Ideas, Ideas, Ideas!

4th March 2013

After the wealth of knowledge we received from Sacred Heart, we came back to school eager to implement these new ideas into our classrooms (our classrooms consist of split year levels 4/5 and 6/7). We were both enthusiastic to start Contemporary Learning but were waiting for the one to one technology to catch up with our ideas.

Being impatient, we began exploring other options and avenues we could take (how would this look in our classrooms?). Our Principal, encouraging us to collaborate with other staff members through cluster meetings and classroom visits, gave us the "Oh My God" moment we needed!

After conducting some online research we began to take interest in the concept of Personalised Learning. The research gave us new insights and our understanding of this new approach to learning changed accordingly. We now understood Personalised Learning to involve:

• Student Centred learning!!
• Adjusting the Curriculum
• Authentic Learning: We want our students to become life long learners. We achieve this by providing links between school and real life.
• Student Voice: Children are involved in planning, giving them some control and responsibility over their learning. (we haven't got this far yet)
• Community Links: There must be open communication between home and school. But more than that, we need to utilise and explore the abundance of services and people our local and global communities have to offer.  

After processing all of this new information about Personalised Learning we decided that both Contemporary and Personalised Learning complemented each other and we were going to use both in our teaching.

Now back to the "Oh My God" moment. It was 6pm on a Wednesday evening and we were still discussing our ideas about PLiCS (Personalised Learning in a Contemporary Setting). We suddenly realised we could merge our classes for our writing block as we were both studying Persuasive Texts (thank you NAPLAN!). We decided we would physically merge our classes and use the school's undercover area as our new classroom (for 1 hour each day). After getting the go ahead from our Principal, out came the First Steps books and off we went to Kmart. At present we haven't been able to purchase Hokki Stools (but we're working on it!). In saying that, the children love their new, funky ottomans, mini coffee tables, bean bags, rugs and cushions (see pictures below).

Our Activities:

We referred to First Steps to find our persuasive writing activities and prepared a folder with a task card and all required equipment.

Our First Day:

As we were nervous about the children's excitement about this new classroom, we thought it was important to lay down the ground rules. We established a list of classroom rules, consequences, jobs and expectations. To familiarise themselves with the new environment and activities, we gave the students a minute to walk around and get a feel for their new learning area.

To our relief the children immediately selected an activity, found a comfortable learning space and began their activity straight away (yes we are being honest).

We couldn't believe how two classes (40 children) could merge together so easily. The children wanted to be in this new area and were eager to please.

Where will we go from here?

Our Changes:

After the first day we realised that although we had fulfilled the contemporary part of our vision, it wasn't personalised. To make it personalised, we decided to add a warm up and challenge activity to every task. We also created different grids for each child. These grids allowed the children to select an activity, but were tailored to their needs.

These are examples of 2 children's grids, which they used to select activities. Notice the difference in what was expected of them.