Lesson Study 07.05.19
Yesterday some of us met with Rhona Leonard to discuss a lesson study cycle to be taught this term. We will plan lessons collaboratively which will be taught in one class with observers looking at three target students. This is to examine how particular students learn and what they bring to the learning experience. The observers do not observe the teaching, they observe the learning for the targeted students. Students are interviewed after each lesson to discuss the learning which has taken place. Teachers then discuss their findings from the lesson, the information is then used to plan subsequent lessons. There will be three lessons in this cycle.
Rhona shared the following questions for us to reflect on:
1. What role does reflection and collaborative practice play in your current practice, before actually starting LS?
This year we are working a lot more staff wide discussing PD that we are doing - we are all trying to do blogs now about our teachers inquiry. This means the staff are doing a lot of collaborative work in meetings to understand our inquiry and what we want to do as a whole staff at Oruaiti school. This has made some very interesting discussions but I feel that it has been really worthwhile. As far as collaboration for planning we have talked about this at a syndicate level but have not done this so far. (I did used to plan maths with Kaiya when she was here). When we sat down to plan the writing lesson for Puriri class I think it took a wee while to decide what direction we wanted to go but after we got started we all took a role and all three of us worked really well together and you could tell it was a well co-constructed plan because it was delivered well by Petrina. I definitely think there is room for more of this collaborative planning to be taking place.
Here are some the questions I had in my original inquiry relating to planning in a syndicate:
What differences will you make to the way in which your syndicate/department
sets up instruction for reading/writing/maths?
How will you ensure maximum opportunity to learn for all students in your
syndicate/department?
What learning experiences will you include so all children are challenged?
2. Thinking about effective teaching and learning, what do you consider to be examples of this in your current practice, before starting LS?
In my current practice I really try to create a safe and supportive learning environment for all of my students, where they know they are valued - I will listen to their opinions and it is safe to take risks.
I also try to ensure my students make connections with prior learning and I try to provide lots of different opportunities to learn. I really liked the ideas about teachers maintaining high expectations of their students and at the beginning of the year this was a real key message for me from the TOD that Manaiakalani presented. See slideshow:
