Impact Burst!

What happened for the learners?

Over these last two terms, the students have overtime become more active in participating in the guided reading sessions. They now actively takes part in their learning through asking questions and sharing their ideas with each other. They make inquiries into what we are learning about. They have become more focused and engaged with the discussions. 

They are continuing to develop and use Reading strategies that are modelled for them during the sessions to develop deeper understanding of the text so that they can begin to extend their thinking beyond the text.

What evidence do I have for this?

This is evident in my recordings of the Guided Reading sessions, my students' results and also in the students' self reflection.
Below is a recording of my students' self reflection:
The students were asked the following reflective questions:

1. Do you think Reciprocal Reading has helped you to become a better reader?
2. How has it helped you?
3. What have you started doing more of during group reading time?
4. Do you think you can use the skills that you have been practising during guided reading across the other learning areas?
5. How do you think you can use the skills across other learning areas?

Below are the results collected from Running Records/PM Benchmark for the targeted students:

Target students	May results	November results
Child A	Level 12	Level 15
Child B	9 yr R.A	10 yr R.A
Child C	10 yr R.A	10.5 yr R.A
Child D	Level 27	Level 29
Child E	Level 26	Level 26

Key:

Moved up

Stayed the same

  What did I do to make this happen?

• Deliberate acts of teaching of questioning skills using Reciprocal Reading cards as a guide.
• Facilitating the discussions so that it is focused and relevant to students' understanding and knowledge so that they can begin making the connections. 
• Explicit teacher modelling of how to make predictions, ask critical thinking questions, summarising and clarifying ideas and words within the group setting. 

Wonderings about what next:

• Even though students are now more verbal in sharing their ideas and engaged with group discussions, students need to move on from just answering the questions that they have been asked and have deeper and more meaningful discussions that extends their learning and helps them to develop a global view.
• The development of meaningful learning talk is very important and building the confidence and the skills so that students can draw out ideas of their own and respond appropriately and thoughtfully to others.

Monday 13th of November 2017

Reflection:
Recording of today's session. Students have days when they are more vocal than other days, I used more prompting and questioning today to draw out the ideas from the students.



Students' self-reflection of Reciprocal Reading:

Intervention...Continues...

Week 9 Intervention!

Reflection:
I needed to work out a better way of documenting the evidence and progress that the students are making, so this week, I have decided to trial organising all the video onto one Google Slide.
This looks tidier and I can watch the progression in order instead of going from one blog post to another.

Week 8 of intervention!

Target group

Reflection:
Second week back in Term 4, students were a bit unsure of what to say...More prompting from me this week, however, the students were engaged in the text and slowly started participating more. Emphasis on "All ideas are good ideas!"

Mindset for achievement!

Been hearing a lot about growth mindset recently and author Carol Dweck, so I decided to find out more... Read an interesting article on fixed and growth mindsets.
This article talked about how students' attitudes can greatly influence their achievements in learning.
Then it led onto talking about how to go about changing mindsets for success.
Our teaching practice in the classroom affects our students greatly.
One of the emphasis to change mindsets talked about the impact of praise and feedback.
It also talked about the impact of teacher mindset, which I find very interesting. In the 2012 study, they found that educators who had fixed mindsets used 'comfort-oriented' feedback for the students (feedback that didn't encourage the students to challenge themselves) this correlated with low motivation and of the students having low expectation of themselves, thus not achieving well academically.

Reflection:

• How can I change my own fixed mindset?
• How can I change my students' fixed mindset?

Week 6

Friday 29th of September

Reflection:
Students led this session on their own with very little teacher input. The students displayed confidence and active listening which enabled them to participate in the discussions that occurred during the session.