by meeting the needs of diverse learners e.g. Differentiation Universal Design for Learning Self directed learning Blended learning Culturally Responsive Pedagogy

Engage through powerful partnerships

Evidence of powerful partnerships being developed e.g. Strong teacher and student and whanau learning relationships Appropriate and responsive co or team teaching strategies Opportunities to connect with their wider community Critical friendship - observation and feedback Open to learning conversations Restorative Practice (being a warm and demanding hub coach)

Inspire through deep challenge and inquiry

Evidence of students being inspired through deep challenge and inquiry e.g. Students being supported, challenged and extended in their learning Use of SOLO Use of Learning Design Model / Inquiry Learning Learning area expertise / literacy and numeracy across curriculum

Personalising learning

Personalising learning is a strategy focusing all of the schools resources to ensure that the potential of each learner is realised by ensuring that the learning experience is appropriate to them personally and that they are able, with support, to decide what they learn, how they learn, when they learn and who they learn it with. 

Personalising Learning is about strengthening the link between teaching and learning engagement. 

Personalising learning recognises that the quality of learning is shaped by learners’ experiences, characteristics, interests and aspirations. High quality teaching explicitly builds on learner needs – as well as on high expectations and good subject knowledge. 

Personalised Learning puts children and their needs first. The distinctive feature of the pedagogy of Personalising learning is the way that it expects all pupils to reach or exceed expectations, feel fulfilled and achieve success. 

Personalised Learning maximises personal potential. We personalise learning so that...

• Everyone get the chance to be the best they can
• Everyone gets the chance to have high quality teaching that is responsive to their needs 
• Everyone gets the chance to have an educational path that takes into account their needs, interests and aspirations 
• Everyone’s integrity, dignity and validity is respected 
• Everyone thinks about and presents their knowledge in different ways 

Personalised learners… 

• Are engaged with learning and the life of the school 
• Take responsibility for his or her own learning and behaviour 
• Show independence in, and having control over, learning
• Enjoy confidence in oneself as a learner 
• Display maturity in all relationships, marked by mutual respect.

Are the innovations in your school amplifying learning? If so - how?
This is from our Principal, Maurie, A case in point is when we were settling on our innovative approach to NCEA which is largely to skip NCEA L1 and set our students on a 2 year journey to a quality NCEA L2. Having our 14-15 year olds ploughing through 120+ credits towards NCEA L1 did not allow us to ensure our students were inspired by deep challenge and inquiry as it promoted surface coverage to get through so many credits. Because it could not pass through this filter our moral purpose required us to think differently.

I have a Qualification SPIN, which is two 80 minute blocks a week, through this I am covering design through digital media. The students have been working on web development and image manipulation. Normally I would run this for 6 weeks and then assessment. As I am only focussing on one achievement standard, I can delve into it deeply, I am not rushing through, I am allowing students time to develop and create portfolio's of evidence, rather than a single shot assessment. This is allowing students to learn from failure, be creative in their designs and application of the tools and techniques. Which in terms of the learning allows for quality work to be produced. One of the students is a priority learner, it also means that I am working on personalising his learning, which is allowing him to develop a digital media and print media outcome. It is working towards his needs, still along the school theme for term one around identity, rather than the school identity, it is his own identity.

How is digital technology supporting innovation in your school?
I am going with the ideas of the Core Education 2013 trend of ubiquitous, http://www.core-ed.org/thought-leadership/ten-trends/ten-trends-2013/ubiquitous-learning.

Social:
Social media
always on, always connected

Technology:
mobile technologies
cloud computing
online services
UFB access
wireless

Educational
Learning works best in the right context and the right time. Ubiquity helps learning be right there.

We have bring your own device, this allows for the learner and the teacher to use different activities to allow for different learning needs. Rather than one activity for all learners. It allows for the personalisation and differentiation in learning.

We also have the platform, no, not the same computer for event student, but hobsonline, this allows for a one place for students to goto to access their learning needs. 

Where do the tensions/challenges lie if any?

For me, its the challenge from the traditional, I know its hard to explain, but one of my titles at a previous school was ICT Innovator, I was always looking at what is happening next, having that future focus look. The challenge was from the people that are not. 

Developing ideas for space and place

It has been a busy week, through my travels last week I brought a sphero, inside it was this notebook. One of the things that I liked was the Design process that is listed

ASK // What are the problems? What are the constraints?

IMAGINE // Brainstorm Ideas. Choose the best one. 

PLAN // Draw a diagram. Gather needed materials.

CREATE // Follow the plan. Test it out.

IMPROVE // Brainstorm improvement. Make changes.

When I saw this, I though of our own Learning Design Process.

It has become more important for me as I enter the second year at HPSS that I use the words to help develop students understanding of a common language.

As I start to develop my foundation SPINS for term 2, an ideas was put forward from a staff member to help develop the theme of Space and Place.

The museum Following this conversation, you begin your tour of the school with the mentor at your side, providing a running commentary and introduction to its key features. First, you walk back through the museum. The mentor explains that the museum is one of the most important parts of the school as it is a place for capturing and building a shared history. Each museum in each school is different: some reflect the industrial histories of the area, others a particular event and its causes, others specialize in a particular fi eld from botany to nuclear engineering. The purpose of the museum is central to the work of a future-building school, the mentor argues, because the museum makes visible that the world hasn’t always and won’t always be like it is today. 

The museum, says the mentor with a hint of melodrama, releases us from ‘the tyranny of the present’. It is a space where the other possible futures that might have emerged are made visible, where the uncertainty and contingency of each discovery is made apparent, where the struggles people had to go through for each scientific breakthrough, each piece of legislation, each new work of art, are presented. History, these museums show, is not a simple progression of inevitable change, but a site of debate, contestation and choice. These museums show how things have been different in the past, they provide a record and a collective memory of other ways of doing things, they provide a resource for confronting new situations. They are a commitment to remembering and nurturing different ways of living in the world. 

The museum ‘exhibits’ are often objects that are annotated with different historical accounts. Produced by the students either with new research that challenges them, or with greater discussion of the period, the exhibits often have alternative history simulations attached to them, crafted beautifully by the students, showing how a different decision at a key moment might have led to a different trajectory for social change. Some of the most annotated artefacts are those associated with the great war of 2020 that many children have a fascination for – surely it would have been easy to avoid this, they argue. Each annotation, each alternative simulation becomes part of the museum’s own resources, accessible not only by the school community but by the wider world. One corner of each museum in every school is also dedicated to the ‘museum of uninteresting objects’, which is wholly curated by the primary children, who are challenged to bring in an object that is of absolutely no interest at all; objects don’t usually last long, the mentor says, as the school’s members are usually pretty quick to point out something of interest in everything. This part of the museum, again, says the mentor, is important in encouraging students to look at things differently, to make the familiar strange, which is a core component of the future-building school.

An except from Learning Futures, Education, Technology and Social Change by Keri Fisher.

So I plan to have students investigate virtual or augmented reality ideas and develop skills to incorporate them into their projects. 

The second SPIN around the theme of Space and Place is to look at develop skills in Digital Media, to use our community as the context. We have a number of new initiatives on the point, so having the students developing a webpage to display content that they have created, edited and developed will be an important part.  The idea is for students to develop skills. 

Floortime is one that allow skills to be developed, outside the classroom of assessment? 

For the floortime I am co-teaching with another learning area, so technology and art together. The idea is to learn about the Battle for our birds. http://www.doc.govt.nz/our-work/battle-for-our-birds/

Now the issue is food supply and the abundance of it during a "mast". This is when the beech seeds drop onto the forest floor, http://www.doc.govt.nz/our-work/battle-for-our-birds/beech-mast/

The idea is for students to develop various native birds and introduced species and add a form of movement to them using electronics. I have an entire page in my book of notes that I have written up while planning this tonight, so I can go back to the teacher and present my idea and listen to the changes that they would like introduced to be able to cover the skills in their area. I think this is what I am liking about HPSS, is the co-teaching, not being SILO'd out. Being able to learn from others and develop the principles of HPSS. 

One of the parts that I like is how it fits into the theme of space and place.

The question now remains, how have I fitted in with the guiding principles of Floortime?

The guiding principles of Floortime are:
FloorTime replaces MyTime. It remains a time where students have greater freedom of time and teachers are encouraged to be as creative and responsive as possible.

Guiding Principles for all FloorTime modules

• All sessions are as flexible and responsive as possible
• All FloorTimes would be vertical (Year 9-11 together)
• Teachers will offer engaging pop-ups based on interests and needs
• Students are encouraged to be self-directed as appropriate
• Students are encouraged to run pop-ups based on interests of students in the group

Standards creep towards year 10

I had this come through my email the other day,

I notice that students in Year 10 may now be able to gain some NCEA credits in Dance and Drama ( Maths and English credits have been offered for several years at Year 10). 

Is this a trend. Are we disadvantaged as a subject if we don't follow suit? Is this even a good idea? I see Hobsonville Point is doing the opposite - removing NCEA Level 1... 

Views?

After the initial shock of the email, and the want to type out something rather quick, I thought I would wait to see how the discussion went... also there is a 5 hour flight between Adelaide and Auckland

We have added a very simple 2 credit Unit standard as its being required by SLT. US25659.

Above was the content from the next email, hang on, what does he mean required by SLT? So the question went back?

It was for all departments 

I think the underlying reason is to increase pass rates for NCEA Level 1. Also to give students early exposure to NCEA. Its been going for 3 or 4 years now .

I would have to say I was stunned, "I think the underlying reason...?"
The thread went one for a bit more, more teachers talked about what they are doing at year 10 around assessment, more Unit Standards were talked about.
My reply is below

While I find the conversation that is happening incredible at present, it has raised both joy and sadness. The ideas around creative programs that build on curriculum and dispositions. The sadness is around some of the offering of standards that are being used to support these programs. I have had to think about what is the expectation that is being pushed on teachers by senior leaders. That has been why my replies have been around understanding of the impact of these ideas, some of which I am still working out to understand as there maybe a lack of my understanding. 

I am seeing standards that are around second change learners. Is this really the best offering for students? 

Is it good assessment practice by offering students a unit standard at year 10? 

Is offering students a unit standard at year 10 preparing them best for the learning required at ncea level one? Do students see the amount of work involved in a 2 credits unit standard that the only grade of achieved as an academic equivalent of another subjects achievement standard where the grades can work towards merit and excellence? 

Is this developing the best outcomes for the students? 

Is this starting towards a mentality of is this worth credits?

Is this helping with student wellbeing? 

What is the key driver for this change? 

Many would be asking what standard would could be offered to students at year 10, what does the student voice say? Part of me would like to see a conceptual or prototype standard that works towards students being able to critically reflect about their work, being able to communicate with others and developed through an understanding of learning. If it was to be a digital technologies standard, digital information skills, or digital media skills, however I would want to look at the knowledge based standards and limit the amount of words for each answer, similar to the idea that Julie put out last year around developing one of the knowledge based standards, give students the practical based skills, as well as evidencing the academic requirement of the subject.

Yes, at Hobsonville Point Secondary school we are looking at a 2 year qualifications pathway for our year 11 and year 12 students. 20 credits at level one and 60 credits at level 2. It does have its challenges and new learning that is taking place. I look forward to the end of this year and the exploration of what courses might look like during the next stage of learning.

While the conversation goes on,  One of the interesting emails included;

Last year our school ditched all standards at Year 10. Reasons for this:
- Student wellness.
- If one subject has credits available at year 10 that puts pressure on all subjects to offer them.
- We have no issue with NCEA Achievement so no need to fit early credits in.

I thought it needed something else using one of the resources that has been developed at school. I especially like the idea of the Kete - portfolio of assessment. The graphic below was created by Heemi.

We have been developing a lot of thinking at school around the ideas of what NCEA is and how we are going to deliver it. Though we have the teachers that have been through the process within other schools working at HPSS. We are also challenging the thinking and ideas of what programmes of learning might be.

This is one of the pieces that we have been working through the narrative with the staff on the ideas of NCEA.

The top section is us looking at what is it that we are trying to work towards, we are looking at it in the way of the bird. The Nga Pirere is the fledgling, Nga Manu is Branching, Kua Rere is the Flight.

The second half is the look of the Kete Aromatawai - the portfolio of assessment, what does this look like for a student.

Through the google group(subject association) it has been explained a number of times that the siloing nature of a students learning has not afforded itself to a classroom teacher being able to have a picture of where a students needs are. I know myself when I was a form tutor as well as a classroom teacher that I accessed the Student Management System to see where a students learning was at. Many times the students did not know themselves where they were at. Even with portals and NZQA a number of credits are not normally entered until the end of the year due to the nature of the subject or have been held due to the schools trying to get students to not look at credit counting or due to having moderation of grades before hand. This is tricky as a number of students, those that are going down the non academic pathways don't see the achievement of their work until too late. Even students that used the apps or keep notes usually had some credits wrong as what they were told in class is different to what has been published.

One person provided an example of not knowing where he was at within his own learning when he was at school on the group. He then found out he was at 144 credits in level one. Are students now are looking at the quality of credits, rather then the quantity of credits. With the ideas that came out in this thread, this was also the case. How can we be delivering quality credits? How is the structure of schools that are aiming for academic success developing pathways for students? How are the other 70% of students being catered for.

These are things that are constantly in our minds. What does a Kete aromatawai look like for the students in your class? How full is the kete and what would it look like for someone outside of school?

Though I am not a parent, I do not have a record of learning that I can look at and see, what does one look like for a student that has gone through a course that has a mixture of achievement standards and unit standards?

Maybe this could be a good teaching as inquiry topic?

hak

This came across my twitter feed tonight. To me it signalled a major issues that I have been dealing with years through my teaching. That is why did people not like it when I haked. I always looked for new ideas to improve engagement with learners.
How many processes in school are illogical or outdated, why is it a mission to change these?

Learning

While the learning of the student is important, there is also the learning of the teacher.

This was summed up this week by a post from Maurie, the principal of Hobsonville Point Secondary School. I believe it shows the learning that our teachers at school are going through and explains what their journey is at present. http://principalpossum.blogspot.co.nz/2016/02/others-voices.html

I myself am I going through that Journey. Taking up a leadership role this year. The Learning Design Leader of Technology.

Over the weekend I attended the subject association committee meeting and contributed towards the discussions. Many of these are the same that happen at each new committee. How to develop a regional based structure, as well as Professional Development of the members.
It was interesting when I listened to the conversation, around how to develop regional based participation, the word clusters kept coming up. This causes many confusion of what a cluster is, we now have cluster of schools, clusters of teachers. The idea that has merit is one of Hubs. Considering how we have Learning Hubs at school, we need to develop what these regional Hubs will be focussed around, and who will lead the Hub. This will be developed as we go on through the year, but first thing, who is in each Hub? Have we got the areas sorted?

That night saw conversations with a cousin, who is into supporting youth through scouting. The ideas of dispositions and developing these as part of the scouting curriculum is of interest to me. It is great to see various students at school interested in scouting and talking about it with us teachers. The ideas around the slackline development as I talked about in my previous post came from his ideas. We are now developing a shared understanding of the lingo used. I also handed over the 12 GPS units that I used to support the Get Lost initiative that we ran at school last year for his scouts to learn how to use. Developing mini geocaches where scouts get GPS coordinates to be able to find, that then moves to geocaches around the city. Many talk about how the phones that they use could be used. But there is something in having just a basic tool to do a complex job that makes it unique. Also having conversations about his son's learning and how he is going at school, makes for some interesting conversations in the different way students learn.

Working through on Sunday writing an educational paper with another teacher about a project that we have been developing over the past four years has been one of reflection and challenge.
While writing this paper, it has been amazing the number of ideas and learning that I have taken from Hobsonville Point, and how before I was at the school was developing ideas and context around.
One of the ideas was around how teachers could mentor each other, which I see as the basis of the critical friendship that we have at school. See Ros' post about what this means. http://rosmaceachern.blogspot.co.nz/2015/10/critical-friendships.html

The other is around growth mindset, being open to try new ideas, through searching growth mindset and Hobsonville Point Secondary School I came across Steve Mouldey's blog post which has been the basis of this weeks Hub lessons for me. https://stevemouldey.wordpress.com/2015/03/28/growth-mindset-activities-for-students/

I will have to search the #hpssblog (only just being introduced) more for other ideas I can use in my learning.

Adventurous

At the beginning of extended hub today I asked my students what adventurous meant to them.

Developing the habits and for students to be able to see them not just in school, but in life, is important to us. We spend a great amount of time in Learning Hubs, and developing the relationships with these hubs is important. Without these relationships today would have been a complete fail. Students need to be supportive, give things a go, have trust in each other. 

I have been looking at doing this activity for the last couple of weeks, but weather and other activities have got in the way. Today, though it was hot outside was the perfect day.

Once students entered what adventurous means to them, I showed them this video

Getting students to realise the opportunities and the risks, rules for this were important, only one person on the slackline at a time. We want everyone to try, as well as safe.

Everyone gave it a go, tried different ways to balance, walk the slackline. It was one thing that struck me though, was the support from all the students to walk the slackline with support from a helper. Even though there were many failures, the support was there to try again. Something that I want to see from other areas of their learning.

Yes, even I had to give it a go, I had to demonstrate what would happen, they thought that I was playing shaking the slackline at the start when trying to balance, however with their own experiences they found the same issue. Conversations about breathing that came out of the videos were then had.

Students want to give it a go again, develop their adventerous, I wish to show them this video on where it could lead, but that can wait for another day.

Here are some photos from the activity today

I will end this post with another piece of information, this is from our hub curriculum

Next time, I need another set of post it notes to ask the question, what does adventurous look like?

Things to do next
Developing support, only fingertips to be used.

• Walk the line and hug the pole.
• Swat - two feet on the line get down as low as you can, go past the wobble point
• One foot Balance, 10 seconds
• Walk Backwards
• Bounce (gentle bounce) offload

Hand hold support

• Onload, 30 cm jump, 90 degrees to the line, up and forwards to get on the line, control forward motion
• Side jump

Vocab
Relax and Breath. Try to feel whats happening. And only exercise will stop you from shacking. And
believe it or not: Everyone is shacking with it foot and leg like a lot.
Shacking is when the line wobbles a lot when you try to stand on it.

Thank you to Steve for supporting me in the developing of the ideas.

Evidence for Digital Media Logo assessment

One thing that I keep thinking of is, what does evidence look like of logo development. Through one of the websites that was linked to earlier this week, I found a great tutorial that could help with showing advanced tools, plus I like the way that it was put together at the end.

First thing is first, sketching ideas, this is a great way to use a different space for the students to thinks creativity, something I would world allow them to wok where they wanted, to develop the idea, use the hallway, a breakout space, outside. Whee ever their creativity and imagination is best found. Use a visual diary, of piece of paper on card something that they can scribble over and take photos of or scan. 

I plan on getting my students to use vector based tools, opening then up to a produce outside of photoshop gives them opportunities to develop new learning using concrete information that they may already have.

Through the tutorial I like the way that the author has taken screen shots with brief pieces of information on how they created this. This type of method is shown in the level 3 digital media exemplars where students showed how they created their complex digital media. A tutorial that is published could allow next years students to learn how to develop and create their own ideas. It also helps the students to learn to use knowledge and skills from their other subject like english, to be able to communicate with and audience.

At the end of the tutorial I like the idea of a branding guideline sheet, it helps show the understanding of how the logo, colours, font can work to enhance the print outcome or website and it also informs where some of the unique ideas of the student come from through the exploration of the brand mark.

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The tutorial that I have taken these images and idea from is available at ​http://design.tutsplus.com/articles/creating-a-coffee-house-logo-from-theory-to-vector-in-adobe-illustrator--vector-10709

Wellbeing and a learner

Last year one of the staff challenges at Hobsonville Point Secondary School was wellbeing. 

HPSS Wellbeing Challenge - Term 4 2015

Aim: To develop a wellbeing challenge to encourage staff to look after themselves in Term 4. My initial thinking is to set a focus/challenge each week e.g. drinking more water, try a meditation strategy, get more sunshine, do some exercise, sleep well, reflect etc. Then provide some resources to support each week’s focus and encourage people to complete a weekly gratitude journal entry or reflection.

I have decided that this needs to continue for my own sanity. One of the things that I have seen happening for a number of years has been people putting tie downs between trees and then walking on the tie down. This had some interest, considering I wasn't in the right head space at the time. Now being at HPSS I am looking at new ways to look at our Hobsonville Habits. But the Habits are not just for the students, I believe that they are for us all at HPSS. It is amazing at the conversations that happen between staff, students, support staff that all mention the Habits.

From Sally Hart Blogpost

So why have I included learner in this post as well, I believe to be able to work towards the habits we have to learn. I am working on developing my learning in taking up a new skill, with that will come new knowledge. Doing a number of youtube searches ends up with hours of watching people do the cool things. But what about the beginning, what gear do I need, what resources? Having gathered student voice from the Individual Education Meetings at the beginning of the year with families and students many of them talked about wanting to develop new skills, not just within subjects, but also outside.

Two great sites for getting your slackfline gear,

torpedo7.co.nz

http://www.slacklineshop.co.nz

Beginners slackfline video, 3 steps,  

Having to break down the skills required

1. Foot position

2. Elbows above shoulders

3. What to do and where to look, what to do with your head

Setup at school this afternoon

Had to work out if this is possible at school and make sure it is safe.

Yes, the Health and Safety is important. 

I will be sending out some video ideas to my Learning Hub students, as we work out what a Learning Journal will look like and develop. Can students show ideas for developing their learning and their Habits. Do they understand how the Learning Design Model could be used to help develop the new knowledge and skills.

I look forward to developing my wellbeing, my learning as I myself develop confidence in this with my learning hub students.

Getting to know the learner

This week at HPSS, we have been having Individual Meetings with our parents and students in our Learning Hubs.
This has been a fantastic way to meet the new year 9 students as well as continue to develop relationships with the parents of last years hub students and to get to meet the new hub students and their parents.

Throughout the meeting we have been asking questions, which I have to say have blended themselves ratther well.

What are your interests and passions?
What sports do you play or would like to play?
What are your main strengths?
What do you find difficult?
What are you most worried about?
What are you most looking forward to?
Wht is your favourite learning area(s)?
What was your favourite thing about your previous school?
Parent - Looking forward to / expectations...
Parent - Worried about...
Student aspirations for the future...
Parent - how could/would you like to be involved with what we do?
Ideas for a personal and a learning goal to start the year.
Any other information.

As well as these questions has been information around an EOTC trip next week, checking parents details and the all important module selection booklet.
Getting to know the learner is an important part of what we do, having these meetings at the beginning of the year has helped as I did not get to meet some parents until the end of semester one last year, or through the information night during term one.

Students have yet to know what their timetable looks like, this is happening next week as students return their module selections forms and learning coaches enter it into the system. The main thing to look for around this is choice, learning area coverage.