TE RITO TOI - What do we need to do before students come back?

13^th May 2020

Webinar with Professors Peter O'Connor and Carol Mutch

TE RITO TOI - What do we need to do before students come back?

Te Rito Toi is a resource created to help teachers work with children when they first return to school following major traumatic or life changing events.

AT THE HEART OF TE RITO TOI is the understanding that schools must not just prepare students for the future but they also need to help them make sense of the present. After disasters and crises, schools must as a first priority help learners safely explore the changed world in which they live.

What do students need? 

They need to see things which are familiar, school, playground, friends. We need to show that some things are the same and others different.

What do you do on day one?

It is not about catching up on lost work, it is about keeping the focus on wellbeing – spiritual and physical, and looking after the need for students to feel safe, cared for and loved by ensuring they feel they are in a safe place. There will be high levels of anxiety so go back to working on relationships it’s not about literacy and numeracy. Look to strengthen the relationship, don’t feel it should go back to normal. Classrooms need to be fun, good places to be in, the best way to deal with things is through a pedagogy of love and care.

The results after the Christchurch earthquakes improved because the schools returned to focus on a pedagogy of love and care.

Learning happens in a range of ways, find gentle ways to the curriculum – the curriculum will arise!

What have students been doing? 

Let this be the time to share what they’ve been doing – best way to do this is through the Arts, such as: fiction picture books.

www.theeducationhub.org.nz/bear-goes-into-lockdown 

The Arts help us to name emotions, thinking and feelings. The process of ‘doing’ or ‘making’ allows time for students to relax, talk and interact. Singing is also important – have fun, dance, move! Find the sideways in!

when your house burns down you won’t build it exactly the same again

WE don’t have to bounce back as we left– we can go back differently! Instead it can be strengths and interests driven, not assessment based. I think this is really important, and it is great to have educators talking about holding off on assessments but will those in power agree?

Sadly, from the Christchurch experience we know there’s not enough mental health support available – therefore, self-help is needed to look after oneself and colleagues. Going forward as staff, we should be careful about judging fellow peers, everybody has a lot more going on than we see or know, we need to  allow for safe, respectful ways of checking in with each other.

NZEI Speaker: Dr Carmen Dilli

13th May 2020

ECE Voice: How to support well being when we return to school

Fears for health and an emotional state make people behave differently when feeling fearful.

Practical steps will put people’s minds at ease, i.e. cleaning and routines to support sense of wellness.

Stress in the family, issues at home, we need to  think about what has been encountered by children and what can we provide. How do we reestablish connection for slow to warm children? Use reminiscing and reinforce that school is a safe place to be. Welcome children back gradually, be fully present with them, notice the way they are expressing their feelings. Children who are returning to school need to feel secure and safe in relationships. It is important to communicate well with parents, take this on board. Plan for it, respect that parents have fears and talk about it with parents, reassuring them. Make parents feel welcome, be non judgmental.

What should we prioritise with parents?  

The key message is to play it safe. Listen to fears, reassure that we have a plan.

What happens if there is problems with child behaviour? 

Look at what is underlying the behaviour, and  what it is the child is trying to express. Look beyond the behaviour to what the underlying issue may be.

What do teachers need to support them? 

Good school policies and the work setting is very important-good conditions of work, student ratio, pay.

What should the team be aware of when trying to create a slow, calm, environment? 

Try to build in a pause before we ourselves respond, notice our own thoughts, own judgement, take a pause and check own thoughts before we respond.

Webinar: Professor Welby Ings

22 April 2020

How to keep relationships at the forefront of learning and teaching from home

Relationships and Common Sense

This time is ideal for learning new things we’d otherwise never have had time for. During the time of polio outbreak in NZ in the past - New Zealanders learnt other skills. This time doesn’t have to be perfect, time to be creative and work with what we have - resources, time, energy. Technology might change, but human behaviours are most important. This is temporary, time has become more gentle, it is a time to make and create things which will sustain us. Remember that nobody knows what is going on in your world!

Covid history!
Our kids are embodied in history - comic book daily diary, time capsule, they are all living inside Covid history. Don’t replicate what is at school, think interdisciplinary - read a book, illustrate it, new chapter, set projects that can be realised in flexible ways, put the potential for growth at the forefront, create activities relevant to time and situation in which students are living.

Learning is not a glass full of water, you are not going to be worse off for it - your child is learning brilliantly in a world outside of school...they are not going to forget how to read, each child is a sponge and will use whatever context wraps around them…

Let's think about what learning really is - your child is just learning just in different ways!

Human's over curriculum! 
The child being at the center of learning. It is easy to become remote from the humanity of educating. Ask kids about what is good about learning this way, and what would they change and what is worth keeping. We should have positive discussions with kids, and put humanity back into learning. How do you learn? What’s the best way for you to learn? Why?

We should encourage passion project learning, and flexibility to learning where our role is to facilitate the context around these passions. When a person is involved in the question they are learning, there is buy in.The wonder of learning in a different context. Community care - i.e. teddy bear everywhere in the neighbourhood, look at how communities make environments and how they can support education. It doesn’t necessarily need to be technology based.

Some questions to ask ourselves
How do we recover from failure and carry on? How do we work with a difficult situation where you don’t have the resources that you think you need to carry on? How can we best meet the needs of our most at risk students? I don’t think we can realistically solve situations now that we couldn’t solve before this, we can get insights and this experience may teach us something.

Flipped Learning Lens
One lens is never as good as multiple lenses offering different takes on a situation - flipped learning lens. An interesting point is that while Professor Welby Ings couldn’t read and write until high school, his parents never let him think he was stupid, while still being logical parents they did preserve belief in him. For some who have trouble learning in formal environments they may have found great value in the current situation.Things that may be challenging in school are not challenging in the same way. School is not the god of education, we function as educators. There is a greater realm outside of school - do the best that we can!

Te Reo Pronunciation

Te Reo Pronunciation 

presented by Sharon Holt

Some background: Sharon used to be a relief teacher ECE, her own passion was to build confidence and skills in te reo in other teachers, given how difficult it is when not immersed in te reo.  

Today Sharon is the author of Te Reo Singalong books/shows/workshops and author visits known as 'The Writing Bug'

Pronunciation Help

sharonholt@outlook.com

tereosingalong.co.nz

Facebook: (Te Reo Māori Challenge)

Te reo learning videos: patreon.com/sharonholt. 

See www.tereosingalong.co.nz for free music.

Music and repetition is the way to learn!

The 5 vowels are the way to go....aeiou ah eh ee oh oooh. FYI every māori word ends in a vowel (the spirit flows on the vowel)

Vowel songs  - aeiou he piko....

Remember to take a break after the vowel ta/ma/ri/ki

8 consonants and 2 digraphs -sing to the tune of Twinkle Little Star

h k m n p r t w ng wh........roll the rs

Make a chart....get into practicing consonants all the time!

ta te to (different pronunciation of this t: sounds like tah teh toh tongue on roof of mouth) while this t is different: te ti  tea for two
au....whanau
ai..kai
ie..ata marie
kō/wh/ai....kor/whai not (koh)
kauri....kau/ri
tōtara....tor/ta/ra
Pukete ...puh keh teh
Rototuna....Ro/to/tu/na
Matamata...Ma/ta/ma/ta....don't stress t
Ōhaupō....Ohh/hau/poh

Two recommended games

1. vowel chart and two dice labelled with vowels and ? , put counter on when land on dice, can also interchange the dice, good for groups racing to complete a line across, down, or diagonal to see who wins first.

2. Place names (as above) with segmented sounds in different colours, 1x dice with colour, and cover when each colour appears in the word - when one word is complete pick up next, the winner is the person who gets the most words. 

New Updates to Mathletics

Professional Development with Maggie from Mathletics 23rd October 2019

Student console 

This uses traffic light system, red, yellow and green shows which activities need to be done again.

How to limit access to Live Mathletics so that students spend time completing activities properly. Animation will not complete if not getting answers correct.

Use the 'i' to turn off animation, as it the animation prevents students from using the 'drag' tool during activities.

• Good to use in student console - the A-Z dictionary (at side)

Problem solving activities are in Explore - students do not have access to this until we assign it in teacher console.

• Good to use  - the videos to show examples to students.

Play - games area for students,

Rainforest Math - good for additional work (select by year)

Mathletics will add a Multiplication game by end of the year

Teacher Console

Recently added -Assess learning loss - step by step guide how to access learning gap

Teacher Profile - allows us to adjust password
Classes - best way to move students between groups- go Student Management.  Remember don't remove students from class - however it is possible to reinstate without going through admin.

NOTE: Will lose current data when move to new curriculum - therefore download the material if want keep records

My Courses - create custom course - select Year level that you want to particular student to follow

Resources Hub - similar to what used to be Mathletics Library. Mathletics for Early Learners - videos, Numbeanies games (sep App) - uses cards to work with devices, it is also more interactive and good to use in groups.

Problem Solving - from Years 3-11
Best to use filter by Year levels - can do sub strand - preview/assign students also have a workbook to complete - record, draw, or type into
Best to 'favourite' activities that you like/want to use - then Assign

Launch live or Assign. Launch live takes priority for 60 minutes then other activities take over again. If students have questions it will show up in problem solving assign grid

Curriculum Activities - the traffic light system easily shows where students are sitting

Results
Shows where students or class are sitting by topics

Reports - see student of class strengths. Also possible to filter by date.
Effort & Participation

Certificates
Can only get 1 certificate per week.
4 bronze certificates = silver
4 silver certificates = gold (20 weeks of work)

STPs

Adding the 6 Standards for the Teaching Profession. The 12 RTCs have been made non-viewable but this can be turned back on again in the labels gadget by selecting all labels not just selected labels.

Neuroscience of Self Care

Kathryn Berkett Keynote Speaker

Neuroscience of Self Care

Red Reactive…........................................................................................Green Rational

Sandpapered brain concept….When something affects/stresses you, then it can continue to build up - it is important that we need to be able to reset ourselves. In order for creativity to develop requires green brain zone. The staffroom needs to be a red brain friendly zone.

We need to consider are our leaders the cheese or the owl? Do they activate (sandpaper) their colleagues stress levels. It doesn’t take much to sandpaper us!!

A Sandpapered Brain

Fight/flight response due to stressor i.e lost car keys. This results in physical effects: heart, breathing, eyes/hears sharpen, stress response, combine to activate brain to survive. Think about our students and ourselves - look around, fig-it, breathing, heart rate, stomach, dry mouth, stomach purges (nauseous), temperature changes, immunity lowers, panic attacks, long term stress response - weight gain/loss, bowel/bladder, blood increase -tightness in shoulders.

As teachers we need to stay in the green zone, especially when dealing with students who may be in red reactive zone. After cortisol has been activated it takes time for cortisol levels to decrease.

Remember to check in with your body - need to reset asap rather than wait till end of day. Physiologically this has an impact on our bodies - reason for getting sick in holidays. Therefore we need to reset ourselves. 

Perfect Practice make Perfect (calm self down) - walk, run, yoga, drink tea, cook....

1. Identify what calms you
2. Do that until you create a physiological calm state in your body
3. Condition this moment (think of Pavlov dog, bell, salivate - word/action only associate with calm not stress/anxiety link)
4. Practice, Practice, Practice

Check in with yourself…

Some See me….

Boys Show me I Belong….

Hate Tell me what is Happening….

Carrots Give me some Control….

Deep breaths until calm! The lungs are the only organ we can control when in high stress state.

The Sandpaper differs for everyone - status, person, it is important to acknowledge the sandpaper for you. Then reset, move back into green creative rational brain zone.