Wednesday 6 December 2017

Writing Inquiry (T4 2017)


This slide deck is my writing inquiry for Term 4 2017. Although I had previously been compiling reflections and evidence through my blog, I had to change as our school had to send our inquiries to ERO and they wanted everyone to do it the same way.

Each week we documented, reflected upon and had evidence for what we did.

BOY 2016
MOY 2016
EOY/BOY
2016/2017
MOY 2017
EOY 2017
 Comment on success
Joshua
AT L1
AT L2
BL2
Below
BL3
At
 Joshua needs support to stay on topic and task, but when focused, can write an story appropriate to the task. 
Stanley
BL2
AT L2
AT L2
At
BL2
Well below
No shift. Stanley is at school maybe 1-2 days a week. When he is here, because he wasn't here the day before, he doesn't know what is going on. He struggles to do work independently because he doesn't have solid routines of being in the classroom.
Reign
No data
No data
No data
No data
BL2
Well Below
 When he is focused, Reign can write a 1 page story that makes sense. He has a lot of techniques built into him from previous schools that are weird and hinder him from focusing on his writing. I think he would benefit next year from having visual aids/checklists to help him remember what he needs to put into each story.
Ariki
New stu
BL1
BL2
AT L2
At
BL3
At
 Ariki can write confidently independently. He has only been at school for about 4 days in the whole of term 4, so BL3 is an OTJ. He takes on board feedback and can reread his work to check it makes sense and knows how he can improve it.
Paula
No data
No data
No data
No data
L1
Well Below (ESOL)
Paula came to school and couldn't speak, write or read in English. For him to achieve L1 is a huge deal. He can now write independently.
Lopiseni
AT L1
BL2
AT L2
At
BL2
Well Below
 Lopiseni hates writing. Maybe one out of every 5 writing sessions he will actually do any work. For him, I think he needs to work on confidence more than actual skill. He has skills, just refuses to use them.
Sosaia
AT L1
AT L2
AT L2
At
BL3
At
Saia has made the biggest confidence shift out of all these kids. He can write 2-3 pages independently, brainstorm his ideas, reread his own work and check it. He has learnt new literacy skills and I can see he is trying to use them in his writing. 

Although only 3 students are 'at' for National Standards, I think they have all made progress towards achieving their goals, which were;
Goals
Write more than 5 sentences independently.
Use full stops, capital letters correctly without reminders.
Use speech marks and paragraphs correctly with limited support.
Remember to elaborate and give detail without T reminder.
Gain confidence - be able to write without 1:1 T support.

Things I think made the most difference to students
- Teaching them how to edit and make changes to their writing
- Getting them to talk about their ideas first, then write independently, then check with a buddy.

Things students think made the most difference to their learning
- specifically showing how to use dialogue (Stanley)
- writing the words for me to copy and telling me the spelling (Paula - ESOL)
- teaching us new words in reading, then we can use them in writing (Ariki)
- buddy marking to make a story better - teaches us to look for mistakes in our own writing so we can fix our mistakes in our own writing (all)
- kids WANT to try little groups where they have different skills to focus on instead of whole class writing (all)
- kids WANT to do spelling next year to learn new words and how to spell them (all)

Things I think I could do better next time
- using visual aids for checklists or brainstorms
- having writing groups every week. A lot of the time we did whole class stuff, and I would pull these students down as a group. Maybe having set groups would have made more of a difference.

Maths Inquiry (T4 2017)



This slide deck is my maths inquiry for Term 4 2017. Although I had previously been compiling reflections and evidence through my blog, I had to change as our school had to send our inquiries to ERO and they wanted everyone to do it the same way.

Each week we documented, reflected upon and had evidence for what we did.




BOY 2016
MOY 2016
EOY 2016
BOY 2017
EOY 2017
Comments
Syraiah-Lee
S4
S3
ES5
ES5
SE6
At
Huge progress. She has achieved all the goals set in this inquiry and more. Her confidence has grown hugely and she is more aware of what she can and can't do.
Stanley
S4
S4
S5
ES5
SE5
Below
Again, Stanley has not made progress this year because he is never at school. The one or two days he does attend school, he doesn't know what is happening because he hasn't been here in so long. The learning he misses in week 1 is built upon in week 2 (and so on), so he is always behind.
Lopiseni
S2
S3
S4
S4
SE5
Below
 Lopiseni has made progress. He has learnt to use place value partioning to solve add/sub problems. He can skip count. He has memorised some 2 and 5 times tables. He has low confidence and often refuses to participate in learning.
Sosaia
S3
ES5
ES5
ES5
S6
Above
 Same as Syraiah-Lee - huge progress! Saia's confidence and willingness to participate in maths is completely different. He has felt success, and he likes it. He has achieved all the goals set for him.
Villiami
S4
S4
S4
S4
SE5
Well-Below
 Viliami's confidence has grown in Maths. He can use place value partitioning (most of the time) to solve add/sub problems. Although he is still well-below, he has made shifts this year whereas last year he didn't. A win is a win.

I believe all the students have made progress towards, or have achieved their goals, which were;
Goals
- Transfer skip counting knowledge to be able to use times tables.

- Memorise 2, 5 and 10 times tables.
- Learn to skip count in 3s, 4s and 6.s
- Use PV knowledge to solve problems. (PV partitioning)
- Be able to identify how many 1s, 10s, 100s and 1000s in a number.

Things I think made the most difference to students
- Maths clinics. Ottilie and I did clinics where students could sign up to attend the one they wanted. It helped us both to cater more to the needs of the students. Instead of both classes having a range of stages 4-7, we could have one class of stages 4-5 and the other of 6-7. We could do more targeted teaching at their level. This also helped them feel successful as they weren't always being outdone by the stage 6-7 kids.
- Having a focus on learning and memorising times tables.

Things students think made the most difference to their learning
- Learning times tables - buddies, bracelets, having it on the wall, practicing skip counting together, I tested them on times tables etc. In small group as well, where they were all at the same level.
- Kids liked being able to choose their own learning (cross-grouping).
- Saia knew that his next step was to learn division facts.

Things I think I could do better next time
- Maths groups instead of whole class. I definitely want to do cross-grouping again, it makes things a million times easier.