Term Three 2015
“The best teachers don’t give you the answers... They just point the way ... and let you make your own choices.”
2 Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015
Index 3 Your Soapbox
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What are people saying about sexuality in childhood?
Paul Flanagan
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A Pair of Happiness (At Anatolian Schools)
Insan International
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Schools’ passion for eJIWI’S MACHINES WORKSHOPS AT MOTAT MOTAT
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Introducing Chatterboxes talk cards
IPL, University of Waikato
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What I Wish I Could Tell Them About Teaching in a Title I School
‘Love Teach’
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Bests of the Fests
SGCNZ
21
MOTAT Industry Career’s Day 2015
MOTAT
22
Improving Prediction Skills Through Patterning
Elaine Le Sueur
26
Learners need advocacy
Laurie Loper
30
Children globally get their voices heard on Listen To Us song
Voices Around the World
34
Mad to Teach in London Schools
Michael Day
42
She Wrote This Letter
True Stories of a Midwest Yankee
43
Improving Your Brain Health By How You Relate to Others
Michelle LaBrosse
44
Artist Reveals Extremely Detailed Drawings in Her Notebook
Sophie Roach
46
Malala Turns 18, And Opens A School For Syrian Refugee Girls
Hannah Bloch
52
Hillcrest High School dominate art awards
54
Artwork Inspired by the Reef
56
Teaching English Overseas
University of Sussex
58
Generation Gap
Elaine Le Sueur 59
New Zealand Crowned World Children’s Literature Champion
60
“There’s Snow Limit For Kinz”
66
NZ Needs More Female Technology Role Models
72
Chilton St James
Does your school have one of New Zealand’s best environmental initiatives?
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Japanese Students Draw Stunning Chalkboard Art
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Occasional Tale - a teacher turns to‘The Good Life’
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Front Cover:
Fantasy and future combined
Back Cover:
Adelaide Zoo, email us for further information
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Your Soapbox!
“
I long ago retired from regular teaching, although at 68 I still have a few students come to me privately. But I’m not au fait with the current situation, so forgive me for my question. It is true that NZ Immigration lists Social Workers as high on the list of occupations required by our country. Is it also true that school are going to need social workers on staff as more handicapped students are accepted into main stream education? If the answer to this question is ‘yes’, why are well qualified social workers, registered here and with experience and excellent CVs being turned down by schools? You will guess I know someone in this situation who has been trying for a year to find work. Currently she is working in home support (cleaning and helping elderly clients like me) She and her experience are wasted in this role but I’m wondering if there is some element I’m not aware of which prevents schools taking the social workers for which we’re supposedly desperate? Kind regards Lynda
”
If you want to have YOUR SAY please email your offering to: soapbox@goodteacher.co.nz
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What are people saying about sexuality in childhood?
Paul Flanagan
Introduction I appreciate that people are interested in my doctoral study. They invariably ask, “What’s your topic?” I then take a deep breath, and carefully answer… Whenever the words sex(uality) and child(hood) are mentioned together there appears to be some unease within a conversation. Particularly as a middle-aged male discussing children and sexuality I can sense questions and suspicions forming, and often expressed as an easy out: “what an interesting topic”! My interest in researching sexuality in children’s lives originates from practice as a family counsellor in both statutory and community settings. Through working at Child Youth & Family, and then at Parentline (Hamilton), I have engaged with a number of school principals and teachers, and families, regarding concerns for children’s actions which have been perceived as “sexualised”. My Master’s research involved a survey of principals of primary schools in the Waikato, asking about their experience of responding to sexual concerns for children; what they based their decisions on; who they consulted; and what policies the school had connected to this issue (see Flanagan, 2009). Teaching in counsellor education at the University of Waikato has provided me with the opportunity to take this interest further with doctoral research, in which I have interviewed teachers, parents and counsellors. The research journey has been, and continues to be, one that is exciting, challenging, perplexing and frustrating. This article shares something of this journey, in relation to the stories shared about children’s experiences; teachers’ and parents’ understandings; and what my hopes are from this study.
Adult judgments of children’s actions An early experience in counselling practice related to
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Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015 5
working with children and questions about ‘sexual behaviour’, and which absorbed my attention, was the vastly diverse ways that principals had responded on these occasions. I would find one principal who expressed great care for a child, searched for support for both the child and their parents, and developed a plan with key staff at the school to assist the child remaining safely in school. Conversely, I would know of another principal whose response was to stand down a child, followed by a disciplinary meeting with the Board, and then exclusion – so a child was outside of school and particular support that can be accessed through enrolment in a school. These experiences drew me into enquiry about these principals’ specific judgments, and the rationale sitting behind them. I am aware that, on its own, one child’s story cannot be simply compared with another’s. There is a range of contextual factors to consider: safety of children; safety of any possible victim(s); access to adequate social service and educational supports; staffing and parental considerations; the social and economic environment and nature of the local (parent) community; to name a few.
Adult notions of childhood Sitting among these considerations are the various understandings that we have about childhood. Many of us will be familiar with the theories of development that situate children as passive learners, receptive as ‘becoming’ beings and therefore positioned as innocent and angelic: “butter wouldn’t melt in their mouths” (see Uprichard, 2008). Within this understanding, children are positioned as not needing to know about sexuality – but if they do know something, then they have been tarnished, corrupted or abused in some way. We may also know of the developmental theories that suggest children are active in their learning - that, in fact, they take a ‘being’ position as well as ‘becoming’ (James, Jenks & Prout, 1998; Jenks, 2005). Children are, as such, exploratory, inquisitive, and innovative enquirers – of themselves, and their social and cultural worlds. Within this understanding, children can be positioned as potentially having knowledge of sexuality – for example: the older sibling enquiring about where babies come from; a child walking in on their parents during love-making; playing games of “mothers and fathers” or “you show me yours and I’ll show you mine”. Children may be viewed as forward, precocious, or intelligent and inquisitive. However we understand a child and their words and behaviour, I think it is important to consider the child’s actions in context – asking questions about their intentions and meanings of what they say or do. I think of an 8 year old boy who threatened to ‘sex and rape’ one of the girls in his class. His words were a reaction to a girl who he experienced as teasing him and he had wanted to ‘get back at her’ by embarrassing her and hurting her. His intention was to embarrass her through kissing her, an action sometimes referred to by children as ‘sexing’. He also 6 Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015
wanted to make her feel hurt. He was aware that rape involved hurting females, but had no idea of rape as a sexual action. To him, ‘sex and rape’ was no more than a threat to kiss and hurt the girl in response to her teasing of him. However, adult responses to his words took up assumptions of sexual intercourse and violence. How often might we, as parents or as teachers, misunderstand what a child has said or done? While we can think of this as a moment when a child learns about clarity in communication, should this not also be a learning moment for us as adults in how we read, see and hear children’s behaviour? (see Robinson, 2005).
Children as sexual beings It might be difficult to think of children as sexual beings, but to do so recognises a range of biological and sociological research (Freud, 1962; Hawkes & Egan, 2008; Moll, 1912). Within an hour of birth boys experience erections, girls can experience vaginal lubrication (DeLamater & Friedrich, 2002), and boys are known to experience erections in utero (Martinson, 1994). The experience of masturbation (euphemistically referred to as comfort or self touching) is common to many children as both sexual pleasure and as some form of emotional comfort (Mallants & Casteels, 2008)). Babies, toddlers and young children, girls and boys find out about themselves and their bodies (and of their peers) through self discovery, mutual play, observation and touching (Friedrich, et al., 1991; Johnson, 2011). There is opportunity for learning about self care and respectful relationships – depending on how adults respond to those moments of children’s ‘sexual’ behaviour. There are many factors that shape our thinking and understanding of sexuality, and how this can be expressed in our lives – including culture, religion, experience and personal ethics or morality (Seidman, 2003). The negotiation of understandings and meanings can differ between parents, and within school settings these can be even more complex.
New Zealand research about child sexuality One aim for my research is to open possibilities of new thinking for parents and teachers to support children through experiences that are seen as sexual. My hope is that adults in children’s lives can be respectful in their enquiry about what a child is doing or saying. Another hope is that children might feel safe in how they are asked about their actions. Where a child is at risk of harm from another child then immediate action by an adult is of course necessary – but where the action can be mediated safely and without overreaction, then adult responses should be caring and without harshness. My doctoral study is ongoing, hopefully to completion in 2016. During the project I have written a number of articles for teachers on this subject (Flanagan, 2009, 2011, 2014a). Other articles reflect on my practice as
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a counsellor with children, parents and teachers (Flanagan, 2010, 2014b). The study design included three focus groups (comprising four teachers; seven parents; four counsellors) and individual interviews with five teachers, six parents and six counsellors using a series of vignettes based on non-fictitious events in New Zealand children’s lives – these were altered to protect children’s and schools anonymity. Participants were recruited from two schools and one counselling agency and came from across both North and South islands. While I intended inviting children to participate, and had received ethical approval from the Faculty of Education Research Ethics Committee to approach parents for their consent, multiple attempts to recruit children were met by non-response from parents, or parental consent with child refusal, and one board of trustees declining me approaching parents. Each of the six vignettes gave an example of a child or children engaging in some speech or action, which had been perceived by an adult (in this case, a teacher) as sexual. Many participants expressed surprise at the sexual interpretation of many of the vignettes, but responded within the interviews with their own understandings, questions and wonderings. Two vignettes, and an initial analysis of teachers’ and parents’ responses, are presented within “Unpacking ideas of sexuality in childhood: What do primary teachers and parents say?” (Flanagan, 2014a). This article is freely available online at http://www. tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/23265507.2014.9724 36#.VPWL_HyUfyB
References: Flanagan, P. (2009). Play, prey or “sexploration”? Understanding and responding to sexual actions by children at primary school. Set: Research Information for Teachers, 3, 19-26. Flanagan, P. (2010). Making molehills into mountains: Adult responses to child sexuality and behaviour. Explorations: An E-Journal of Narrative Practice, (1), 57-69. Accessible at http://dulwichcentre. com.au/explorations-2010-1-paul-flanagan.pdf Flanagan, P. (2011). Making sense of children’s sexuality: Understanding sexual development and activity in education contexts. Waikato Journal of Education, 16(3), 69-79. Flanagan, P. (2014a). Unpacking ideas of sexuality in childhood: What do primary teachers and parents say?. Open Review of Educational Research. doi :10.1080/23265507.2014.972436
Freud, S. (1962/2000). Three essays on the theory of sexuality. Translated by J. Strachey. New York, NY: Basic Books. Friedrich, W.N., Grambsch, P., Broughton, D., Kuiper, J., & Beilke, R. (1991). Normative sexual behavior in children. Pediatrics, 88(3), 456-464. Hawkes, G.L., & Egan, R.D. (2008). Developing the sexual child. Journal of Historical Sociology, 21(4), 443-465. doi. 10.1111/j.1467-6443.2008.00345.x James, A., Jenks, C., & Prout, A. (1998). Theorizing childhood. Oxford, England: Polity Press. Jenks, C. (2005). Childhood. (2nd ed.). London, England: Routledge. Johnson, T.C. (2011). Understanding children’s sexual behaviors: What’s natural and healthy. San Diego, CA: Institute on Violence, Abuse and Trauma. Mallants, C., & Casteels, K. (2008). Practical approach to childhood masturbation - A review. European Journal of Pediatrics, 167(10), 1111-1117. Martinson, F. M. (1994). The sexual life of children. Westport, CT: Bergin & Garvey. Moll, A. (1912). The sexual life of the child. Translated by E. Paul. New York, NY: The Macmillan Company. Robinson, K. (2005). Childhood and sexuality: Adult constructions and silenced children. In J. Mason and T. Fattore, Children taken seriously: In theory, policy and practice. (pp. 66-76). London, England: Jessica Kingsley Publishers. Seidman, S. (2003). The social construction of sexuality. New York, NY: W.W. Norton. Uprichard, E. (2008). Children as “being and becomings”: Children, childhood and temporality. Children & Society, 22(4), 303-313.
Paul Flanagan, Doctoral Candidate and Senior Lecturer in Counsellor Education, Faculty of Education, University of Waikato paulf@waikato.ac.nz
Flanagan, P. (2014b). Ethical beginnings: Reflexive questioning in designing child sexuality research. Counselling and Psychotherapy Research, 14(2), 139-146. doi:10.1080/14733145.2013.779734 Accessible at http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/ 10.1080/23265507.2014.972436#. VPWL_HyUfyB
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Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015 7
Thousands of elementary school students across rural Anatolia are facing kilometers long cold and bumpy roads regardless of unfavorable weather conditions just to get an education. For a beautiful video about this venture use this link... Pair of Happiness https://youtu.be/rTl2tOEd20E 8 Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015
“A pair of happiness” project came to life to provide resistant shoes to low-income students who can’t afford a pair of shoes, attending rural schools across Anatolia,
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where 7000 village roads were closed on January 2015 due to snow. We are aiming to provide a total of 10.000 pairs of resistant shoes to 75 elementary school students in severe need across 33 cities of Anatolia. This project is the first global project aiming to support poor children in Anatolia, therefore it will be a breakthrough if we achieve our goal.
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Anatolia (from Greek Ἀνατολή, Anatolḗ — “east” or “(sun)rise”; in modern Turkish: Anadolu), in geography known as Asia Minor (from Greek: Μικρὰ Ἀσία Mīkrá Asía — “small Asia”), Asian Turkey, Anatolian peninsula, or Anatolian plateau, denotes the westernmost protrusion of Asia, which makes up the majority of the Republic of Turkey. Wikipedia Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015 9
For a beautiful video about this venture use this link... Pair of Happiness https://youtu.be/rTl2tOEd20E
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Road Map: The Need: Students from 1st to 3rd grade were chosen as our target age group as they are amongst the most vulnerable to harsh weather conditions and long commutes to schools. Children who will be granted with these 10.000 resistant shoes, were already determined by the collaboration of school officials, teachers and local municipalities. We have received physically stamped and signed forms from 75 schools and we categorized them by shoe sizes in a spreadsheet.
The Fund: Each pair of shoes costs $10 to produce, if ordered as 10.000 pieces at once.
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By $100.000 pledged fund, we will mass produce and deliver 10.000 shoes to 33 cities directly by our team. Photos and videos will be available upon deliveries on www.insaninternational.com
The Shoes: These resistant shoes feature sturdy soles and are all water-proof. Sections of them up front and in the back were hardened through injection molding to resist deformation. They were designed with velcro straps so that children can easily put them on and off. Straps were strengthened with an additional layer of leather. Inner-lining of the shoes were made from “tartan” fabric that’s used in seasonal shoes, which provides sweatproof comfort during the months of Spring.
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Each donor’s name and donation (if he/she accepts) will be listed on project website which will be alive even after the project mission is completed. We will also share the name of the donors to school teachers for them to share and remember.
Donations:
Each pair of shoes costs 10$ including transportation to the school. Donations can be done via 2 websites: www.insaninternational.org apairofhappiness https://goo.gl/hjq6Pw If we can’t reach our goal, the funds will be donated to Insan non-profit organisation to save the lives of 20 children listed in www.insaninternational.org
For a beautiful video about this venture use this link... Pair of Happiness https://youtu.be/rTl2tOEd20E Who we are: The brain team of the project includes (left to right) Kivanc Kilicer, Seda Diren and Can Gokceatam
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Kivanc Kilicer: INSAN Non Profit Org. Chairman: Graduated from ITU Faculty of Management with a Management Engineering degree in 2000. He has completed his post graduate studies in Management Information Systems and is continuing his education in ITU Remote Sensing doctorate program. Having worked in managerial and director positions at several leading multinational companies for 10 years, he started his own business on media investment and has been successfully running it for the last five years. Having observed the needs-gap in different parts of the society and consumption habits of individuals at different income levels, he was actively involved with development of the project with the goal of sharing his experience in relativity of the concept of “value”.
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Seda Diren: INSAN Non Profit Org. Vice Chairman: Graduated from Kadıköy Anadolu High School in 2005 and from YTÜ Faculty of Architecture with a City and Zone Planning degree in 2009. Currently continuing her studies in YTÜ, FBE City Landscape Organization and Design post graduate program. Having an opportunity to reside in several different cities across Anatolia during her education and observing first hand the condition of education of female students in particular, she was actively involved with development of the project with her motivation to contribute to improving conditions of those girls. Can Gokceatam: INSAN Non Profit Org. IT Director: Graduated from Bowling Green State University, USA with a Visual Communication Technology degree in 2009. He has completed his internships at Rockwell
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Automation software department working on user interface and experience and various photography studios in Texas and Colorado. While he has a vast knowledge of many facets of visual communication technology, he has chosen to specialize in photography, web design and programming. Can had vast contribution on the technological part of the project including the setup of one of the first database-run charity sites serving for Anatolia. Contact: Kivanc Kilicer, Chairman +971526998809, kivanc. kilicer@insaninternational.org Project Site: www.insaninternational.org/ apairofhappiness Crowdfunding Link: https://goo.gl/hjq6Pw https://twitter.com/insan_int https://www.facebook.com/insan.int Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015 13
Schools’ pass
eJIWI’S MACH There’s a creative genius on the loose at the Museum of Transport and Technology this winter! Joseph Herscher is a local boy who grew up in Western Springs, Auckland and regularly visited MOTAT during his childhood to get his fix of machines and mechanisms.
His love of mechanical contraptions grew to the point where, as a young student he was using entire walls of his flat to support elaborate Rube Goldberg machines featuring levers, pulleys, gears, inclined planes and all sorts of combinations of weird and wonderful gadgets to complete a simple action in the most complex way imaginable. Check out some of his creations at http://www.josephherscher.com/. Joseph took his talents overseas and is now based in New York where he has achieved international acclaim for his contraptions, with guest appearances on Sesame Street (PBS), Brain Games (National Geographic’s highest rated show), CBS Sunday Morning and the NY Times website. A bona-fide art star, Joseph was artist-in-residence at the McColl Center in North Carolina in 2013, and appeared at the Venice Biennale in 2011, Ars Electronica in Berlin and the Quebec City Biennial. He has created machines for commercials for Fidelity Investments (USA), Berman Bread (Israel) and 42Below Vodka (NZ).
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sion for
HINES WORKSHOPS AT MOTAT
Throughout the winter Joseph is at MOTAT filming, Jiwi’s Machines, a comedy web-series starring ‘Jiwi’, an endearing inventor who will combine Rube Goldberg contraptions with slap-stick comedy and physical science to create a thrillingly interactive, hilarious, scientific web experience for Kiwi kids. A few lucky New Zealand students will be able to meet Joseph and tap into his particular genius as they build their own working Rube Goldberg machine. Groups of up to 60 students can book to attend one of six limited edition workshops, run by Joseph, based at MOTAT in September this year.
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This is a unique opportunity for students to meet a YouTube star while they flex their design-thinking muscles and apply their knowledge of simple machine types in a crazy, mechanical, chain-reaction contraption building challenge. For more information or to book please email bookings@motat.org.nz or phone 09 845 3696.
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Introducing Chatterboxes talk cards - bec Language is the foundation of education
Over recent years, teachers of new entrant classes have constantly commented on the diminishing ability of 5 year olds to hold a conversation about the common, everyday things in their world. The teachers say that many new entrants have a limited vocabulary and cannot easily converse about
Families are children’s first teachers. They provide the early learning about the home, the environment, the culture, the religion and all of the important things that make up a child’s early knowledge. This important time for a child sets them up with beliefs and values that they will carry on as they grow and go to school. The time spent talking to children about any and everything creates a knowledge of their world and gives them vocabulary with which to talk about their experiences themselves. This sets them up for success in education. Talking can happen anywhere, in the car, at the shops, watching TV, making a meal, doing the housework, and at the countless other times that parents and children are together. Talking about family stories, special events and special people in their lives provides children with the experiences of language and life that they need for school learning. Talking to children is one of the most important things a parent can do, takes little extra time and is the least expensive!
daily life, family and the world in which they live and play. Many are unable to speak in sentences, lacking the early knowledge of language and how it works. This seriously impacts on their ability to begin the learning, the reading, writing and mathematics that make up education in New Zealand. However, it is simply and cheaply remedied.
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cause…
Literacy facilitators at the University of Waikato, with this in mind, and being very aware that the child’s first teachers, the parents are often very busy supporting their family, decided to create a series of “talking cards” with ideas for conversations. The aim of this resource is to suggest prompts for parentchild conversations around the ordinary aspects of life that build vocabulary and experience in children in their early years. Parents have a wealth of experiences, knowledge and cultural information to share with their children. Parents who have ongoing conversations with their children provide them with a bank of knowledge with which to inform their learning. These experiences, and their associated vocabulary, are those that form the basis of early reading and writing.
These cards cover a variety of common situations and give ideas for conversations. The packaging also has additional prompts and ideas to consider when with family. They are aimed at pre-school and new entrant learners and their families.
At present the card sets are available in English, bilingually in Māori and English and completely in Te Reo (Māori). They are available from the Learning4 Stores for $6 each. Only $5 for 10 or more. (Plus postage)
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What I Wish I Could Tell Them Ab I’m in my fifth year of teaching English at a Title I middle school.
There are so many things I would tell them. •
I would tell them about the bright bulletin boards, posters, and student work that are either taken down or covered with white butcher paper for most of the spring semester, because the state mandates that there can be no words of any kind on the walls during one of the 14 standardized tests.
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I would tell them about the 35 desks I have in my classroom, and how in two of my classes, all the desks are filled.
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I would tell them about the hours I’ve spent outside of class time writing grants to get novels because my school doesn’t have the money for them.
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I would tell them that I get to school about two hours before the first bell every day, but I still spend less time at school than most of my colleagues.
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I would tell them about how I’m not allowed to fail a student without turning in a form to the front office that specifies all instances of parent contact, describing in detail the exact accommodations and extra instruction that the child was given. I would tell them about how impossible this form is to complete, when leaving a voicemail doesn’t count as contact and many parents’ numbers change or are disconnected during the school year. I would tell them how unrealistic it is to document every time you help a child when you have a hundred of them, and how this results in so many teachers passing students who should be failing.
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I would tell them how systems that have been put in place to not leave children behind are allowing them to fall even further behind.
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I would tell them that even though I love my job and work harder at it than I’ve ever worked for anything, the loudest voice in my head is the one that is constantly saying you’re not doing enough. I hear it all the time.
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I would tell them about the student in one of my classes who in August of last year, flat-out refused to do any work because of how much he hated reading. I would tell them that today, when he found out we weren’t going to be doing book groups, I heard him mutter, “Oh, man. I wanted to keep reading,” and I said, “WHAT DID YOU SAY?” really loud and shook his shoulders jokingly. We laughed together and I had to change the subject quickly because I choked up thinking of how much work it has taken both of us to get to this place, and of how badly I hope that
Title I schools are public schools that receive special grants because of their high number of students who have been identified as at-risk. I adore my students and my teaching team. I love teaching. I’m really good at it. I respect my administration and feel valued by them. But at the end of this year, I’m leaving. I’m not sure if I’ll continue teaching elsewhere or start a new career. If I do leave, I’ll be one of the 40-50% of teachers who leave during their first five years. A drop in the bucket. To other teachers, I’m sure this isn’t surprising. Without knowing me or where I teach, they can probably easily guess why someone who loves her job and is good at it would be leaving. But it’s not teachers who need to know what it’s like. It’s everyone else. People who have no idea what it’s like teaching in a Title I school. Some of these people are even making important decisions about education.
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bout Teaching in a Title I School his high school teachers don’t give up on him. •
I would tell them that if I could compartmentalize things so that teaching was simply instructing a reasonable number of students and grading and planning lessons and visiting students’ families, I would be a teacher forever. No question.
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I would tell them that I teach the honors section of my grade level, but only about 70% of my honors students had even passed the standardized test the year before they came to me. My colleagues who teach the non-honors classes inherit students with a passing rate of 30-40%.
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I would tell them that almost all my students passed after being in my class, and that I’ve worked really, really hard to find a way of getting my kids to excel without “teaching to the test,” but that instead of being proud of this, I think of the handful who didn’t pass, and how I could have done more for them.
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I would tell them about my pencil cup that I keep filled from donations and out of my own pocket. I don’t ask for collateral or even for students to return them because it would take up too much instructional time. I once had a student refuse to do work because he didn’t have a pencil, and I said, Don’t you know that you’ll have to do the work so that you can go on to the next grade with your friends? And he said, without skipping a beat, I’ve failed almost all my classes since third grade and I always promote. I don’t even go to summer school. I stood there, dumbfounded, knowing he was right, but surprised he’d figured out the system so easily. The next day, I had the pencil cup.
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I would tell them about how policies that have been designed to not leave children behind are
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also teaching them that hard work doesn’t matter. •
I would tell them about David, a severely dyslexic student my second year of teaching who made my teaching life miserable early on with his constant defiance and disrespect. I would tell them about the day he came in early before school and asked if I could type out a poem that he’d written and memorized in his head, and as he recited it I started crying, then he started crying too, and I would tell them how everything was different between David and me after that.
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I would tell them about how I try to divide my time between everybody when my students are working in groups, but I almost always end up spending more time with my struggling students. I know that my students who are behind need me, but that doesn’t mean that my advanced students don’t need me just as much. I always feel torn. In an effort to not leave five students behind, I’m leaving behind 30 others.
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I would tell them about my students’ parents, and about the dreams they have for their children. I would tell them about the single mom whose husband died last year and left behind two children with learning disabilities, and how she’s now working two jobs to make ends meet. I would tell them about how the dad of one of my students who took me aside at Parent Night and said to me, with tears in his eyes, “I didn’t get past the fifth grade. But Carmen, she’s going places. I know it.”
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I would tell them that students who break rules at our school often don’t receive consequences. Last year our school had a higher number of office referrals and in-school suspensions, so this year teachers have been “strongly encouraged” to deal with discipline problems themselves. That
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means that unless the offense is severe or dangerous, students remain in class, whether or not their behavior is blatantly defiant. •
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I would tell them what a difficult situation this creates for the brand-new teachers, who are learning for the first time how to manage a classroom in an environment with so little disciplinary support. I would tell them how many teachers—good teachers—I know who have walked away during or after their first year because of this. I would tell them about how a few weeks ago, I told another teacher’s student I would be escorting her to the office for her behavior, and she replied, “Why the f**k would that matter?” This student was back in that teacher’s class five minutes later with candy she received in the office. I would tell them how hard it is to not feel hopeless when you realize that systems are teaching students that not only does it not matter if you do work at school, but it also doesn’t matter how you behave. I would tell them about my quietest student, Isobel, and how, on the day of our poetry slam, she stood up in front of the class and, in a voice that was loud and confident, recited every word of Amy Gerstler’s “Touring the Doll Hospital” by memory, and how all of us gave her a standing ovation and ran to hug her afterwards, and how it made me think of the quote from a character in Wonder by R.J. Palacio, “Everyone deserves a standing ovation because we all overcometh the world.” It was one of those weird moments where literature and life and beauty crash into you together at a thousand miles an hour and it knocks the wind out of you, but you look around and you’re alive, more than ever. I would tell them how my personality has changed under the stress of the past five years. I used to be fun. I used to be a bright and warm person who would go out of her way to help people or make them laugh. Now, if I can manage to act like myself during the school day, the second the bell rings I’m withdrawn, snappish, and moody.
•
I would tell them how this stress has started to overrun the part of teaching I love so fiercely.
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I would tell them that it feels like I have three choices: 1) stay where I am, continue working hard and destroy myself, 2) stay and protect myself by putting in less effort, or 3) leave and abandon a profession and kids I care about.
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I would tell them how much I hate all of those choices.
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I would tell them that I’m not alone; that my story is all too common, and that I know far too many teachers who have it worse than I do.
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I would tell them about when I interviewed
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recently at a private school on the other side of town, and how it went really well and they said they wanted to scoop me up right then and there, and how I got back in my car and put my head on the steering wheel and wept.
Why do I want them to know these things? •
Certainly not for the glory. If I’ve learned anything in my time as a teacher, it’s that the only heroes in this story are kids who go to school and do their best despite the systems that are keeping them down.
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I’m also not writing this for proof or validation that I work hard. I don’t have anything to prove about my work ethic or value as a teacher, to myself or anyone else, and this is not meant to initiate a game of “who has it worse.”
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I’m also not writing this to incriminate my school administrators or my district. If I thought the problem was confined to my school, I would not be sharing this publicly. The problem is nation-wide.
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No. I’m writing this because I care about what happens to my students, and other children like them in Title I schools across this country whose needs are not being met, and who are learning harmful lessons from the larger systems in place that are supposed to help them.
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I am writing this to give others a picture of the type of learning and teaching environments that are being created by these systems.
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I’m writing because it’s 2015, and far too many children in this country are still receiving a lower quality education because of the neighborhood into which they were born.
I don’t know what to do about it. I have some ideas, but I don’t have nearly enough knowledge of policy to even know where to begin. All I know is what I and others see at the front lines every day, and I just know that it’s not working—for students or their teachers. This is what I would tell them. I may have burned out in the process, but I will never stop fighting for these kids, their families, or the teachers who care about them. Love, Teach (Any names of students have been changed in this post.)
Posted by Love Teach at 6:37 pm April 22, 2015
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Bests of the Fests Shakespeare Globe Centre New Zealand will hold its prestigious week-long residential course, SGCNZ’s 2015 NSSP at the Silverstream Retreat, in Stokes Valley, Lower Hutt, Wellington from 27 September to 5 October 2015. Forty-six secondary student actors and directors were chosen from SGCNZ’s 2015 Regional and National University of Otago Sheilah Winn Shakespeare Festivals (SGCNZ UOSWSF), joined by winners of the SGCNZ/Bernina Shakespeare Costume Design Competition and SGCNZ/Morrison Music Trust Shakespeare Music Composition Competition Winners. The latter two will be the Student Costumier, who will be given $100 to purchase items and/or fabric to create indicative costume items to differentiate often shared roles. The Student Composer will also work closely with the directors and write and perform (often with other talented NSSPers) items to create the mood of each scene’s setting. All will do Workshops all together for half of each day and for the other half, work in their pre-allocated three groups with a high calibre Director. Each group will rehearse 40 minutes of the play selected by their Director - Pericles directed by Peter Hambleton, As You Like it director Rachel Henry and Much Ado About Nothing directed by Perry Piercy. These will be performed in a public performance in Expressions [Theatre] Upper Hutt on October 3 with one in the Legislative Chamber at Parliament on October 4. Leading Tutors of the Workshops include Sir Jon Trimmer taking Mime and Characterisation, Michael Wilson, teaching them skills around recording an actual radio play he has written, dance singing and
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stage combat. Each provides skills for the young people not just to become theatre practitioners, but also to take into whichever workplace of their choice. The whole SGCNZ NSSP troupe will be continuously assessed during the entire week by all staff involved. Twenty-four students will be selected to be members of SGCNZ Young Shakespeare Company to travel to the UK in the July school holidays in 2016. The SGCNZ YSC 2015 has just performed at a function hosted by the NZ High Commissioner, HE Sir Lockwood Smith, to great acclaim. Later in the week, they had the rare chance to perform rehearsed scenes from As You Like It on the Globe Stage. These opportunities will be repeated next year for SGCNZ YSC 2016 in the commemorative year of Shakespeare’s death 400 years ago and 25th anniversary of the founding of SGCNZ by its CEO, Dawn Sanders. In the words of Morgan Hopkins,, “It was such an incredible experience - to be in the Penthouse of NZ House, with its amazing panoramic view of London, performing in front of all these dignitaries and the SGCNZ Teachers Go Global.” “Knowing the future of New Zealand is in the hands of these outstanding young Kiwis augers well for all concerned,” said Dawn Sanders. Shakespeare Globe Centre New Zealand (SGCNZ) is a life skills enhancing organisation which supports Shakespeare’s Globe, London and the artistic and educational strategies associated with furthering the international understanding of Shakespeare and his contemporaries in performance.
Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015 21
On a bitingly cold day in June, MOTAT welcomed 28 students from six Auckland high schools to our second Industry Careers Day.
Sheraleigh Waru Papakura High School with Alistair McIntyre 22 Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015
Industry Careers Day (ICD) was developed in partnership with the Youth into Industry programme with support from Doug the Digger Roadshow, National Road Carriers and a number of companies from the infrastructure sector.
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MOTAT Industry Career’s Day 2015
Theo Manilla from Rutherford HS with Alistair McIntyre, Doug the Digger
The concept was to revolutionise the old style run-of- the- mill careers day and preselect senior (Year 11+) high school students through work placement coordinators in high schools.
Students and school staff gathered early in the morning for a ‘tool box’ meeting which outlined the activities for the day and focused firmly on health and safety expectations – when the students were working around heavy earth moving machinery and trucks, health and safety awareness became very important!
Identified students would benefit from a day spent with people who are working on the ground in the infrastructure industry including quarrying, road transport, earthmoving, and civil works.
After the briefing, students were eager to start working with the machines on hand, which included a plate compactor, a foot tamper, a mini excavator, 12 tonne vibrating roller, skid steer and a large (24 tonne) tip truck. At each activity students were encouraged to ask questions and complete workbook activities including quantity and loading calculations as well as compliance documentation. Probably the most popular activity of the day was the challenge of manipulating the mini excavator to carefully place a small batten on top of two road cones.
Representative companies from these disciplines were invited to bring along their equipment and provide a relevant and practical hands-on experience for students.
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Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015 23
Rutherford HS students at Youth Into Industry Careers Day at MOTAT.
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A good attitude towards work and healthy lifes tyle choices were important themes throughout the day. Students were invited into a mobile drug testing unit run by The Drug Detection Agency (TDDA) to learn about industry regulations for drugs and alcohol in the workplace and what they could expect from the drug and alcohol testing procedures. The NZ Police CVIU (Commercial Vehicle Inspection Unit) was well represented with a number of traffic compliance officers showing students what they looked for when they pulled trucks into roadside weigh stations for regulation checking. At the end of day there was a debrief session where the students were encouraged to think about a career in the infrastructure industry and given further avenues to explore. In many cases students were able to exchange their contact details with very supportive industry personnel – yes, they were networking! After such a successful event and the enthusiastic feedback received from school coordinators and students alike, MOTAT will definitely be facilitating a third event in late May 2016. The Museum is considering ways to extend the programme into a multiple day event with deeper engagement and unit standards alignment.
More Information: Youth into Industry programme can be seen here: http://youtu.be/YS5zrWo9Mfo MOTAT Careers Industry Day 2014 video can be seen here: http://youtu.be/cfQ7Z7GIhUA
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Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015 25
Improving Prediction Skills Th Need some help to challenge your students with mathematical/ scientific ability? How do you define fairness in a game context? Fairness in a game context with older children means • treating people so that everyone has the same chance • using the same rules for all players • thinking about how your actions will affect others • considering the facts before making a decision to act
The concept is within a specific context, and the implication is that one person’s win is another person’s loss so not everyone can win. We assume that there is equality between the players if the players listen to the rules and agree to follow them to the letter, so therefore the game is balanced and fair. How is it then that we still hear accusations of unfairness between the players? You have probably come across this cartoon on the internet:
• not blaming others for your mistakes
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hrough Patterning Elaine Le Sueur Are you a cheat? Let’s take a simple game between two players using coins. The answer depends on the players’ perception of the fairness of the game so we need to investigate further. The aim is to determine if the game is rigged or not. Players must listen to the rules and agree to follow them exactly so that the game is said to be ‘fair’ because the player with the best skill at diagnosing an emerging pattern is the one who is more likely to win. The rules of the game would be classed as ‘unfair’ if one player had more turns than the other because the contest is to determine who can see patterns based on an equal number of plays.
Before playing: Players to agree on the number of coins to be used for the trials and random arrangement of the row. This number and arrangement of coins remains the same each time that the game is played. A row can be vertical or horizontal. E.g.
How to play: Two players take alternate turns to remove one coin from either end of a row of coins arranged randomly. Value of the coins for each player is added up when all the coins have been removed and the player who has made the most money is the winner. This example uses two coins of each denomination of NZ currency. 2 x 10c, 2 x 20c, 2 x 50c, 2 x $1, 2 x $2
Procedure: •
Take coins of various denominations and arrange them randomly in a row.
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Make a note of the order of the coins so that the game can be repeated many times and ensure that each player agrees on the order.
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Play the game two or three times and think about what you are doing as you do it.
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Based on the outcomes of the games you have played, attempt to come up with a strategy that will guarantee you a win or draw.
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Play the game again a number of times using the same setup and your chosen strategy to see if the results are the same.
Can you find an optimal strategy to ensure that you win or at least end the game in a draw each time regardless of whether you are the player who goes first or the player to go second?
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Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015 27
To think about: Will it make a difference to your chosen strategy if you… •
Use a different arrangement of the coins?
Further challenge: develop a computer simulation to test a strategy for every possible arrangement of coins •
Use a different number of coins?
Further challenge: develop a way to predict the • •
success of your strategy using different numbers of coins and test it. You play different opponent? You increase the number of players and change the number of coins?
The Thinking Process
Test your strategy
Look for a pattern
Generate possibilities/ new strategies
Think about cause and effect Look at what works/ what doesnt work
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The ability to spot emerging patterns and to use the knowledge to make predictions about what will happen next is an important dimension of decision making. We do it all the time. When you play a game such as this, the brain compares it to what it already knows and uses the data to construct a way for you to act when faced with a similar experience in the future, seemingly unconsciously and without effort as a picture falls into place.
Being aware of your thought processes (metacognition) improves your ability to recognise patterns and help you to explain a winning strategy, or to recognise a losing one. Sometimes it is easier to see a mistake than it is to predict a success (also known as learning from our mistakes). If you are unable to prove that the success of your strategy was not due simply to chance then you will run the risk of being accused of cheating!
Some other interesting patterns to investigate: Chess: Every expert chess player masters a number of patterns as a basis through lots and lots of practice, and goes on to analyse unfamiliar patterns to discover if clever strategies exist already, or develop their own and play them.
Fingerprint recognition http://sciencespot.net/Media/FrnsScience/ fingerprintbasicscard.pdf http://www.wonderville.ca/asset/fingerprint-activity http://www.explainthatstuff.com/fingerprintscanners. html Cryptography Visit this website for more links. Scroll down to the helpful resources and fun cryptology projects to try. https://www.cerias.purdue.edu/education/k-12/ teaching_resources/lessons_presentations/cryptology. html
Fibonacci: 0,1,1,2,3,5,8,13,21, etc
Bird vocalisation patterns
If you understand that the Fibonacci sequence is just adding the previous two numbers together to produce your next value can you develop a quick way to reach a specific place value in the sequence (eg, the 50th place)?
Can you recognise the bird in the tree in your garden by listening to its song? Listen to and download NZ native bird songs at http:// www.doc.govt.nz/nature/native-animals/birds/ Music
Fractals
Sample melodic pattern can be found at https:// en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melodic_pattern A YouTube video of a four note minor triad pattern to try on your instrument : https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=EDp2txI0Kd4
A fractal is a geometric shape that can be subdivided in parts, each of which is a reduced-size copy of the whole. Find out more at http://fractalfoundation.org/ resources/what-are-fractals/
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Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015 29
Learners need advocacy If advocacy is about giving people a voice, none are more in need than the learners in our schools. Although I’m certain no teacher would want their teaching to be disadvantaging their students, the evidence keeps building that this is what’s going on. What follows is a rundown on just a little of that evidence, with accompanying comment.
Gut-feeling evidence. Whoa there, hang on a minute, I hear you say, how can gut-feeling be evidence? Well, strictly speaking, it doesn’t qualify. But I include it because, in the course of the work I used to do, I was in and out of classrooms a lot, and couldn’t help noticing the things that were happening therein. Out of that experience a gut feeling emerged suggesting there was something wrong, efficacy wise, with the learning I saw happening. That gut feeling was to last all of my 50 years working life in education. It was my constant companion. That qualifies it as evidence in my book. Besides, that instinctively sensed intuition started off my quest for answers. I came to the conclusion that something seemed to be disadvantaging the life chances of many students. But I had to wait until I had left the paid work force before I found my feeling had a substantial basis in fact. Once freed of the belief paradigms of education I found the space and clarity to spot what was going on. Not that that was difficult, Nuthall’s findings were by then available and all I had to do was make use of them. But in those days, my way of thinking was very uncommon and it certainly didn’t make one popular.
Nuthall’s evidence What evidence did Nuthall contribute that affirmed my suspicions? Working as a professor and learning researcher at Canterbury University from the early 1970s the late Graham Nuthall found two things of significance to my argument. One concerned the erroneous beliefs teacher’s hold about learning (see also the discussion about the Beliefs About Learning Questionnaire below). These make the teaching practices built on those beliefs into a learning process that is “inherently inefficient”. The other main finding was that all but a handful of students possess a “remarkably similar” capacity to learn. I drew two conclusions from Nuthall’s discoveries. The first is that there had to be a massive waste of the learning capacity being
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Laurie Loper Psychologist experienced by the nation’s children. The second is that there needed to be a way to visually demonstrate this waste and of showing its magnitude. So I set about constructing something to show these things, the result being the “Notional Diagram” (see below). The yellow area depicted represents the amount of developed capacity to learn of the nation’s young and the green represents the amount that remains undeveloped. This diagram is actually two diagrams in one for it shows how much of the total capacity to learn of our nation’s children is available to
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be developed in an efficient learning regime (refer right side) as compared to what would be developed in an inefficient one (refer left side).
Notional Diagram Comparing the two coloured areas, it will be apparent that they are roughly equal. What’s shown, then, is that about half the learning capacity of our nation’s children might not be being developed. Granted it’s not known how much of our children’s capacity to learn is getting developed, given the second of
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Nuthall findings (concerning the remarkably similar capacity of virtually all students to learn), achievement data certainly confirms the fact that much of it is not. The image the diagram presents could well be closer to the truth than is realised. At the very least it alerts us to that possibility being plausible. An additional thought, if our economy depends as heavily as we are led to believe on the highest achievers coming through, the diagram suggests that even the highest achievers have considerable room for improvement. But the extent to which they may need to improve is dwarfed by how much the rest need to improve because we must never forget that they are all potential high achievers too.
The evidence of Te Kotahitanga Te Kotahitanga was a large Ministry of Education funded research and professional development project that sought to improve the achievement of Maori students in mainstream classrooms through the implementation of a cultural pedagogy of relations. Driven by its creator, Dr Russell Bishop, it ran from for several years involving many secondary schools. When the Government of the day did not renew Te Kotahitanga’s contract, in its place came other approaches. In effect Bishop’s programme found that if teachers were able to relate to Maori students as they are used to being related to within whanau/hapu/iwi contexts, they will feel more valued as Maori and so would participate and thus perform better as learners, this effect being enhanced when the pedagogies used were also part of Maori culture. These would include older helping younger, learning co-operatively as a group (as opposed to learning as individuals), and learning in a context that included the expression of other cultural norms and values. Since by far most classroom teachers in our system are not culturally Maori nor is the pedagogy anywhere near as just described, there’s a large cultural barrier for Maori students to clear before they can even start learning in the competitive context that characterises most mainstream classrooms. Not feeling valued as Maori, spirits quickly sag, as does achievement.
Praise Training evidence There is a lot of confusion around the use of praise, which includes the purpose for using it. My many
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years experience of teaching people in all sorts of child care and teaching situations to use specific positive feedback has taught me that many people fail to understand that its main purpose is to shape behaviour and that it use needs to more in the nature of a dynamic art than one of mere mechanical application. Few people demonstrate in their use of it that they even know that specific positive feedback is what obtains the best outcomes. Of all the hundreds of teachers I’ve taught to use specific positive feedback only two I found used it to anywhere best effect and even they weren’t using enough of it. I could quote figures to support what I’m saying but in the interests of brevity/clarity I prefer to just provide an overall picture. Backed by studies such as John Hattie has done on the learning effect praise use contributes, there is no doubt in my mind that this is a major, yet unrecognised, reason why teachers fail to promote learning as well as they might.
Beliefs About Learning Questionnaire evidence Following on from Nuthall’s discoveries about the effect of erroneous teacher beliefs about learning, I decided to construct a short questionnaire of a dozen items. I did so as a means in part of alerting teachers to the fact that these erroneous views do exist and in part to test whether in fact teachers I was working with at the time knew whether or not their beliefs were true. I chose beliefs that Nuthall’s findings could verify, this serving the double purpose of raising awareness about the beliefs themselves and acquainting teachers with Nuthall’s findings at the same time. Evidence was obtained from about 100 secondary trainee teachers undertaking their Diploma of Teaching qualification. Of the 100, only one responded that all 12 beliefs were untrue (the correct response) not because she knew that for a fact, she just twigged to it from the way the questionnaire was formatted. All the others turned in a very mixed bag of responses, all of them having no idea that all of the beliefs were untrue.
Bobbie Math’s evidence As the new kid on the block, Bobbie Maths is exciting interest both here and abroad in Singapore and the U K. It is an approach with many parallels to Te Kotahitanga. What distinguishes it from Te Kotahitanga seems to be it’s more cross-cultural in its
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reach and influence, more focused on pedagogy per se and more determined to make use of approaches that have a proven track record for promoting student progress. Amongst it’s several other reasons for success is that it has shown the capacity to lift the performance of all students irrespective of their academic status (to get an enhanced sense of the importance of that, refer back to the discussion on the Notional Diagram). It also has an inbuilt support system to address the crossover situation teachers face as they take on board the entirely new learning perspectives that have proven to be so crucial to the success of the approach. I’ve personally witnessed this approach in action. It literally does give students a voice in their own learning for one of its key pedagogies involves the use of the verbal skills needed, for instance, to propose solutions to maths problems and justify them, explain steps taken and why particular decisions were made, report back to the larger class group, and so on. I’ve also heard what teachers involved say about their experience of learning to operate it. A period of around 3 years is what most teachers take to shuck off their former beliefs and teaching practices. A change-crossover period of that length is hardly surprising for those beliefs and practices are centuries old and, like driving on the opposite side of the road to what you’re used to, old habits tend to reappear when pressure comes on. But although this re-orienting makes for hard work, what makes it all worthwhile is teachers seeing, for instance, previously low achieving Maori students gain 4 – 5 years in a twelve month period and seeing their status as Maori learners going through the roof. The spectacular success of the Bobbie Maths programme implies that teaching practices used in the past have hindered student progress, not helped. Hence the dismal results achieved by many interventions (as John Hattie affirms in his latest article). Many interventions seem to rely on tweaking some aspect of existing practice. It’s rare indeed to see the holistic way Bobbie Maths goes about its work. It breaks the mould, the efficacy issues it addresses seemingly are beyond the ken (awareness and understanding) of those who design interventions or write policies to improve educational outcomes across the board.
John Hattie’s evidence Few in education will not be familiar with his name, or with his research deeds. I’ve already made reference to his latest report so will make use of only one of his latest findings. It is that between-teacher variation within the same school is the main reason for New Zealand students not making the progress they should. Fix that, he says, and all would be sweet. The 5 policy distractions he lists all serve to direct attention to the habit interventions have of trying to find solutions for the wrong problems. In putting the emphasis for New Zealand underachievement on
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between-teacher variation, though, I think he may well have fallen into the tweaker’s camp himself. Be that as it may, his evidence, too, backs my contention that within the learning context as we know it there is much that is askew.
The evidence of evolution There are many species on the planet whose members exhibit redundancy in the form of an oversupply of capacity. Ants spring first to mind, but bees come close behind. One falls by the wayside, another equally endowed to perform its role takes its place. It makes no sense to me that a species as highly developed as homo sapiens would not have developed the same attribute. Indeed, as Nuthall has shown in his finding that all but a handful of students have a “remarkably similar” capacity to learn, in my book, that constitutes proof that redundancy of learning capacity is also part of humanity’s learning arsenal.
Best Evidence Synthesis evidence In each and every approach discussed, reliance has been placed almost solely on finding efficacy solutions from within existing pedagogical practices. You might call this ‘a what works best’ approach. The most successful of this kind of approach is Best Evidence Synthesis (BES). Driven by its founder, Dr Adrienne Alton-Lee, this last-to-be-mentioned source of evidence arises out of a scientifically rigorous approach that has quietly in a no-fuss, word-of-mouth way gained considerable kudos and acclaim both here and overseas, especially with teachers. One of the many interesting things about it is that in the exercising of the rigour involved, many, many approaches have to be discarded, as few (albeit for a variety of reasons) proved effective enough to make the cut, this proving also that there are a lot ineffective approaches ‘out there’. But even BES doesn’t go down the road of developing approaches that are based on/around the nature of learning per se. To conclude, like John Hattie, I see there is little gain to be had in raising achievement across the board by following the distracting policy pathways he has identified: appeasing the parents, fixing the infrastructure, fixing the student, fixing the schools and fixing the teachers. His solution of evening up the variation in teaching outcomes within schools may well have some merit as an interim solution. But in the long run there is only one solution capable of properly evening things up and of mobilising every skerrick of student learning capacity. To me Hattie’s and other solutions are mistaken for what we already know about the nature of the learning process, suggests that in not moving that to centre stage in our policy thinking, not only will we fail to bring greater equity into education, we will be in grave danger of missing out on an abundance of student achievement riches.
Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015 33
Children globally get their voice
Otjikondo School, Outjo, Namibia
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es heard on Listen To Us song Over 33,000 students from schools around the globe have this year shared in one common learning experience - to master one of the vocal parts for a new song called Listen To Us. Listen To Us is uniting young people around the world as part of the Voices Around The World project. This is the third year of the project and has involved over 1,400 national, independent and international schools, and culminated in the release of the Listen To Us CD in July.
The Voices Around The World project, which is in its third year, is spearheaded by former music teacher and international school principal, Laurie Lewin, in collaboration with singer/songwriter Howard Jones. Laurie has travelled to many schools to support them with their rehearsals and recordings of Listen To Us, and to encourage students to think about the words they are singing. “Young people really want to make a difference,” he said. “They want to work together for change. Many who we’ve spoken to, from all around the world, show they’re absolutely passionate about the meaning behind the words of the song. You can see it in their faces and hear it in their voices while they’re singing. Whatever their age, participating in such a project has a huge impact on them.”
The CD features the voices of over 5,000 students from recordings that were made by schools in 48 different countries including Cambodia, Israel, Iceland, Australia, Brazil and Turkey.
Children from Al-Shams School in Syria record their voices for the Voices Around The World CD
All proceeds from the sales of the CD plus a DVD will this year go to support schools in Tanzania that are in need of basic learning resources.
Anglican International School, Jerusalem
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Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015 35
Bengeworth Academy, Evesham, UK.
Laurie was inspired to find a school in Syria to participate in this year’s project thanks to the suggestion of a student who took part in 2014. “During last year’s project, I visited an international school in Dubai to help the students with their recording,” explained Laurie. “I spoke to a young girl there who’d been practising the song with me. She said ‘I’d like to be singing this with my friends back in Syria.’ She was a Syrian refugee. Thanks to her wish, this year we are thrilled to have children from Al-Shams (The Sun) School, Sweida city, Syria joining us on the recording.”
Voices Around The World - Project Director, Laurie Lewin, talking to children at St. Christopher’s School in Bahrain
Kristina Bourner who is the music teacher at St Christopher’s School, an international school in Bahrain who taught Listen To Us to some of her students and whose voices are on the CD said “For students around the world, sharing in the recording of a song with a common goal is an incredibly powerful experience. It is uniting children of so many cultures with one important message – that working together, you can make a difference.” 36 Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015
One of the students from St. Francis College in San Paulo Brazil who took part in the recording said “The project is good because it involves young people from all kinds of backgrounds. We are all singing the same song and we are all linked by the music.” Sponsors that have helped to raise awareness of the project this year have included Coins Foundation, Monjasa, Bandzoogle, the International Primary Curriculum, and the Charter for Compassion.
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Laurie Lewin with pupils at Otjikondo School, Outjo, Namibia
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NZ Herald Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015 37
The British-Georgian Academy, Tbilis, Georgia
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Girls waiting to record - Panaga School Brunei
Panaga School, Brunei
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Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015 39
Listen To Us is available to download from iTunes and from the Voices Around The World website where you will also be able to find out how to participate in the 2016 project. You can also see feedback from some of this year’s participating schools on the Voices Around The World Facebook page.
Voices Around The World - Music Adviser Kristina Bourner and young girl at St. Christopher’s School in Bahrain
Tymberwood Academy, St Joseph’s Prep School, Ilfield Special School and Cecil Wood School help to launch the release of the Voices Around The World CD featuring 5000 childrens voices
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Young student at the Anglican International School, Jerusalem
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Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015 41
“People told me I was mad to teach in London schools, but I’ve had the time of my life” Hawke’s Bay to London: I’m not the first teacher to make the journey and I’m pretty sure I won’t be the last. But now I’ve been here in the land of ‘pea-soupers’, top hats and Dickensian poverty (only kidding) for six years, I feel I’m ready to evaluate my experience and draw some conclusions. So after two years as a music teacher what was the response of my NZ colleagues when I told them of my plans to settle in London? ‘Why would you want to do that?’; ‘You’ll get ripped apart’; ‘The kids are terrible’; ‘You’re mad’ were some of the more encouraging comments! Luckily, I didn’t listen. As for so many others, the decision to move to the UK was made easier by the fact I have family here: my parents are both originally from England and my brother lives here. Career-wise, I seemed to have hit a brick wall. My problem was that I was struggling to find a job as a music teacher in NZ – and this was before the current problem of over-supply was anywhere near as bad as it is now. My horizons felt very limited. For me, one of the main attractions of the English education system is the supply system whereby you can move from school to school in temporary roles, picking up new experience and ideas in a very small amount of time This could not contrast more with the situation in NZ. The system whereby each school – especially in rural areas - has its own own group of local teachers they can call on for supply cover meant that I was never going to get the kind of richness of experience that I’ve been exposed to in England. When I started teaching in London, I was learning all the time from the different schools where I worked: I was meeting new teachers every day, swapping lesson plans, building up my own library of resources. I felt really energised and stimulated by the new environment. But what about the kids? Well, what about them? Yes, there are challenging schools in London with challenging kids. But I’d taught in schools at home where there was no support to address bad classroom behaviour, where kids came from a very disadvantaged background and gang culture was 42 Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015
prevalent. So no one can claim this is something that’s peculiar to London. And when you remember that there are more than double the number of people in London as in the whole of NZ, of course you’re going to come into contact with a far more diverse population. Coming to the UK can be a permanent career change. Or it can be the most fantastic OE with career development attached. As a supply teacher you enjoy incredible flexibility, you can have days off whenever you want, you don’t do any lesson plans or marking – the work is simply handed to you when you arrive at school. And you can leave the classroom on a Friday afternoon, head for the airport and be in Rome – or Paris or Athens or Madrid and hundreds of other amazing places – a couple of hours later. But a word of warning: teachers in permanent posts work extremely hard in the UK. The education system has undergone a period of huge reform under the Coalition Government in a bid to raise standards of teaching – and learning. Teacher training in England, too, is extremely demanding. Having observed a friend training in the UK, I’ve been struck by the fact that his workload is literally four times larger than mine was in NZ. And the amount of paperwork teachers have to do in England is, frankly, bananas. A recent survey shows that 73% of trainee teachers here have considered leaving the profession – mostly due to workload. But if teachers in the UK are being turned off teaching as a permanent career, the opportunities for supply teachers are even greater. I’m now working for a teacher recruitment agency, helping people like me find the jobs they want and settle into new lives in the UK. I’ve had the time of my life – it seems unfair not to help other share the same experience! Michael Day is International Candidate Manager at Prospero Teaching in the UK. If you’re interested in teaching in the UK, get in touch at http://www.prosperoteaching.com/
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She Wrote This Letter To The Woman Behind Her At The Grocery Store... Andrea is a mother of five and runs a wonderful blog she calls, True Stories of a Midwest Yankee. One of her latest posts about an experience at the grocery store is beginning to gain a lot of attention, touching the hearts of people all across the country. After reading it, you will see why... Dear woman behind me in line at the grocery store, You don’t know me. You have no clue what my life has been like since October 1. You have no clue that my family has gone through the wringer. You have no clue that we have faced unbelievable hardship. You have no clue we have been humiliated, humbled, destitute. You have no clue I have cried more days than not; that I fight against bitterness taking control of my heart. You have no clue that my husband’s pride was shattered. You have no clue my kids have had the worries of an adult on their shoulders. You have no clue their innocence was snatched from them for no good reason. You know none of this. What you do know is I tried to buy my kids some food and that the EBT machine was down so I couldn’t buy that food. I didn’t have any cash or my debit card with me. I only had my SNAP card. All you heard was me saying “No, don’t hold it for me. My kids are hungry now and I have no other way of paying for this.” You didn’t judge me. You didn’t snarl “Maybe you should have less kids.” You didn’t say “Well, get a job and learn to support yourself.” You didn’t look away in embarrassment or shame for me. You didn’t make any assumptions at all. What you did was you paid that $17.38 grocery bill for us. You gave my kids bananas, yogurt, apple juice, cheese sticks, and a peach ice tea for me; a rare treat and splurge. You let me hug you and promise through my tears that I WILL pay this forward. I WILL pay someone’s grocery bill for them. That $17.38 may not have been a lot for you, but it was priceless to us. In the car my kids couldn’t stop gushing about you; our “angel in disguise.” They prayed for you. They prayed you would be blessed. You restored some of our lost faith. One simple and small action changed our lives. You probably have forgotten about us by now, but we haven’t forgotten about you. You will forever be a part of us even though we don’t even know your name. You have no clue how grateful and
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embarrassed I am that we pay for all our food with SNAP. We eat well thanks to the government. I love that. I love that the government makes sure my kids are cared for. It is one less worry for us. I also struggle with pride and embarrassment. I defiantly tell people we are on SNAP. Daring them to judge us. Only those closest to us know why we are on SNAP. They know my husband is a hard worker who was laid off after 17 years in a management position with his former company. They know we were moved from our home to a new state only to be left homeless since the house we had came with the job he lost. Only those closest to us know my husband works part time while looking tirelessly for more; that he has submitted more applications than he has received interviews for. Too many jobs are only offering part time work anymore. It is not easy for a 40-something year old to find a job that will support his family of 5 kids. You know none of this but you didn’t let that stop you from being compassionate and generous to someone you have never met. To the woman behind me at the grocery store, you have no idea how much we appreciate you. You have no idea the impact you had on my kids. You have no idea how incredibly thankful I am for you. Your action may have been small, but to us it was monumental. Thank you. Thank you for not judging us. Thank you for giving my kids a snack when they were quite hungry. Thank you. Just thank you. Forever, Andrea, the woman in front of you at the grocery store with the cart full of kids who are no longer hungry.
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Improving Your Brain Health By How You Relate to Others How well your brain works is impacted by how you relate to other people. When doing the research for Cheetah’s “Happy Aging Project” program, we synthesized two important bodies of knowledge from leading research on brain health and performance. Read on to see how you relate to others can significantly impact your overall brain health. In his book, Buddha Brain, Rick Hanson writes about the first and second “darts.” The first dart is the event; the second dart is how we perceive the event. If we perceive certain people’s actions as troublesome, the pain we experience comes from the second dart – that is our perception of their actions. According to Dan Siegel in his book, Interpersonal Neurobiology, these second darts are formed from our synaptic shadows – those are the neural network patterns laid down throughout our life and many set before we were even conscious of any programming. But even though unconscious programming creates the way we react to the world, it does not have to be the way we always react. Siegel’s work shows that how we interact with people significantly impacts our brain health. Since how we take care of our brains as we age impacts how we age - so it goes to reason that paying attention to how we are connecting with others (friends, family, coworkers, and supervisors) can also help us age in ways that bring us more long-term happiness. Improving our brain health by fostering healthy, rewarding connections with others also helps us be more effective in all areas of our lives - and it’s a crucial “soft skill” for Project Managers. I’ve assembled this mind map showing what we can do to increase our awareness of how we are connecting with others. This is adapted from Siegel’s work on what he labels the “window of tolerance” – I’ve renamed it the “window of awareness.” You will notice the window of awareness is in the middle, framed by the boxes “chaos” and “rigidity.” Chaos and rigidity describe how we react to information coming in – an ongoing stream in our lives. I refer to this as the “what is.” The information below the central box on chaos, window of awareness, and rigidity illustrates how we unconsciously react to this ongoing stream of information. Our perceptions are our unconscious reactions to “what is.” They are influenced by our internal context (our programming) and how we react externally, often referred to as our triggers or our “buttons getting pushed.” The less aware you are of your perceptions, the smaller your window of 44 Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015
awareness, the fewer choices you have in how you react to the world, and the less ability you have to authentically connect with others in the moment. And this becomes a BIGGER issue as we age, as we have a lifetime of programming that can make us pretty darn rigid in how we respond to the world. To improve your brain health, increase your happiness, and improve your relationships with other people as you age, align your behaviors with those in the top part of this graphic – the primary one being living in a state of wonder. Wisdom is becoming more and more conscious of how your perceptions influence the way you experience the world. Think about a time when your perceptions created a reaction that hurt your relationship with another person. Then, ask yourself this question: “I wonder what else could be going on here?” Let’s consider an example from Project Management. You’ve joined a new project team that’s been put together to tackle a new project: building a new back-end database for your company’s online sales system. In early project initiation and planning meetings, you and the other project team members enthusiastically brainstorm a wide range of ideas - it seems that everyone has something to say, except for one co-worker. This co-worker sits quietly during meetings and doesn’t contribute new ideas or respond to others’ ideas; your initial perception is that this person doesn’t care about the project or think it is important, and you’re worried that they’re not going to do their part to bring the project to completion. Before you get too committed to this perception, pause. Ask yourself: “I wonder what else is going on here?” After chatting casually with this co-worker about how they’re doing, you learn that they have at least five other major projects on their plate. They don’t seem particularly excited about your new project, so they don’t want to get in the way and stall other team members’ ideas. By looking at this co-worker’s behavior from their point of view, you widen your window of awareness. Instead of perceiving your co-worker as not caring about others’ ideas, you can appreciate their intention to allow others the opportunity to take the lead on this project. When you shift your perceptions of others’ behavior to find the positive intent, you set yourself up to have mutually respectful, rewarding, and effective working relationships.
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Cheetah Learning is committed to helping Project Managers have thriving professional and personal lives. We recently completed a new program called the Happy Aging Project, where Project Managers learn how to use tools such as the ones above and a host of other mind, body, and lifestyle About the Author: Michelle LaBrosse, PMP, is an entrepreneurial powerhouse with a penchant for making success easy, fun, and fast. She is the founder of Cheetah Learning, the author of the Cheetah Success Series, and a prolific blogger whose mission is to bring Project Management to the masses. Cheetah Learning is a virtual company with 100 employees, contractors, and licensees worldwide. To date, more than 50,000 people have become “Cheetahs” using Cheetah Learning’s innovative Project Management and
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practices to use their Project Management skills in a way that can significantly increase their overall happiness (and success) in life. For more information on Cheetah’s Happy Aging Project, visit www.cheetahlearning.com/hay accelerated learning techniques. Honored by the Project Management Institute (PMI®), Cheetah Learning was named Professional Development Provider of the Year at the 2008 PMI® Global Congress. A dynamic keynote speaker and industry thought leader, Michelle is recognized by PMI as one of the 25 Most Influential Women in Project Management in the world. Michelle also developed the Cheetah Certified Project Manager (CCPM) program based on Myers-Briggs Type Indicator personality profiling to help students master how to use their unique strengths for learn is recognized by PMI as one of the 25 Most Influential Women in Project Management in the world. Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015 45
Artist Reveals Extremely Detaile “Organized chaos” is how Austen based artist Sophie Roach describes her style. She started to sketch because of the “stress and boredom of college,” but it was only in 2012, two years after she began that, Roach’s art began to take off.
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“I didn’t realize it would be possible to make a living with my doodles until about two years ago” Roach told Chipper Things. “Since then I’ve drawn on so many different objects from cars, to guitars, to skateboards, to surfboards, to soccer balls, to (so many) shoes. I took on my first mural projects earlier this year and I’m totally obsessed now.” Roach loves making lists and doing things efficiently, which might explain her success. Her clients include Nike, Converse, Vans and Urban Outfitters, and she has published a zine.
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ed Drawings in Her Notebook
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Malala Turns 18, And Opens A Scho
Yousafzai survived being shot in the head by a Taliban gunman in 2012, as she returned home from school on a bus with her classmates in northern Pakistan. Since the attack, she and her family have lived in England. iMalala Yousafzai walks with Syrian refugees on her 18th birthday, during the opening of a school for refugee girls in Lebanon's Bekaa Valley. WAEL HAMZEH/EPA /LANDOV The new school will serve more than 200 Syrian girls between ages 14 and 18, according to the Malala Fund, Yousafzai's nonprofit organization, which is helping support the school.
Malala Yousafzai celebrated her birthday and the opening of a new school with "brave and inspiring girls of Syria" in Lebanon on Sunday. Malala Yousafzai, the Pakistani education activist and youngest-ever Nobel Peace laureate, celebrated her 18th birthday today by inaugurating a secondary school for Syrian refugee girls in Lebanon's Bekaa Valley, near Syria's border. 52 Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015
"The new curriculum will enable students to receive their baccalaureate or vocational degrees through the Lebanese Ministry of Education and Higher Education or the Syrian equivalent," says a statement on the fund's blog. "Students unable to commit to the fouryear baccalaureate training will participate in skills courses intended to help them find work and generate their own incomes." The fund's blog quotes Yousafzai: "I am honored to mark my 18th birthday with the brave and inspiring girls of Syria. I am here on behalf of the 28 million children who are kept from the classroom because of armed conflict. Their courage and dedication to continue their schooling in difficult Back to index
ool For Syrian Refugee Girls
conditions inspires people around the world and it is our duty to stand by them," Malala said. "On this day, I have a message for the leaders of this country, this region and the world — you are failing the Syrian people, especially Syria's children. This is a heartbreaking tragedy — the world's worst refugee crisis in decades." Lebanon hosts more than 1 million of Syria's 4 million refugees. Today’s school opening in Lebanon follows Yousafzai’sappearance at an education summit in Oslo last week, where she noted that her birthday was approaching: “My life of being a child will come to an end,” she said in a speech. She’s vowed to continue to fight for the rights of children. “I think there’s no limit of age ... to speak of children’s rights,” she said. “My father has been doing it as a teacher and I will continue to do it as a woman. As an adult, you can be the voice of children.
Malala Yousafzai poses for photographs in New York. Yousafzai survived being shot by the Taliban in 2012 because she advocated education for girls. In April we quoted Pakistani officials as saying that 10 men arrested in the near-fatal shooting of Pakistani youth activist Malala Yousafzai had been convicted in a secret trial and sent to prison for 25-year jail terms. Authorities now say that’s not true — all but two of the men were “secretly acquitted” and set free. The two men who weren’t acquitted were actually handed life sentences, the officials say. Reuters reports that the men were “freed,” but Saleem Marwat, the district police officer in the Pakistan’s Swat region, tells NPR’s Philip Reeves that “only two were convicted. The other eight were never convicted, so it is wrong to say that eight convicted were released.” Philip notes that in South Asia it is “common for police to respond to public pressure by arresting large numbers of people who turn out to be unrelated to the crime in question, including relatives of suspects.” According to the BBC:”The secrecy surrounding the trial, which was held behind closed doors, raised suspicions over its validity. SCOTT NEUMAN
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Hillcrest High School dominate a
The winners for the 2015 secondary school arts awards have been decided for another year with Hamilton’s Hillcrest High School again dominating prizes. Excellence in Art Competition was created specifically for senior secondary school students in the Waikato, Coromandel and Newmarket in Auckland. Two thousand dollars in cash prizes have been awarded with the top prize of $500 being won by 54 Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015
Hillcrest High School’s Emma Savage with her school also receiving $500. Second prize of $300 was won by Chelsea Lowther of Hamilton Christian School, with the third prize of $200 going to Alanah Hanley also from Hillcrest High School. The judges also awarded Honorable Mentions to Angie Zhou (Hillcrest High School), Harrison Forlong (Fraser High), Sarah Boyed (Epsom Girls Grammar) Back to index
art awards
The competition judges were Leafa Wilson, art curator from Waikato Museum; and full-time artist Sante Cronje from Cambridge. Emma Savage’s win means the art awards have been won in consecutive years by Hillcrest High School. All the art award paintings remain on display at the Creative Waikato offices in Alexandra Street in Hamilton.
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Artwork Inspired by the Reef Science without Borders® Challenge Winners The Khaled bin Sultan Living Oceans Foundation is proud to announce winners of the 2015 Science Without Borders® Challenge. The Challenge is an international art competition that inspires students to be creative while raising awareness of important ocean conservation issues. The theme of this year’s Challenge was Reef Relationships. Students submitted artwork that portrayed relationships between coral reef species such as the symbiotic relationship between clownfish and anemones, while others focused on the relationship people have with the reef. This year’s competition was bigger than ever and we could not have been happier with the overwhelming number of exceptional entries we received. Our offices were flooded with canvas paintings, watercolors, pastels, pencil drawings, and even some very impressive crayon art as entries came pouring in from around the world. Over 150 students submitted artwork from 17 countries including Hungary, India, Kenya, New Zealand, and Pakistan. This was the first time we expanded the program to include middle school students, and were pleased to see that more than half of the entries were in this new category. The contest was especially fierce this year not only because of the sheer number of entries, but because so many of the pieces were truly stunning highcaliber art. Our judges had an extremely difficult time choosing this year’s winners.
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Written by Amy Heemsoth
Middle School First Place: Rachel Shen, Age 13, Ontario, Canada; Preserve to Survive the StrugglesSecond Place: Jonathon Xu, Age 12, Ontario, Canada; The Precious Ocean JewelsThird Place: Chime Rosaldes, Age 12, Manama, Bahrain; Eye of the Ocean
High School First Place: Michelle Huang, Age 17, Texas, USA; Treasure ReefSecond Place: Sukanya Wattal, Age 15, Jammu, India; Coral for a Fish, as Mother for a ChildThird Place: Morgan Herrmann, Age 17, New York, USA; The Eel and the Cleaner Shrimp Middle school first place winner, Rachel Shen, attends the Beware Wet Paint Progressive Art School. When asked what inspired her to create her artwork, she said, “I am inspired by the beauty of coral reef. We took a family vacation to Hawaii. I still remember the kayak and snorkeling trip in Kane’ohe Bay during which I saw a lot of beautiful coral reefs and fish. I wish my artwork could bring people’s attention to the connections between corals and another sea animals.”Rachel will attend summer art camps where she states that, “she will be able to express her creative thinking.” Michelle Huang, a senior at Dulles Math and Science Academy and first place High school winner, speaks passionately about her conservation art piece saying, “I want to emphasize the significance of actively preserving our natural world. The fates of a multitude of species and habitats lie in our hands, an idiom I chose to depict literally. At this point, even if our actions do not directly harm the environment, sitting idly by while others do is just as detrimental. It’s now our responsibility to protect our earth by effecting change.” Michelle will be attending Columbia University this fall. Through the Science Without Borders® Challenge, the Foundation hopes to promote public awareness of the need to preserve, protect, and restore the world’s oceans and to inspire students to conserve and protect coral reefs around the world. How teaching English on my year abroad improved my French Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015 57
It seems counterintuitive, but teaching English can be the best way to immerse yourself in another culture and learn its language Teaching your own language gives you a broader insight into language learning – you see what works and what doesn’t. I began my year abroad in Paris as an intern at a publishing house, earning €2.70 an hour for menial work. I’d hoped to be able to soak up French in a real-life setting, but was constantly writing emails and making calls in English, with little free time for learning my second language. I soon realised the only thing I’d really learned was how to use a document-binding machine. Luckily, I’d taken an intensive English-teaching course in London the previous summer, which helped me find a new job with a language school. I took the Tesol course (the Celta is also recognised by the British Council and reputable schools worldwide), which enabled me to spend the rest of my year teaching English to adults, either in one-to-one lessons or small groups. Students planning their years abroad might worry about teaching English. It seems counterintuitive – you go to another country to learn the language and end up speaking your mother tongue. But in my experience, it can be a rewarding job and is perhaps even the best way to immerse yourself in another culture and learn the language. Ellen Rothnie, a student at the University of Glasgow, who has recently returned from two years abroad as a British Council language assistant in a school in Arévalo, Spain, agrees. She says: “The feeling of integrating is so special. I wanted to improve my Spanish and was astounded by how much I did. I
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noticed a difference within a month.” Broadly speaking, you can either work or study on your year abroad. While some universities offer exchange schemes such as Erasmus, participants sometimes find they struggle to practise their target language, as their social circle often revolves around fellow international students. As for work, there are year-abroad internships – these are fiercely competitive and frequently involve dull admin work for minimal pay, which is difficult to live on when you add up the costs of travelling to another country and renting accommodation. Teaching English is among the best-paid options; I earned €19 an hour, although my weekly hours varied a lot. The British Council assistantship offers a fixed monthly income – between €700-1,100 in Europe, depending on the country you choose – and a more reliable chance of finding a position. The only drawback is that you might not be offered your first-choice destination within your chosen country. What struck me most about teaching English though, was the potential for improving my French. Teaching your own language gives you a broader insight into language-learning – you see what works and what doesn’t. Among my students, I encountered a full range of abilities – speakers of near-native fluency and those who could barely string together a simple English phrase. I noticed what held my weakest students back – too
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much focus on writing down notes, crippling shyness and fear of making mistakes, and the other extreme – overconfidence, speaking at length and carelessly repeating the same errors. I saw how my best students learned – by being chatty and enthusiastic, and by watching hours of AngloAmerican TV and films in their spare time. Trying to follow their example, I studied French thrillers and reality shows, picking up slang and colloquialisms, which helped me get by in everyday conversations. Rothnie also found that teaching English helped with her Spanish. “My students often didn’t know what I considered to be basic expressions involving prepositions, such as ‘run out’, or ‘left over’,” she says. “Then I realised that in Spanish there is usually a separate, single equivalent verb which, before my year abroad, I probably didn’t know either.” At university, language teachers often tell students to avoid directly translating English phrases word-for-word, but it’s only when you’re interacting with native speakers in another country that you grasp the common expressions and idioms. Teaching English can also give you the chance to socialise with native speakers, as Amy Stewart, a student at the University of Strathclyde, found on her year abroad in Tenerife. As a British Council assistant, she became friendly with her fellow teachers and even went to stay at the family home of a Spanish colleague. Despite her concerns about living in a hotspot for Anglophone tourists, Stewart improved her Spanish by taking part in language exchanges with locals. You need to be proactive too, she says: “If you go looking for areas that aren’t quite as touristy, then you’ll find them.” Ultimately, the success of your year abroad is down to your own efforts – but maybe there’s something about teaching that gives you a certain motivation. After all, when you’ve been telling your students to knuckle down and practise vocabulary in their spare time, you feel like a hypocrite if you don’t do the same. http://www.theguardian.com/education Keep up with the latest on Guardian Students: follow us on Twitter at@GdnStudents – and become a member to receive exclusive benefits and our weekly newsletter.
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Generation gap The generation gap that folks speak about is more a conflict of ideas and it causes me to doubt that it exists in life at all except within the mind Since if we take the time to listen It disappears, I find. Posted by Elaine Le Sueur at 12:44 PM
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New Zealand Crowned World Ch It’s official - the New Zealand Kids’ Lit Quiz team has the best literature knowledge and the fastest reflexes in the world. The team won the title of World Champions at the World Kids’ Lit Quiz final in Connecticut, USA, today. Hailing from Southwell School, Hamilton, they fought off stiff competition from a stellar line-up of international competitors, including teams from the US, Canada, Australia, UK, Singapore and South Africa.
Wayne Mills, the Kids’ Lit Quiz Master, said the New Zealand team were quick to press the buzzer on a wide range of topics. “They displayed great literary knowledge in a very diverse range of categories. They were tested on subjects such as; Books made into Disney Movies, Dr Seuss, Mythology, Anthropomorphised Animals and Book Series.” Mills says they stayed calm throughout, building on one another’s strengths. “They believed in themselves. It wasn’t one child that won this - it was the entire team.” Mills says the win proves that NZ kids are avid readers with phenomenal literary knowledge across a broad range of literature. The NZ team was the clear leader in the end with 37 points, leaving the remaining teams tightly bunched from 28-22. Team members Gabriel Mikkelson 11, Harriet Stephanie 11, Amelia Le Comte 11 and Finlay Buckell 12, are elated with their result.
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hildren’s Literature Champion They are the first Waikato school group to win the national Kids Lit Quiz final held in Wellington earlier in June. During the world final, teams were quizzed on all types of children’s literature, including books, poetry and historical literature. The students also had to learn the opening lines of nearly 300 books. The children fundraised to attend the world final, held in the University of Connecticut. After their win, the Southwell students are scheduled to meet prominent US children’s author and illustrator Brian Selznick in New York, whose works include The Dinosaurs of Waterhouse Hawkins and The Invention of Hugo Cabret Wonderstruck. The coaches were Julie Huggins and Gerri Judkins. Kids’ Lit Quiz was launched 24 years ago by Wayne Mills. Mills was inspired to create the quiz after reading a study that showed students’ reading drops off at intermediate age. “I wanted to create something that would encourage and enthuse children through this time, and support a life-long-love of reading,” says Mills. Kids Lit Quiz has become hugely popular in New Zealand, spreading to eleven countries around the world. There is current interest in expanding the competition to Malaysia and Botswana. More than 4000 children around the world participated in the 2015 quiz. The Kids’ Lit Quiz is a not-for-profit organisation run solely by volunteers and supported by a family of sponsors including the Wright Family Foundation.
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Gabriel Mikkelson, Harriet Stephanie, Amelia Le Comte and Finlay Buckell
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“THERE’S SNOW LIMIT FOR KiN
Known for providing quality early childhood education in Auckland, Kindergarten NZ Limited (KiNZ) is undergoing a rebrand - revealing a new look and feel.
Established in 2002, KiNZ is a subsidiary of the Auckland Kindergarten Association – offering early childhood education for children aged between three months to six years of age at four sites in Auckland:
To celebrate, parents of children attending KiNZ Myers Park have been advised to pack their little ones up with KiNZ Myers Park (Auckland Central), KiNZ Mission a few extra layers, warm socks and gumboots on Heights (Flat Bush), KiNZ East Tamaki (Otara), KiNZ Thursday, 25 June, as two tonnes of snow will be Sandringham (Sandringham) delivered to the kindergarten for the children to play in. The special snow party took place at KiNZ Myers Park 66 Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015
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NZ”
and for many children, it was the first time they had seen snow. Chris Coombe, Chief Operating Officer from KiNZ, says: “We’re really excited about our rebrand and thought what better way to celebrate the new look, than to involve the children themselves.” “Our new logo provides KiNZ with a fresh new look and feel that will help reinforce the values it is widely
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recognised for.” “For many children at Myers KiNZ, this was the first time they’d seen snow and we really looked forward to seeing them play in it with sledges, building snowmen and making snow angels.” For more information about KiNZ and to find your local centre, check out: www.kinz.org.nz. Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015 67
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In Afghanistan, many girls are forbidden to ride bicycles The Skateistan organization empowers girls through skateboarding 70 Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015
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Did you know‌
Over 50% of is their students are Park - Myers Kindergarten situated in Myers streetworking children and over on Queen Street 40% areingirls - The last timeofit them snowed Auckland was in August 2011
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NZ Needs More Female Technology Role Models for Future Growth - Principal New Zealand needs more female role models in science, maths and IT if we are to meet future industry demands says the new principal of one of the country’s most respected private girls schools.
young women are armed with skills such as resilience, flexibility, leadership and initiative, she says. “My goal is to ensure that we prepare young Chilton women for the rapidly changing world they now inhabit by constantly reviewing our offering and ensuring that our curriculum remains relevant to them. We want to keep our girls engaged with material that is diverse, challenging and satisfying,” she says.
Kathy Parker
Part of this diversity includes a strong emphasis on service and the artistic disciplines the school offers, says Parker. She says the increasing emphasis on development of STEM science, technology, engineering, and mathematics subjects actually complements Chilton’s traditionally strong performance in the arts.
Chilton Saint James’ new head Kathy Parker says that the education requirements of today’s girls have changed significantly since the school’s inception. “The challenge in educating the next generation of girls is ensuring that we not only provide the most up-to-date learning resources for science, technology, engineering, and maths education, but help them find the passion to carry them through into successful career paths,” says Parker. “With nationwide skills shortages in IT and other technology related industries, it is critical that we address the level of support and encouragement we provide as parents and as a society for the next generation,” she says. Parker, says girls need a wide range of role models to aspire to if they are to pursue technology based subjects that the country is most in need of. “Establishing and promoting role models at an early age is an essential part of framing the career development of our next generation of scientists and technology industry leaders; in many ways it is even more important for young females”.
“Although not commonly paired together, traditionally analytic subjects can be enhanced through creativity - particularly where a degree of lateral thinking can put forward unique solutions - we have found the cross pollination of ideas from disciplines leads to better innovation,” she says. Parker is only the 14th principal in the school’s almost century long history with the school opening its gates in 1918. The school’s Board Chair Michelle Luping says more than 50 candidates from New Zealand, Australasia and other parts of the world applied for the role but Parker was the standout educator. “Kathy demonstrated a clear understanding of the various levels of learning within the school from early childhood and primary through to secondary and the educational demands of each level. She also had a clear vision for the future growth of the school and the demands facing our students in the dynamic global marketplace.” Parker will leave her role at ACG Senior College to take up the new Wellington position in October.
Parker says when female students see the same role models regularly publicised, it sends a message that these are more the exception than the rule. “I believe we need to see each technology industry seeking out successful professional women and proactively developing their profiles. As educators, we also have a role to play in better facilitating girls’ exposure to these women,” she says. Alongside a greater focus on technology, and teaching of the curriculum it’s important that today’s 72 Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015
About Chilton Saint James School: Established in 1918, Chilton Saint James School is a private girls’ day school from Years 1 – Year 13 with a co-educational Preschool from the age of 2.
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Does your school have one of New Zealand’s best environmental initiatives? Canon launches a search for the country’s best environmental projects Canon New Zealand announced that its 2015 environmental grants programme is open and calls for not-for-profit organisations and schools championing environmental initiatives to apply. Canon is offering three grants of $5,000 worth of Canon equipment, ranging from digital compact and DSLR cameras, to binoculars, printers and multi-function devices, to those who are undertaking sustainability projects or initiatives. Canon New Zealand Managing Director Kim Conner says she is always impressed by the range of environmental initiatives that the programme attracts and is looking forward to learning about the projects taking place this year. “Each year we are inspired by the number of passionate people in our community who are making a real difference in encouraging others to look after our environment so future generations can enjoy it. “Our environmental grants programme aims to recognise and reward the best environmental initiatives. The high calibre of environmental projects being undertaken always make it difficult to select only three,” she says. Winners are selected based on the positive impact their project is having on the environment as well how the Canon products can help them to drive greater success. The winners are sought across three categories: Regional, Education and Community. Last year’s winners were an eclectic mix of projects involving glacier monitoring, an ecological island on school grounds and an education programme. The Tread Lightly Caravan won the community award for their work educating school children to reduce their impact on the environment by making small daily changes, Rhode Street School in Hamilton took out the education award for their student-inspired ecological island, and Massey University in
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Palmerston North won the regional award for the work being carried out to track and record the descent rate of South Island glaciers. Rhode Street School principal Shane Ngatai says winning a Canon Environmental Grant award has provided students and the wider learning community with an opportunity to accelerate their learning. “Entering and winning the Education category last year was, for our students and whanau, recognition of the awesome learning opportunities taking place here at school,” says Mr Ngatai. “The Canon products chosen by the students included a Canon 7D camera with a macro lens, enabling student inquiry into recording the diversity of living things on our Ecological Island up close and personal. Another choice was a high definition outdoor camera to record the movement of animals on the island and document the growth of the flora and fauna over time. “Our thanks goes out to Kim and the dedicated Canon team for creating this very worthwhile grant scheme. The first stage of the Island is due in mid-October 2015,” he says. When the ecological island is completed it will include three different areas: New Zealand natives and an insect island, a dry, desert-type climate under a dome, and a Kiwi wetlands area. The environmental grants will be awarded under the following categories: • Regional Award: An environmental project with significance to a rural or regional area within New Zealand; • Education Award: An environmental project being run by a kindergarten, primary or secondary school or tertiary organisation, or group within the organisation, within New Zealand; • Community Award: An environmental project being run by a community group or organisation within New Zealand.
Visit www.canon.co.nz/environment for terms and conditions and an application form. Applications close on August 3, 2015 and the winners will be announced on August 31, 2015. Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015 73
Japanese Students Draw Stunning Chalkbo Over the last few years, Japanese students have gotten into the habit of drawing beautiful works of art on their chalkboards during downtime between classes. To celebrate this awesome trend, Japanese chalkboard manufacturer Nichigaku just hosted a chalkboard art contest to find some of the best chalkboard art in Japan. Japanese chalkboard art tends to focus on things dear to the students, like sports teams, school activities or their favorite anime/pop culture characters. In these submissions, however, the young artists really pulled out the stops, drawing in a wide array of different artistic styles. The contest attracted 50 submissions from 249 students. The first-place winner received a 100,000yen ($812 or â‚Ź716) gift card. See some of our favorite pieces below!
Skateistan was founded in 2007 by Australian skateboarder Oliver Percovich 74 Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015
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oard Art For Blackboard Drawing Contest
Since then, it has spread to Cambodia and South Africa as well
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Occasional Tale - a teacher turns My partner and I live on a five-acre lifestyle block. Sometimes it seems much larger, as there are several tree-covered hills and a lot of limestone rocks to navigate around. The rest is pasture. Now pasture is all very well but only for a short time. In early spring the grass grows and the paddocks become a sea of waist-high stalks. Being a towny, I would have been content to let nature have its way and just sit back and observe the seasons. I was soon informed by paddocksavvy people that if the grass was not eaten, the land would soon turn into a mouldy mess of rotten hay and nothing would grow except ragwort, dock, nightshade and their noxious cousins. We had to get stock to control the grass. A few years down the track, we have two donkeys and four sheep. Augmenting the menagerie are seven hens, a cat, several dozen goldfish and Honey. Honey is a Chihuahua. She is about two years old. We acquired her from a rescue centre when she was a puppy. Very cute, big black eyes and large, floppy ears. Knowledgeable breeders of Chihuahuas inform us that pedigreed, mature dogs should have erect, pointed ears. Honey either is having a very long childhood, or is not of pure breeding. Her ears flop over; we think they are quite endearing. When she was little, Honey had two canine companions, Rex (Golden Retriever) and Otto (Dobermann). Perhaps I can write about them in a future episode. We lost Rex and Otto when Honey was very young. She has become very devoted to us. Now, our rural idyll has had several, shall I say, challenging moments. One of these has been shearing time. Twice a year it has been necessary to shear two of our sheep, which are Romneycross. The other two are Wiltshires and do not, praise be, need to be shorn, as they moult very conveniently. The sheep are not tame. Their fright-distance is about two kilometres; perhaps I am exaggerating somewhat. Anyway, they take to their hooves whenever they see a human approaching. This would not be a problem in an ordinary paddock. Our place, however, has only one or two ordinary 78 Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015
paddocks. The rest is, as mentioned, hills and rocks, only fenced at the property’s boundary. Our shearing yard is quite a way from our main ordinary paddock. A couple of days before shearing we let the sheep wander into an adjacent area, which is a hill with a grassed pathway surrounding it. The hill is steep and bush-clad. To get the sheep into the yard, someone has to climb the pathway and herd them around until they run into the yard. Easy! The first time we attempted the great muster, I manfully climbed the hill and had no difficulty in starting a stampede away from me in the intended direction. Four sheep ran towards the yard. About five metres from the gate, the lead ewe decided that a 180 degree turn was in order and she and the others, at full speed, executed the turn and raced through our two-person cordon. Back to square one. I can’t remember how many times I climbed the hill that day but we did finally manage to get the four sheep into the yard in time for the shearer with his portable kit. When he heard about our experience, he informed us that we needed an experienced sheep dog and would bring his next time. This he did. I think my partner, a South African, learned a lot of new kiwi vernacular that day but not very much about sheepdog ability. From memory, the shearer left without a fleece. I felt a bit tired from hill-climbing. The shearer was due again a few days later for a retry. I decided to try a muster by myself, as my partner was out. I can remember running downhill after the sheep, yelling like a berserk Viking. Unbelievably, the sheep ran straight into the yard and I managed to shut the gate. Who needs dogs? I dined out on that episode until the next shearing. All my yelling, running, stickthrowing and use of newly-learned vocabulary came to nought. It took about two hours to achieve our goal. I think the sheep became bored with running. At a dinner party, we told some farmer friends about the situation. We were assured that proper dogs were the answer and they would be supplied for us next time. That was the first time we looked
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to‘The Good Life’ forward to the bi-annual muster. The day arrived and so did the farmer with his three dogs. He stood at the bottom of the hill and yelled something unintelligible. The dogs took off up the hill, barking very loudly. We heard the barking for quite a while but no sheep appeared. Eventually we climbed up to investigate. The dogs had two sheep isolated and stationary. The other two had disappeared. The farmer and I climbed into the bush at the top of the hill. One sheep ran past us. We continued to the top. Looking over the other side we could make out a series of ledges, each about three metres high. On the second ledge was the sheep. I think it took about an hour for the farmer to dislodge the creature. It appeared, quite unfazed at the bottom of the hill and ran between us back to the other side. From memory, the farmer did not try again. We still meet up occasionally but don’t talk about sheepdogs. What’s this all got to do with Honey? Well, when she was a few months hold, Honey started to show an aptitude for herding. We noticed that she became quite excited whenever she saw the sheep. We were loathe to let her too near them, considering the weight difference between a fully-grown whether and a 3 kg Chihuahua. One day, however, she jumped out of my partner’s arms and went straight for the sheep. To our amazement, they took to their hooves and Honey followed, yelping and howling.
Episode One: Honey
the yard, Honey in hot pursuit. Then they stopped and huddled against a rocky outcrop. We called Honey and she returned. This rocky outcrop had been our Waterloo several times in the past. Pre Honey, the lead sheep had often managed to outmanoeuvre us a number of times, just a metre from the gate. I approached the group. Careful prodding was needed to coax them away. A wrong movement would send them back between us to paths, hills and ledges. I pushed at the lead sheep. She moved-the wrong way. I was about to give up and accept that I would be in for another hill-climb when Honey dashed forward, yelping hysterically. The lead sheep immediately turned and ran through the gate. The others followed into the yard. Success! This has happened twice now. We haven’t trained her but we notice that Honey keeps looking at us, as if for instructions. Her recall is pretty good. Looking at that first video, I can see that she has learned a lot. Most of the time she runs the right angles and this quartet of stroppy sheep no longer challenge her authority. Occasionally she tries out the two donkeys. That is not successful. Today was shearing day. The three of us were successful first attempt. Honey is probably the only sheep dog that has to be carried to the paddock but she has a big heart. She earns her treat on shearing day.
The next day, we needed to shift the sheep. I took a video of what transpired. Honey ran straight for them. They split up but she ran out and headed them back together. All that was visible at times, was a white tail scything through the grass. Sometimes she ran the wrong way and the sheep were stubborn but eventually all four ran through the gate. We called Honey and she ran back to us. I swear she was smiling. The day for the next shearing arrived. Could it just be that we had the answer to our problems? I climbed the hill and my partner hid behind a tree, holding Honey. I saw the sheep, they saw me and took off down the hill. I heard Honey screaming to be let go. Apparently she was shivering with excitement. The sheep ran towards
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“The best teachers don’t give you the answers... They just point the way ... 80 Good Teacher Magazine Term 3 2015
and let you make your own choices.”