Dear Deborah, Rory and Garry and teachers in the Rotorua TiLL cluster,
Kia ora.

Our classroom visits / learning conversations are due to start this week as per discussions on our first professional learning day on June 14. Pauline, as you were not able to be there I have put you into the time slot after Donna. If this doesn’t suit, then the first two time slots on Friday are free. Please confirm with me which slot suits you best. Lessons are usually 30 – 40 minutes, with the rest of the time being used for the learning conversations. Please organize a venue for the learning conversations where we won’t be interrupted. If you would like student voice recorded during the visit, I can facilitate that for you straight after your teaching. This would provide interesting data for your action research, especially if you/we recorded student voice twice. The attachment included here gives you an example of questions frequently used to gather student voice. The teacher voice template is the one we will look at during the learning conversation.

Thursday 24 July
9.00 – 10.30 Waiki Edward, Kaitao Int

11.15 – 12.45 Donna Te Puia, Mokoia Int

1.30 – 3.00 Pauline Smith, Mokoia Int

Friday 25th July
9.00 – 10.30 - free, 11.00 – 12.30 - free

1.30 – 3.00 Laytee George, Rotorua Int

Monday 28th July
9.15 – 10.30 Tina Muller, French, Rotorua Int

11.00 – 12.30 Rachel Hitchens, Rotorua Int

Kwei Yi – to work in normal classes, in her team teaching role please

I may not have the exact timetable times – I would appreciate it if you could let me know any changes I need to make. I will endeavour to be at the relevant schools 30 minutes before the first session recorded for your school.

Just a reminder about purpose and process…

Purpose: to record ‘baseline data’ for the action research, which will show what stage your students are at in their learning of Chinese/French on the day of the visit. The intervention(s) you choose to put into place between classroom visits 1 + 2 will be observed in classroom visit #2 and student learning outcomes will be compared.

Process:
Please send me a lesson plan which will show learning intentions, (success criteria ) and learning activities. Feel free to use the template I am attaching here, or use one of your own. If you normally team teach with Kwei-Yi, then please do this during the visit. Kwei-yi should also come to the learning conversation after the classroom visit.

I can observe either by recording what I see and giving written feedback after the learning conversation or by videoing the lesson. Although videoing is a scary option, what this would mean is that you can keep the video for your research, and you can interpret the data in it without having me doing the scribing first. With the best will in the world, when a person (me)observes and records, I can’t get everything down and also can’t help but place a subjective filter over it, even if every attempt is made to be objective. Teachers who I have videoed before ALL say they get more out of this feedback. Over to you – I will bring video gear, but will go with your wishes.

Please send an email back to me so that I know you have received this – I will phone the principals tomorrow, to check that arrangements are OK. Please don’t hesitate to email or phone me if you have any queries.

We will touch base about our blog when I see you.

I’m really looking forward to seeing your students in action.
Ka kite
Jeanne

TiLL dates for 2008

Professional Learning Day 1 SaturdayJune 14 @ Rotorua Int
Professional Learning Day 2 Tuesday August 19 @ Waiki's
Professional Learning Day 3 TBC - please check out with your schools - 10, 11 or 12 Nov?

Classsroom visits - for first visit dates and times see posting above.
Classroom vists - second visit:
Friday 24 October
9.00 - 10.30 Tina Rotorua Int
11.00 - 12.30 Rachel Rotorua Int
1.30 - 3.00 Laytee Rotorua Int

Thursday 30 October
9.00 - 10.30 Waiki Kaitao Int
11.15 - 12.45 Donna Mokoia Int
1.30 - 3.00 Pauline Mokoia Int

Kwei Yi – to work in normal classes, in her team teaching role please