Professional Learning Teams

Facilitators: Kaye Fletcher, Robyn Barratt and Catherine Kleinitz

So. What did I hope to gain or learn from this PD?
The main skill I was hoping to get out of this PD was to become a more useful contributor to professional discussions, including those with colleagues, in particular those within my PLAT. Although all of the skills I learnt about and practiced would also be useful when discussing problems with colleagues in general as well as with students in my role as a facilitator.
A brief overview of aspects to successful coaching that I found interesting is that:
•    Change is an internal choice and the role of a coach is to guide the colleague or student in question to make change for them and feel empowered by this process.
•    Coaching is not about problem solving but rather by helping colleagues or students to reflect on their own skills and strategies to solve issues.
•    Paraphrasing is a skill refined over time.
•    The role of a coach is different to that of a friend or ‘problem solver’.
Other main points discussed about change included:
•    Culture and the importance of recognising the individuals backgrounds and beliefs through
o    Use of language
o    Accepting diversity
o    Use of protocols
o    Building trust
o    Rapport/body language
o    Use of tone
o    Physical versus verbal signals
•    Paraphrasing being an important step in the coaching process by acknowledging and clarifying problems in a manner that is supportive through
o    Emotional paraphrasing that displays a genuine sympathy to the person
o    Content paraphrasing that highlights your understanding of the underlying issue and seeks clarification
•    The use of protocols when providing feedback to peer observations. The format we discussed and role-played being GAIN SO FAST.

In reflection I found today an informative and useful experience in that it provided a framework to help me build upon the skills I already have in coaching. It also helped me to clarify what the actual role of a coach is.

Some useful documents including power point presenattions and proformas: ACEP Documents

The overall aim of the day was to train Teachers to be Accredited ‘Merit and Equity’ members of selection panels for teacher employment interviews.

The day covered the following aspects of merit and equity training;

• Legislative framework for decision making
  • Public Administration Act 2004
  • Victorian Equal Opportunity Act 1995 (VEO)
• Merit in employment
• Equal employment opportunity

Within these dot points a range of issues were discussed such as;

• Objectives of the VEO 1995
  • equality of opportunity
  • elimination of sexual harassment
  • elimination of discrimination in regards to the following ‘attributes’
    • age
    • impairment
    • sexual orientation
    • marital status
    • many others
  • Direct and indirect discrimination

The day also covered practical aspects of selecting new staff members such as;

• Defining key selection criteria and position descriptions
• Job Requisition
• Forming a selection panel
• Developing a selection strategy
  • conflict of interest
  • short listing strategies
    • fair, consistent, ranking system
    • inclusive of all applicants
  • prior knowledge of applicants
  • information gathering and verification
    • work samples
    • written application
    • referee checks
  • interview strategies
    • questioning
      • related to selection criteria
      • consistency
      • not discriminatory
• Reporting on selection

The Merit Protection Boards roles were also discussed. In particular its role in resolving grievances, such as selection grievances. Issues covered included;

• Grounds for lodging a grievance
• Eligibility to lodge a grievance

Overall I found the day informative. The Group Exercises were the most productive. In groups we were given various tasks that addressed;

1. Recognising perceptions and bias
2. Analysing the interview process
3. Developing questions to ask in an interview that are relevant to selection criteria
4. Examining Teaching Service Orders (TSO’s)

The most useful resource I was given today was the ‘Good Practice Checklist’. This document provides a comprehensive checklist of all aspects of merit based selection including;

• Recruitment procedures
• Selection

1. Selection strategy
2. Shortlisting applicants
3. Information gathering
4. Information verification
5. Assessing applicants and the Selection Panel Report

• Post-selection

Acknowledgment of attendance

In this presentation Maria mainly discussed he review process for the new Physics Study Design. This was only a minor review as it was discussed that with the possibility of a new national science curriculum by 2011 that the study design as it exists may not be relevant after this time. Having said this the new study design is certified until 2012. The main points of this discussion highlighted/considered/included;

• No new concepts
• Teacher workload
• Clarification of dot points in previous study design
  • Splitting some old points into 2
  • Including symbols and equations
  • Making some concepts explicit Specifying what is not included

• The inclusion of Key skills at the start
• Use of a cognitive triangle using 14 verbs across all outcomes (a version of the revised Blooms Taxonomy)
• Change in structure with added flexibility between Unit 1 & 2 Areas of Study

Maria also discussed the lag between VCE enrolments in Physics compared with other VCE Sciences. One point that was made about this was that Physics is only a pre-requisite for 4% of Tertiary Courses as opposed to Chemistry (14%) and Maths Methods (22%).
Other anomalies that also exists between Physics and other VCE Sciences being;

• The drop off between Unit 1 and Unit 2 enrolments.
• Gender inequality with general a 60/40 split between boys and girls.

Session A8 Youtube Physics Chris Jones University High

This session was probably not as useful as I would have hoped as my experience seemed to be at the same level if not above that of Chris’. He did however provide some good resources to look at such as;
• Wake Forest University
• Colorado State University
• Rutgers Physics Teaching Technologies

Other more specific Youtube clips/ keyword searches he suggested to look at included;

• Rubens Tube
  • Standing waves

• Auroras
• Glass breaking waves
• Dr Altmans Channel

Chris also suggested setting up a Youtube Channel which I have done using the Channel name of Coburgmaths.

Session B11 Helicopters in Detailed Study: Aerospace Kelvin Barraclough Gisborne SC

This session acted as an overview of the theory behind the flight of helicopters. It was quite dense but still had some content that I could follow. It was obvious that Kelvin is very interested in flight, being a volunteer at the Aviation Museum in Point Cook.

Session C14 Vernier LabQuest stand alone data logging Mal Johnson and John Cadogan

As we have recently purchased a Vernier LabQuest I thought this may have been a good opportunity to get some PD and meet people who have already been using it.

Mal Johnson from Mazenod College in WA (johnson.mal@mazenod.wa.edu.au) was the educator involved in delivering this session. John Cadogan as far as I could tell was the Scientrific Rep who provided the info on licensing and purchasing etc.

This session covered a few areas of interest. In particular the use of an emulator which is like a virtual LabQuest display that you could use with a digital projector to analyse data with the students and show them more clearly how the LabQuest works. John said I may be able to get a copy of this for free if I send him an email (john@scientrific.com.au)

Another interesting way of using the LabQuest is to collect the data with the students and then load this onto a USB and transfer to the K Drive. Since all students will also have access to the LoggerPro software (even at home) they will then be able to go and analyse the data independantly at home opr collaboratively with others.

The LabQuest can also be used as an interface by plugging it into my Mac and collecting data and analysing it on a digital projector.

The LoggerPro software is updated through the LoggerPro website

Session D4 Video analysis with Vernier Logger Pro Gary Bass

This particular Summer School was hosted by The University of New England in Armidale, NSW (about an hours flight northwest of Sydney in one of those little planes called Dash-8’s). All up their was roughly 200 Mathematics Teachers from all over Australia employed in both the private and public sector and from Primary and Secondary Schools.

The aim of this Summer School was to improve the quality of Mathematics Education throughout Australia by looking at and investigating many different aspects of education, both in general and those more specific to Maths.

The daily routine for the 10 days didn’t vary much. It consisted of Keynote Speakers, Workshops (10-15 teachers plus a facilitator) and Tutorials (4-5 teachers only).

The role of the Keynote Speakers was to provide a background about an aspect of education ( How the brain works, International Standards etc.). After each of these there were timetabled Workshops (they even took the role) where an assigned facilitator would help to start group conversations about the preceding Keynote. The tutorial groups would then meet every 2-3 workshops to further discuss and explore ideas we found interesting.

Because of the broad range of material covered in these 10 days I thought the best way to share my understandings and knowledge of the content discussed would be to use Posts (over a period of time – say 6/7 weeks) for each of the Keynote Presentations. These Posts will include information about the presenters, reading material that has been made available and interesting points form both presentations and workshops.

Here’s a quote from the participant website that probably says it better than me:

“The School provides a balance of ‘big picture’ ideas and practical resources, of cutting-edge mathematics and pedagogic practices, international perspectives and local applications. Presenters have been drawn from universities, educational jurisdictions, schools and industry to provide the broadest possible range of stimulating material.

The 10 days is organised into five modules comprising keynote presentations, question time, workshop sessions, and small group tutorials:

• Frameworks – implications of cognitive neuroscience for pedagogy and the curriculum; assessment; the results of PISA 2006;
• Potential Difference – addressing the challenges of student diversity: gifted and talented; low-achievement; Indigenous students; gender issues; non-English speaking background students;
• Cutting-Edge Mathematics – hearing from mathematicians who live, breathe and apply mathematics in everyday life;
• Next Praxis – “digital-age” kids and the pedagogical and curriculum implications associated with engaging the current generation of learners; and
• World Class – the impact of particular learning strategies, feedback, and qualities of learning communities that achieve exceptional outcomes.”

https://sakai.une.edu.au/portal/site/project_mathematics

If you would like to provide any feedback about how I could improve these Posts it would be greatly appreciated. This might be best done by leaving comments on the blog.

If you wish to discuss the posts with one another this maybe should be done through the Summer School Topic on the Forum.

Disclaimer: Some of the material will come across as quite dry and dull…sorry about this in advance. BUT the one thing I did find throughout the 10 days was that it was all planned to a very high standard and all the pieces seemed to come together nicely. So i guess all I am saying, is give Maths a chance!!!

Cheers,

Mark