At our  Kāhui Ako after school meeting last Thursday, there was a real buzz of excitement as leaders shared and developed their workshop abstracts for our annual Kāhui Ako Conference, Tuesday, January 28th, 2019. Mark the date in your diary to join our whole Kāhui Ako for a day of workshops, fantastic speakers and entertainment.  

Our 2019 conference theme is ‘Whiria te tangata’– Weave the people together. With our Kāhui Ako focus on inquiry and collaboration we extend our invitation to all of our community teachers and principals to share your inquiry journey in a workshop. Team up with a colleague and share what has inspired you, what has worked for you, and what you will try next!  If you are interested in leading a workshop please feel free to contact us by November 10th indicating your interest or any further information you may need.

Invitations for teachers to sign up for workshops will be going out next month, with workshops finalized by mid November.  

Visits to our schools.

Next week Sandy Blackburn and Linda Rubens will visit Wainui School staff to lead professional development in an after school meeting on ‘Introducing the  Learning Progression Framework – Key to the Curriculum Progress Tools.  

This pilot will focus on

• Why we are using the L.P.F. for our Kahui Ako
• What the difference is between the curriculum tools of PaCT and LPF
• What the LPF progressions look like
• How the LPF illustrations work
• How the learner can use the LPF to identify next steps in their learning
• How LPF can support teachers when making OTJs

If your school is interested in a similar session for their staff, please contact either Sandy or Linda to set up a suitable time, either this term or in 2019.

Rōpū taunaki / Learning Support Focus Group

Linda Rubens and Leanne Evans took a drive out to Mt Wellington to attend a PD session on iPad accessibility. While this session was targeted towards learning support students, we soon realised that all students and adults for that matter could benefit from some of the functions available under the Accessibility framework. To give an example, we have found that students prefer their screens with the brightness at a minimum, which generally means that the teacher can barely make out anything on the screen. However, if they went to Settings and Accessibility on their iPad, they have the option of inverting colours and changing how warm or cool the colours should be. This was developed for people with low vision, but works equally well for students wanting a dimmer screen, that we can all read!

Guided Access, which can again be found in the Accessibility category on the iPad, can lock students into one app. This was designed with ADHD students in mind, but could help all students who get easily distracted. Lastly, and this is a good one for all of us with ‘older eyes.’ In the Accessibility setting, you can increase and bold the font. This makes emails, messages, and everything you read on your iPad and iPhone bigger, bolder and basically easier to read.
Ngaio pukapuka kōrero / Professional Reading

Continuing from last weeks ULearn reflection I have included the following links from two conference presenters Karen Boyes, and Mark Treadwell.

‘Winner of the NZ Educator of the Year 2017 and 2014 and NZ Speaker of the Year award in 2013, Karen Boyes is a sought after speaker who continually gets rave reviews from audiences around the world. Her dynamic style and highly informative content—which turns the latest educational research into easy-to-implement strategies and techniques — set her apart from others in her field.’  Follow the link to her website here

Everything is hard before it is easy- Karen Boyes  As our senior students in our Kāhui Ako prepare for their up and coming NZCA exams the following blog by Karen Boyes may be useful. Follow the link here.

Goal Setting in Primary School  – Karen Boyes

An essential part of learners being independent and self directed is their ability to set and reflect on goals for their success. At each age and stage of schooling there are several suggested key ideas and strategies that will scaffold the learning for learners to be able to be highly efficient and proficient goal setters further up the school. Ensuring the foundations are strong will facilitate success later. Follow the link here to read a blog by Karen Boyes .

What does the future of learning look like?

Author of The Future of Learning, MARK TREADWELL, says we need to embrace learning systems that have proved over thousands of years to be far more equitable and successful than rote learning has proven to be over the past two hundred years.

Question: If the purpose of education is to ready young people for the life ahead of them, what should the future of learning look like? Follow the link to an earlier 2018 publication from Mark Treadwell  here.If you know of colleagues who have not yet joined our Orewa Kāhui Ako Community Page  on Google+, please do share this link with them.