Zones of Regulation

As part of my behaviour management of a student in my class, it has been suggested that I use the Zones Of Regulation as a way to modify behaviour and support this child in the whole thinking process. The more I have learnt,  I have come to realise that this will work for more than this child in my class and am looking forward to the coming term to put into practice some of these ideas.

The "ZONES" has a framework that provides strategies to teach and support children to become more aware of and independent in the ways they control their emotions and impulses, manage their sensory needs, and their ability to problem solve conflicts.

The FOUR ZONES: 

RED ZONE: Is an extremely heightened state of alertness and intense emotions. Trigger words for the children are mad/angry, terrified, yelling/hitting,elated,  and out of control.

YELLOW ZONE: Is also an heightened state of alertness and elevated emotions but the child has some control. Trigger words for children are frustrated, stressed, worried, silly/wiggly, excited, and some loss of control.

GREEN ZONE: Is a calm state of alertness. Trigger words are happy, calm, feeling OK, focussed, and ready to learn. This is the zone where optimal learning occurs.

BLUE ZONE: Describes a low state of alertness. the words used to connect are sad, tired, sick, bored, and moving slowly.

Using the colours of red, yellow, green and blue can be compared to traffic signals. Green being a 'green' light for learning and everything is good to go. A yellow sign indicates caution and maens be aware. Stop for red which is the outcome you need. Being blue usually is a sign for re-energising or rest.

Everyone experiences all these states of emotions and are very normal, the framework will enable me as an educator, to empower my students how to recognise and manage their zone based on the environment, its demands and the people around them.

Where to next? What implications will this have on my teaching? How can I manage this so that it becomes part of 'the way of being' for my current class?

Where to next?

• Make resources such as posters, needed to scaffold the thinking for my students. 
• Create a space in the classroom where the children can refer to to assist each other. 
• Plan for time for the explicit teaching and role playing of the ZONES and what strategies we can co-construct for everyone in our class. 
• Create a classroom toolbox, as place for "things' that can be used for sensory support, card of yoga poses for calming techniques.
• Ensure that I have a bank of resources such as, music, movement games, breathing techniques that I can access at short notice.
• What sorts of resources will I need to source to empower and engage my Maori learners? Some research maybe needed to ensure that this covered.

So some work for the term break but hopefully in the long run it will be worthwhile.  Success isn't always about greatness. It's about consistency. Consistent hard work leads to success. Greatness will come. Dwayne Johnson

Maths is a language

This term we have been changing our pedagogy in regards to the way we teach maths at our school. We start with a word problem and give the children time to notice things about the problem and how/what they need to learn to solve the problem so there so much more student agency around the learning.

The problem can be worked on over a number of weeks with reviews as the children learn more. The problems have been set at a higher level for all the children. The children are encouraged to work together to solve parts of the problem to improve their skills - we discovered that the children were unable to break a bigger number into 'do-able' numbers, using known fact to solve division problems and understand how decimals work.

As part of the follow up to the NOTICE, the children write their own learner pathways recording the learning they need to solve the problem. The planning is reflects the learning needs, we are now planning in response to what they children reflect on day by day. The activities each day are small bites of what they are learning - division of numbers, multiplication of 2 digit numbers, recording remainders as fractions and decimals. Because the children are working collaboratively, they are using the language of mathematics to explain to the others how they solved the problem. With the use of TALK Moves, the children's ability to verbalise their strategies with each other has given the learning more meaning and more purpose.

The improvement in the children's ability to verbalise the ways they are solving the problems has been amazing. When testing their strategy knowledge through GloSS snapshots has made a significant difference and using Seesaw has given them a platform to share their learning with their family and whanau.

Not only has the children's learning improved I know that my teaching has more questioning and the possibilities are endless, especially when my ADHD/ autistic child is solving higher order thinking problems then it is worth it. Also we are using the language of mathematics more as in this TED Talk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6yixyiJcos has made a difference in the way we are teaching mathematics.

https://www.weareteachers.com/multiplication-vocabulary-mistakes/ Is also a reading that has made sense in the way we are currently teaching mathematics in our class.

Clarity, Share and Understand Learning Intention and Success Criteria

What is the aim of learning intentions and success criteria? It is not to help the students complete the activity - it is help them learn.

I was given this reading of Chapter 3: Embedding Formative Assessment and it has made me rethink how I use WALTs and Success Criteria. Also I have been thinking about using a whole class approach and this reading has given me some scaffolding for what these lessons will look like.

Here are some pointers from the recap -

• I may not know exactly where the lesson is going - it is the experience rather than the outcome.

This has happened when I gave the class a maths problem I thought they should all be to work through if they worked within a small group. The problem was too hard and I realised the children were unable to recognise the patterns of 3/4 digit numbers - how these break down into smaller workable numbers. This was good as it gave the children loads of questions regarding what they needed to learn and therefore the writing of their learner pathways was way easier.

• Keep the context of the learning out of the learning intention.

I have always struggled with WALTs and how to create them, during my observations of colleagues, I discovered the importance of keeping the context out and how it makes the learning more transferrable for the children to apply the learning. This has happened more since using a whole class approach and asking the children at the end of the lesson what they have learnt. 

• Start with samples of work rather than rubrics, to communicate quality

Using Notice, Think, Imitate and Innovate has given more scaffolding to my class lessons. By using 'good' exemplars the children have become more aware of the standard they are trying achieve and where they need to go with their learning. It has changed the way the children 'think' about their learning, and what steps they may need to get there. The children are beginning to show this in Seesaw when they realise what they have learnt.

• Use big ideas, learning progressions and staging posts

As part of the team planning, we are unpacking each big ideas and finding all the learning progressions needed to solve the problem. It is rich learning because each child is able to take what they need and this in turn build more student efficacy, which is what we after for 21st learning.

Being an Across School Leader for Eastern Kahui Ako

Theory for Improvement Document

As part of my role for Accelerating Literacy and Mathematics across the Eastern Kahui Ako, I have been working with my colleagues to create a mandate for the 5 schools and their staff to improve the learning for their children. This attached document is approximately 50 days work after our discussions with teachers, principals, and unpacking the data that we know so far.

My reflections on this journey so far

• Initially it was very unsettling as there wasn't any scaffolding of what our COL would look like.
• Feeling of excitement to create something new for our Community that could bind us more together - create a community.
• Having a clearer 'big' picture of the schools by unpacking the relationships between the 5 principals and their staff - has been key to our approach to the individual schools.
• Understanding the individual school's cultures has assisted in the data - both with the response to our questions and the results within the data and the range.
• Amazement - that there are still teachers who are teaching who are more worried about the workload as apposed to the children's progress and what it takes to improve their learning.
• Sense of pride - of what we have achieved in a small amount of time especially with this document.
• Science - and how you teach it and how it underpins all - reading, writing and mathematics.  It is what has been missing in our curriculum but  with this Theory of Improvement document there is a way ahead, especially with the approach.
• Grateful for the opportunities as I have been able to work with other passionate teachers who are willing to make changes in their pedagogical approach and that of others.
• Keen - to make change in my community, school and my class to improve the learning.

Where to next?

• Get PACT into the other schools so that they can be passionate about teaching.
• Make the most of my time in the role.
• Create a start point for the future for our schools.
• Be more present for the other schools, principals, DPs and their teachers.

Dyslexia Staff Meeting

The first activity involved the staff discussing their weekend and then writing about it for 1 minute. After the minute, there was a word count. the next part of the activity was to discuss favourite take away and why you liked it for 30 seconds.  Another minute to write, but this time to write using the less dominant hand. This was a quick activity to show us the problems that children in our class have processing writing in an every day situation.

We were asked to share our feelings -
- frustrated
- too slow
- too hard
- messy
- poor quality
- distracting
- putdowns

This activity was to help us to walk in the shoes of the individuals in our school. I realise that I need to cater for my dyslexia in my class more.

What does mean for my class?
I need to enable my children with dyslexia by:

• Getting a 10 minute unassisted writing sample and then type this to have a screening as part of their file.
• Use memorized words of singing - from Production as a regular part of the week.
• Use clapping games to build memory
• Use funny rhymes to help the build spelling memory
• Use colour to help these children recognise words and ideas
• Repeat ideas
• Be patient
• Seat the child fairly near the teacher base so that I am available to help if necessary, or they can be supported by a well-motivated and sympathetic classmate.

Dyscalculic children are already spending a lot of mental energy trying to understand the maths, the last thing they need is to have to memorise the instructions at the same time.

I need to enable my children with dyscalculia by:

• Giving children own set of work to complete, which is at their level.
• Allowing extra time - even with problems they can do, dyscalculic children are much slower.
• Using written rather than verbal instructions and questions. 
• Focus on understanding (especially of quantity)
• Use concrete materials to help link mathematical symbols to quantity
• Start at a level which the child is comfortable at, so that they experience some success, and slowly move to more difficult areas
• Provide a lot of practice for new skills/concepts
• Reduce the need for memorisation, especially initially
• Ask a lot of questions to get the child engaged and thinking about their own thinking
• Make learning as active and fun as possible - a positive experience

Teaching Writing

Writing is not my strength and I have been working on improving my practice. My planning has changed as I am trying to implement ideas that I learnt during my ALL Teacher Action Inquiry last year. This year the teaching is all about the purpose - the WHY?
I have been using the Writing Learning goals to shape my lessons and what I have seen in the children's independent writing books. I have also used next learning steps when I mark and use peer evaluation in response to the Literacy Progressions of children shaping their writing in response to feedback. I found this most helpful in developing Student Agency.
As a Team Leader I have had the opportunity to observe the teachers in my team although this has been to improve their practic,e I have found the discussion with My DP most informative and has made me reflect on my own practice.
So when I was send an email this morning to ask if The DP and another teacher could observe me to show her how to complete an observation I was quite looking forward to being able to reflect from the "inside out" as apposed the looking in from the "Outside".

Here is my observation notes -

What was seen:  

Description of lesson:

• Writing lesson includes rotations (guided, follow up, independent writing, computers)
• Use of ALL strategies evident (purple pen in guided etc)
• Students all engaged in learning tasks which manages behaviour in class
• Context of guided writing connected to Science unit - water cycle

Guided teaching

• Use of IWB for WALT and co-constructed SC. WALT - write an introductory paragraph using clear and specific language/vocab
• Teacher selecting a range of students for ideas and explaining.
• Used resources for assisting constructing SC.
• IWB used before students write. This allowed oral dialogue.
• Shared construction for a starter (hook). Teacher then revisited the SC with the group for collaborative peer assessment.
• Computer students were writing a letter. They are aware of the process but not necessarily following it through (e.g. planning)
• Some students using Writing Fun to publish their explanation. Not sure of visual language features being used.
• Independent writing allows for free choice of writing but with a skill focus
• Teacher roved at appropriate times for assisting other students
• Teacher built on students current level by being positive about students
• Feedback/feedforward frequent in independent writing books.
• Routines well established for student agency - resources available for student success
• Students worked in guided circle, at desks, on mat (less engagement from one boy), and at computers

Student Voice:

What are you learning?

Student - In my independent or guided? We are looking at using specific language in an organised way.

Why?

Student - So the reader can understand what a water cycle is and how it works

How successful were you with your learning?

Student - pretty good as I have organised my idea using specific language. I could change my full stops to create complex sentences. The plan was good to organise my ideas. I would use it again to write about how things happen.

What does your teacher do to support you with your learning?

Student - She provides a focus for our learning and gives us ideas and planning templates. She gives ideas when she teaches or marks my book.

Is there anything else your teacher could be doing to further support you?

Student - Nothing really because she explains things in a way that I understand.

My Strengths

• Learning is engaging and provides a great climate of learning
• Good use of technology for teacher and students
• Positive learning routines that encourages student agency supported by students appropriate resources
• The use of student voice in the guided session promoted positive learning and ownership. This was also used formatively by the teacher. This allowed the teacher to provide appropriate scaffolds for student thinking and contribution to the writing lesson.

So where to next

• How can clarity be built for all students where all students are connecting between  strategies from guided learning to applying them in independent activities. (Most students showed strong connections but there were a couple of students that lacked depth of application due to not using the strategies that have been developed)

• How do you differentiate learning for all of your students in Writing and track the achievement of this learning?

• How will you go about sharing the positive practice in teaching Writing across your team?

Inclusion

During one of our staff meeting last term, the RTLB Advisor ran 2 workshops one on behaviour and one on revisiting the Special Needs register at our school. While doing the holiday tidy up I discovered the hand out from the power point for behaviour and some of the notes I had made, this and the CORE Education article (Quite simply included ..by Fionna Wright) that I have just read, have encouraged me the change around my room seating plan.
 

The child in my class has Simpson Golabi Behemel Syndrome - it is a rare disorder with only approximately 130 people in the world have been diagnosed. One of the side effects is that is very big for his age - very large hands, head and feet. I have also discovered that part of the disorder is a very large tongue. He is identified on the special needs register and has a computer and printer, and his very own set of tote trays for his books and pencil case.

 

He struggles to hold a pen correctly and has difficulty write on and between the lines, so his computer is essential. The student is working on his self management, being ready to learn can be a problem. He has learnt many avoidance behaviours - pencil sharpening, lost books, annoying others, reading in the corner (not at the correct time) and no completing the set task. This has all improved since the beginning of the year, still developing too.

 

Being overly large he has a chair that is build for him, I did have a desk placed to one side of the class and all his gear was located there as the power point to charge his computer was there too. But after reading the article and hand out I have rearranged the furniture so that he has his chair located within the class and his gear located near the other children's tote trays. By doing this I have created a very large space for our mat area and my teaching base is now more solid.

 

I am quite excited and looking forward to how the children react to the changes. My main aim is to create a more inclusive and a positive learning environment for all. 

New Inquiry - How can encourage children to reflect on what they have learnt?

My next inquiry has come from my own reflections from my feedback session for my READING OBSERVATION. The children now understand what they are learning, why they are learning it and how they be successful with this learning. Also as part of my own self appraisal, I have realised that I need to focus on my lessons having a beginning, middle and an end.

This is part of my research into improving my teaching - I found a blog with the title
Top 10 Evidence Based Teaching Strategies for Those Who Care About Student Results.
This unpacked is what I need to do to in my class. Number 6 particularly struck a chord with me - Feedback is the breakfast of champions, and it is the breakfast served by extraordinary teachers around the world.

Evidence Based Teaching Strategy 1 : Clear Lesson Goals
I need to be clear about what I want my students to learn during each lesson. The research says that such clarity effect on student results is 32% greater than the effect of holding high expectations for every student (and holding high expectations has a sizeable effect). "If you cannot quickly and easily state what you want your students to know and be able to do at the end of a given lesson, the goal of your lesson will be unclear." Clear lesson goals will help me (and my children) to focus every other aspect of the lesson and on what matters most.

Evidence Based Teaching Strategy 2 : Show & Tell

Start my lessons with show and tell. Put simply, telling involves sharing information or knowledge with my students while showing involves modelling how to do something. I need to be clear about what I want my students to know and be able to do by the end of the lesson, I need to tell them what they need to know and show them how to do the tasks I want them to be able to do. Concise lesson goals!

Evidence Based Teaching Strategy 3 : Questioning to Check for Understanding

Use questions to check for understanding during the lesson. Making sure to check for understanding before moving onto the next part of the lesson. By using techniques such as random questioning of group, children showing answers on whiteboards and think-pair-share will help me to check for understanding before moving on from the show and tell part of the lesson, and thinking about what other questions I could possibly ask within the lesson.

Evidenced Based Teaching 4 : Summarise New Learning In A Graphical Way

 Graphic organisers have their place to help my children to summarise what they have learned and to understand the connections between the aspects of what I have taught them. Studies show that it doesn’t seem to matter who makes the summary graphic, be it you or your students, provided the graphic is accurate. Discussing a graphic organiser is a way to finish off your show and tell. I can use this tip to help the children reflect on what has been taught throughout the lesson.

Evidence Based Teaching Strategy 5 : Plenty of Practice

Practice will help my children to retain the knowledge and skills that they have learned while also allowing me another opportunity to check for understanding. I must ensure that my students are practicing the right things. My children need to be practicing what they learnt during my modelling, that will hopefully reflect my lesson goals - WALTs. I need to be mindful that the practice is not about mindless busy work. Nor is it about giving them independent tasks that I haven’t previously modelled and taught. Finally, research shows that students do better when their teacher has them practice the same things over a spaced-out period of time.

Evidence Based Teaching Strategy 6 : Provide Your Students With Feedback

Giving feedback involves letting my children know how they have performed on a particular task along with next steps to help  them improve. Unlike praise, which focuses on the student rather than the task, feedback provides a tangible understanding of what they did well, of where they are at, and of how they can improve. In John Hattie’s view, any teachers who seriously want to boost their children’s results should start by giving them dollops and dollops of feedback.

Evidence Based Teaching Strategy 7 : Be Flexible About How Long It Takes to Learn

The idea that given enough time, every student can learn is not as revolutionary as it sounds. It underpins the way we teach martial arts, swimming and dancing. It is also the central premise behind mastery learning, a technique that has the same effect on student results as socio-economic status and other aspects of home life. By adopting mastery learning, I need to differentiate in a different way. I can keep the learning intentions (WALT) the same, but varying the time I give each child a chance to succeed. This could be a struggle with the time framework for timetables and weeks but very much worth thinking about.

Evidence Based Teaching Strategy 8 : Get Students Working Together (in productive ways)

Encouraging productive group work within the class. When working in groups, my children tend to rely on the child they believe is most willing and able to the task at hand. Psychologists call this phenomenon social loafing. To increase the productivity of my groups, I need to be more selective about the tasks I assign and the individual roles for each group member and ensure each group member personally responsible for one step in the task.

Evidence Based Teaching Strategy 9 : Teach Strategies Not Just Content

By explicitly teaching the children how to use the relevant strategies. There are strategies underpinning the effective execution of many tasks that I ask my children to do at school. And, just as with content, I need to tell students about these strategies, to show them how to use them and to give them guided practice before asking them to use them independently.

Evidence Based Teaching Strategy 10 : Nurture Meta-Cognition

Meta-cognition involves thinking about your options, your choices and your results – and it has an even larger effect on children's results than teaching strategies. By using meta-cognition  my children need to think about what strategies they could use before choosing one, and  think about how effective their choice was (after reflecting on their success or lack thereof) before continuing with or changing their chosen strategy. The Teacher Support Materials with the School Journals have a mega-cognition aspect of each possible learning experience.

Hopefully by actioning some of these aspects I can encourage the reflective practice for my children.

Final Data for ALL

The children in the ALL invention group have had their final "official" assessment marked and moderated and now I have to analyse the results.

THE GOOD
There has been movement in some areas of writing with the most achievement being 9 sub levels for one child in the area of structure and language features. The children have all had different areas of success. Confidence has grown, they now are wanting to write and record their ideas - where there was a reluctance before. They are more willing to plan and think about the sequence of their writing.

THE BAD
Some of the group did not make any movement in some areas at all. Some of the children went backwards in the areas of ideas. I was very disappointed with the children's attitude rating as we had really worked on this area - the videos I recorded earlier in the month were very positive.

THE UGLY
The results for the spelling component of eAsTTle  were very discouraging. There were not any changes in their results - the mark before the intervention being <2B and then at the end of the intervention <2B. I was very alarmed until I looked at the individual papers, before and after. Initially the children's results were very low, some words had only initial and ending sounds. For the second sample the children had made some improvements but still not enough to move them above <2B. I did try using a spelling programme as a component of the intervention but to no avail. In this group 4 out of the 6 children have been diagnosed with dyslexia, I need to do more to support these children with their processing of words.

ALL - What's working? What's not!

After today's sharing of blogs and the Team Leader's meeting, I realise that I need to make time to reflect, make changes, records those changes and try something new/different.

So to do this I will try to begin with questions.

What's working for my struggling writers?

Because I am working with them each day for guided writing (20 -25 minutes) and then an extra 45mins over 3 slots, the children are feeling much more confident.  They are now following aspects of the writing process - planning, drafting, revising and in some cases publishing.

The children are using a range of sentence starters and structures - moving away from simple sentences and adding depth to their writing. Ideas generally haven't been a problem for this group and orally their language is quite good. Now the children are stretching out the sounds they hear within words and are beginning to use tools - exemplars, essential lists and try/spell notebooks.

When the children are working in their independent writing books I have noticed some changes in the amount and the content for some of these children. The most noticeable change is their willingness to write - actually seeing themselves as writers, not as a subject.

What's not working for my struggling writers?

Mileage! I don't seem to be able to get through as much as I plan to do with this group. By the time we discuss what we are writing about, include everyone's ideas and plan, the actual writing in their books isn't being done in a timely fashion.  I need to build in some urgency - but this has been the problem for these children in the past, the pressure to get pieces of work completed.

Independently planning - As part of our experience I have recorded the words for use later, and then we have planned as a group together in our first session. generally I scribe and the children tell me their ideas, some children are asking if they can use other words in their planner.

Verbalising the learning - the children reflect and evaluate at the end of each piece. This gives them their next steps for their next writing piece. While the children are doing this, they are animated and can easily tell me what they need to work on.  I feel that when I'm not there beside them that this not at 'the front of their brain' helping them make decisions while they are writing. Could they tell someone else what their next steps are? Some, but not all!

What next?
I need to discuss with the children what 'we' can do to write within our time, more writing. What would help them? I will try to use Jeff Anderson - 5/7/10, write for 5 minutes, read and discuss your ideas/ improve it from feedback (spelling, editing) for 7 minutes, continue writing for another 10!

Encourage those who want to be independent in the planning stage to try to get the main ideas down and then to come back to the group and share. Give the graphic organiser (large copy) to pairs of children and get them to record what they want. Use sticky notes ( I do now - I scribe them) with more independence - children to write on them.

Before writing the children will be asked to share what they are working on in this session - I will write this onto the top the page for them to look at during this piece. Hopefully they will tell each other before  they start writing if I make "verbalising their next step" part of the practice!

How will I know if I'm successful?

My struggling writers will be able to tell me what their steps are, there will be more independence for the planning stage and there should be more writing.

The Importance of an Audience

Yesterday I decided to "pinch" one of the ideas for our ALL Meeting on Wednesday. It was sharing the children's writing with their parents. A wee girl in my group always has wonderful ideas but the dyslexia and handwriting skills make reading her writing a mission. So pushing the aside the surface features and writing it so you can understand her expression and ideas - I published her writing in an email to her parents and on our class weebly.

Awesome response from her Mum. She immediately emailed back and commented on the weebly.
I will make sure to capture those warm fuzzies  for each of the children in my ALL writing group.

What a simple idea for my colleague - but so effective.

ALL Team Meeting

This morning the teachers involved in the ALL intervention, all met to discuss the gems, challenges and celebrations. We are being lead by the AP who is setting us - readings, supporting our ideas, challenging our thinking and helping us to collaborate.

My first thoughts were that this was just a meeting to tick the boxes for the invention. I was pleasantly surprised to sit around the table and share what has been happening for each of us. It first started with the team reporting/sharing what resonated with us from the reading - Gail Loane "I've got something to say".  It was so fantastic that the reading appealed on so many different levels and there was much nodding around the table.

Points made - Everyone can write something
                    - The importance of good feedback (modelled and children using the learning to improve each other's writing)
                    - The children's writing is about their lives/experiences
                    - Reading aloud their writing to share ideas - deeper features over surface features
                    - Taking time to craft ideas
                    - Sharing GOOD writing and other writer's work

So after that we shared - gems, challenges and celebrations. Gems are as the name suggests - moments that needed to be captured. These ranged from using sticky notes to sequence ideas, parking the planning and explicitly teaching ed endings, the children's willingness to write (these children are reluctant writers) and the use of oral language.

One teacher had used the ALL 'experience' time to send emails to the children's parents with a snapshot of what they had written with a personal note from the child. A great way to create an audience for the writing. The teacher was so impressed with the instant feedback from the parents. I need to give this idea a go, so that I have more buy in from the parents.

I shared my challenge for one child in my ALL group who has great oral language but the surface features (spelling, handwriting and lack of spaces between words) make it hard for her to read back what she has written. I realised the wealth of knowledge sitting around the table. From drawing a happy face on a finger, using handwriting cards so she can see correctly formed letters, using coloured paper and having larger lines for her to write on, were some of the ideas forthcoming.

The meeting/sharing was very empowering and has given me more enthusiasm again to do the best I can for these kids. What a journey we on together!

Using words to describe

We visited the bush last week and played "Hide and Seek". The children were excited and were able to give be some words to add to our planner. After looking through the words given I discovered a real lack of depth to their words - words like fun, nice, noisy etc.

So today I was given the opportunity to re-visit the bush and add some more words to our planner. We went outside into the bush situated along side our school again. It had been raining hard yesterday and the area was damp and rather chilly. The children were wearing mainly shorts with a sweatshirt. With the help of the Teacher Aide, we took the children blindfolded and made them stand in places on their own where they couldn't hear each other and waited...

It was interesting, a couple of children had to look, some stroked the trees around them, some stamped the ground and some shouted. So we 'released' them and asked them to tell us how they felt, what did they hear, did they smell anything and so on. We had prompted them before hand to think about these elements before we took them on their travels.

It was like pulling teeth, they didn't have many words for cold, (like the wind was whipping through the trees and the Teacher Aide was turning blue!). Some of the children were rubbing their legs and rubbing their arms but still they could only come up with words like cold, really cold...
After getting some words out of them and it was beginning to rain we went inside to write some synonym webs for cold and scared.

After the children came back to class, I asked a colleague for some resources around words and what she used to develop the language for her children who were struggling with writing as well. As we have been given some more allowance on our photocopying budget I have gone a bit mad.

Lots of laminating tonight, hopefully it will help tomorrow when we make more synonym web for describing words for out Hide and Seek writing.

Inquiry - How do I help my struggling writers?

 I have selected 8 children  to work with using the ALL programme. This is a programme where the children are exposed to guided teaching for a period of at least 170 minutes - 200 minutes per week. This will happen for 15 weeks with the expectation that the children will move a year's progress - A JUMP START. The children are exposed to more oral language, scaffolding, any assistance that the Teacher deems they need.

So, after selecting 6 children with advice and knowing that 2 others are on the fringe and would benefit with extra support, I have 8 children in my ALL group. The selected children were given an e-asTTLe writing test - this was a cold sample, a picture cue and time for brainstorming and then writing for 40 minutes and 5 minutes editing. The expectation was the children would write a piece of descriptive writing. Of these selected children 3 are diagnosed with dyslexia, one who wears rose-coloured glasses to help her with visual dyslexia.

As part of the preparation for ALL - the children were all surveyed to find out how they feel about writing and how the feel about being taught writing.

The children are given a special book - a science book where the left hand page is blank and the right hand page is lined like normal. The blank page is for gluing in planning, graphic organisers, stretching and chunking words and practising writing a sentence. The book is set out with a learning goal sheet, Essential spelling lists 1-7 and success criteria for writing. I call the group my writing club.

I have struggled to plan for these children as I want them to have some input as to what to write about. So I started my first session with them today. I first showed them their books, asked them what they what to write about. The children came up with ANZAC (as the classroom is full of ANZAC, as it is our topic study), holidays, dolphins, fantasy & futuristic stories, and animals. I have created a list to use and guide the children. I began talking about animals - Pets and I found out that all the children in the group all have a pet of some sort. Mostly cats and dogs as well as a horse.

This has become my starting point as I want to develop the children's ability to describe when writing and it is always good to start with something they're familiar with. As I needed to work with the rest of the class on deconstruction of the new genre, I sent the writing club group away with a fat strip of paper and the expectation they would write one sentence about their pet.

Tonight I wrote out their sentence using Comic Sans font and the children can use this as the starting sentence for the piece of descriptive writing. Tomorrow together we will plan using a main ideas spider graphic organiser, word banks and write what next step they need to focus on during their writing.

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