Rāmere, te 8 o te Noema 2024
Orewarewa whenua, puāwai māhuri
On the fertile ground of Orewa, the sapling blooms
Twin Pics
Are you looking for new image prompts for writing? Check out Twin Pics. A new pic is loaded each day and is AI-generated. Students need to use descriptive language to describe what they are seeing. Enter this into the prompt and see how close they get to the actual prompt.
I have also used these images in the classroom as a writing prompt and students love the diversity of the images and the ideas that stem from them.
Scratch Conference 2024
Ever thought about how you could be more productive with Scratch in your classroom? Every year, the Scratch Conference is hosted for educators around the world. There are both virtual and in-person options for attending. Below are some of the links to the sessions I found interesting. However, each link does offer a preview of other sessions. These sessions are straightforward and easy for educators to follow. Find out how you could incorporate Scratch or Scratch Jr into your programme.
Introduction and Welcome to Scratch Conference 2024
Students Developing a Digital Identity Using Scratch
Scratch Jr for Early Learning
MakeyMakey and Scratch!
Google Classroom – Practise Set Templates!
Google Classroom has updated their options on Practisse sets and now has templates available for kaiako to edit and deploy. One of the key ones is a Daily Check-In sheet. This is a great way for students to communicate with the teacher without the pressure of others.
Kāhui Resource: Mihi to thank visiting speakers and PD provider
E te whānau, we have written up a unique mihi, had it checked by Kereama Nathan and it’s hot off the press to be used for kaiako to thank someone who has been in to your kura to provide professional development or presented to your staff.
There’s a slideshow and audio recording to help you learn it. Put in the mahi, learn it by heart and you can appropriately ensure that your manuhiri and guest speaker/s are given the thanks that they deserve.
This is a less formal mihi written for anyone, any gender, any age to deliver.
Karawhuia! Give it a go!
The Mental Health Foundation New Zealand – Rethink The Mental Health Act
Our government has introduced a new Mental Health Bill to replace the current Mental Health Act (Mental Health Law).
Why change?
- The act is over 30 years old and has never been comprehensively reviewed
- The NZ Mental Health Foundation says it, “criminalises the people needing mental health support the most”.
- A person is assessed to be declared, “mentally disordered”.
- A Judge can use this law to force a person to receive mental health treatment
- Whether or not the person agrees
- Little say in what kind of treatment
- Little choice of where
- This includes being detained in a hospital and the length of time
- Some treatments considered traumatic and against human rights
- Considered racist – 2020, half of people subjected to solitary confinement were Maori.
The Mental Health Foundation says, “This forceful approach criminalises people who deserve support, care and a health response”.
The following information is from the Mental Health Foundation NZ Website:
The Mental Health (Compulsory Assessment and Treatment) Act 1992 is Aotearoa New Zealand’s mental health law. It covers how we treat people believed to need acute mental health support.
Every 46 minutes, a New Zealander goes under this law. This person could be you, or someone you love.
Click on the video below to learn more about what our current Mental Health Act is.
It’s widely agreed this law needs urgent change — and there are many important reasons why, including that it criminalises the New Zealanders needing mental health support the most.
Click on the video below to hear 6 reasons why the act should be changed.
On 1 October 2024, the Government introduced a new draft law, the Mental Health Bill, to replace the current Mental Health Act. Public consultation on the Mental Health Bill opened on 25 October, 2024.
You can now have your say on this law until midnight on Friday, 20 December 2024 by clicking here.
Learn more, and get involved in this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to change our mental health law for the better, by clicking on this link
New Curriculums are out!
The long-awaited refreshed (refreshed and refreshed!) curriculums have finally been released. There will be lots more information to come on these going forward, as we help unpack them for you. They can be accessed here.
Mathematics and Statistics Curriculum
Michelle Caldicott from Orewa College shares Literacy Strategies in Year 9-12 Sciences
As we move into the new NCEA environment where students will be assessed on literacy and numeracy in separate assessments, the individual subjects are taking more responsibility for developing literacy across a range of styles and contexts.
In middle school science, we have added tasks that rely on aspects of literacy that relate to the current Nature of Science rubrics. (this might change slightly when the refreshed science curriculum is released).
Each UKD document has a range of scaffolded tasks including-
1. CLOZE activities on paper or Key topic notes designed to be used digitally, after watching a video. There is a choice of key terms to use correctly. Here is an example from y10 Biotech.
2. Muddled paragraphs are good as a group activity for sorting ideas – an example from L2 Bio is given here. These offer a form of revision as well as emphasizing accurate writing.There is no perfect correct order. If the group has dominant personalities, giving each student 2-3 slips of the sentence parts means everyone has to participate.
Osmosis paragraph
Muddled Paragraph – cut up the phrases and put together in the correct order
Osmosis is the movement of water from
The cells swell and become turgid and this causes an increase in mass.
When carrot tissue is placed in solutions with a high water concentration,
When the carrot tissue is placed in a hypertonic solution (a low concentration of water),
When the carrot tissue is placed in a solution which is isotonic to its tissues,
The carrot tissue loses weight as the cells become plasmolysed
water moves into the cells by osmosis from the hypotonic solution (high water) to the hypertonic solution in the cells.
the water moves from the carrot tissue into the solution by osmosis.
membrane, down the concentration gradient.
and the tissue becomes flaccid.
there will be no gain or loss in weight as the carrot as the solution
has the same concentration of water.
an area of high concentration to a low concentration across a semi-permeable
3. Muddled steps for a process or experimental method to be put into correct order. Sometimes we print this out for a group to re- order, or simply get them to cut and paste into the correct order.
4. Key terms and definitions tables – initially giving them both to match up, then writing their own.
5. Create tasks – for Do – show your understanding by producing a poster, pamphlet, comic, or fictional story that explains the science.
Example from Y10 Biotech –
October was Dyslexia Awareness Month, so its a good time to remind ourselves of the importance of developing the best possible literacy programmes based on the most up-to-date research. This will give those children with a reading disability the greatest chance at success. Not all students who struggle with reading skills have dyslexia but a structured literacy approach will benefit everyone.
Dr. Stephanie Stollar has the following reminders about dyslexia:
“Dyslexia is a specific learning disability that is characterized by difficulty at the word level – reading, spelling, and text reading fluency. Students with dyslexia struggle with language, not with visual memory. These students often have difficulty breaking spoken words into phonemes and matching phonemes to graphemes.
Other fast facts about dyslexia:
There is no single test for dyslexia. It can’t be identified in the absence of instruction.
Students with dyslexia can learn to read, but it requires sustained and intensive instruction. Early intervention can minimize the impact of reading disabilities.
Teachers can watch for signs of dyslexia such as difficulty pronouncing words, decoding single words, recalling the right word, or spelling.
Screening for reading disabilities, such as dyslexia, can start in kindergarten. Taking action early can prevent or minimize the impact of dyslexia on learning to read.”
(note that kindergarten refers to Year 0/1 NZ equivalent)
It is a good time to reflect on the Ladder of Reading developed by Dr. Nancy Young. She will be in New Zealand in January 2025. Click on the link for details
Dr. Nancy Young NZ Tour
Some students struggle with sounds, others with spelling, and some with reading comprehension. It is important to work out what the area of difficulty is regardless of whether a student has dyslexia or not.
It is important that your school has an effective screening assessment and process in place such as DIBELS or similar and then follows up with further diagnostic testing of the identified at-risk students so that the appropriate interventions can be implemented. A one size fits all programme is not ideal especially for tier 2 and 3 instruction. The area of difficulty needs to specifically targeted and addressed.
If you’re not familiar with this tool take a look at the webinar by Emma Nahna linked below
DIBELS webinar
Kāhui Ako Hui Dates – Term 4 2024
Thursday 21st November – ASL @ Orewa College – WSL @ Orewa College 3.30pm
Thursday 5th December – ASL @ Orewa College – WSL @ Orewa College 3.30pm
