My little space in the world

How exciting to think that others can see the benefits of using Blogs like this. I want to share with you two schools that have started similar such blogs after seeing what we are doing. Jono Young at St Joseph’s, Timaru has his Year 7 & 8s with the blog http://taniwha.edublogs.org/. Sally Morch from Greytown School has also started one with her Year 4 & 5 students – http://www.room7readinglogblog.blogspot.com. They are sharing their books in text and pictures and will be adding their podcasts in a couple of weeks time. Keep watching the developments with these too!

Evelyn Mann’s keynote to open the conference was interesting.  She discussed the ‘literacy’ of drama and how drama reinforces many literacy skills.  The fact that you can ‘think, feel and represent messages through drama’ enables it to be a literacy.  This is interesting – as an e-fellows group, the discussions on ‘what is literacy?’ have been evident at all our sessions together.  We have discussed this exact concept – the literacies that are prevalent in so many contexts. 

She also discussed how drama is a motivational and inspirational approach to literacy.  This is exactly how I feel about my Reading Logs as Reading Logs project.  The online concept, the interaction with ICTs, the online conversations about reading have all been motivational and inspirational for the group, particularly the ‘Buddies’ (reluctant/at risk readers). 

Robyne Selbie also made an interesting comment in her welcome speech.  She commented on how the technology of today is actually creating more opportunities for writing and reading than previously.  How true.  When last did parents, brothers, sisters, classmates, teachers, strangers . . . give a reader public feedback that promoted further thought, discussion and ‘conversation’, as it does on our blog?

My presentation isn’t until Tuesday afternoon (feels a bit like the ‘graveyard’ shift!), however I am looking forward to my workshops and the authors dinner tomorrow night (I am having dinner with Kate De Goldi – and about another 30 teachers!).

On Thursday I presented two workshops at the South Island DP/AP Conference in Timaru.  It was a privelege to be a part of only a small number of workshop presenters, however it was also a privelege to hear John Hattie speak in regards to effective teaching.

He was speaking in regards to the aspects of teaching that ‘make a difference’.  These are the aspects that he has identified from years of meta-analysis of research.  I was particularly taken my the number of boxes that my ‘Bloggers group’ and my e-fellows project were able to tick in regards to Effective teaching practice that makes a difference.  The data in our school recognises that along with class teaching of reading, the bloggers programme has been able to enhance the ability of our readers.  Aspects such as peer tutoring, collaboration and ownership are all present, and according to his data create more effective teaching.

It was then a real privelege to have him appear at my workshop (and stay for the duration!).  While my presentations were on a range of ICTs that enhance teaching and learning in the Senior School, part of it obviously included my e-fellows project.  I was able to acknowledge some of the things John had talked about earlier in the morning, in my presentation!

The mentors have added a new dimension by trying to make contact with some authors – and now we have hit the jackpot!! Aidan’s post on Kate De Goldi’s ‘The 10pm Question’ has had the most inspiring post by the author herself. Click on the link and read for yourself!  I can’t wait to see Aidan’s reaction tomorrow at school!

The mentors have taken the idea of contacting authors and run with it. As a result they are taking more care to add detail and thought to their posts. In the last week Aidan has made contact with Kate de Goldi’s agent, Lucy has e-mailed Tania Roxborogh, Tyler has e-mailed Joanne Harris and others are waiting in the wings to make contact with Vince Ford. It would be great for them to make a post on the kid’s reviews and to get author’s perspectives of their writing. We wait in anticipation . . .

As well as hooking reluctant readers into reading through the blog, I had hoped to create ‘reading conversations’ about books through the blog. This is more than evident in the blog with 282 comments! These are mostly from other students in our school and relate directly to either the other persons experience in reading the book, or in their interest in wanting to read the book. I think that any conversations about books within our school are positive and 282 comments that wouldn’t have occurred without the blog must surely be a measure of success!!

My big problem is that I had started with 22 students – 10 buddies, 10 mentors, and 2 ‘back up’ mentors. Unfortunately our ICT suite only has 16 computers. This was more than enough initially when buddies and mentors were paired up. NOW THOUGH . . . most of the buddies are more than competent in making these posts independently (and do) – which means that I don’t have enough computers all of a sudden!! We are managing this with the Bloggers laptop (thanks to the Unisy’s Grant last year) and the fact that some students can be using the Easispeaks to record their snippets while others are on the computer.

After 3 days away from school (2 at CORE in Christchurch with the other e-fellows) it is nice to be back in the company of my wonderful bloggers! The excitement for today is that Aidan has had a reply from Kate De Goldi’s agent in regards to his post about her book ‘The 10pm Question’. He has sent her the link to his post and so we now wait in anticipation to see if she makes a comment on his post. Lucy has also really enjoyed Tania Roxborogh’s book ‘Limelight’ and so she would like to try and make contact with her in regards to the post she is currently putting together. Others are now talking of other New Zealand authors such as Vince Ford that they could read the books of and try and contact!

This is giving even further interest and adding another ’spark’ to our programme.

Yes – I have been a slacker (well in the digital world anyway!). I am in Chch tonight excited again about a couple of days being spent with my fellow ‘e-fellows’! I have however just realised that it has been far too long since I have made a post on the blog. I have found that due to the nature of mentioning student names a lot (I guess I could be just saying Student A) I have been writing a lot in the ‘old technology’ – pen and paper (my ‘other’ reflective journal)

The blog continues to grow – in size and popularity within the school. I have brought in a few more students who are VERY excited about being included. There are still a great deal more who would like to be included in the programme. Ideally I would like this to continue next year – but open it up so that students make their posts in reading time from within their own class. Instead of a relatively small group (22) coming to me – I could make myself available to support ‘inclass’ in the classrooms, eliminating the stress and maybe expectations on themselves for teachers. I’d like to think that with time the teachers would develop the necessary skills (and confidence) to run it quite independently in their own class.

I spent some of last week interviewing the bloggers about the programme. I took them back to their reading survey that they carried out back in April (based on NEMP Reading Attitude). It was interesting to see the shift. Not one child went ‘back’ in their attitude. This in itself is interesting as at an Intermediate it can be very easy for the ’strugglers’ and reluctant students to get harder on themselves and ‘more down’ about how they are achieving (or not). In most cases there were improvements in regards to how they felt about reading and how they perceived their reading ability. My big ‘aha’ that I will share at our workshop tomorrow will be series of video clips from interviews where a majority of the students have told me very simply that they now ‘enjoy reading’ – how beneficial must that be to their self-esteem, their ability to function in class, and their perception of what they can actually do – or try to do. I will get my summaries up here in the next day or two, along with any ‘aha’ moments from my two days with my ‘like minded fellows’ (and our mentors of course!!)

Click here to view a little multimedia summary of our project so far:
For blog

Well where do I start?

• 7 of the 10 ‘Buddies’ have had running records taken that show 5 of them have made significant progress in the term on the programme. One of them has shown 2 years improvement since February and another 1.5yrs since February. This is significant.

  When I chatted with them about why they thought that they had made such a jump they both told me that they felt better about reading since Bloggers, and that they know that they can read. One of them also told me that he liked it that others were interested in what he was reading.

• The Mentors have asked for more sessions – as they feel that while they enjoy working with the Buddies, they would like to have more time for themselves to post to the blog!
• One of my mentors is moving to Oman in a week. She has asked if she can still contribute to the blog from there!! – Of course she can!!!
• And then today – one of the mentors is in Samoa with his family on a holiday (wedding I think!). We has made this fabulous post about visiting the home of Robert L Stevenson, and sharing some of the information about his life in Samoa – I never knew Robert L Stevenson spent the last five years of his life in Samoa!!! How neat is that? Josef’s Post
  
   

I didn’t realise how long it has been since I made a post on my blog!! I have been keeping a thorough journal of what has been going on – but unfortunately this has been of a very old fashioned nature – pen and paper!!! I have so much to share with you that I will make each of my ‘points’ in a separate post so as to give it the emphasis it deserves!