This I believe about teaching...

There's a few posts starting to pop up around the blogosphere from the group working towards their Digital Pedagogical Licence Advanced from the Smart Classrooms Framework. Today @jnxyz shared an extract from his belief statement. I really like how directly and simply he's framed what he's shared and really recommend going to have a read.

As I blogged about a couple of days ago I'm presenting my belief statement in a multimedia fashion (typical for Mobbsey really, above and beyond and putting far more pressure on myself than necessary...). It's coming together quite well, my big problem is going to be stopping. Because of the nature of how I want to present my information I've had to consider making navigation as simple as possible and as a result have split my belief statement into four sections:

• This I believe about Knowledge (presented as a basic test video)
  
• This I believe about Learning (presented as an interactive Wordle)
  
• This I believe about Teaching
• This I believe about ICTs in Learning and Teaching
  

I haven't finalised how I want to present the Teaching and ICT sections yet. I'd like to use photostory for one of them, with a voice over and the other I may keep as "traditional" text. I'll admit I'm pushing the boundaries, and honestly, it's motivated by more than just trying to do something "flashy". I've not seen many portfolios that are more than text based responses to the guiding questions, why not? Is it that we've not been brave enough? Is it that it's easier? Is it that we haven't thought about the other options? It's probably a little bit of all of those things, but I've long been a believer in Gardner's Multiple Intelligences and am a more recent convert to the ideas behind Universal Design for Learning and presenting a purely text based portfolio seems quite limiting from these points of view.

Unfortunately, at this stage I can't share my interactive Wordle with you or a completed belief statement draft, but I can share some thoughts around the next section on my list to tackle.

This I believe about teaching...

1. Relationships are the key to any class's success
2. Teach the students you have, not the students you wish you had
3. It's best to not know everything about the topic
4. It's best to ask questions (colleagues, students, others)
5. You can't ask the students to do something you wouldn't at least try yourself
6. Your job is more than content, you're a role model in social interactions and ideals too
7. Firm and fair will win over more classes than iron fist or light and fluffy
8. Helping them find their strengths prepares them for success
9. Guiding them towards their own answers is more important than them getting it right the first time
10. Make sure it's their work and that you're not doing it for them
    
11. By the end of it your job is to be there when they need your input
12. It's more about helping students to master skills than knowledge
13. It's about helping them grow and broaden their awareness and understanding of the world around them
14. It is about the students and not the teacher

I know my list isn't done yet. What would you add to it?

Something Different

A couple of weeks ago I sent a rather odd email to the two other Year 11 English teachers who are timetabled on the same line as me. it went something like:

Was thinking since we're all on at the same time if we could look at opening the doors and doing some collaborative work, maybe even some rotation style stuff. Are you interested in trying something a little bit different?

My wonderful team teachers jumped on the idea and we talked about it briefly before we got lost in the day-to-day busyness of school and then a week out I sent another email and organised a longer meeting:

Ok, so some idiot (me) had some dumb (aka brilliant) idea about doing some wizz bang thing with three classes of Yr 11 Eng in Wk 8.

This was the idea - in order to give students opportunity to personalise their learning we would run a series of rotation activities complemented by a series of optional lectures. The collaborative week would run over a weeks worth of lessons (three 70 minute sessions across a week) and students would be required to keep a learning passport of their completed activities. As they completed activities they were required to show a teacher who had to verify that the work was completed satisfactorily. Over the course of the week students needed to complete eight rotation activities and attend a minimum of one lecture over the course of the week.

It was an interesting week and the three of us are sitting down together to record a reflection session tomorrow afternoon. I'm really looking forward to hearing their take on it all.

Teaching = Changing

"As teachers we must believe in change, must know it is possible, or we wouldn't be teaching - because education is a constant process of change. Every single time you "teach" something to someone, it is ingested, something is done with it, and a new human being emerges."

- Leo Buscaglia