Learning without Limits

Learning without limits - Dame Alison Peacock - 23.10.14

Lifting the lid on learning- keeping the door open for children to learn

The conflict between professional principles which drive you and the accountability and pressure from external forces.

Raising aspirations of low attaining children and parents 

Escaping from the bottom set:

Labelling leads to, " destruction of dignity so massive and pervasive that few subsequently recover from it." Hargreaves 

Trivial things like where you put your bag etc. can dominate a child's experience of school depending on the atmosphere and priority of the school- FEAR

The same can be said for children labelled in academic terms

Negative feedback can hinder learning and aspirations- emotional impact

Teachers following lesson plans rather than using professional judgement just to meet curriculum needs.

Teachers and pupils disengaged- poor behaviour/ low aspirations 

Making an irresistible curriculum- excite children and empower staff

Currently, we have freedom but it doesn't feel as if we have direction 

Academic Studies

http://learningwithoutlimits.educ.cam.ac.uk/downloads/creatinglwl_forumarticle.pdf

http://learningwithoutlimits.educ.cam.ac.uk/downloads/creatinglwl_forumarticle.pdf

Learning without Limits Books

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Learning-without-Limits-Susan-Hart/dp/033521259X

The Research School

http://thewroxham.org.uk

Classroom Based Study

http://www.cambridgeassessment.org.uk/Images/challenge-and-success-alternative-approaches-to-assessment-in-the-primary-classroom-alison-peacock-presentation.pdf

Teachers arrive at school defeated- under pressure to cover all areas of the curriculum, all the 'we have to' things, marking and evidence to show the feedback that is happening.

Building on excitement in the classroom rather than suppressing it.

Wroxham School 

Children at Wroxham love their school: children learn by choosing their own challenges, independent learning not forced, lots of fun elements around the school-bus, jeep, someone dressed as a rabbit.

Children collaborate and know how to work well with others- trusted to make sensible choices

Circle Groups- Y6 work with younger children

Pupil Voice - has a powerful role in the school and children are empowered and taking ownership

A Team Approach 

School improvement didn't come from monitoring, work scrutiny or any other 'traditional' methods

Developing a team amongst the staff

Living a vision of trust, co agency and inclusion 

A listening school

Mutual respect

Enabling and supporting

Monitoring quality of learning NOT quality of teaching 

Encourage risk taking

Staff self- regulate, manage, improve, motivate

Children do the same

Whole School Democracy 

Everyone is valued

A participative culture

Weekly mixed age circle meetings- instead of assembly- shared agenda: game, news bulletin, shared discussion. Democratic Engagement 

Older children act as role models- they value younger children, raises responsibility, model teaching practice, culture of respect

Shared decisions

Challenging yourself is valued BY ALL

making sure the curriculum has a little bit more to stimulate and engage children

Sparking interest and keeping it going- with staff and children 

Professional Learning:  Trust

Listening not telling

Freedom for staff to make own judgements 

Put in place contexts that create rich contexts for learning 

Open-ended curriculum experiences

Connecting books and Brains

Evidence in books etc. surface evidence doesn't provide a full picture of the thinking and process behind learning

Giving children a quality assessment process NOT just in books- evidencing process

Writing is to convey meaning- needs an audience- motivates- who will read my ideas?

Children want to boast about their learning

Making school unmissable 

Lesson studies rather than lesson observations 

Teachers and children NOT graded

Once graded- feedback is irrelevant 

Co Agency

Thinking in partnership

Making suggestions

Shared involvement

Help bring ideas to fruition

Feeding in ideas and materials 

ASKING QUESTIONS 

Challenging

Everybody

Maximise opportunities for all staff to learn from each other

Value different ways of working 

Capitalise on differences to inspire teaching

Create structures to encourage mutual support 

Dispositions

Openness

Questioning

Inventiveness

Persistence

Stability

Generosity

Empathy

New Curriculum 

Dialogic pedagogy

Authentic first hand experiences

Open ended challenging tasks

Language for learning- talk is important 

Creating First Hand Experiences

Historical features to support understanding- Celtic roundhouse, trenches etc.

Assessment 

No 'ability' groups

Children choose levels of challenge- mainly in maths, literacy children make their own list of personal challenges and tick them off when they think they have achieved them

http://vimeo.com/69709930

Feedback is positive, high quality discussions

Secretarial skills- enabling children to keep up with their ideas- eg. Handwriting practise

Learning partners- choose partners for a week etc. 

High expectations 

Lesson study

Background metric for triangulation- levels recorded but not shared with children or parents

Discussion with staff- who are exceeding your expectations, who is in line, who is below expectations 

Based on Y2 performance but viewed of in terms of expectation and challenge

Whole school accountability NOT just teacher in the class

Teachers need to model challenge, openness and reflection

Working with Families

Trust

Openness

Learning Reviews

Reports written in a dialogue with children

Family Learning

Keeping learning interview records/ notes

Children produce a learning review video/PowerPoint and evidence from work, discuss successes and challenges with child, parents and teacher- How can I improve? 

Children identify issues and think of a way to resolve them

Y6 children choose if they feel confident to do level 6 paper

Children choose whether or not to work in a fast paced level 6 target group

Whole family approach- child, head, teacher, parents

100% attendance 

Use a whole day and evening

Reports

Children write comments about their learning throughout the year

Comments passed to next class teacher or used throughout the year

Language of school talks about challenges and next steps NOT levels

Booster groups are supplemented by a Maths Club which children sign up to depending on their challenges- squash and biscuits provided!

Developing a culture of togetherness 

Shared responsibility

Powers shared amongst all not a select few

Child behaviour 

http://www.alfiekohn.org/index.php

In Summary:

Children are not labelled

Children are given responsibility for their learning

Children feel empowered (co agency)

Children's learning is celebrated and shared

Staff put children at the heart of planning

Feedback is positive but not graded

Learning experiences are exciting

Self assessment is key

Families engage in all aspects of learning and evaluation 

Learning Loops

Our Year 5 topic has traditionally been World War 2, however, in light of curriculum changes, we have updated with a selection of BIG questions to inspire curiosity. 

Our BIG question was, How does the past affect our future?

<img style="max-width:100%" src="//cdn.thinglink.me/api/image/571046082818080769/1024/10/scaletowidth#tl-571046082818080769;1043138249'" class="alwaysThinglink"/><script async charset="utf-8" src="//cdn.thinglink.me/jse/embed.js"></script>

First of all, we shared ideas and questions using padlet and from there we took aspects the children wanted to look at more detail-the smaller loops which answer the bigger questions.

As we go through the term and more learning is achieved, work is added to reflect this. Also, as more learning occurs more questions and more loops are added too.

Hole in the Head Presentations

This year, my Year 6 class have looked at Edward Jenner, Charles Darwin and Dr Barnardo all usually following some kind of poster or biography idea for the children to show their learning. However, for Gandhi, I wanted something different.
I stumbled upon this blog post http://jivespin.wordpress.com/2013/12/03/head-in-a-hole-a-different-way-of-reviewing-learning-and-progress/ which talked about Hole in the Head presentations.

The children enjoyed this activity and it allowed for those that were less confident at speaking in front of others to feel more comfortable as the could 'hide' behind the poster.

Key Features of the Poster:

• Picture/drawing of the person's body
• Thought bubbles (could have good and bad viewpoints)
• Speech bubbles
• Name of person
• Mini-profile - age etc.

The simple structure allowed lots of creativity, especially with the speech bubbles as the children talked about Gandhi's Salt Protest. The children were able to present their information in the 3rd person or as Gandhi which really added to their work.


Using technology:

• You could use Morfo to recreate the character speaking
• Use Explain Everything to annotate around a picture or drawing and record the presentation
• Use Thinglink to bring the picture to life with lots of video and captions

Using technology in Maths Investigations

Recently, I delved into the archives to find some of the classic maths investigations which have been done many times around the world. I decided to revisit the 5 multilink cube problem, known by some as Pentominoes or Zids and Zods by others. Either way, children need to make as many different shapes as possible using the 5 cubes.
Previously, children haven't recorded their findings, have drawn them on squared paper or  my TA has taken photographs. This time, I used the app Pic Collage for the children to record and photograph this themselves. The beauty of using this app was that the children could rotate pictures on the app or physically move the shape and photograph it and compare them with their previous shapes. This was great for getting rid of duplicate shapes and also supported children visualising a rotated shape ( a classic KS2 SAT question)

Whilst this worked well for this investigation, I feel there is a lot more potential to record all the work and thinking that goes into a maths investigation. Having the 'whole picture' would really support AT1 assessment. For more problem solving resources try:


nrich.maths.org


inquirymaths.co.uk






























Possible Next Steps:

1. Export the Pic Collage to Thinglink app and add video of the children working or presenting their findings. Children could also add further pictures of any tables or graphs they have produced.
2. Export the Pic Collage to Explain Everything, children could then annotate around the picture, record a soundtrack taking somebody through their method of investigation. Graphs and tables could then be produced using the Explain Everything app.

The Power of Skype

This year, I decided to sign up to Skype in the classroom just to see what could be achieved by technology. As Twitter will testify, technology wins!

#skypeclassroom

Brazil

International Week came around early in October. Year 6, were assigned Brazil and within a few days I had linked up with a school in Brasilia. The children were shocked, intrigued and wanted to ask as many questions as possible. They particularly like the basketball style vest uniform. This half an hour, made International Week.

Mystery Skype 

I had the bug now,so we looked at Mystery Skype. A game where you answer yes or no questions to pinpoint the other school's location. There are several good blogs on mystery Skype etiquette and class planning, 

 

http://theglobalconnection.wikispaces.com/Mystery+Skype+-+What+is+it%3F

being one of the best.
We connected with @mstoalsclass in Dublin and a school in Vancouver. The latter taking 90 minutes to crack! This tested geography skills, collaboration, questioning and distilling of information- great for the More Able.
Follow #mysteryskype

Authors

I then explored the Skype in the classroom site further. There are a huge amount of lessons for you to sign up to. Keen to inspire a range of writers i my class, I found National Geographic writer @jodi_kendall
She gave the children a great insight into her career and how she combined it with photography. Her tales of manta rays and orangutans had us all hooked.
The children then wrote stories of journeys they'd taken and were really keen to post on her blog to say thank you.

http://www.jodikendall.com

Next, I found another author @mattwardwords who wrote the excellent Fantastic Family Whipple

http://fantasticfamilywhipple.com

The children loved learning about California, his writing journey and his ideas. The book itself was about a family of record breakers, the next day the classroom was awash with Guinness World Record books. All children wanted to write about obscure records, some had even written a story at home! Unheard of behaviour. 

Story Tellers

World Book Day arrived, a great group of people based in Florida known as the Sunshine Storytellers offered to read us a story. We had a 3-way Skype call with another school in New Jersey, amazing. How they all laughed when they heard how cold the UK was.

Topic Work

Using Skype this term, we have connected with two schools in North-eastern India and have learnt lots about their areas, language and how their school operates. The Indian national anthem sung in Hindi was a highlight. Importantly, my children could learn about expectations, attitudes and tolerance, things that are difficult to teach in the classroom.

               My class

The view in India


Skype Thoughts

For some Skype calls it can take a few days or weeks, so allow enough time.

A lot of the other schools we Skyped had small groups ranging from 10 to 20, for fairness, most of my calls were with all 60 year 6 children. It works much better with a small group, more jobs and greater involvement.

Practise getting the children to present and speak clearly.

Get a microphone!

Check the broadband connection, some of our calls have been a tad slow which can quickly frustrate 10 year olds.

Make sure you it is clear what your call focus is, it can become slightly one way at times.

The Skype safeguarding is excellent.

Time difference can lead to some early or late calls but they're worth it.

Skype Ideas

We need more British schools online so connections can be more regular without interfering with the school day.

Authors, poets; where are you? 30 minutes during a poetry week would really add another dimension to a schools work without costing a fortune.

Museums and galleries would be another excellent addition, particularly for schools who are unable to visit some of our national collections in London.

Guided Reading/Book clubs with other classes

Sharing writing on a similar topic

Performances- poetry, dance, class presentations on a topic 

Maths challenges-particularly open ended problems

Olympic style sports challenges

Mystery Number - similar to mystery Skype but with guess the number type questions. Eg. Is it an odd number?

Interviews with each other

Hotseating of a character

Sharing learning

Tour of your school

 

I'd love to hear any more ideas and it would be even better to connect with you.

@mistercollard

Coding the Taj Mahal

Coding; I thought we ought to get this ball rolling. I knew some of my boys had attended Code Club, some couldn't spell coding and some were handy on an ipad so @Hopscotch was the obvious answer. Our topic was India so our goal was a Taj Mahal in code. Here's how it went:

1) Human Coding - In pairs the children had to guide their 'robot' partner around the playground with some chalk. This got them into the idea of an algorithm and also showed how comfortable they were with the mathematical language needed.

2) Hopscotch - I introduced the children to hopscotch and showed them a few basic functions and have them the target to create a square. Those that were quick were then challenged to create more complex 2D shapes or experiment with colour, size etc.

3) Circles - The next challenge was to draw a circle. The children experimented with many different ways of programming a circle and using the repeat functions.

4) Taj Mahal - We looked at some outline drawings of the Taj Mahal and discussed the shapes that were used in the construction of building. The children, now armed with programmer skills, began to code, some drew a basic shape, some created backgrounds and some added a title.

The most encouraging part of the whole experience was the speed in which some children went home and downloaded Hopscotch. On Monday, I was greeted by a host of iPads brought in just to show me how much better their work was. 

Coding; everyone is talking about it!

Thinglink for Non Chronological Reports

This week is Creative Arts Week at school. My Year 6 class are going to look at poet Benjamin Zephaniah. Before we delve into his poems and perform some ourselves, we are going to learn about his background, beliefs and what makes him passionate about writing.

We are going to create a non-chronological report about him but I want it to reflect his passion for creativity and multimedia, so we are going to use the app Thinglink.

http://www.thinglink.com/scene/495336546740731905

http://www.thinglink.com/scene/502225511313833985

I used Pic Collage to create the picture using words as subheadings related to the pictures. I then used this in Thinglink to add other text about him, video of his poems and other pictures which show his work in more detail.