Toolkits - Term 3: Empowering Students through Feedback.

 Feedback and Feedforward: Empowering Student Learning

With Elena Terekhina (Manaiakalani Network)

Feedback can come from teachers, peer or whānau; our focus is teachers' feedback.

The assessment for learning archway has six component parts (or capabilities)

1. Capability One: Building learning focused relationships sits as the foundation stone of the archway. Teaching and learning are founded on the quality of the relationship built between teacher and student. This strong relationship is the foundation for learning upon which all else rests.
2. Clarity about learning – Everyone knows what they’re learning, why and how (LI/ SC).
3. Assessment literacy – Knowing how to use assessment effectively (summative and formative).
4. Promoting further learning – Helping students move towards their learning goals (This will be one of our focus for today looking at effective feedback and feedforward).
5. Active reflection gives the opportunity for both teachers and students to evaluate the effectiveness of the teaching and learning process.
6. Clarity about next steps requires shared knowledge of the big picture of the learning between students and teacher. Students know what they are aiming for and how to get there. 

All these capabilities based on principles, knowledge, skills and understandings which teachers and learners progressively develop and integrate one with the other to deeper and deeper levels of understanding.

Assessment is either summative or formative and needs to be used to improve learning. The purpose is to 

Feedback types

• Evaluative
• Descriptive
• Generative - how to improve

Clarke (2003) suggests three types of prompts for providing descriptive feedback dependent on the needs of the learner:

Reminder prompt (“You read that italicized word in a normal voice. Remember we talked yesterday about words with italics and what we need to do with our voice…”) 

Scaffold prompt (“Try rereading that sentence again and put emphasis on the word in italics to show amazement…”)  

Example prompt (“Try emphasising the word in italics with your voice to show amazement, like this: You aren’t going to eat that are you?”)

Focus for prompting needs to be around the learning intention(s) or goal(s) of the task. (As always)

Feedback is a shared response; teachers give feedback, and students need to act on it. These capabilities don’t develop automatically. They require planning, explicit teaching, modelling, practice and scaffolding

Giving them a map of what they have done.

Students with assessment literacy can understand what they are learning, how they are progressing, and what to do next. ​

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In Te Mātaiaho, progress markers and teaching sequences provide clarity about expected learning each year. When teachers share this information with students in accessible ways, students gain the ability to interpret feedback, track their progress, and adjust their learning strategies. ​

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This builds self‑regulation and motivation — key characteristics of how people learn. Students who understand progress information can take greater ownership over their learning, participate meaningfully in conferences, and develop long‑term learning confidence.​

John Hattie: we need more than a dollop of feedback. But it is more about what they hear/receive :

We know students and people in general are selective on what they hear. 

Ask students, "Tell me what you heard?" - This is to encourage students to interpret what we are saying.

Feedback should be more work for the receiver than the giver.

Research doesn't support the sandwich model for feedback, as they often focus on the Praise.

Effective feedback is focussed.

We often pick up the book and think where do I start. Pick one or two skills that are the most important that related to the success criteria.

Effective Feedback should be Focussed (Specific), Accessible, and Timely

Students need to be doing the heavy lifting (learning); don't do it for them. You can give support or scaffolds.

Feedback needs time for students to receive, if it is worth us writing it, then give students the time to read it!

Rather than writing feedback and then forgetting it. What about using feedback as detective work? Here is 4 comments which one goes with which story/essay? - Given to a group of four students. In maths, you have 5 right and 3 need fixing, find them and fix them. 

 - https://tipsforteachers.co.uk/feedback-detective-work/

Train students to give feedback, and then they will be able to do self-review better.

Ultimate GOAL is transferable Feedback - how will this feedback help them next time?

Toolkits Term 3 - Gemini Notebook and Using PATs

 

 Gemini Notebook for School Leaders

Was previously Notebook LM. 

You can use a range of resources and sources, narrow them down and then do analysis and summaries, and ask questions. It will only refer to the documents you have asked it to look at.

Benefits:

Gemini Notebook does not feed the wider AI community; however, if you share your notebook and have used personal information, is this within school policy? Or remove personal data. Gemini doesn't replace or substitute professional oversight or expert teacher judgement.

Sharing is currently only within your domain, but could be made open soon. Just remember to be vigilant with the information that you are sharing. i.e no personal information.

Chat Roles can be changed and updated as needed for each notebook and for different purposes while using a particular notebook.🤩

Reporting to Whānau-using the new PAT Whānau Report

This is a great new feature that I can see the possiblites for and was also great to see how we can do other testing using the PAT system.

Select the class or year level a student is in, find student and select. Once selected the option for whānau report will now be available. Selected which report you want to view, Reading, Maths... They will look something like this:

They can be downloaded too!

Pitomata - Share Meeting

First Glimpse of Pitomata

New development in our Share Pedagogy with the connected. 

We need people to think about - now young leaders can capture learning what is going unseen , how can if showing the growth of learning rather than a finished product , student agency 

Sign in with Google. 

A new communciation pops up at the top of the page, and spaces you are part of (classes) and following (friends)

• You can insert straight from Google Drive, everything must be insert through the drive. 
• You can search/filter posts to view. Needs to be reset 
• Oversight
• Class - is where you can manage the class (add students) 
• Members: can be seen who is in the class
• Can freeze students while remove comments, delete, and learners can flag a comment, this gvies you a report and this is emailed to the teacher and principal. We can also edit the comment. 

Parents - can they comment?

Tuhi mai Tuhi atu - school to school

How do we make the comments are purposeful, rather than a social chat.

Layers:

Principal - see all - oversight and make discussion

Team Leaders  - see team

Teachers - see class

Student - granula level

Next Steps - Whanau Hui - to discuss with community to see what students are doing

Rolling out 2027 T1 - no cost

Edublog has a button that can convert Edublog to a PDF this can be moved into Pitomata. Pitomata can this can also be taken to a new school too.

Manaiakalani is only paying for Edublogs up to January. Wordpress will preserve for 2 years, then disappears. 

External friend who is vetting from an outside perspective and looking at security.

Post Grad: W8/9 - Learning Journeys

 Digital and Collaborative Learning Journeys

Whakataukī

Titiro whakamuri, kōkiri whakamua
Look back and reflect, so you can move forward

Critical Reflection based on Learning Theories

Insights

As a class, we are looking at Class Companion, which students use to get instant feedback for their writing and can then modify it.

When I had another look at the diagram, it was interesting to see where I could improve 

Reflecting and Reflection:

Think about the past to help with the future this only works if you consider what has happened in the past.

Kia whakatōmuri te haere whakamua - means I walk backwards into the future with my eyes fixed on my past.

It is important to describe the situation so there is context, however when reflecting it is very importing to look at Why? How? and So What? or SO What now?

So remember a little bit of description for context but for this assignment we need to be more reflective. It is not always easy to be reflective straight after an event, but record those what if and come back to them later as they will create learning and action to make the next step better or even easier. 

Most important thing to do with reflection is to write it down.

Then write a short reflection on an experience you have had in digital and/or collaborative learning using the suggested structure.

• Keep description (what, when, who, and where) to a minimum

• Write about your thoughts and feelings during the experience, after it, and since

• Focus on reflection - why did you do something in a particular way? How would you change in the future? So what does this learning help you with?

The Power of Collaboration - Video

Hold out your hand and imagine you receive a stone; close your hand around it. You are keeping control. Imagine the stone is so large you need others to help you move it; that is collaboration. 

Where are you and your school on the digital journey? Being part of the Manaiakalani Network, I think we have teachers on the journey between Emerge and Extend and senior school teachers trying to move into Extend.

This is an interesting explanation of Critical Reflection;

Remember when reflecting we are:

There is a difference between reflective and descriptive writing - so be careful!

Takeaways

Prompts for Reflection

These sentence stems could be useful, especially if stuck...

Reflection:

I am now looking forward to this reflective assessment. These questions will also help with general reflection for my classroom practice. 

Things to consider for the assignment:

• Write experiences in first person; be honest and meaningful about your practice.
• Keep the context (description) the "what, who and where" limited
• Use 3rd person when referencing and reinforcing using literature.
• Use student voice and feedback if you have it.
• You can reflect on different stages; however, don't forget the whole process needs to be achieved and reflected on.
• Remember to step back and take another look.
• Use Hindsight
• What now?
• What will I do differently?
• What will I keep the same?
• Consider the events going on around you at the same time that may influence the task/outcome.
• Examine your biases and positionality (my normal is different to someone elses normal)
• Ensure reflection flows from past, to present to speculative future.
• What happened → Why it mattered → What it revealed → What I will do differently

But this gave me the opportunity through group breakouts to reflect on how I could modify the tasks I set for writing. E.g. using Google Docs, write a collaborative story, put it into Class Companion, individually look at the feedback and modify your version to make your best copy. Then share orally with your partner, or the class; each version should sound slightly different. 

Toolkits - Term 2: Gems with Gabriel

 Socratic Learning Gems

This is very important as no matter what students do in the future, they need to be able to question and respond appropriately to further themselves.

As teachers, we aim for equity for everyone. This is a great way to help achieve this. Imagine if we could have interviewed Shakespeare and asked him what he was thinking when he wrote Romeo and Juliet or Macbeth.

Oh wow, here is my chance to interview Macbeth or Sir Issac Newton on the laws of Physics.

Remember to do it in PARTS and to create the Gem (or get the Gemini to write its own Gem, huge timesaver). The important part is to front-load the character. AI is a great tool for adaptive learning.

Interview with Sir Issac Newton, using a site and a YouTube video. Then I had it transcribed into a doc.

And What about Shakespeare?

You can add the Gem to the Class site via an image of the historical character. This way, students can interview them in pairs or small groups. Then the Transcript can be put into a Google Doc and added to their blog, or they could create a video of the interview.

Post Grad : W7 - Making Videos

 Whakataukī

Whāia te iti kahurangi ki te tūohu koe me maunga teitei

Seek the treasure you value most dearly: if you bow your head, let it be to a lofty mountain

Making Videos

Great way to incorporate cross-curricula/integrated

SDG - Sustainable Development Goals - there are 17  adopted by the UN. 

They include: No Poverty; Zero Hunger; Gender Equality; Good Health and Well-being; Quality Education; Gender Equality; Clean Water and Sanitation; Affordable and Clean Energy; Decent Work; Reduced Inequalities; Sustainable Communities; Climate Action; Life on Land; Life Under Water; Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions.  All have specific targets to be achieved by 2030. 

Yes, these can influence how businesses operate, but they can also relate to reading to develop a deeper understanding of our impact on the world.

Our Target

My Stop Motion

Digital Technologies in the Curriculum

These skills don't just apply to computer programmers; they help students develop problem-solving and critical thinking skills.

Computational Thinking for Digital Technologies

Our Takeaways from Tim's Video

• Not Just for Computer Scientists
• Logical Thinking
• Algorithms - Process
• Breaking a Big Problem into smaller chunks - Decomposition
• Skills for Everyone
• Clarity and Strategy
• Abstraction - Big Picture
• Pattern Recognition
• Cycle of Reflection
• Cause and Effect

With algorithms, there is always more than one answer. 

Look at this map (Activity for Year 0-3): which way would you go?

 

Let's Teach Kids to Code

Learning to code but also code to learn. Just like when you learn to read, you can read to learn.

Through Scratch, you can use computational thinking. Mitch Resnick talks about Critical Thinking and broader literacy, engaging students to make Mother's Day Cards in Scratch.

Critical Thinking teaches students to 

• code 
• text-based language
• step-by-step activities 
• step-by-step building

And is part of the Experiential Learning Cycle

According to Code Academy, coding brings the virtual world and real world together. 

Code Academy brings the virtual and real world together. E.g. move the sprite in Scratch using noise, motion and score. - Application would be launching a Rocket in Scratch.  

Pair Programming 

One on the keyboard (driver), one thinking (navigator), swap over. Then swap pairs. This raises overall thinking all involved.

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Conditional Thinking

If / else 

If - is the true/false statement 

E.g. If the case, I will go in

If / then

Reflection:

Even though I have used Scratch many times, it was wonderful to learn about the if-then conditional code blocks. As always, I enjoyed sharing my knowledge with others, and this was a great opportunity to work with the overseas students. 

Stop Motion - What a jam! I have heard about how easy it is, and it is funny how, until we have the right app and someone to help us navigate it, we often put things off. My go-to is iMovie, so often I will just go "It's okay, I will just film it", but this was fun. The tricky part was the timing. Our person fell over with all the documents, and getting the specific image might have worked better if I kept my finger on the click button. So I got the range, rather than the paper hanging from the top of the screen (which we deleted). Definitely something I want the class to try.