Culturally Responsive Practice

Teacher Only Day @  Breens
30 March 2016

Part 1 -  Ross: Ministry of Maori Development

(A river that comes from the mountain is most correct for Mihi) .

Effective Literacy Practices

Expectations - high for every child's performance - ok is not good enough ... shoot for the top of the mountain

Knowledge of the Learner - Do your students know as much about you as you know about them?
.... connectedness - hard to 'rebel' against, generates levels of engagement, responsiveness and positivity ... - Beginning of the year present an in depth mihi

Knowledge of Literacy Learning - Learning the code, making meaning, thinking critically
Use School Journals

Engaging Learners with Text - rich text experiences

Instructional Strategies - range of instructional strategies to help all students become active members of a literate society ... just as many Maori learn by doing as any other culture, just as many learn by reading as any one else - don't just assume.

Partnerships - partnerships are collaborative relationships that contribute to and support students' learning


Read Colouring in the White Spaces

'We can't do anything about what happened at home or on the way to school, nor about some of the systems in schools. But as the person standing in front of them, charged with teaching them, I certainly can make some changes.  Tony Renshaw, Te Mana Korero video

PART 2  - Iceburgs and Fluffy Bunnies

Sharyn Gousmett - Educational Psychologist

Every behaviour stems from the brain and the pathways that have formed. 

It wan't the bit at the top of the iceburg that sunk the Titanic but all the ice underneath ... to change the behaviours at the top we need to deal with all the 'ice' at the bottom.

Phases of Escalation

1) Calm - What does that look like for the child? ... following rules, responding to praise, being on task. What can I do? structure of classroom, predictability, attention for positive behaviours, teach social behaviours (should be 4 positives to 1 negative)
2) Trigger - What triggers might be present? Ones we have control of; conflict with adult or student, change in routine, mismatch between requirement and actual ability level, limited strategies to be able to identify the source of their problem thus misinterpreting situations, making error in their work, or avoiding new work if they perceive they will make a error, being corrected, .... Triggers we don't have influence over; health, sleep, quality of home, parental ability. What to do ... work alongside student to identify source of the problem, explore possible solutions and implications of these, provide options for time out of class, provide opportunities for de-brief and catch ups during the day, develop a plan in advance to resolve any problems, practice going through the plan when calm.
3) Agitation - What does the student look like? ... non-conversational (even talkative kids - flight or fight), moving in and out of groups, off task then on-task. What to do ... acknowledge they are having a difficulty, give them an option to have space from the class, do a preferred activity for a short time, provide an independent activity rather than group, provide a movement activity for the individual or whole class. 
4) Acceleration -  What behaviours is the student showing? ... increased questioning/arguing, off-task provoking others. What to do ... avoid escalating behaviour (don't shout, take it personally, get in their face, space or argue), don't show reactive behaviour, instead disengage briefly, regain your composure and then return, pause rather than respond immediately, show that staff can be calm and controlled, use calm, soft and serious tone, Focus on behaviour while maintain respectful tone, be brief and focus on  expected behaviour, maintain distance where possible to avoid further escalations, if needed take class outside.
5) Peak -  Indicators ... physical abuse, severe tantrums, hyperventilation. What to do ... focus on student and staff safety, notify staff of situation, if needed use lock-down procedures.
6) De-escalation - Behaviours include; confusion, attempts to reconcile, withdrawal/denial, may respond well to calm tasks, blame projection, responsive to clear brief directions. What to do ... allow space to calm down (can take quite some time), remove any confrontation, seperate from classmates, independent work that is easy to follow, continue with task until compliant, active work like colouring or copying is better than reading, don't enforce the consequence
7) Recovery - Indicators: want to become engaged in non-interactive activities, willingness to resume work, subdued behaviour, denial and defensive regarding out of control behaviour. What to do .. help student to return to normal classroom activities, debrief when appropriate (do they know when this will happened and how it will take place), document the incident, focus on making it right.  As a staff debrief and do some calming activities.

Students need to know the adults are calm and in control, whichever stage they are in.

The purpose of discipline is to teach and not to punish.

Unlocking Formative Assessment

Unlocking Formative Assessment by Shirley Clarke, Helen Timperley and John Hattie



Strategies that has been tried and tested in schools over several years and have made the greatest impact when implemented are;

• making sure the learning objective of a task is clear
• separate the learning intention and success criteria from the task instruction

Success Criteria

The purpose of Success Criteria is to make the chn absolutely sure of what is in the teacher's mind as the criteria for judging their work. Sometime students can be invited to help create the Success Criteria. Remember to tell the students how this is relevant to them, how it will be useful in the future. Display the Learning Intention and Success Criteria visually. If possible get students to read aloud.

Impact on Children

• children are more focused
• quality of work improves
• behaviour improves as task focus increases
• chn have greater ownership
• chn are automatically self-evaluative

Student Self-Evaluation

'Unlocking' chn's thinking and raising their self-esteem;

•  'I'm really pleased you've noticed you're stuck. I need to find out what you need and then you'll be able to learn something new'.
• 'Well done - if you are finding it hard, you are learning! Let's find out how you can be helped with that learning'.
• 'It's great that you are finding that difficult - see if you can tell me what it is that I need to help you with, so that you will be able to learn something new'.
• 'I'm a bit worried that you're finding it too easy. I'm pleased with what you have done so far, but unless you are finding this more difficult, you're probably not going to learn something new'.

Chn seem to have been liberated when they realise that tchrs welcome hearing the difficulties they are experiencing because the difficulties signal what needs to happen to enable them to learn more. Sts enjoy finding out that other chn have the same thoughts, problems and successes. 

Feedback

Various feedback studies have found that feedback is most useful when it focuses on the LI of the task rather than on other features. Don;t give feedback on spelling if the LI is to add more description.

The best feedback is done face-to-face but written notes commenting on progress against the LI and hints on how to improve are most useful when face-to-face is not possible. If tchrs are not noticing good effort chn can become disheartened and give-up.

First highlight three success phrases then follow with 'closing the gap' prompts;

1) reminder prompt - 'Say more about how you feel about this person.'

2) scaffolded prompt - 'Can you describe how this person is a good friend'? or 'Describe somethings that happened which showed you they were a good friend'. or 'He showed me he was a good friend when ... (finish this sentence).

3) example prompt - Give sts option of 2 words or phrases and say 'Choose one of these or your own'.

'The test of a successful education is not the amount of knowledge that a pupil takes away from a school but his appetite to know and his capacity to learn. If the school sends out chn with a desire for knowledge and some idea of how to acquire and use it, it will have done its work. Too many leave school with the appetite killed and the mind loaded with undigested lumps of information'. Abbott 1999

Ipsative referencing - st's attainment is measured against his or her previous attainment, particularly when it is referenced to the individual student's targets.

Targets

Targets need to be visible whilst chn are working eg flap in the back of the work book. Sts need to be told what it means to meet a target eg. 'You've met your target when you and I believe you will always be able to do that thing. A target needs to be quantified by a number of letter eg. 

• try to use 'but' and 'then' in between some of your sentences
• do not use a rubber for the next five pieces of writing
• remember to have 'b' and 'd' around the right way.

Questioning

Questioning is a good strategy to encourage sts to think more deeply about a subject.

• invite students to elaborate ... 'Say a little bit more about ...'
• echo ... 'So you think that ...'
• non-verbal invitations ... eye contact, tilt of head nod ...
• make a personal contribution from your own experince ... 'I remember when ...'
• clarify ideas ... 'I can tell that is the case because ...'
• make a suggestion ... 'You could try ...'
• reflect on topics ... 'Yes, I sometimes think that ...'
• offer information or make observations on a topic ... 'It might be useful to know that ...'
• speculate on a given subject ... (encourages sts to explore ideas and understand that uncertainty is part of the process).

Raising Students Self Esteem

Chn should know that learning is a continuum on which we are all placed and that, given enough time and input, anyone can master.  One perceived problem is that learning is linked to the rate in which learning takes place. Sts assume someone who catches on quickly has a greater ability.

The problem with external rewards as sts are encouraged to strive for the reward not intrinsic success. Written comments have been found to be more beneficial. 

Sts often prefer to be praised in private. Praise should be directed towards the confidence to keep trying, the willingness to keep trying alternative ways to process information and to the correctness of the performance ... 'You're really great because you have come to understand how to do these problems correctly.'

'Where the classroom culture focuses on rewards, "gold stars', grades or place-in-the-class ranking, then pupils look for ways to obtain the best marks rather than at the needs of their learning. The reported consequence is that where they have any choice, pupils avoid difficult tasks. They also spend time and energy looking for the 'right answer'. Many are reluctant to ask questions out of fear of failure. Pupils who encounter difficulties and poor results are lead to believe that they lack ability, and this belief leads them to attribute their difficulties to a defect in themselves abut which they cannot do a great deal. So they 'retire hurt', avoid investing effort in learning which could only leas to disappointment and try to build up their self-esteem in other ways. Whilst the high achievers can do well in such a culture, the overall result is to enhance the frequency and the extent of underachievement. What is needed is a culture of success, backed by the belief that all can achieve.' (Black and William, 1998)