Digital Fluency Session #4 My reflection

Digital Fluency Intensive Session #3 Reflection

My Pepeha

Digital Fluency Intensive Session #2

Our group's video of the hangout we were involved in. 

Hangouts #1.mov

2019 Digital Fluency Intensive PLD session 1

Teaching as Inquiry 2018 - Last presentation to staff

• My Inquiry questions:

With target group from Rm 7

‘Will teaching students strategies to craft their sentences in their writing, improve the quality
of their writing and their achievement level?’

With target group from Rm 10

‘Will reading and writing links provide students the awareness of how to craft sentences
to improve their own writing as authors do?’

Changes I’ve made to my practice:

• Linking reading and writing
• I now make sure students are aware of the audience for who they are writing and the purpose for their writing.
• I discourage students from writing every detail, rather encourage students to hone in on a few ideas for elaboration.
• I ask students to point out which language features they used in their writing e.g. using noun phrases, adjectives, adverbs, compound and complex sentences, complex Interruptors, zig-zag sentences etc
• This makes the students more aware of how they craft their sentences
• I have encouraged students to give peer feedback to each other and respond to peer and teacher feedback / feedforward
• Invited a first time author to come in and explain the process he used to write, edit, proof read and publish his story
• Got the target group to review the first time author’s book and provide feedback and ideas for his next book (The author finished his second book and has requested the group to review it)

• Impact of changes either positive or negative and your thoughts on reasons

Assessment data

- Teacher OTJ at the Beginning and End of the year (Rm 7)

Student	Year Level	Beginning of 2018	End of 2018	Impact of changes
Student 1 An	7	4B	4A	Moved up 2 sub levels
Student 2 Da	8	4B	5B	Moved up 3 sub levels
Student 3 De	8	4B	5B	Moved up 3 sub levels
Student 4 Lo	8	3A	4A	Moved up 3 sub levels
Student 5 Ma	7	3A	4P	Moved up 2 sub levels
Student 6 Te	8	4B	5B	Moved up 3 sub levels
Student 7 Tr	8	3P	4A	Moved up 4 sub levels

- Teacher OTJ Mid year and End of the year (Rm 10)

Student	Year Level	Mid year 2018	End of 2018	Impact of changes
Student 1 Ana	6	3A	4B	Moved up 1 sub level
Student 2 Can	7	3B	3A	Moved up 2 sub levels
Student 3 Fran	7	3B	3A	Moved up 2 sub levels
Student 4 Jus	6	2P	3P	Moved up 3 sub levels
Student 5 Nga	6	3B	3A	Moved up 2 sub levels
Student 6 Ty	7	-	3A	Improved

The TAI is still on with the target group in Room 10. The writing of these students has improved
and they do have an idea as to how to craft sentences. The number of sessions this group has
had with me is far less compared with the target group I taught in Room 7

- Student Voice

- Anita

- Davarni

- Dekorah

- Loto

- Maya

- Telesia

• Ideas for inquiry next year:

Work with groups of students from years ⅚ and years ⅞

Continue to inquire into

• Whether linking reading and writing will improve achievement in both reading and writing
• Responding to peer and teacher feedback / feedforward - will this improve the quality of writing and achievement levels?

I enjoyed inquiring into my practice in teaching writing. I am eager to continue working with students and accelerating their progress. 

This term the students in the group are writing recounts and explanations to revise the genre structure and language features, how to craft sentences for effect, grouping ideas in paragraphs, linking paragraphs appropriately using AAAWWUBBIS, writing compound sentences using FANBOYS, using zig zag sentences and complex interruptors in their writing. This is to jog their memories after the holidays and also as a preparation for e-asttle writing assessment.

3 students are writing a recount of an event they participated in and are proud of themselves.
3 students are writing an explanation about why we need to be sun smart.

Can't wait to see if these students will write interesting recounts and explanations using the knowledge of how to craft their writing.

Crafting sentences

In one of our sessions we went over how the students could write any genre in the best possible way by crafting sentences using adjectives, adverbs, complex interrupters, zig zag sentences, simple, compound and complex sentences, linking ideas within paragraphs and linking paragraphs. We discussed how we could use AAAWWUBBIS (After, Although, As, When, While, Until, Before, Because, If, Since) to connect ideas within paragraphs and between paragraphs. We also discussed how we could convert simple sentences to compound sentences using FANBOYS (For, And, Nor, But, Or, Yet, So).

In the  piece of writing the students were working on, they were meant to make sure they crafted their sentences as they wrote. They also had to show me that they used all the different things they learned for crafting their sentences well. Their pieces of writing are being crafted well with the deliberate teaching of how to craft sentences in their writing no matter what genre they were writing.

I was so pleased that the students are writing and beginning to craft their sentences very well.

It will be interesting to see if the students use all that they learning over the term in their writing test.