Our first mini-teach meet!

On Tuesday, February 11th the Best Practice team ran our first mini-teachmeet and it was an awesome success.  We had a fantastic range of presenters who shared what they're doing in the classroom and at Fulston Manor School to drive forward outstanding practice.

The afternoon twilight session kicked off with an interactive presentation from Claire Forster, who explained how she is working in her classes to 'feed forward' with focused assessment criteria, teaching pupils how to effectively provide written and oral feedback and taking the time to allow pupils to respond/reflect/re-engage with the feedback they've been given.

Next up was Graeme Bowden, who shared all the amazing activities he has magpied from Twitter in his classroom/department - see link for his #sharingiscaring ideas: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/8npn5cwcjkvregh/YbAK_yXYZr/TeachMeet%20-%20Tues%2011%20February%202014/GBO%20TeachMeet%20Presentation%20-%20February%202014.pptx

Sian Hampshire followed up with her out of the box thinking in terms of using the classroom environment, including using different coloured electrical tape to turn her classroom floor into an interactive world map - see link for her presentation: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/8npn5cwcjkvregh/67YGtwqVL1/TeachMeet%20-%20Tues%2011%20February%202014/SIH%20-%20Using%20your%20classroom%20to%20promote%20progress%20-%20TeachMeet.pptx

Claire Williams then shared her engaging lesson ideas, including one the Best Practice team keenly nicked from our first TeachMeet experience (TMKent and Medway November 2013) - the TV plenary! Her brilliant ideas on engagement can be seen here: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/8npn5cwcjkvregh/SWACx5vB_U/TeachMeet%20-%20Tues%2011%20February%202014/CLW%20-%20ENGAGing%20ideas.pptx

The last of our first set of presenters was Honor Robbins who shared what the Skills SIG team have been developing - the WIGWAM: What is going well at the moment - an opportunity for pupils to self-assess at a mid-point in a piece of work, which has the opportunity for application in PSHE as well in terms of self-reflection.

When all our first presenters finished we had a quick Q&A session, where the presenters were asked what from their shared ideas they felt had greatest impact so far on their own practice.  Following this we had our audience break-out into working groups to see what they could come up with using #PoundlandPedagogy resources.  The purpose was to allow the smaller groups to use the resources available to plan ideas they could take away to their own classrooms.  There were some fantastic ideas in the making, however because of our tight twilight schedule we weren't able to share at the end what all the groups had come up with.

The second half of the twilight session was kicked off by yours truly!  I decided to share all the techy treats that keep me sane, with a focus on using Prezi as an alternative to PowerPoint and reinforcing the #sharingiscaring mantra already begun by Graeme's presentation.  My quick ideas can be found here - http://prezi.com/gnmk-puisoyh/some-techy-treats/?utm_campaign=share&utm_medium=copy

After my manic presentation we heard from the Coaching SIG, Gemma Davis and Louise Hay, about what they're doing to help teacher's at FMS help themselves through mentor-coaching. 

This was followed by Jasmine Mulligan's exciting ideas from a 'flailing NQT' (her words, not mine...I think she's completely rational and level headed :-) on motivation in the classroom.  Her wonderful ideas can be found here: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/8npn5cwcjkvregh/QHSiVTiEFN/TeachMeet%20-%20Tues%2011%20February%202014/JMU%20-%20Best%20Practice%20Stuff.pptx

Danielle Baker and Liz Heatley then shared what the AFL SIG has been working on in terms of Assessment for Learning - to be updated with link to their Prezi.

The afternoon was drawn to a close with a great presentation from Martin Waterman about his use of SAM Learning to engage and motivate GCSE pupils in terms of homework and to cut down on marking time. 

Overall the twilight miniteachmeet was a great success and the Best Practice group are looking forward to our full scale project with the consortium next month.  Thanks to all those who presented and all those who attended.  Any feedback on the twilight please to Graeme Bowden, Sian Hampshire, Claire Williams or me (Vicky Mitchell).

TTFN!

 

Purple Pens of Progress

 

What is it?:

A way for pupils to improve their work and overtly show PROGRESS before/during/after a lesson. 

 

How's it work?: 

1.  Get at least 16 purple pens (KCS sells multi-coloured pens in plastic candy jars which include purple pens as well as orange, green, teal, pink, red and black, or individual, cheap purple pens can be found at Wilkinsons).

 

2.  Provide time within the lesson for pupils to respond to feedback.

 

3.  Explain to pupils how purple pens of progress work - they must respond to any marking comment made by the teacher or by a peer to show their understanding of how to improve their work.  Then, pupils must make the improvement(s) suggested using the purple pens to show a difference between their previous work and the improvement

. 

 

What does this look like in a real lesson?:

This worked a treat when helping year 8s understand how to describe and explain survey results on peoples' perceptions of India. 

 

The focus of the lesson was to take the data presentation of survey results pupils created in a previous lesson and try to analyse what their results meant for how people viewed India in the UK.  In Geography our experience has been pupils struggle to extend beyond the descriptive when looking at data, so the entire lesson was devoted to drafting and improving their analysis. 

 

I modelled describing and explaining and then I set pupils off to describe and explain what their results meant in 10 minutes.  Then pupils passed their analysis to a peer who had a green pen and a pink pen for feedback (green for what they did well in their analysis and pink for what they could improve on and any spelling or grammar mistakes their peer marker could find).  Pupils had 7 minutes to read their partner's work and provide peer feedback (feedback techniques were modelled before pupils attempted this technique, to ensure the feedback was accurate and constructive).  Pupils then received back their draft analysis with peer comments, which they had to respond to using the purple pen - responses from the year 8s were mostly very good, examples included: 'Thanks for your feedback, I'll try harder to use better grammar next time' to 'I thought I was explaining clearly, but now I know I have to look back over my work to see where I went wrong.'  One pupil, without prompting, went back and extended one of his paragraphs of analysis, acting on his feedback that he needed to provide more reasons to back up his explanation.  Pupils then reflected on what the results overall meant for our key enquiry question 'How do people in the UK view India today?'  When I took their books in for marking I was so impressed with the results - their analysis was far better than what I expected based on experience with the previous year 8 cohort.

 

Where did this come from?:

I found this idea while checking out the following website - http://magpieandtry.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/26-purple-pages-of-progress.html.  Have a look to see how much further this idea on showing pupil progress can be taken.

Speed Dating

What is it?

A revision technique or way of getting pupils to teach each other about a new concept/theory.

How does it work?

Step 1:  Provide pupils with a number as they walk into the lesson - for the more courageous, ham it up and act like the most enthusiastic speed dating host/hostess that has ever existed.  Pupil numbers will correspond with a seat in the classroom, which has on it a sticky label with the name of a concept, case study, key term you want pupils to know.  Pupils must wear these labels during the lesson and 'become' that idea/key term/concept/theory.

Step 2:  Provide pupils with 10 minutes to become the expert on their sticky label - you could provide them with specific things they must know about it or you could leave this open to interpretation to create challenge.  Around the room you could create knowledge bars where pupils can pick up information about their sticky label - for year 11 revision I provided textbooks, computers, revision booklets and revision print offs - pupils needed to find the information for themselves from the knowledge bar.

You may want to use music to set the 'mood' - I have seen some teachers throw Lionel Richie on, however I've found using the following from classroom tools works just as well: http://www.classtools.net/education-games-php/timer

Step 3: The speed date - have the classroom set up in either a horse shoe or circle shape (this allows for the flow of pupils around the room in an organised manner).  Have the outer part of the horse shoe or circle move around in a clockwise direction, meeting and greeting other pupils and taking notes on
what their 'date' has to tell them.  This can again be open, with pupils choosing the information from their dates they think is most important, or can be more prescriptive with a graphic organiser provided for pupils to fill in when they meet their dates.

Timings - I've found 2 minutes with each date provides a sense of urgency and keeps pupils on their toes, however if covering a more indepth concept, it might be best to give pupils 3-5 minutes with each other.

Step 4: Reflect and re-meet - Pupils now need to be given a reflection card covering
1) Who did I meet that I really got along with (the key concept they are now very confident in their understanding)? 
2)  Who would I like to spend more time with (the key concept they feel they need to revisit to gain further understanding)? 
3) Who did I not get along with at all and why (the key concept they still don't understand and find difficult to explain)?

Pupils then take their cards to those three dates and meet back up to discuss further.  Timings here can be more flexible to meet the needs of pupils to gain confidence.

Step 5:  Group date - Pupils will now need to either be given an exam question including the information they have learnt or will need to create something from their learning - you could have pupils group themselves according to what information is linked together and create a product based on their group understanding.

Possible adaptations???

• Pupils choose their topic, rather than having that assigned, based on their confidence levels.
• Pupils provide peer feedback on their dates and set targets for learning (an 'it's not me, it's you' moment)

Tweet2Terrific

What is it?

A strategy to improve literacy skills using social media as a hook.

How does it work?

Pupils are to 'tweet' a peer what they have learnt or the definition of something or an explanation for how something works.  Pupils can use text speak and # just as they would on Twitter and must stick very strictly to the 140 character limit.

Next, pupils pass their tweets to a peer who reads, deciphers and then rewrites their peer's tweet into a terrific sentence/paragraph about the same concept - must be grammatically correct and will not have a world limit.

Possible adaptations???

• In upper school pupils can actually tweet the teacher their ideas, teacher runs the feed to their twitter page on the board and pupils can then pick from the responses on the board which they'd like to make terrific (see example from @FMGeoggers to the right:
• As in the original, however a third step can be added where another peer assesses the finished terrific sentence/paragraph.

Peer Check and Send Service

What is it:
An opportunity for pupils to improve and assess each other's work.

How does it work:
Explain to pupils they are going to 'check and send' the work already completed by their peers.  This can be 'sold' by explaining the Passport Check and Send Service from the Post Office.

Supply peer checkers with either the correct version of information you want all pupils to have (and/or) improved/extended information they all should have - they must then 'check' the information gathered by their peers for accuracy/detail  This can be done with different coloured pens to make it more 'official'.

They must then 'send' a corrected or new piece of information to their peer's work and then hand this work back to the original owner.

Ideas for adaptations???

• Provide pupils with a tick-list as part of the check and send service, they can then glue into their peer's work
• Provide a 'charge' for this service and make certain pupils the check and send service operators (G&T pupils) in the classroom - can then be embedded routine.