Isolation Take 2 week 2

We got the news yesterday that we are still in Level 4 until Tuesday night, and then hopefully some of the country (including us) will move down to Level 3. It's a funny feeling again. I think there was always some hope that we would move to Level 3 quickly, but it's sensible not to. Auckland (and possibly Northland) will be in lockdown for a while so it is particularly difficult for them right now. We are definitely lucky being in the South Island.

I'm watching the Facebook posts of my relatives in the UK travelling around and doing the 'normal' day to day things and thinking that was the other way around a while ago, with us in Level 1 and them in lockdown. Things can change so quickly, especially with this Delta variant.

When lockdown comes there are always a range of posts that pop up on social media that make you laugh, or that are particularly good. A couple that I really like at the moment are the One Day More Corona Parody (thanks to JJ for sending this to me) and the Aranui Community Trust's TikTok that reminds people how to stay safe - love the reo and the energy in this, it's fun but gets the message across.

This week has been busy - contacting students I work with, getting long needed paperwork done and having Zoom calls and Google Meets. I do find the calls difficult sometimes when the video and audio don't match, I realise how much I lip read in these situations and wonder how it must be for those that are hard of hearing and have no hearing aids to help.

NCEA exams have moved back 2 weeks. This will give students more time to prepare, but will also place more pressure on staff as they lose time that would normally be used for planning for the next year. It's a fine balancing act and I hope that schools consider the well-being of staff as well as the well-being of students. 

I am watching the paralympics at the moment. What amazing athletes. They have overcome so much and are competing at such a high level. I have learnt a lot about the classification system - this site helped immensely and I am continually referring back to it as I watch new events. It's so sad that the Paralympics don't get as much publicity as the Olympics, but I guess that is the way with many sports - someone makes a decision as to what gets airtime or pages in the news.

The good weather meant I could get out in the garden and the longer daylight hours have been great. I'm loving the spring flowers and the blossom on the fruit trees, The rain now means that I get more genealogy done and I am working on my mother's Sagar line at the moment which has been really interesting. Lots of Barons and property, very interesting history. The photo here is of my gg grandfather's Ironmongers shop - it has been recreated in the Abbey House Museum in Kirkstall which is where the Sagar family held a lot of land. I remember my mother saying the shop was exactly how she remembered it, right down to the smell and the bench she used to sit on. I'm loving the research and the gardening.  It's a win win for any weather for me at the moment.

How do I feel this week? I was feeling ok for a while, then had a wave of OMG how am I going to manage this, then after chatting with a couple of people I felt better again. Just shows how important it is to stay connected to others during these uncertain times. Make sure you reach out and have some good conversations each day. He waka eke noa - we are all in this together.

Isolation 10

Thurs 30 Apr
Wow - I can't believe I am writing Isolation 10 already! The time has actually gone quite quickly. Today I felt like some days are more productive than others, I was very productive in bursts today. rather than full on throughout the day. Had some time when I just was not really onto it but then got totally motivated and got a heap of work done. I think it's about being aware of what we are feeling. I needed the time at lunch today to sit out in the sun and pat the cat. Just felt like it was the right thing to do at the time - I didn't even go for a walk which is unusual. But then I worked through until quite late when I felt like it. Maybe this is something we need to think about for work and study - when do we work best? I normally work really well at 7.30am. I know many others would be horrified at that time of the morning but I do work well early in the day. It gives me time to get set up and organised. Recently that has pushed out to 8.30 - I think working from home has made me a bit lax on that 6am start!!!
I got some good news today. I have been waiting for an appointment for my foot for over a year now. It was scheduled for Apr 3rd and of course that got cancelled due to Covid19. I had resigned myself to the fact that I probably wouldn't get an appointment for another few months but today I got a message saying I could go tomorrow. I am just a little bit excited and hope that something can be done eventually as I can't walk very far without it being strapped up. Here's hoping something can be done - I don't mind if it takes ages to do it, just knowing would be good.
I managed to take the pool from green to clear over the last couple of days - had let it go by just not really thinking about it. Might need to concentrate a little more on my surroundings. So much going on right now - there are different things to focus on and a pool is well down the list.

Fri 1 May
I can't believe it's May. It seems like April didn't really exists this year. It's very strange.
I had a good day today - 12 calls online and a very busy day both at work and not.
Went to the surgeon - finally getting an MRI for my foot to get all the information needed to see if he can fix it or not. He had some ideas but wants all of the information before we go the next step - if he can. Feel good that at least there is a next step.
I did a bit of reading today and found this great advice for lots of calls and how to combat Zoom fatigue.
This afternoon I went to the Future of Learning catch up - these have been going for a while - in person, then online. It was good to tlak with other educators and share experiences and ideas. I do enjoy those conversations.
Watching the Repair shop again tonight reminded me of my father's clock. I think I'll get that out and have a look at it.
My Peptalk magazine arrived today. Wow what a great resource. There were two books in one and I found the information was really great. My daughter had a look as well and she thought it was good as well. If you haven't got your free copy then go to this link and order it. Yes, free. I've subscribed to further issues, that's how much I enjoyed it.

Saturday 2 May
Made a big cooked breakfast for my children - it's nice to have one occasionally. Keeps me going all day and I'm a pretty good short order chef. It's always nice to have my 2 children around. We played some games, went for a walk and just had a nice lazy day. Managed to do quite a bit of the jigsaw - I'm worried now, almost finished all the ones I have in the house!

Sunday 3 May
I really have felt very lazy this weekend. I think that the online calls take it out of me quite a bit. I know I have to work extra hard because of my hearing and I struggle with the lag between voice and camera when I know I do rely a bit on lipreading.
I have 187 emails to sort through. Hmm. Maybe I'm a little unsorted right now - very tired at the end of the day and have struggled this week mentally. Finally finished that jigsaw today - found another 2 in the back of the cupboard so I haven't run out just yet!

Later in the week...
So I've slowed down on the day by day account. I think I just find every day is busy with work or just trying to find time to relax so from here on in I'll do an update when I get the inspiration.
Had a Boma New Zealand Rethinking Education Campfire on Tuesday - really interesting to hear some students talk about their experiences of online learning. You can read some of their ideas on my blog. It showed me how important student voice is in this isolation time. I have made a survey for my mentor group and it's been interesting getting their feedback. I'll do another blog on Reflection and Isolation sometime soon.
I attended a NZQA workshop this week. I was happy that I felt confident in this area, but it was interesting to see the questions others asked. I wonder how we can improve teacher knowledge in this area? There are obviously a lot of people not sure of how things work. Something else to ponder.
I've had a couple of conversations with some of the Boma Education Fellows for this year. It's hard not being able to talk face to face and our programme has certainly been disrupted. Getting to know each other is taking longer, but at least this week I managed to catch up with a few and have some conversations both around what our kuras are doing online, and with our own projects. My project is in a bit of a hold at the moment due to many things, but I did do some more research this weekend around diverse learners and looked into some other sites that cater for these learners. Been a good learning weekend in that respect.
Another flashback moment on The Repair Shop this week - a spinning wheel. Mum used to spin and I remember carding wool for her and watching her spin and knit for hours. She also dyed the wool herself - I remember the different natural dyes she used. I still have homespun jerseys that she made for my children. Such memories and a skill that can be lost if we don't take things up. I wonder how many things are handed down from parents anymore now that we are busier in our lives. It makes me wonder if maybe lockdown is a good thing - getting back to spending time with family and not being able to fill our days with things. Maybe this is the start of people learning the old skills again. I do hope so.
I completed my Microsoft Innovative Educator application for the next year today. The MIE group in New Zealand is fantastic. Such great support and I have made some good friends out of this group so hopefully will be able to continue on with this for 2021 - even though I work in a Google school! I still use a lot of Microsoft tools and and I am passionate about their resources. They certainly work hard to make things better for schools and offer some interesting and useful courses on the Microsoft Educator Community site - go and have a look!
I also completed the Science of Wellbeing Course today - and have a blog half done on that - another day.
Well it's Mother's Day. I've done a couple of blogs, a bit of gardening and managed to finally clear my emails down to single figures. Must be time to have a break and get this posted.

Boma Education Week: Rethinking Education

This call was on Wednesday night and Boma New Zealand had organised 4 speakers. These are my notes from this session.

You can watch the videos individually here:

Dylan Wijaya 

Melanie Riwai-Couch 

Claire Amos 

Rachel & Michael Perrett 

Claire Amos:  the Principal of Albany Senior High School, co-founder of DisruptED and and a board member for NetSafeNZ and 21C Skills Lab

Claire has been doing DisruptEd interviews to try and capture what educators have been noticing. The thing that matters most is wellbeing, not about teaching, learning or assessment but making sure they all feel safe and well. We know they can't learn when stressed and it's hard for teachers when they are unwell.

Where online learning is working is where there is a connection. A connection between school, whānau and the community.

Less is better - you can't do as much as you do in class. Forced to think about what really matters.

Create space in the curriculum

Create space in the day to go deep and wide

Need to have a combination of structure and flexibility

Home isn't school - you can't transfer straight across

Would do better if student centered at school - they would have more agency

They did Mon, Tue structured, then Wed-Fri student led - students loved that

Created agency, self direction and managing time and space

A challenge: The digital divide

OK if already using online platforms, they transitioned easily.

Real cost of digital divide is not about tools but about social justice. They need to be able to connect and still learn.

We need to embrace digital tools but realise we don't change overnight.

The reality is that education is ultimately quite inflexible. We need to design and prepare the new normal that we want.

Notice, take stock and redesign.

Whatever we design has to be agile - we may move in and out of levels. Needs to be a robust powerful experience

How do we measure success? NCEA has it's place but need to move beyond the traditional

Concept of personal constructs of success. Not our place to tell a young person what success looks like. Could be a portfolio of evidence. No one measure of success. Work with them to define what they want for themselves. 20th Century skills. The moment we turn it into a criteria it becomes redundant. Success is when they believe in themselves and can contribute.

Opportunity to consciously and critically integrate Te Ao Māori

Stop being seen as a school in isolation - be a learning hub/community hub - like a marae

A lot we can take from Māori constructs and community to reimagine school. At the moment we are still in the Western industrial age. Use the Māori view lens then we'd have a good educational model.

Working with nature - Green School - see below

Meeting needs of diverse learners and ESOL - think more collaboratively about resourcing

NCEA Hackathon Resource Group - to share ideas and resources

Virtual Learning Network - online courses and resources

Power of school and a platform such as Te Kura - we already have an online school - what would that have looked like if we had access to all of that during this time?

Communities of Online Learning (COOLs) - these had concerns about business - what if we had those?

Could have schools networked across geographical areas, not just Kāhui Ako 

Network/Collaboration/Sec schools online - where teachers are available and can cater for diverse learners and ESOL

Designing powerful online learning takes skill

We are not taught instructional design

Value in Portfolios of Personal Excellence (POPE) - they do impact projects at her school. This has earned them scholarships and opportunities in business. Sometimes we determine that NCEA has too much weight and value. Do impact projects need to be assessed to be valuable? Huge believer in soft skills - Design thinking, agile, collaborative, communicate, self directed

Ideal Learning structure:

Co-Learning hubs - Yr 0-13 learning space and a location for health and wellbeing. Co-working innovation with community as well

In and out of spaces as needed. Teachers there to open eyes and guide through the journey. Learning doesn't just happen in Yrs 1-13, it happens throughout life.

We get caught up on subjects and year groups - trying to keep the adults happy

Self directed learning schools in Canada - students come together for home room then work how and where they want to. This is the beauty of what we see in Primary Schools. Student have time to be self directed, but want some structure. Work with community groups, iwi, whānau

Teacher shave thrived where they already use UDL in normal practice. This online learning has shone a light on some people's gaps in practice.

Are teachers digitally literate? How can we use tech to be more inclusive and meet the needs of diverse learners?

Passion is the key to a great teacher

 Dr Melanie Riwai-Couch: Kaihautū Māori and education consultant for Evaluation Associates Ltd, and experienced researcher, evaluator and change manager for kāhui ako.

School Led Learning at Home: Voice of parents of Māori and Pasifika students

Team worked through surveys that were gathered through social media. Thought they would get 20 or 30 but got 100 overnight. Wanted to make sure the perspectives of parents were not lost

The name wanted to capture a new way of being - the partnership between home and school. Other names undermined the learning at home each day.

Doesn't matter what school wants - what happens in my home is what I want to happen.

Identified some benefits that would be good to carry over into school

How happy were parents with the work sent home? 50% gave a 4 or 5 but  25% only gave it a 1 or 2

If school didn't have a culturally sustainable practice then that was magnified online.

What's the best way to gather voice? Didn't use case studies but used pools of stories. Have conversations with communities.

Do we engage with parents and communicate or do we tell them things?

Parents - are they informed consumers or do we say "this is how we define success" and "this is what's important to us". Need to include the voice of parents. Best way to start is to start.

In the report they have included questions that you can use to help reflect on practice. Take back to your own setting.

Māori and Pasifika realities may not be the same as ours.There are questions to ask now and some to ask later. All the questions are designed form themes identified in the data. Constantly reflective.

How can we not be tokenistic in Māori and Pasifika?

The role that complexity plays - equity shouldn't be the end goal - devices are just a milestone on the path to reach potential. It's not enough to just have a conversation. Parents have their own perspective on their children. Need to engage beyond the surface. Her own children use identity, language and culture to grow.

Provocations - things to think about:

Focus on getting devices into homes - need them there to be able to engage

Homes are sacred spaces - no-one asked me about hundreds of people online coming into my home every day

Pasifika - loving home being calm and peaceful, it's a spiritual calm during the day

This is a chance to understand learning and how they can apply it to their own setting and reality

What are we going to go back to? Don't lose the learning. Māori and Pasifika parents have perspectives we can learn from. Need to take our parents with us into the future.

Thesis - a chapter on iwi educators defining success. Want them to achieve NCEA and be literate but also be proud and strong in their culture and to return home to serve their communities.

Really important to many Pasifika families - a right of transition - not just the child but the family as well. Want them to achieve all they can but be a whole person. Need to create conditions in schools to enable them to feel like that.

Curriculum violence - Anne Milne

Rachel and Michael Perrett: Founders of Green School New Zealand which uses a community-integrated, entrepreneurial way of learning with a focus on exciting and empowering students to lead the way sustainably.

Redesigning Education for a long time. Did Green School in Bali for 11 years.

Want to engage young learners as individuals who learn in unique ways

Sustainable caring for our planet

Creating a curriculum that addresses real world problems and engage students with joy, resilience and optimism

High respect values - entrepreneurial spirit to allow them to be changemakers

Whole community involved

Bring people along on a journey

Much of what they do is old knowledge, old wisdom and new future. Pioneering spirit. Authentic self directed learning in a natural context. 600 teachers applied before they even advertised.

Green School Compass - REAL (Relationships, Experiences, Action, Local)

Relationships - self/community/nature - this trumps procedures every time

Culture trumps strategy

Iwi first - needed to earn their place there

Engagement is extensive and rich. 

Māori blessing and powhiri - looked to reach consensus rather than just consult

Parent are essential - need to go on a journey with them to create a sustainable future. Have The Bridge where they can have coffee, the internet - co-working space. Parent have rich skills to share - can park and play

Socio economic background  - schools in Bali, Mexico and South Africa. 70 different cultures in Taranaki

Budget of 25NZ, 25Aus, 50 International

Using Bali formed Vision and values

Tweaked their content and curriculum with others

Focus on starting local and moving global

Community trusts and groups and sustainability. Support them and integrate with them and business. Public Sector support been cherished and supported. Had 7 weeks of this year before lockdown. Turned a dairy farm into an International Destination Private School

Academic rigour - sounded themselves with people to guide them

Hope to open up after school hours for sustainability studies and have camps in the holidays

Pride and partnership - an evolving process

Previous nature based school failures - many were too fringe, easily marginalised. Construction costs too high. Ego. Lack of academic rigour.

Made a list of mistakes form Bali they didn't want to make. It can be traumatic, it's stressful. Tough to conjure up a project like this but have a genuine desire to help. Montessori and Steiner have helped pave the way.

Need to be seen as serious, not fringe. Academic rigour is really important - you can learn calculus and stats in nature.

Unless Universities change it's hard for schools to get pathways so they are doing a blend of NCEA with the Green School Diploma to allow access to Uni

100% in Bali is Green School Diploma and Uni will take their students, but here it's not enough. In Bali 52 Universities came to recruit graduates - self starter, independent learner, self confident and determined. Some universities are listening but we lose so much talent to an antiquated machine.

They are moving from being the builder to the BoT. Roll early Feb was 47 and maybe have 65 by Term 3 and 100 for Term 1 2021. Want to continue to grow to perhaps 450-500 Yr1-13. Bali had a waiting list to get in. International school, but more and more people going to them.

Dylan Wijaya: a year 12 student attending St John's College in Hastings, New Zealand. For the past 3 weeks, he and 6 other students have been striving to create a cost-effective ventilator in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Called it Pear because it was like Apple, plus the Hawkes Bay is known for Pears.

Still at the brainstorming stage.

Lockdown has given him time to learn material at his own pace. Says he does 4hrs for the 6 hour day. More hands on approach plus time for hobbies

He is pursuing his purpose - to save lives

I really enjoyed this session - it reinforced my thinking around education and what education could look like. We need to make sure we take this opportunity to move forward, not take a step back into what we had. I'd love to work towards the idea of a marae as our school hub - more community involvement. More things to ponder!

Haeata Week Ten

Took me a few weeks to get this finished, and then didn't post it, but here it is - the last of our planning journey blogs for Haeata. I started it in December but Christmas got in the road. Back into it now...

Here it is - the last week of our amazing journey, a term of developing ideas and planning. A time to get to know some amazing people and make some really great connections with staff, students and community. I feel very blessed to have been in this position and to have this opportunity. I know that next year is going to be full on and we won't have as much time to be able to ponder things and read and write as much as I have. But I am looking forward to being with the students and in our amazing new kura with the fantastic kaiako that I have the privilege of working with. My blogs will no doubt take a bit of a different flavour from here on in, but I am keen to keep tracking the journey we are on and sharing it with others.

Day One

We have had a few forums going over the last few weeks around some odds and ends like wearing hats - inside and out, staff dress code, duty, lots of every day issues. Today Andy went through these and pulled out the general consensus on what we are going to do next year. It's been good to have input on this as we all come from different angles and it's great to hear what others have to say. So, decision time and lots of these were nailed down. The Wonder Wall also got some answers, although many had been answered just in the course of time which was great.
Our Puna Ako time in our hapori was spent looking at NCEA yet again. It certainly has been the elephant in the room and still has us discussing how, why and what for. We are also aware of our own limitations as a hapori and how that might impact on our ākonga. How can we cover for areas of interest that we don't have expertise in? There are lots of options here and we will work through these once we have our students and identify their needs.
Mai time was time for some reading, and I had the opportunity to make a Chocolate Salami which I brought in to share on Tuesday. Well worth making - quick and easy, and delicious!

Day Two

A late start on Tuesday meant I had time to do some Christmas shopping bright and early - out of the Christmas rush. My lack of voice over the weekend meant I only felt like staying home and reading a book - probably a good idea - but I do feel a bit behind in the Christmas preparations!
The rest of the day was spent looking at our Learning process and NCEA, then preparing for a hui with our senior students. This was held after school and gave the students and their whanau the opportunity to come and talk about NCEA, the uniform and leadership in the school. It was a good afternoon and a great opportunity to get some student voice on all of those things.

Day Three

Starting the day with kapahaka practise is always a great energiser - except when you don't have a voice. Mine is only just coming back, so it was a mime session for me.
The last of this year's digital korowai were presented today with a few surprises, including the revealing of "Bad Fanta" among us. It's great to find out about people and one of our staff does roller derby in her spare time.
Wellbeing was a trip to the beach and I wandered collecting rubbish for a while then sat and chatted and relaxed. It was a beautiful day and nice to watch the surfers and all the people having a great day out. Mai time in the afternoon gave me the opportunity to finish my Week Nine blog! I also read this article which I enjoyed, talking about the move from child-centered to skill-centered learning and how play can help the move back to more child-centered.

Day Four

We started with some work on NCEA in our hapori, then a group of us went out to the University of Canterbury to support one of our kaiārahi who was being honoured at the Māori Graduation Ceremony. It was a fantastic morning and such an amazing feeling to watch and join in with the celebrations of all the graduands and whānau.
The afternoon was spent at one of the closing schools, packing up the Science gear ready for it to be moved to our new site in the new year.

Day Five

We had an extended kapahaka practise and learnt another waiata that we can practise over the holidays. A wonderful lunch was put on by the Senior Leadership team and the afternoon was relaxed as each hapori took the floor and danced, sang, played games and generally entertained each other. The evening had us enjoying some good food and drinks at The Bower as our year came to an official end.

Day Six

This day was very special as the new site was blessed and the carvings were brought in. It was a lovely morning and it was very

moving to be a part of it. Afterwards a couple of us went and packed up the Music equipment in preparation for it's move to Haeata. This was a very moving time for me as I was HOD Music at Aranui High School in the early 2000s and being there at the end of an era, packing up gear that I had purchased 15 years ago, was quite emotional. Watching the demolition going on around us as we packed gear was hard. It is the end of an era with the closing of the schools, but also the start of a new one at Haeata. It has been a difficult time for the community and all of those involved but also very exciting moving forward. I am pleased to see that there is a 3 part web series being made about the history of Aranui High School, called Te Tōnga ō Te Rā - you can watch the trailer here.

Day Seven

Just before Christmas the new kura was made available for the community to come and have a look around. Our staff took people on tours and showed them through the school. It was the first time many of us had been in some of the spaces, so it was very exciting for everyone. It is such an amazing space and I am looking forward to working in it. This article quotes a parent saying "It's like a resort".

It's been a term like no other. I feel like I have been at a conference every day for 10 weeks - full of learning, talking with people and reading and listening so much. It's been tiring but also very exciting. We have an amazing bunch of staff and amazing ideas. I am looking forward to meeting our students in a few weeks!

Haeata Week Nine

Day One

We had some time in smaller groups across hapori to talk about Relationship Management in our first block and together we worked on coming up with a statement that described relationships for us. Our group used this statement that was made by another staff member, but we felt it summed things up for us:

Building trust and respect and creating a culture of belonging where everyone feels valued and safe to be who they truly want to be and to have the understanding to allow others to be who they want to be.

Another comment which I found quite useful was about the difference between restorative practise and restorative justice. Restorative Practices are the way that you talk to students. The way you shame them, or not, in front of others The way you approach them in the classroom, the way you talk to them when they make a mistake, the way you interact with students. Restorative Justice is the way that you deal with issues after they occur, the way you talk through problems with students and find solutions. I felt this was a good way of clarifying the difference.

Some of the new staff presented their digital korowai today - just another reminder of how great these are to give us an insight into their personal life. We are very keen to take this idea into our hapori for next year.

The second block was around assessment and we had a list of articles to read and reflect on. I read some really interesting articles during this time and wrote quite a few pages on reflection around these, maybe they will all make it into another blog another time! Meanwhile, here are a few links to some I found particularly interesting.

Principles of Assessment for Learning

Assessment Literacy

Personalised Assessment (school stories)

Working Inside the Black Box 

Assessment tools for Maori learners

Blog on NCEA by Principal Possum

In the afternoon we met some more whānau at our enrolment hui, and once these had finished, I read more of the articles on Assessment as I found some of them quite thought-provoking.

Day Two

Our hapori had some time this morning to discuss assessment  and we wrote a large list of assessment tools that we could think of:

NCEA Unit and Achievement standards, STAR, Gateway, CTC, SiteSafe, MOOCS, Royal and Trinity Music exams, Services, Te Kura, Peer and group reflections, Portfolios, ITOs, First Aid, Spirit of Adventure, Outward Bound, AsTTLe - the list goes on. We are not restricted to just using NCEA and it is good to get an idea of other assessments and pathways that we can look at. When I think of assessment I am always reminded of the quote by Albert Einstein in this picture.

An interesting question came out of our discussion, "Is it our job to be a vocational transitional facilitator?". In some ways I think it is. As senior school staff, much of what our students are looking for is the pathway when they leave school. We need to have some tools to enable this and support them in their journey. So, what about those that don't know what they want to do? How do we help support them? I feel it is about exposing them to a range of opportunities and ideas that they might get a spark from that can set them on a pathway for life.

Our next block was working on our relationship agreement. Previous comments had been collated by Andy with all of our views put into one document. Many of our comments were very similar and some underlying common themes emerged. Some of these themes were:

• It is vital to form positive relationships with all, including whānau
• Restorative practice can help maintain these relationships
• We need to create a safe environment for all
• One size does not fit everyone
• We need to preserve mana
• Student perspective is important

We also had discussions about what we would do in certain situations with students, for example swearing, fighting, communication with parents. This really brought home how different things might look from one end of the school to another, but also how different it can be from one incident to another. So much depends on the individual but there are certain base line strategies that can be followed and we focussed on these. We then looked at pro-active management strategies that we could use, personally, in our hapori and kura wide. Some of these are really simple but can make a big difference to our students. Examples could be:

• Correct pronunciation of names
• Showing a genuine interest
• Learning about our ākonga
• Modelling good responses in an age appropriate way

Day Three

We spent some time working on NCEA and assessment today as well as how the timetable might work for us before our hapori took a break and met at my house for a swim and some lunch together. It's always good to spend some social time together as a group and we are really lucky that we all get on well together - well, I think we do!!

More enrolment hui in the afternoon, meeting our awesome whānau.

Day Four

Excitement today as we met at the school site for our site visit. We were given a safety briefing, signed for our key cards and were taken on tours of the site. So great to be able to actually see what the spaces look like. It's meant to be finished by next Friday so we were keen to see where things were at. Having watched the fly-through on the Haeata website, I was amazed at how accurate it was! Even down to the colour scheme!

The outside spaces were lovely, in particular I liked the small stage type areas outside the hapori, lots of uses sprang to mind. I got a sneak peak at the Performing Arts area and was excited by the practise rooms (yes they are soundproof - 2 of us tested that) and the recording spaces. My one reservation, which I had from the flythrough and was confirmed in the actual space, is that the sound/recording booth for the auditorium is on the side, not at the back of the space. We didn't get into the space itself, but the front of house lighting rig looks pretty cool. The technology area in our hapori looks amazing and I can hardly wait to see how everything comes together next year.

We dashed back to school in time for more enrolment hui and then spent the afternoon working on more assessment and timetable clarification in our hapori.

Day Five

A day out for Ihutai (our hapori). We travelled over to Living Springs for the day which was an amazing site to work from.

It was nice to get away to a space where we could focus on planning and have some in depth discussion without any other distractions. We were well looked after with fantastic food (the muffins were enormous!) and a tour of the area, which included a bit of rock climbing by our resident expert, James, as well as a bush walk to an 800 yr old Kahikatea, one of the oldest trees on Banks Peninsula. It was a lovely day out and a great time together.

Only one week to go - this term has gone so quickly. I lost my voice on Thursday - tired and needing a break. So many of us are feeling the "end of term-itis" drain and I know we will all be looking forward to a break.

Haeata - Week Eight

Day One

We started our day practising two waiata. I am finally getting these learnt, with the aid of sticky notes and lots of singing in the car. I'm loving singing every day and now putting the movement in as well is challenging again!

Glenys Williams came in to show us around our Linc-Ed site today in preparation for our Enrolment hui. This is the Student Management System (SMS) we will be using across the whole school and it was good to get into it and have a look around. The beauty of this system is that it is able to be personalised for our kura and we have input into what we need for us specifically. Some of our staff have used this before but for many of us it is a new platform.

We had a session in our Puna Ako time where we did some more unpacking around NCEA and what this would look like with regards to our Principles and Dispositions. Still many discussions about what this might look like for our ākonga.

After lunch we got to meet with some of our ākonga and their whānau. It was really good to have some time to chat and learn more about them as well as answering their questions, even though there are still a lot of unknowns with specifics, it was helpful to touch base and learn more about what their thoughts are.

Day Two

This morning started with our waiata again. I was pleased that I have learnt the lyrics to 2 out of the 3 so far as it makes it so much easier to harmonise. I was feeling great, then another was added today just to keep us on our toes! Glad we are able to have the lyrics for that one that we are singing in a few weeks time.

Paul (SLT) took us through the timetable plan today. It was good to get an idea of how the week will look and it also has a lot of flexibility in it which I am excited about. Our time is split into Kaupapa Ako (time for transdisciplinary learning), Puna Ako time (for our smaller groups with one kaiako), and MAI time (My Area of Interest).

Karyn took us through some reading and information around self-regulated learning after starting with a poem by George Betts "To Our Children". In my search for a copy of this poem I came across a book by George Betts called "Journey of Lifelong Learning".  The subtitle is "Major concepts, discussion and activities for facilitating wisdom in our youth" and after reading this, I thought that some of the activities and questions could be really helpful in helping formulate some discussion for our ākonga during Puna Ako time. She gave us a lot of readings and information to digest and I particularly found Karen's blogposts interesting as they come from a personal perspective and challenge us to think about what we are doing in our schools and why.

At morning tea I found this blogpost by George Couros which I felt really summed up a lot of what Karyn was talking about this morning.

The rest of the day was Apple IT training and I have written a separate blogpost about this.

Day Three

Started with work on unpacking Puna Ako time. We were looking at what this could look like in our hapori and then each hapori presented their ideas back to the group. This was done in a variety of ways, some of which had us highly entertained.

At lunch I had a good chat with one of our new teachers for next year. I will be her mentor and it was good to touch base and see what was on top for her at this stage. Such a different start for a new teacher, being part of a new school and having the opportunity to be a part of planning  and designing new learning ideas, not your usual start to teaching!

In the afternoon we had some more hui with whanau and then after school a number of our staff went to the Christchurch Connected Educator Christmas drinks which was a nice way to unwind for the day.

Day Four

Extra waiata practise was held today for those of us who were struggling a bit to get the moves down. Great to have so many talented people around to help us and many of us took advantage of the extra practise. After that we started unpacking MAI time. MAI time is a time for students to follow their passions and explore something they may want to find out more about. We had discussions around whether this should be a documented time and what it might look like in our hapori. We then had our own MAI time so I spent most of it writing blogs and chatting with kaiako on a range of topics. It is so good to have time to be able to have conversations about all sorts of things. You learn so much from just talking with other educators.

Our afternoon was spent with a young man who is coming to Haeata next year but has been at Te Karaka Area School. It was great to hear his point of view as to what worked and didn't for him as far as the project learning approach and his NCEA credits.  Getting an insight into how they managed NCEA in a different setting was really helpful. Being able to make NCEA and assessment work for us, rather than the other way around is a must.

The evening was spent at a community hui where a number of whanau came to hear what was happening at Haeata and meet the staff over a coffee and a sausage. Such a great feeling having the staff and community in the same place and being able to make more connections.

Day Five

The day started with more waiata practise, we are starting to sound and look OK! Puna Ako time saw us do an overview of the 8 weeks. We put up all the topics we had learnt about and then added our feelings and questions to each of the big picture sections. This gave us a good idea as to the issues still facing us. We were lucky to have a good chunk of time on this during the day and I felt we needed to have this overview as we have learnt so much and it's good to go back to everything and just make some sense of it. Some of our questions were answered, others brought up even more questions but it was nice to have that time to voice those.We shared an idea around how NCEA might work with the Korepo hapori (Yr 7-10) and got some feedback from them as well. We unpacked the timetable even more, getting down to what defined each of the blocks. How is MAI time different from Kaupapa Ako? What would we see across all blocks? This will inform a lot of our thinking over the next 2 weeks.

Day Six

The Aranui community concert AFFIRM was on the Saturday this week. Haeata was there in force, with most of the staff able to be there for some of the day. We had a tent with a lot of information for prospective ākonga and their whānau and I know that I spoke to a large number of people over the morning when I was there. It was a great day with performances by a huge range of local groups and chances to talk with lots of people.

Haeata - Week Seven

Day One

During Mai time we spent time calling families to invite them to met with our staff at either an specified time or at our hui on Dec 1st, or at AFFIRM on Dec 3rd. The chance to meet with whanau and ākonga is fantastic and will help us be informed about our community for next year.

I also read this article titled "What schools can learn from Google, IDEO and Pixar" that one of our staff shared (thanks Fred) and found it to be really inspiring. I really liked this paragraph which made me think: 

"What would it mean for schools to have a culture centered on design thinking and interdisciplinary projects instead of siloed subjects? What if the process of education were as intentionally crafted as the products of education (i.e., we always think about the book report or the final project, but not the path to get there). What if teachers were treated as designers?"

The afternoon was spent preparing for our school visit trips. Our Year 1-7 kaiako went to Wellington and the 7-13 kaiako went to Auckland. This was a great opportunity to see what was happening in other schools around the country.

Day Two

Being picked up at 4.50am to catch a plane is not the easiest start to the day, but our hapori were on the redeye flight to Auckland.

From the airport we went by bus to Hobsonville Point Secondary School where we spent the day. The Principal, Maurie Abraham, went through how the school worked and gave us a lot to think about in terms of curriculum and structure. We then were treated to a tour through the school where we got to see students in action. It was great for those of us who hadn't been in that type of learning space to see how it might work for us.

Off then to our accommodation and a reflection on what we had seen and how it might inform our work at Haeata. Dinner and social time wrapped up the day and we are all asleep fairly early that night (well most of us were).

Day Three

On the bus at 7am to get to Rototuna Junior High, with a stop for breakfast on the way. This was an interesting environment as the Junior High had been open for a year and the Senior High is opening in 2017. Their staff are in the same place as us, having a term to prepare for their students next year, although they get just Year 11 in the first year, where we get all our students at once. 

We had some time in the Junior High, having a briefing by the Principal and then students showed us around the school. We asked lots of questions and got a glimpse of what they were doing with their Year 7-10 programme. Our hapori (Ihutai) then spent some time with the Senior High staff and had a look at their programme for 2017. It was a great window into their thinking and gave us a lot to discuss on the bus later!

One of our staff managed to organise us a visit to the Warriors training facility at Mt Smart Stadium and we spent an hour there learning about their training program, getting insight into their data collection and how it is used to inform the training and then had a tour around the training space. I really liked the words above their screen in the tactics room: 

Off to the airport for dinner and then home for a rest!

Day Four

We were thankful for a late start today after two very tiring days. Our first session had us practising two waiata that we are learning as a group. I really enjoyed learning the actions to ***** , but trying to put the words and actions together was fairly challenging!

We then had a reflection time on our school visit from Wednesday, talking in pairs and small groups about what we saw and how we felt about what the schools were doing. It was interesting to hear different perspectives and to realise that because we come from different backgrounds, we see different things. Those of us who have never worked in an open environment had thoughts around the space more often than those that have worked in those spaces before. 

Our second session was around Relationship Management. As a new school, this is something we need to unpack and get an overall agreement on. We were asked the following questions:

What do you personally believe?

What is important in managing relationships? Managing behaviour?

What do you think about positive reinforcement? About reward systems?

What do you think about consequences? About punishments?

Our answers were then collated and we will be unpacking these more next week. I am sure there were a wide range of answers as some of our initial discussion showed. We were given a Blendspace full of articles and videos to look at, many quite polarising about their viewpoint on the above questions. These are some of the ones I read.

Why relationship-building is vital in schools

10 Ways to make effective rewards systems in virtual schools

Creating culturally safe schools for Maori students

Restorative practices in schools: Far-reaching implications

Our last session was preparing for our Enrolment hui for next week. We have parents and students coming in to meet with kaiako and we talked more about what information we would need to be able to answer their questions.

Day Five

Rebecca (one of our SLT) started today with letting us know about the external agencies that will be involved with Haeata. There are a huge range of people involved, from Youth Workers to nurses, After School care and many more. It is great to see the range of support for our students and our community. This is such a big part of helping our students feel supported and there has been a lot of work going on in the background on getting this all together.

Our hapori spent some time today on a survey around NCEA. We were given a lot of statements and had to give a 2 word reaction to each one. We used the tool Poll Everywhere https://www.polleverywhere.com/ which was a good way to see a snapshot of us as a group. There were many things we agreed on wholeheartedly, but also some things we need to unpack a bit more so we are all on the same page.

During Mai time I wrote my blog on my hearing loss and ILEs . I found some interesting articles that had been written on this subject and it was good to see what others had found and were thinking about. This came to the top of my thinking while we were away this week and certainly is something to think about for next year.

At lunch we had a meeting about Out of School Music hours and Itinerant music tuition. This is a difficult space at the moment as we don't know our students for next year so it is very difficult to say what we will need in the way of support musically but it was good to start looking at what we might want to put in place.

We finished up the day by unpacking more NCEA and were all given the opportunity to speak on points that we wanted to expand on. I liked the way we did this, with each person having two blue (for the statement) and two pink (against the statement) pieces of paper and you could play these to speak for one minute about that statement. It was a good way to make sure everyone got the opportunity to have their say, but not for too long!

One of the main things I am learning is about my view on education. Always being challenged and asked about my point of view has meant that I have had to actually have a point of view on things. I have had to work out how I feel and what are important ideas to me. It has been amazing to have this time to think and be challenged. Loving it.