Food for thought

In the first few days at the CBE, many in depth conversations have been had. The following points are simply "food for thought", and something that can possibly be explored.

- Ideas - video for Numeracy and Literacy in the world - Great for a beginning presentation on Numeracy and Literacy.  (See Alberta website)

- A Loxton example of how integrated learning could be used to provide student feedback through different curriculum lenses could be in English and Ag. The students gather information for a Wine Making assignment (Ag) and then learn the structure of the text type needed for this task (English). The Ag teacher could then mark and provide feedback on the content, while the English teacher marks and provides feedback on the Literacy skills.

- Idea - buy a flip camera or any effective camera for each teacher to film activities/ new strategies in practice. Good for sharing, providing evidence and observe own practice.

Effective teaching practices:
- Consider purchasing either: 4-5 whiteboards on classroom walls, buying mini whiteboards enough for one person or whiteboard tables.

- iPads have been discussed regularly as an effective resource in teaching. More investigation will occur when we visit schools this week.

- Using google to share and submit work from students and teachers. It is more than just a search engine.
e.g google drive, google chat, google plus
- could this link in with Day map?
-schools need to consider the infrastructure required.

- Need to weigh up the value of written comments at mid semester reports compared to written feedback, telephone conversations and interviews throughout each semester. Research has proven that students improve with timely and pertinent feedback.

- Make more use of email communication with parents. Could this be through Daymap?

- If a reporting system was to change, the school would need to consider what they are willing to give up, in order for teachers to provide more ongoing communication.

- When introducing a new concept/idea into a school, what is the school willing to give up? Through continuously adding, teachers become stressed, some things need to be put aside in order to be more effective/efficient.

- If considering changes in the reporting system:
Improve the feedback shared with parents in parent/ teacher interviews by providing parents with concrete information on what their child needs to work on, but first provide information on what they are good at.

- Is making a phone call to a parent an invitation or a teacher just 'off loading' and making it their problem?

-Unlike Canada's Provincial test, our NAPLAN occurs early term 2, which means we can use the data to work with those students in the latter part of the year. Similarly the ACER testing that we do at Loxton High School in Maths and English occurs at the start of the year, which provides specific
information on areas of weakness that can then be addressed. Retesting is then done at the end of the
year to see improvements made.

We just wanted to capture some of these ideas while they were fresh in our minds as a way of sharing with others.

Love the Calgary school buses - 'Cheese Wagons'