You win some, lose some, all the same to me (RIP Lemmy - Motorhead)

We're just about at the new year. 

2016 is poised, ready to pounce! What better way to end the old year than with these five items.

1 What students say they want!
In the old days students had zero say - these days - we're at least interested in what they say they want - so read this!

2 LISTEN!
It's a forgotten skill. Listen to this message, please!

3 Creativity in ignorance
I like this idea - there is creativity in ignorance.

4 Typeface
This is a pretty cool site - lets you see various typefaces - I'm big on wysiwyg.

5 Awesome reader
Love this too - suggests other books that you might like! Anything that promotes reading is alreight by me.

So here it is Merry Christmas, everybody's having fun (Slade)

Been a while since I worked through my bookmarks. Here' s my Christmas pressie stocking filler of five more things I found valuable.

1 Making Khan Academy style videos
This looked cool: The app that lets you create Khan Academy-style videos in 60 seconds!

2 Medium.com
Not strictly educational but this is a handy guide to getting bespoke content on your interests from medium.com.

3 I love exams...
Great little post and video by a student about why students find exams pointless. Great stuff!!

4 I love grading papers...
A companion piece to number 3 - great little post by an educator about why teachers find grades ineffective and pointless. More great stuff!

5 Summaries of book's key ideas
This is pretty cool - a summary of the key ideas from some key writers (including Sir Ken Robinson, Stephen Covey, Malcolm Gladwell, Seth Godin, and others)

Well we got no class (Alice Cooper)

School is out for the Christmas break in the U.K.

They finished on Friday and so students flooded the high streets of the land.

As they did so I once again wondered why the hell the Brits bother with a uniform for their under 16 age secondary school students. A level students tend to be in mufti which is also bizarre given the unbending desire for the formal uniform below them.

Bizarrely the school authorities persist with trying to get students to wear a 'smart' uniform of white shirts/ ties/ blazers. Laudable but, long ago, doomed to failure.

What actually happens is an appalling dog's breakfast of: shirts out; ties askew; super short, short short skirts; every kind of shoe under the murky British sun; hoodies; caps; beanies; buttons undone; and ill fitting blazers.

I really don't know why they haven't sorted this by now by dispensing with the pretense and going for a uniform that makes more practical sense in the 21st century.

I guess they just don't care enough to think about it. 

Jolly good, I see, and which prize do you have particular eyes on this evening? (Monty Python's Flying Circus)

And so to the Christmas holidays!

We (the present Mrs Purdzilla and yours truely) have ditched the weird NZ summer Christmas and high tailed it to London, where you find me now.

It's 3.50pm and darkness has descended! WAHOOO!!!! And it's raining! HOSANNA!!!!!!

Back in Nu Zild, the school year ended in the usual way - with a prize giving.

All NZ schools do this and that practice could, actually, be unique. 

It's not like the UK schools I taught at where prize giving was all a tad shambolic, and it's definitely not like a US style graduation ceremony with gowns and tassels and American showbiz razzmatazz.

NZ prize givings are formal and a big deal - like Britain in 1954. Academic gowns. Visiting speaker. Cups. Strict choreographing. Three cheers for the dux! Best behaviour.

Not that that's a bad thing - just a thing.

Come to think of it though: why do we do them like this? In 2015 especially - are they still a relevant way to end the year?

Well there's the celebrating success thing that is important, but we do that all year in assemblies, for all sorts of things.

So it's obviously for the students? Well not really. I'm pretty sure no one sits there thinking, "I'll show them - next year I'll get a prize!" The usual suspects appear to be the prize winners each year and in these December days the accent is squarely on NCEA internal success (the externals have just been sat so they don't figure) which generates it's own success.

It's for the staff then? Well - no. Teachers sit through prize givings and enjoy seeing some of the students getting public recognition but I don't think we sit there thinking, "This is why I became a teacher!"

The various august Boards? Nope (apart from a few, I guess, who like to be seen as the head cheeses).

It must be for the parents then, right? Oh, sure if their loved one is getting a prize, but otherwise... not really.

Why do we do it then? Why why why?

Two words. Public. Relations.

School's do prize giving because it says to the community (and prospective clients) - come on in! The water's fine. 

That's why. Right?

Tempted by the promise of a different life (Tim Finn)

A recent article on Schools in 2030, yes - 2030, tried to project Marty McFly style Back To The Future. 

Dangerous stuff usually. Hoverboards anyone?

So, what did they reckon?

Well two things emerged and they won't be much of a surprise I shouldn't think.

One - they predicted 'totally transformed classrooms', a.k.a. 'learning spaces'.

These would be open and flexible and equipped with the latest technology. There, students are sometimes working alone , sometimes in small teams, and sometimes in a whole class or even bigger group.

There have been some early adopter schools who have embraced this concept. We've yet to do so at my current school.

Two - teachers as 'activators' (we are no longer 'transmitters of knowledge' but we are also not 'mere facilitators'). The writers cite our own John Hattie during their article and that pleased me a lot.

Hattie's work remains extremely valuable to all educators and so, it's worth quoting his findings at length here (my emphasis):

 "The remarkable feature of the evidence is that the greatest effects on student learning occur when teachers become learners of their own teaching, and when students become their own teachers."   

"The act of teaching requires deliberate interventions to ensure that there is cognitive change in the student... It involves a teacher who knows a range of learning strategies with which to supply the student when they seem not to understand, who can provide direction and redirection in terms of the content being understood and thus maximize the power of feedback, and who has the skill to 'get out the way' when learning is progressing towards the success criteria."

 To accomplish this second change our English courses have changed substantially to be much more inquiry based. Often the emphasis is on - teach me what you've found out. 

We are also learning to 'get out the way'!

We're growing up little by little (Celebration)

And so to the last of Ann McMullan's five critical skills that my students need.

5 Persistence.

Again, it is hard to argue against this as a necessary skill. She defines persistence as "the ability to continue with a task and maintain attention despite setbacks, resistance, or distraction".

As I've indicated before, my classroom door has a Maori phrase on it - Whaia Kia Maia - pursue it until it is conquered - so, yeah, I'm a fan.

It IS important that students learn how to keep focused, despite challenges. No problem there. 

But where does this come from? I'm a strong believer in intrinsic motivation (rather than external incentives and rewards). Getting a student to believe in the power of effort and hard work goes a long way towards ensuring perseverance when the going gets tough. But having that belief is tricky. Very tricky.

Like students anywhere, my students are on a continuum from very low persistence levels to intrinsically motivated workaholics. Most fall into the bell curve middle ground.

What do I do to help them? 

Having regular checkpoints works for some students. We have a couple of humungous assignment style standards that last two terms and hopefully the progress checkpoints enable students to build on a pattern of success.

Secondly, our English courses are now set up to provide stacks of choice, which, again hopefully, increases their motivation and engagement.

So - that's the five - a recap for you from her article:

1 Self-Direction 

2 Evidence Based Thinking

3 Persistence

4 Calculated Risk Taking

5 Tolerance for Ambiguity

I think you'll all agree (oh blogosphere-ites) that she's onto something with this list!

Walking on my way, heard someone say...(The Sweet Inspirations)

Number four in Ann McMullan's critical skills is...

4 Evidence-Based Thinking.

According to McMullan, "using concrete evidence, based on reliable data and findings, is critical to building... skills in students". 

This one is self evident in theory - yes students must communicate their positions on issues based on sound data, facts, and sound logic - but in the real world students are lazy and, well, it's easier to ask a mate or go to google (and then probably wikipedia) for their info.

In other words, their searches tend to be shallow.

I'm no different. My music blog often opts for wikipedia 'research' on songs/artists that I'm writing about because it's quick and easy.

Ann recommends that we use words that encourage critical thinking such as “Confirm”, “Criticize” “Demonstrate” “Question” “Analyze” and “Interpret” in order to give our students the opportunities to develop patterns of evidence based thinking.

On one level, I don't think those global umbrella terms actually get to the core issue though: saying "analyse Ken Kesey's style" doesn't automatically lead to deeper solid evidence based thinking. 

Asking five 'why?' questions might result in a better focus on evidence.

Although, I do like 'demonstrate' as a verb as in, "demonstrate why you think that about Ken Kesey's style".

Anything that leads to a deeper response, though, well - it's alright with me!

Tongues of fire wagging wild, They dance around me merrily (Don McLean)

Number three of Ann McMullan's 5 critical skills that students need.

3 Self-Direction. 

Ann (quite rightly from where I'm sitting) places the emphasis squarely on students to create "student-centered learning experiences, rather than relying solely on teacher-delivered content".

She points out employers increasingly want self-directed learners. That means those who have the skills necessary to set their own learning goals, institute plans to accomplish those goals, analyze and solve problems, own and manage their own learning and improvement, while always wanting to improve and learn more. 

This year my senior English classes were asked to do these things and many loved the change from teacher centred lessons.

But not all. Many of my students still want me to direct them at best and spoon feed them answers at worst.

I can see the concept of self directed inquiry learning improving over successive years as overtly inquiry based methods are embedded more and more.

At the moment then, I'd give my students a solid convincing pass grade (a B+, a merit, a 7/10) but I have a strong feeling that we'll get to A star, excellence, 10/10, in two to three years.

Everyone's got something no one else can do (Perrin Lamb)

Here is the second of Anne McMullan's five key critical skills students need:

2 Tolerance for ambiguity

According to her, "It is essential that today’s students develop the skills to think through ambiguous situations and stay with the question—in a state of ambiguity—until they have the time to examine various aspects and perspectives on the issue."

I'm not going to argue with her about the need for this - it seems self evident in the complex 21st century world we find ourselves living in that flexibility, adaptability and versatility will be much valued as skills.

Having worked in the Middle East - Qatar and the U.A.E. - this particular skill was much in demand and people who couldn't adapt did not survive.

But what of my current students?

Unfortunately many of them still want 'the answer'. Rather than do a work around and explore and develop their thinking on an idea they want to move onto the next point as quickly as they can (while checking with me constantly that they are on the right lines).

This exploring, probing, inquiring, developing, looking for connections skill is often what leads to a perceptive, original thought which is then rewarded with an 'excellence' grade in our current system. 

So, how do I help my students learn how to tease out their thoughts, expand their thinking and dig deeper?

Giving them an answer is NOT the answer to that question. 

Back in the day, I used reflective journals in my media studies classes and they were a brilliant week by week vehicle for my students to make discoveries, ask questions, pursue lines of inquiry. 

Boy - do I miss them!

For what it's worth, in these post NCEA days in English I use mind mapping and Socratic questions, discussions and one on one conferences, listening to them articulate their problem and leaving space for them to answer.

My students often find this frustrating and give me the sense that they would rather go somewhere else to get 'the answer' if I don't provide it. 

But I persist. 

Whaia kia maia (pursue it until it is conquered) is written on my classroom door!

How is the air up there? (La De Das)

I thought I'd apply these five critical skills that Ann McMullan listed in an article to my students at Woodford House.

Here's how I think they stack up (the next posts will take a stroll through the other four)...

         1 Calculated Risk Taking. 

Metiri Group CEO Cheryl Lemke defines this skill as “the ability to carefully consider all the factors related to the decision being made, calculate the chances of a positive outcome and the consequences of a negative one, determine ways to reduce risks along the way, and then determine whether or not to take the risk based on this information”. 

In other words whether to risk failure or not! 

I think my students have refined this as a skill with their strategic negotiation of NCEA exams and I'm not sure, but I think I have a bit of a problem with this. 

In my eyes the modern world of teaching closely reflects societies desire to lesson the chance of failure. Sports teams are now more often about participation rather than winning (and therefore risking failure). Many of my students are a product of this approach and are often shielded from the harsh world out there that presents failure. 

This is curious because often the girls themselves espouse the benefits of failure. 

In our school we've adopted the 'not yet' approach to a fail (or Not Achieve) grade in an attempt to get the girls to bounce back from a failure. Without much success from where I'm sitting. 

Girls doing NCEA who think they may fail an external exam do not even remove the shrink wrap protecting the integrity of the paper because if they do, and if they attempt the standard (signalled by removing the shrink wrap) they will automatically be graded (and therefore, most likely, fail).

Part of me remembers how much I learned from my failures and if the students have taken their calculated risk taking to this extreme then they won't make those discoveries that come with failure. 

Part of me thinks - have a go! Commit! Learn by failure! 

Many roads have I travelled (Madonna)

1 The power of habit
This kind of article is like a film promo - all the best bits are condensed into a short read on the power of habits. I'm a fan, having been taught the habit regime by a master.

2 Failure
I'm a big fan of failure. Period. I feel bad for people who haven't tasted enough failure or who have been protected from failure. Not cool.

3 Social learning
It's becoming more and more important for me to understand what motivates the social learning of those I teach. I get older but my students stay the same age and they are not living in the world that I know from my increasingly distant youth. These types of articles help.

4 Powerpoint
I like powerpoint as a tool. More than prezi or powtoons. I bookmarked this article to help me use powerpoint for good and not evil.

5 What if...?
These are six great 'what if?' questions.

Just my imagination (The Temptations)

Short read time on the blog today because I liked this by Judith Yates:

The education system is not preparing students for the real world by stifling imagination. Every workplace, every profession, relies on creativity, problem solving, and exploration of ideas. Professional athletes, architects, journalists, and accountants will go no further than the initial job interview if they say, “I need someone to tell me how to do everything all the time.”

Right on sister!!

The full article is good too - not yer usual piece by an educator - she's a criminal justice instructor!

The opposite of 'stifle': encourage; support; and my favourite...STIMULATE.

So let's get to it and really stimulate imagination in our classes shall we? 

All of us. Every day. Every. Day.

Shout, shout... I'm talking to you! (Tears For Fears)

Super excited about the 'new' Beatles version of ONE. Picture me watching the DVD as you read this latest five things I've bookmarked and now want to delete list!

1 Woodford House

Mrs P shouts the Year 13s a soft serve cone

Let's start this edition with a celebration of the wonderful place where I ply my trade. Groovylicious baby!!

2 Dan Rockwell
Writing as Leadership Freak, Dan is an amazing blogger. he posts every day and has more hits than misses. Here he is on seven ways to make team meetings work.

3 On line courses
Here's a great link to 37 on line courses. Coding features but there is so much stuff here. So - what are you waiting for? Go learn something! 

4 Medium - writing
One of those things you should be doing (yes - you!) is writing!! Let Medium.com help you.

5 End of year
I wish I'd seen this bookmark earlier - a great activity for the end of year with seniors!

The crazy gypsy in my soul (Billy Joel)

Sayonara seniors!

Today was the day our seniors went on study leave before their external examinations start next week.

Always bitter sweet saying farewells. All year they've felt like my students and then I have to kind of abandon them to the vagaries of the exam process (fingers crossed they get a good question to answer) - I sense that a lot of them would like my reassurances while they do their answers!

There has been some debate in my corner of the staff work room this week on the usefulness of exams.

Two extreme camps emerged:

• Ditch them! They are outmoded and unnecessary in today's enlightened progressive educational climate.
• Crank them up! If we value them - do more of them and be more rigid with conditioning students to sit exams.

Guess which camp I'm in!

Have you heard about the word that's goin' round? (Iron Butterfly)

What's goin' round?

All Blacks! All Blacks! All Blacks!

...and now - back to the blog...

1 Portrait data
We start this edition with a long read on portraits and the data we give off/away with our portraits. It kinda broadly fit into my education world blog but who cares if it doesn't - it's interesting and therefore...erm...educational! 

That bloke on the right looks well dodgy innit! Is he smiling? Is he thinking, "Is this my neutral expression?" or is this just the way Kiwis celebrate being CHAMPIONS? Read that article!

2 UDL
This bookmark alerts me to the continued importance of UDL in personalised learning,  and we all need these continual reminders right?

3 Craig Kemp
I've probably blogged enough about Craig and his wonderful site but in case you were snoozing, or join us late - here is all you need to know about starting a Twitter account and using it for good!

4 A companion piece to Craig
This by Teacher Toolkit is the next thing you need to read after you've followed Craig's advice!

5 Project based learning
And we finish with this timely reminder about PBL as we head into our end of year activities with the juniors.

There must be something deep down in the dark down there (Tame Impala)

Here's another tight five (go The All Blacks!!):

1 This mixtape of education goodies is worth it's own post but, hey - this is my tight five so they only warrant one place. 

It comes from the good people at Bright. If you haven't caught up with that source...what are you waiting for? It comes warmly Purdzilla recommended.

2 Lots of Lolly
Lolly Daskal (yes - her real name) writes wonderful stuff. Here she is on 12 hard truths about leadership! Again - this could be a post in and of itself but - yep - you got it - I'm in a generous mood.

3 Exams
The bane of a student's life. This Guardian article (I LOVE The Guardian) is a spot on piece of advice about sitting exams! Did you hear that in the back? Come on! You can do it! Never give up! NEVER SURRENDER!!

4 Social media
I liked this article about a school leader's use of social media to communicate stuff. Feels a bit revolutionary, a bit subversive, maybe a tad dangerous. I like it!

5 OTT blogging
In keeping with the OTT nature of this post here are twenty (TWENTY) educational bloggers you could delve into. Woo Hoo - how cool is that?!!

Your focus determines your reality (Qui Gon-Jinn)

Momentum is a delicate, hard won, easily lost, funny old thing.

Sports teams gather impetus from wins or strong performances. Each win builds on the last and confidence rises as a result.

Musicians and bands make progress via success as well - measured by concert sales and movement up a sales chart. When sales fall they need a new success to continue the momentum.

Momentum for students is an individual thing and harder to quantify. For a whole school it becomes even more nebulous.  

At this time of the year (two weeks away from the start of examinations for seniors) momentum is a delicate fragile flower.

Unfortunately, for me, the brakes were applied to any academic momentum I'd managed to engender in the first two weeks of the term.

A number of events have contributed: 

• various Agriculture and Produce shows in our rural markets have meant girls and staff away from school at a crucial time; 
• we held (very successful) athletics sports events on two days which meant changes to the routines of our school day and a complete focus shift; 
• the anticipation and immediate aftermath of those sports days was little interest in academic activities (we were all in preparation mode or else bone tired); 
• a large number of senior Year 12 girls are involved in a prefecture process; 
• two holidays have happened creating less time in class; 
• many Year 13 girls are shifting their gaze to 2016 and the rites associated with leaving a school many have known since they were very young; 
• a major music competition is scheduled for the coming week.

All of these things may be worthy in themselves but none of them help me prepare students for some pesky little English exams.

I am a tiny bit kind of frustrated a smidge because I'm sure the school governors and senior leaders and parents will still expect me to get excellent results.

But we all know what happens when we take our eyes of a ball before it is caught don't we!

'Sright! It hits us smack in the face!!

I don't know where my home is (Nelly Furtado)

Another 5 things that are hovering in my bookmarks, all forlorn and unloved. Time for them to be brought out into the light:

1 Common sense media
As I've mentioned a few times already - one of my spectacular children works for this San Francisco based company. Even if she didn't, I'd love Common Sense Media.

This article is about how the company advocates for students at a political level. 

2 SAMR
I'm a fan but it's always good to know about other, more negative views about SAMR.

3 Email inbox stuffed full?
I've tried but I can't seem to keep on top on my inbox. Time to reread this piece I think.

4 Blendspace
I'll hang onto this one in the bookmarks - project based learning is something I'd like to develop and TES always provides sensible solutions. Really!

5 Leadership freak on being blinded by experience
Ditto - I need to return to this wisdom whenever I start doing the old - 'I know best' routine (doesn't happen often I hasten to add).

When people run in circles it's a very, very mad world, mad world (Tears For Fears)

Print media is so slow.

Each year we (Heads Of Departments) have to write an article about our department for the school magazine (that comes out at the end of each year). It's like a yearbook. A record of what goes on.

The worry is that hardly anyone actually reads our department blurbs. Instead staff and students look for themselves in photos! I know I do!

I asked a few of my buddies what I should write about this year and they said - just do photos.

So here is a sneak preview of this year's article - two months early!

The English department as The Fantastic Four!

My yearly report takes a less is more approach this time around and is dedicated to the four members of the English department. It’s the reason we go from strength to strength!

Here’s to my hard working, giant slaying, earth quaking, heart stopping, fun loving, house rocking English Department team. It is a constant joy to have them as colleagues.

Cover of ‘Iona Road’ by The Purdles (with Warren ‘Mr Fantastic’ Purdy)

Greg ‘Human Torch’ Semmens in awesome mode.

Andrew ‘Thing’ Plant – the serious one.

Amy ‘Invisible Girl’ Reid and other reiders

Warren Purdy       HoD English

It's a world gone crazy (Tears For Fears)

...and school is back (actually for me it started yesterday - Sunday - with Parent Teacher Student conferences).

Hear ye, hear ye - here are five more cool things to bookmark (or they were when I did):

1 Brainstorming does not work! 
What?? I love brainstorming - what the...Have a read! And see your mind ticking over the possibility that working alone may be best.

2 True confession time
I admit it - I am struggling to use my ipad in creative ways in the classroom. My students laughed at me using the ipad to take a picture - I didn't realise (but they did) that it was on video setting! So I read this article and felt better!

3 A great Guardian article on Ken Robinson and creative schools.

4 A personal testament from a Less is Morer about (yeh) Finland

5 I love this one - I've blogged about it before. Books! And why we can't read anymore.

When you were young you were the king of carrot flowers (Neutral Milk Hotel)

Five more of my bookmarks for y'all:

1 Okay - long good read time 
I keep coming back to this bookmark - 

The McNamara Fallacy and the Problem with Numbers in Education from Chronotope.

It's endlessly fascinating, as in - so far I haven't managed to get to the end of it - you may have more luck. It's very thought provoking but it will test your powers of concentration. Are you up for the challenge?

2 and 3 Short good read time with Leadership Freak: The most important leadership idea, today. Yes that hooked me too! And I liked his answer. Then try this one about being exceptional, or not!

4 How to teach revision. Apposite timing Wozza! You need to reread this one.

5 How to transform a school. This is another Guardian article that I bookmarked. They have SO MUCH good stuff!! I love the Guardian. I really really do!

Now it's time to leave the capsule if you dare (David Bowie)

Check these out!

  1 To thine own self be true! Who doesn't love to quote the bard? Here are some favourites from some colleagues.

2 I do not think it means what you think it means! Here's a great list: commonly misused words!

3 This post is for the control freaks out there - you know who you are! Seven ways to rise by letting go.

4 I'm a SAMR fan so I was always going to bookmark this.

5 And another list to finish off with: Six reasons why you should be a blogger!