Listening and Conversations for Learning

We have been focusing on "raising the bar." We are currently setting goals around our learning conversations. This links to our current Learner Attribute focus, "I am a Thinker!"

'Talk Moves' is a powerful tool for learning. Rich talk supports students to make sense of ideas and build a classroom community. This is something that we have been developing in all of our learning conversations. 

Talk Moves prompt:

• wait time
• turn and talk
• revoicing
• reasoning
• adding on
• repeating
• revise thinking.

During our circle time, we have been discussing what an active listener is. We are working hard to face the speaker, think about what the other person is saying and engaging in conversation. 

Why listening is so important? 

Our students said...

Listening is important because you need to get all of the information 

You might learn something new if you keep listening 

You might have forgotten something, listening might refresh your mind 

You might learn how to do something in a different way 

What stops us listening?

Our students said... 

The person talking next to you, even if you don't want to talk to them 

Toys on the mat 

Devices 

Noise in the classroom 

Something that is happening outside the window 

Thinking about stuff e.g. what is for lunch? 

Playing games 

Things on the walls 

What would you be doing if you were actively listening? 

Our students said...

You need to show that you are listening through body language

Focus on what they are saying 

Look at the person talking 

Face the person speaking 

Your brain is thinking 

Add on to the stuff they are saying 

Piggy backing 

Make connections 

Ask questions 

Interacting 

Active listening by sharing ideas 

Not letting someone else distract you 

Repeat what the person says 

Agree or disagree respectfully

What difference does this make for the other person/ people as opposed to someone half present?

Our students said... 

Multitasking is not good because you don't do anything well 

Do one thing at a time 

The person who is talking might feel sad, annoyed, disappointed or misheard

We need to uplift mana and show manaakitanga

These are our conversation guidelines

Te Tiriti o Waitangi

As part of our Inquiry 'Pūmanawatanga' we have been learning more about New Zealand's history. We have revisited our learning around Te Tiriti o Waitangi. We read a comic about Te Tiriti (read it here), we learnt about the different perspectives held by Māori, The Crown and others in New Zealand at the time. Our complex history is very interesting and things are beginning to click for the students. We are learning about the various 'characters' involved, among whom are James Busby, Edward Gibbon Wakefield and Tāmati Waka Nene.

We had discussions around the 'pros and cons' of Te Tiriti. As we discussed the different view points, we also went back to previous discussions around who writes history, and what is the truth?

We encourage discussions of this at home - there is a lot to learn, and it's great to be learning alongside students!

I am a Thinker: Using Digital Technology

We know how important it is to come back to Digital Citizenship. Staying safe online runs through all that we do. We have been exploring our online behaviour. We have asked ourselves would I be comfortable looking at this website with my parents/ teacher? Also would I do this in my normal life?  

We thought about our school value of respect and unpacked what this would  look like when we are online. 

Our Learner Attribute focus this term is "I am a thinker." We have been thinking about thinking as we have discussed our value. We have also worked hard to make our thinking visible. 

Prototypes: Forest Protectors

This is an example of one of our designs

On Friday, we started our prototypes for the inventions we are making. We are designing products or inventions that can be used to help protect our Forests. We have bird feeders, cat collars, waste disposers and so many more! Bring any materials (cardboard, recycling, tape) - basically anything your design needs!

Low Floor, High Ceiling Tasks: Algebra

Stanford Professor, Jo Boaler says that "Mathematics classrooms should be places where students work on mathematics tasks with a low entry point but a very high ceiling – so that students are constantly challenged and working at the highest and most appropriate level for them." You can read more: How students should be taught mathematics: for parents

Today some of us looked at this sequence. Students were asked "How is the pattern growing." It was interesting to see how others visualise the patterns.

We discussed what a sequence means. We came up with the definition: It is a pattern and a series of things that get bigger or smaller. We also said from the pattern you can work out what the next one will be. 

Students were Mathematical thinkers and came up with their own questions about the sequence. 

Flynn and Henry: This is a number sequence.we figured out the rest of it.

Orla and Yasmin: Today we figured out the sequence of this pattern we also figured out what the 100th 1 would be. We found out that what the added up together and other stuff like that.

Jan: I have worked out that if x = million (1,000,000) y = one trillion and one (1,000,000,000,001)

Also, this is my graph of the equation y = x squared + 1.

Maddie: Whatever number you want to times it by that number. This shows the equation for the 70,000th in the sequence.
 

Developing Mathematical Thinkers

Our aim is that students will be able to: 

• question 

• challenge 

• agree and disagree

• extend explanations to justification

• use exploratory talk

• accept high levels of cognitive demand

We have used a no hands up rule throughout the whole space. We are asking students to talk to partners and anyone can be called upon to answer a question. This means that everyone is thinking about what the speaker is saying and are listening for understanding.

We have developed rights and responsibilities for discussion: 

We asked some of our students how they feel when they approach to a challenging problem:

Griffin: When I come across a challenging question in maths it makes me feel happy because I love 💖 challenge that makes my brain jump.

Jude: WHEN I COME ACROSS A CHALLENGING QUESTION IN MATHS IT MAKES ME FEEL CONFIDENT AND BRAVE BECAUSE I KNOW I CAN DO IT !!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ruby: when I come across to a challenging problem I feel excited because then I will be able to work more stuff out and learn a new maths perspective.

Zoe: Sometimes it makes me feel that I should try it, because I want to get better at my maths

Emelia: When I come across a hard question in maths I feel...
I feel confused (sometimes) until it gets explained then I find a way in my head

Flynn: When I come across a challenging question in maths it makes me feel challenged and excited

Nick: When I come across a challenging question in maths it makes me feel challenged and excited to try the question.

Hana: When I come across a challenging question in math it makes me feel like I need to work harder to get the answer because my brain needs to work harder to get the right answer.

Eva: when I come across a challenging question in maths it makes me feel excited because I get to learn new things.

Evan: When I come across a challenging question in maths it makes me feel annoyed or determined. I can be annoyed because I just want to finish the maths question.
I feel determined because I'm excited and I want to learn the answer one day.

Orla: When I come across a challenging question in maths it makes me feel like I need to challenge myself and keep trying even if it is hard or I don't know how to figure it out.

Problem Solving: I am a thinker!

Students have been working on problem solving in Maths. You may have seen some of these on Seesaw. Our big focus is explaining our thinking and justifying our answers. Please continue these conversations at home...

After camp, our students made up their own problem solving activities for each other. We also sent these to Room 3 at Auroa School to solve. Students at Auroa School have made some problems for us. The photos are of us working on the problems that they wrote.

We have been working through a thinking process for problem solving. This is linked to our learner attribute: I am a thinker!

The problems on the slide below are from Auroa School:

Here are some of our camp problems. Can you solve them? 

Questioning and Inquiry

Student Inquiry is at the heart of learner agency. Students need to be able to ask good questions to chase their curiosity and wonderings. This helps students to build on the knowledge that they already have.

This term, the learner attribute that we are focussing on is "I am a thinker." An important part of being a thinker  is being able to ask good questions. We would like our students to design and ask red, orange and green light questions.

Our learners thought about the different types of questions when writing our own for the "Forest Protector" Inquiry. Here are some of them: 

We have also made an "attribute mountain" so students can see how we are going with their questioning. The avatars will climb up the mountain as our students improve their questioning abilities.  

Please ask us at home about our questions and how we will go about finding out what we are curious about...

3D Cubes

We had this problem that had 3D cubes.

First we discovered all the things that it could be. Some people thought it looked like a flower and others thought it looked like a minecraft flower. At first I thought it looked like a stamp that looked like a plus.

Then we organised our thinking into a chart. We found out that each time the pattern grew it added five. It added one to the top and one on the four sides.

Number in Sequence	Number of Cubes
1	1
2	6
3	11
4	16
5	21
6	26
7	31
8	36
9	41
10	46

We drew the next two in the sequence so we could check if it was right. We thought that we would find the tenth in the sequence. We did this by adding five.

From there we did trial and improvemnet to find a formula.

The formula is y = (y-1) 5 +1

(y is the sequence)

BEDMAS is to help us with order of oprations it help us make the formula.

By Zach