WFRC #8: Describe the development hypotheses

WFRC #8: Describe your process for developing hypotheses (what you read, who you talked with)

(1)  Am I promoting self-efficacy?

·         Self-efficacy is a psychological skill. Fortunately, When I was at university I did a paper on Child Psychology. It actually helped me work with all learners. I am going to use google forms, students voice, KWL chart and interviews to develop the skills. Term 1

(2) Are my expectations/resources challenging enough for my students to get good grades (Merit or Excellence Endorsement)

·         I am working collaboratively with two of the internal with my colleagues in the department.

·         I work with colleagues from other schools as there is only one class doing year13 Calculus at Tamaki College. This is especially important for my scholarship students to compare the progress with the other students as scholarship is highly competitive.

·         I am presently upgrading my coding skills by to incorporate spehero into kinematics to make learning more meaningful.

(3) Am I Promoting self-directed learning to imitate the university environment and helping students to choose the correct carrier pathway?

• I have modified my teaching methodology in one of the topics to require the students to have greater autonomy. My role is to facilitate the learning rather directed by giving resource book at the beginning of the unit as well as the specific deadline. This allow students to put input in their own learning and crate their own learning pathway.
• I took my learners to Career Expo as I mentioned on the previous blog. Present undergraduate students and qualified engineers discussed the university environment and self-directed learning.
• Two ex-students Havea pamaka (Qualified Engineer) and Emma Brown(Qualified Engineer) are coming to work with my learners to strengthen the pathways.

(5) Am I giving them enough practice for them to retain their knowledge?

·         I am running extra tutorials to meet my learners’ needs.

·         I have engaged the parents in supporting their learning and encourage them to attend classes.

·         My learners have access to online revision tasks that I have made available on workspace.

WFRC #7: Explain the hypotheses about teaching

WFRC #7: Explain the hypotheses about teaching that you decided were MOST worth testing, and why...

(1)Am I promoting self-efficacy?
• Self-efficacy- Fortunately, self-efficacy is a psychological skill that you can foster and strengthen.  Learners  believe in their own abilities to deal with various situations, can play a role in, not only how they feel about themselves, but whether or not they can successfully achieve their goals in life. Strong self-efficacy learners view challenging problems as tasks to be mastered, develop deeper interest in the activities, a stronger sense of commitment in the subject and quickly recover from disappointments.

(2)Are my expectations/resources challenging enough for my students to get good grades (Merit or Excellence Endorsement)?

• As I mentioned in the blogs I have been working on each topic by digging deeper to ensure the students get good grades. And If they are not happy with the grade trying to give them resit opportunities as they are in the last year of school and all learning counts towards their rank score. Their rank score determines their career pathway.

(3)Am I Promoting self-directed learning to imitate the university environment and helping students to choose the correct carrier pathway?
• The research shows students are dropping out from university at an unacceptably high rate and one of the reasons is poor secondary preparation. Students are not self-directed enough to handle university the university environment so I am trying to imitate the university environment in the classroom.
• My learners and I have been working with tertiary providers and past students and the school's carrier department to identify the ideal pathway. I strongly believe that my learners need to choose pathways that provide both enjoyment and career satisfaction.

(4) Am I giving them enough practice for them to retain their knowledge?
• There are three internals and three external to the program. The three internal adds up to only 10 credits, University entrance requires at least 14 credits in a single subject as one of the entry requirements. Therefore to get entry every learner must be able to pass one of the external.Also, Auckland university engineering counts only externals which means learners must pass all externals(17 from Calculus). My challenge is huge, trying to find strategies to meet my learners' needs.

WRFC#(6) Developing a set of hypotheses

WRFC#(6) Develop a set of hypotheses about patterns in your teaching that could be changed to more effectively address the student learning focus.

My hunches are - I need to promote self-efficacy, Self-directed learning, and imitate university environments. Student enjoyment affects their success. Doing homework helps to retain knowledge. I need to help teach them how to manage their own time effectively and not leave things to the last minute! 

My challenge is to integrate these skills into my own practice to get my students to university by the end of the year. Also, cater for scholarship students.

I have been working with colleagues from my school and other schools, taking students to Pacifica Career Expo, organising NZDE whanau evening and working as mentor, running extra tutorials, initiating collaborative inquiry for one/two of the topics, collaborating with my colleagues for two of my internals, contacting parents to update their children’s progress, making time for scholarship preparation, preparing online lessons and asking for feedback to improve my own practice. 

I try to get feedback from the students on each topic at the beginning, halfway and end of the topic to ensure the best results as every grade counts towards the rank score.

Professional Reading:

Differentiated teaching by Carol Anne Tomlinson & Michael Murphey.

Escher on Ecsher by D Schattschneider 

Calculus Abstract Algebra by David S. Dummit and Richard M. Foote

Calculus Made Easy by Silvanus P. Thompson

“Calculus – Single and Multivariable” by Hughes-Hallett

Maori  designs by Reuben Paterson Maori Artist

SOLO Taxonomy: by Pam Hook; Julie Mills

The Calculus Lifesaver: All the Tools You Need to Excel at Calculus

 by Adrian Banner

Differential and Integral Calculus  by  Richard Courant

My Inquiry Learner' visit to engineering expo

#1.  Raise Māori student achievement through the development of cultural visibility and responsive practices across the pathway as measured against National Standards and agreed targets for reading Years 1-10 and NCEA years 11-13. As a CoL leader within school. I  am more interested in inquiring about student learning and my own practice

  Engineering Career Expo (South Pacifica Professional Engineering Excellence)

·         Two of my Colleagues Mr Vincent  Lee, Mr Johan Koch, and I took my year13 calculus students and year12 students to an Engineering Career Expo yesterday.  Students had an opportunity to learn about the engineering industry through South Pacific Professional Engineering Excellence.  The focus was to explore what a career in engineering could look like and dig deeper into Engineering.
        www.FACEBOOK.COM/SPPEEX.

·         What is engineering?        Engineering is the application of scientific knowledge to solving problems in the real world. While science (physics, chemistry, biology, etc.) allows us to gain an understanding of the World and the Universe, Engineering enables this understanding coming to life through problem solving, designing and building things.

     

·         I am thrilled that two of my old students, both Ex-students of Tamaki College, Havea  Pamaka (Site Engineer - Infrastructure Projects, Downer) and Emma Brown (Engineering PHD candidate), also spoke to our learners about their success. They have promised to visit the school to empower and inspire our learners . I also came to know about this event form Havea Pamaka, 

We also met with the other ex-student.who is a 

Bio medical Engineering student at Auckland university

·         It was emphasised by each provider that calculus was the key to success in engineering and other 

       science related courses at university.

·         The trip was very productive as students learned more about the career and the many types of 

        engineering that are offered. Students were particularly interested in biomedical and environmental engineering. I hope to bring in the ex-students to motivate these students further. Student found it overwhelming to see success from Polynesians and Maori too. Students are going to continue make a relationship with Tertiary providers and past students to find a meaningful pathway.

·         My colleagues and I also found the day extremely useful in understanding engineering in the 21^st century and this knowledge can be shared to other students also.

• Whanau Voice: I had a chance to talk to whanau while they dropped students off at school that morning. It was a good opportunity to update them about their progress.

·         Next Step:

o    Inviting ex-students to speak

Yr13 -WRFC#(5) Begin to collect evidence-Evaluation

WRFC#(5) Begin to collect evidence and data and come to the next session ready to share your preliminary findings about the nature and extent of the student challenge i.e. using your baseline student data and evidence

• I have collected individual students' past year results from kamar blog post is here

• Historical results from NZQA site and my blog post is here.

• Student voice blog post is here.

• The following is the year planner:

• 

• Data:So far my whole class has finished the first internal Trigonometry test( 4credits) and here is the comparison of results between 2018 and 2019

Trends:

• The percentage of students who achieved Merit and Excellence increased, thereby shifted achievement higher out of achieved. Overall, I am happy with these results.

I am currently teaching the differentiation topic and currently only have data from the halfway topic test. As seen above, the majority of students got achieved.
Challenges:

• Lifting achievement up to Merit and Excellence; In order for student to get Merit and Excellence endorsements, students must at least get a Merit or Excellence in this topic.
• Another challenge is that getting students to retain this knowledge up until the end of year exams. 
• To combat this: I have held revision classes in the first week of the holidays to make sure students remember this learning.
• I also hold after-school study classes to ensure that students retain this knowledge and accuracy. 
• My scholarship students have finished another internal test (3 credits) and here is the blog post explaining this. My challenge is to balance the yearly schedule and continue with the scholarship program.

• To figure out how effective these solutions are, I will create a google form at the end of the topic as well as compile data of achievement after the topic finishes and share this in my next post. 

My Collaborative Inquiry Year 11

WFRC#(4) Describe the tools/measures/approaches you plan to use to get a more detailed and accurate profile of students’ learning in relation to that challenge. Justify why you chose these approaches and tools
Minor Collaborative inquiry - Can I improve the Year 11 numeracy credits by collaborating with one of my colleagues (one of my hunches!) and also the technology department?

My hunches are- I need to apply literacy strategies  and SOLO taxonomy effectively in order gain Achievement/Merit/Excellence. Hence, how to carryout an effective Collaboration Inquiry?

The Problem to be solved is:

First Name	Ethnicity	PAT Stanine 2018	Transformation Geometry (AS91034)	2 Cr
Student 1	Maori	4
Student 2	Tongan	2
Student 3	Niuean	3
Student 4	Cook Island Maori	4
Student 5	Cook Island Maori	3
Student 6	Maori	3
Student 7	Tongan	new
Student 8	Tongan	2
Student 9	Samoan	2
Student 10	Tongan	3
Student 11	other	new
Student 12	Maori, Indian	3
Student 13	Cook Island Maori	3
Student 14	Cook Island Maori	3
Student 15	Filipino	new
Student 16	Cook Island Maori	3
Student 17	Tokuluan maori	new
Student 18	Tongan	3
Student 19	Cook Island Maori	4
Student 20	Tongan	4
Student 21	Tongan	3
Student 22	Cook Island Maori	1
Student 23	Tongan	3
Student 24	Tongan	new
Student 25	Maori	new
Student 26	Maori	ab

 The above data shows that the students range from Stanine 2-4.
My challenge will be in figuring out  how to accelerate teaching within a short period.
There are 3 international students struggling with the writing and reading skills

My Tools/Measures/Approachers are:

• Knowing the learner-Approach according to ethnicity background and past year PAT results using Kamar, helps to apply differentiated teaching according to their ability.
• Formative assessments and practice tests in internally assessed topics will help students gain Numeracy credits.
• Student Voice- Instead of simply making assumptions about how best to support students, I am interested in collecting student voice using; google forms, Blogging and videos.
• Promote Mathematical literacy/reading in class to understand the Merit/ Excellence questions to gain better grades.
• Teaching SOLO taxonomy to understand the breakdown of Achievement, Merit and Excellence in NCEA to gain endorsements.
• Using work space and videos to set effective lessons in revising and reviewing before tests.
• Using literacy strategies to understand new concepts.
• Incorporate google drawing into Transformation geometry to increase engagement.
• Peer teaching- Learners feel more comfortable and open when interacting with their peers.
• Weekly catch ups with Mr Nilesh Krishna and Ms Karen Ferguson for effective collaboration.
• Creating key tags using design to make this topic meaningful.

Yr13-WRFC#(4) tools/measures/approaches .

WRFC#(4) Describe the tools/measures/approaches you plan to use to get a more detailed and accurate profile of students’ learning in relation to that challenge. Justify why you chose these approaches and tools

LINK

Major inquiry -  How can I accelerate learning in Y13 calculus so my Maori students (and other students) can pass exams and gain University Entrance with endorsement.

My hunches are - I need to promote self-efficacy, Self directed  learning, and imitate university environments. Student enjoyment affects their success. Doing homework helps retain knowledge. I need to help teach them how to manage their own time effectively and not leave things to the last minute!

The problem to be solved:

This is a mix ability class and there are 3 Māori students, 6 Tongan students, 2 Samoan students, 2 Cook island Maori, 1 Asia and 1 Pakeha in this class.

Currently, there are 3 students who are working above the expected level, 4-5 students who are at an average level and 5 students working below the level. One of these student had never taken calculus before. There are clear gaps here in terms of Mathematics and literacy skills.

My approaches are:

• Knowing learner-approaching according to ethnicity background and past year NCEA results using Kamar, guides me in delivering effective and differentiated teaching.
• Using Vital sheet to track their progress.
• Pre test, Halfway test, End of Topic Test, Mid year examination and Mock examinations for external topics. These tests will help to find out; what learner has achieved, what has not been achieved, and what the student requires to best facilitate further progress.  
• Formative assessments and practice tests for internally assessed topics, helps in gaining internal credits.
• Student feedback for every topic to improve learners work ethic and engagement - using google forms, KWL chart, Blogging and videos.
• After school tutorials and holiday programs to bridge the gap.
• Promote Mathematical literacy/reading in class to understand the Merit/ Excellence questions to obtain better outcomes.
• Teaching SOLO taxonomy to understand the breakdown of Achievement, Merit and Excellence in NCEA to gain endorsements.
• Mentoring- Bringing in guest speakers, past students for motivational talks.
• Attending Career Expos to promote meaningful vocational pathways.
• Using work space and videos to set effective lessons to revise and review the lessons before the examinations.
• Starting scholarship (one group) classes as they have finished their term1 goals. This program will help them to gain university scholarship next year.
• Using literacy strategies to understand, respond and answer questions-Chunk Check Chew, KWL for all topics and Differentiated teaching.