Creatives in Schools 2023

We were lucky enough to secure funding for another round of Creatives in Schools with Harko Brown in 2023! Our aim was to continue the journey we began in 2022 - enriching our tamariki and kaiako with Mātauranga Māori and design and add more pou in our new mara hupara and other areas of our new school build. A highlight for me was leading a staff meeting alongside Harko and sharing our journey so far, particularly with our new staff. It was so great to see everyone excited and engaged as we worked on weaving a ki out of harakeke and then went out to play pukao pou. We are extremely grateful to be gifted a beautiful carved pou from the grounds at Waitangi through Harko and this will be used in our pukao pou field once complete. The slides below showcase this journey:

Creatives in Schools Project 2022

This year I collaborated with Harko Brown in leading our Creatives in Schools project; the aim of the project is below:

Our learners painted tupoko and learned new protocols associated with our school values through honga. They weaved kites through a tuakana teina approach and were involved in designing pou and painting it to represent our kura.

 

Upon completion of the project we reported back to the Creatives in Schools team and here is a short part of it:

Full report 

The outcomes for our ākonga from this project were vast and include: Developing confidence, cooperation and communication skills

The aro-takaro (implements of play) were all cooperative games that involved working together to achieve a common goal. The tupoko (the ti-kouka ‘standing holes) that our ākonga painted as part of our first few sessions were used for many games and skill development. The game of honga requires balancing the tupoko between two people’s foreheads and moving from the ground to standing. This requires a lot of cooperation and communication skills. Many other games with the tupoko required working together with balancing. This helped our tamariki build stronger whanaungatanga with each other and their kaiako. We saw ākonga develop their confidence in sharing, giving things a go and trying their best throughout the project. 

Tuakana-teina During the weaving of kites the students worked in small groups of tuakana-teina from Year 0 - Year 6. This was a great opportunity for our tukana to be experts and teach teina skills they had obtained. 

Links to many areas of current learning in our local curriculum We linked our Creative’s project through literacy and our inquiry, along with links through Mathematics through aro-takaro. As part of literacy our kura uses Storychat for our shared reading approach - we pick a text to read for shared reading over 1-2weeks and create a range of tasks linked to the text and other areas of learning. We linked our texts into our creative’s project with Harko’s support and thus embedded the programme further into our kura. Our term 2 inquiry was based around flight during Matariki and this linked strongly with the kites and gliders that we created with Harko.

Mathematics - shapes and patterns throughout the project - creating shapes using tupoko games. 

 Our inquiry in term 3 is based around sustainability; one student linked this to our Creatives project with a poignant comment to Harko along the lines of - “It’s so good we are using wooden posts for our pou because that’s more sustainable than using metal or steel as it comes from papatuanuku.” 

Strong links to our school’s pb4l approach We have linked colours to our current school values and motto thus far - red for whakamana, blue for manaakitanga, green for kaitiakitanga. Originally we planned to have 7 colours but thought this may be overwhelming, we may add more colours and values over time. These colours are represented by feathers that are placed in the student's tupoko. Tupoko are stacked to create taku huatau (feather topped toktoka columns) that ākonga linked to their value goals. This is something we want to continue developing over time but it was incredibly powerful for our ākonga to share their tupoko with their whānau during our Talanoa. 

A sense of pride and accomplishment Our ākonga are enormously proud of all of the art pieces they created. It was heartwarming to see our ākonga share their tupoko and related value goals with their whānau at our Talanoa. The manu wahine kites they created were utilised as gliders and now are adorned in our classes. The manu wahine and manu taratahi and how they were made was shared at our Matariki celebration with Harko sharing our journey thus far. I had a student bring his whānau to me on this day to get a photo with myself and Harko and the kites he had helped create. The pou/hupara that have been painted with a small group of students are really proud of how fabulous their work has turned out. Although they are not yet complete, they are looking great and will be completed next term. 

Art skills - drawing, painting and weaving Our ākonga had the opportunity to express themselves through their painting of tupoko and develop painting skills. The pou design group expressed their cultural links through art design linking patterns from their cultures into a design. All ākonga had the opportunity to learn weaving skills as well. 

Outcomes for kaiako:

Kaiako were involved during the sessions with our creative and ākonga and were able to learn from these experiences to deliver follow up lessons. All kaiako and wider staff agreed that their knowledge of mātauranga Māori was greatly enhanced through working alongside Harko. As one of the teaching standards states, our kura, kaiako and wider staff have a commitment to tangata whenuatanga and Te Tiriti o Waitangi partnership. The creatives project gave us all the opportunity to gain new knowledge in how we can further embed mātauranga Māori throughout our local curriculum. Our kaiako were bursting with excitement and new ideas after spending sessions with Harko and our learners and that is not an exaggeration. Recently, we had a staff meeting around feedback on design for our new Mara hupara that is being installed in our kura in consultation with Harko. There were so many links and connections made there that confirmed the profound positive impact that the creatives project has had on our kura. An example of this is an aro-takaro implement Harko used with our learners, tama taiki, is going to be a permanent fixture in our mara hupara. We also had learners make their own poi toa and these will also be another arko-takaro as part of our mara hupara.

Virtual Reality Project

This year as part of my role as WST I have been working with a team on designing a virtual reality of our new build school to enable a smooth transition when we move into our new buiding. The presentation below is where we are at in terms of planning:

DFI Day Nine Reflection

 Kia ora koutou,

Today we sat our Google Certified Educator Level 1 exams which went well but did remind me of the stress our students feel when sitting tests! I am glad to have it over and done with and happy I passed! 

The nine week DFI course has helped me learn and acquire more skills in digital technologies and the manaiakalani pedagogy. I have upskilled in a range of areas in google - docs, slides, drawings, forms, groups, sheets, maps just to name a few. I have developed a stronger understanding of the digital technologies curriculum and how to embed this into practice in unplugged environments and digital environments. 

It has been great having time to upskill in a range of new tools and apps such as Explain Everything, Scratch and MITappinventor etc. I hope to bring these tools back to my team, learners and the wider school to grow digital technologies and learning in our kura.

With the new knowledge I have acquired throughout DFI, I hope to support our school, staff and learners in digital technologies and the digital curriculum. This will enable us all to become more empowered through the use of digital technologies.

DFI Day Eight Reflection

 Kia ora koutou,

Today we looked at empowering teachers and learners to take ownership of their learning. We aim to empower our learners throughout all learning areas by giving them choice in the workshops that they choose to attend for reading, mathematics and writing. They also get to choose the text they read as well. We base our inquiry on their interests and get feedback on what they want to learn more of and this strengthens engagement and interest. I personally hope to use DFI to help empower teachers in digital technologies who will then also empower their learners. 

Digital technology curriculum

The digital technology curriculum that includes developing and designing and computational thinking. 

Developing and designing digital outcomes is a more hands on approach to digital technologies. DLO's (digital learning objects) such as google slides and drawings, animation, imovie, tinkercad are just some of what we use in our team with our students. 

Computational thinking is programming, coding, unplugged activities, robotics, spheros etc. It includes more opportunity for unplugged activities in terms of sequencing and step-by-step instructions, coding directions in real life that are ideal for junior school. 

Coding

Coding is something I had recently upskilled myself in as I tried to offer learners new learning through lockdown. I created a Scratch task for learners a couple of weeks ago in which they needed to code a chase game. Initially students found it quite challenging as they were new to scratch so I created slides with step-by-step instructions and then added in some youtube tutorials they could watch if they wanted to code further. 

Slides are below:

Here is one of our student's blog reflections on creating her chase game on Scratch: https://wpstinas.blogspot.com/2021/09/space-chase.html  

As I had already learned a bit about Scratch today I chose to attend the workshop on MIT App Inventor (https://appinventor.mit.edu/). This was similar to Scratch but had more tools and was a bit more complex. What is really cool about MIT App Inventor is that you can download a companion to your phone or tablet and then scan a QR code to try it out. I think this would be so exciting for students to engage in. Here is a short video of the app I created and then explored on my phone. 

DFI Day Seven Reflection

 Kia ora koutou,

Today we focused on Ubiquitous teaching and learning. This means teaching and learning is accessible anytime, anywhere, any pace from anyone. High quality learning that is rewindable so student's are able to access it outside of our 9-3 school hours and also access it more than once.

As we are currently in Lockdown due to Covid-19 having ubiquitous teaching and learning available is even more important. This time around I feel we have tried to make everything as ubiquitous as possible. 

• We use class dojo as one platform for students to post on (as well as student blogs). Although this is private to only our students and whanau we share the learning they post on there onto our sharing slides which are accessible to anyone on our class site. 
• Our learning tasks are available on our site
• We record our google meets and have made them available on our site too
• One thing we could do is add audio recordings (using mote or screencastify to our learning task slides. However we do go over our slides during our google meets and that recording is made available.

A barrier we have found is access to devices and internet which has impacted our learners. We gave out devices as soon as it was allowed however not all students had internet at home. 

Chromebooks

We completed a digital dig that student's do during cybersmart sessions today using a chromebook (or chromebook simulator). Top tips I learned during this are a couple of shortcuts:

• Ctrl L to select address bar
• Ctrl backspace to delete previous word

Ipads and Explain Everything

We had the choice today for our create task to choose between screencastify, Hāpara workspace or explain everything. I choose to look into Explain everything as it is something I had done some PD on years ago as a junior teacher but I found it quite tricky. We were taken through the steps to set up projects on explain everything that students can then use in their learning. I am mentoring a junior teacher at the moment who is very keen to learn new digital skills so thought this would be valuable to share with her.

I created a Kawa of Care for Ipads task in which students have to take photos showing the kawa of care and then record their voice saying the kawa of care shown. I added instructions in with audio and screenshots explaining the task on the first two slides. Screenshots of these are below:

After the instructions there are three pages like the one below for the students to add photos and audio on to showing the kawa of care.

It was really great to learn how to make projects on Explain Everything and I look forward to passing this knowledge onto our junior team.

DFI Day Six Reflection

 Kia ora koutou, 

Connecting through learning blogs, toolkits, sites and professional learning networks:

Today we continued talking about making learning accessible and ubiquitous for all learners so they can access it anywhere, anytime and at any pace through using sites. Ensuring teaching and planning is visible to allow students to know where they are heading in their learning. It is also important to make sure that learning is rewindable which allows students to learn at their own pace and revisit learning. Visible planning and teaching on sites allows scaffolding for learners through rewindable learning. Another tip shared was using a 3 click rule throughout your site so it's easily accessible. 

On our Kea team site we enable access through using google slides that we embed on our site. 

Evaluating class sites:

We had some time to look through class sites and evaluate them based on two criteria:

• Visual appeal
• User experience

It was interesting seeing the difference especially between primary, intermediate and secondary class sites. It's also important to consider knowing your learners when creating your site as what works for one class may not for another. Also taking time to go through your class site with learners to ensure they know how to access their learning.

Our team site: 

We had to come up with three goals to achieve by the end of the today to improve our own sites. Mine were:

• Update buttons on Literacy page
• Update banners for each heading
• Give access to some files

I tried to make the banners photos specific to the learning area. I updated the literacy page buttons and removed some we haven't been using. I also went through our site on incognito mode and changed sharing settings to everyone can view. Here are some before and after shots I took of our team site:

Before:

After: