Is Modern Learning a Fail? - Reclaiming Student Agency at St Joseph's

Is Modern Learning a Fail? 
- Reclaiming student agency at St Joseph's

In the years 2012-2015 at St Joseph's we formed a very clear idea of the skills and competencies we wanted our year 8 leavers to have.  The following two videos give some good examples of what this looked like:

Joel and Rhea explain Innovative Learning (2015)

Our students were raised on a consistent journey from year 4 to 8 where the senior teaching team had stable and well established practices of:

• key competency development, 
• individualised learning,
• collaborative learning, and 
• learning to learn strategies.  

The year 8 classes of 2015 and 2016 exemplify the success of this long term development.

The practice itself led naturally into the MLE-type changes in teaching and learning in 2015 which people have called "the hubs."  Unlike many schools which have MLE-designed buildings but have not developed the pedagogy, we had the pedagogy but not the buildings.  We chose to work around the buildings and do the best we could with them.

Children had a big say in designing how they would use their learning spaces.  The 2014 year 7 class designed them in Minecraft.  They set up their own Minecraft server and shared world which was our learning world for maths - measurement, direction and scale.  Here they talk about the design of the intermediate area for 2015:

What Happened?

Collaborative teaching and learning and flexible environments had been happening for several years already in our school but at the start of 2015 we had a tipping point with more staff ready for them than not and the decision was made to do it schoolwide.  Unfortunately it corresponded with a time when key staff moved on for promotions.  By mid 2016 the whole of the senior leadership team which had enabled this practice, including the principal, had changed, all securing promotions or sought after positions.

The outcome for teaching and learning by the end of 2016 was generally agreed to be a "fail."  The fail had nothing to do with learning environments or how the learning was structured.  All of our evidence over the period shows when key competency, collaborative learning strategies, and student understanding of learning rubrics, learning progressions and SOLO are in place, the students exemplify well managed, self-sustaining life-long learners who thrive in flexible environments.

I returned as principal at the end of 2016 and the community, teachers and many students were very vocal in letting me know the system had failed.  Just looking at it, I agreed.

I was able to establish through staff surveys, interviews and observations that what was really lost was:

• key competency development, 
• individualised learning,
• collaborative learning, and 
• learning to learn strategies.  

Without which there is no point attempting innovative learning.

So called "hubs" which we actually called Engaging Learning Spaces, evolved to meet the advanced needs of our learners and the pedagogy of some of our teachers.  Maybe the mistake we made was that it didn't suit the pedagogy of all of our teachers.   There was certainly sufficient in-built scope within the system as it was initially set up, to meet the needs of all of our learners.

Our 2015 and 2016 year 8 classes who had been well coached in these systems were a huge success for 21st century learning capacities.  This video shows how the children reflect on their readiness and how we structured the environment to support growth in self-management without forcing it past its limits:

In 2013-14 we worked closely with St Kevin's College in the Learning and Change network.  It has been inspiring to reopen these conversations with St Kevin's in 2017 and see how much they have taken from our learning practices at St Josephs.  They tell us these practices are highly successful for them and that they came directly from our collaboration in 2013-14.  Once again, these are to do with tracking the key competencies, knowing each learner individually, focusing on skills and processes and integrating curriculum.  All the things we are focusing on in 2017 for our rebuild.

Trish and Mannix present about our learning to teachers at St Kevin's College (2015)

If anyone doubts the necessity for collaborative learning and teamwork in the 21st century - have a look at my blogpost analysis of the requirements of the world's top employers: Its what we do together that sets us apart

These videos (with thanks to Jenny Jackson for taking and storing the videos) show this type of learning works for children who have been well-schooled in 21st century skills.

However, if these skills are weak, this type of learning system is not at all appropriate.

I am sharing this not because I have any intention of bringing back the "hubs" as people saw them.  We are talking with the diocese at the moment about a complete physical remodelling of St Joseph's and we will not be attempting to use our existing buildings as MLEs in the forseeable future.  We will not be attempting to do anything "out there" with our practice either.  But we will be bringing back the key things we have lost. We will always use our environment as an innovative learning environment though, as innovative learning is what we do once we get our key skills back together again.

At the moment we have children sitting in desks, in rows in many cases, well controlled by the teacher, and device-use limited.  This is a big step back towards 20th century learning and one we hope is temporary.  The needs of the moment dictate this response.  We need to start again.

I know that we can get back to the place where we can have children engaging thoughtfully in the environment beyond the school, where they can engage in meaningful self-directed projects and where holistic, cross-curriculum learning reflects our Catholic worldview on social justice.  As our charter summary shows:

2017 - Consolidate Embed St Joseph’s curriculum and pedagogy Knowing our whakapapa: being a Dominican school High achievement, future-focused, making a difference, being Catholic

2018 – Platform for growth Using technology,, design processes, critical thinking and creativity in transformative ways,  to engage with a relevant, active, purposeful curriculum

2019 - growing Making a difference to our community and world through solving problems that matter

It is staggering to find how quickly good things can be lost and how hard we have to work to bring them back and rebuild a team which can do this together.  Luckily and, I believe thanks to extensive prayer, we have an amazing new team and we just need to continue to focus our energies on the task ahead:

Rubrics for pedagogy

These rubrics for pedagogy were developed in mid 2015 by combining the summary of findings from the OECD research into Innovative Learning with the Microsoft rubrics for 21st century learning.  This term we are working with Core Education on spirals of inquiry and we are using this rubric as a guide for what we want to achieve (double click on the image for a clearer view).

Students map and plan the new learning environment at St Joseph's Oamaru

Our year 7s mapped out our learning environment as it stands now.  They looked at all the things they need to do when they're learning and decided how we could use our space to meet these needs.  These maps are on paper and annotated with Thinglink.

Tannah's version of our learning environment

Tim and Saluni's version of our learning environment :

Makeisha and Alyssa's version Maria's version Aarran's version

Our Learning Environment Modeled in Minecraft

Our year 7s mapped out our learning environment as it stands now.  They looked at all the things they need to do when they're learning and decided how we could use our space to meet these needs.  The environment is modeled using Minecraft.

Zach, Maddison, Nina, Ardan, Tess, Siva:

Ben, Jordan, Abigail, Joel, Tyler:

Laura, Daniel Mannix, Charlie:

A machine for learning part 2

The next step in our "Machine or Learning" inquiry (see Machine for Learning, previous post) was to map what we already have.  In term 3 children mapped our intermediate department and although it was very good, it didn't look quite right because it wasn't to scale.  This term the children measured our spaces accurately and decided on a scale so that they could model the space.  Fifteen children chose to work in three groups sharing Minecraft worlds to model the building.  The remaining children looked at other 3D modelling tools and in the end they have drawn a 2D paper plan.

The next step will be to make recommendations for how our space can be improved for the type of learning the children have already identified.

A machine for learning

A MACHINE FOR LEARNING

(thanks to Mark Osbourne for sharing the term: Machine for Learning, and the link he made to le Coubousier, which we’ve used in our inquiry - environments for learning)         

St Joseph’s Year 7 students consider what their learning is actually like and what ideal spaces for this could be like - this is a brainstorm from the whole class in a shared Google doc (it is not crafted writing).     

WHAT DO WE DO WHEN WE’RE LEARNING?	WHAT WOULD A PHYSICAL SPACE FOR THIS LOOK LIKE?
concentrate and communicate with others listen and discuss your ideas with the people being on task and giving 100% and not giving up sitting down somewhere and listening to each others ideas we learn from our mistakes we debate and share our ideas we take notes and learn from what others have learnt as well put your heads together and discuss ideas with each other. we think that its import to participate  and contribute ideas even if its wrong we share our ideas, discuss our options and our needs and also relate to others, listen, focus, look, think, come up with new ideas,    we like to talk and  listen to each other….and be good friends think, discuss, sing, we argue, we work with others, we get things wrong, we get to try new things. get confused but work it out understand others. we talk to others and ask for advice for good ideas to make our work even better we help with problems and answer things we talk together and help each other to get the job done we get to choose our working space. we discuss our ideas. share our ideas. we get  to  debate we work quietly we learn from our mistakes we concentrate We use MINECRAFT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! to try to answer a problem. we do drama and we do acting AND WE WRITE SONGS AND WE AND WE ENJOY USING OUR DEVICES FOR LEARNING. WE RECOMMEND THAT WE SHOULD BE ABLE TO USE MINECRAFT MORE (NO ONE USE IDEA)   talking sometimes helps if it is on task! say what we want to we help people that need help at the moment when they are  stuck enjoy and get new knowledge do acting, have debates, songs, learn new things and new instruments or activities make sure that everyone is joining in the convo and that people are included in it. Also to encourage others to give 100% and to not give up. Learn to accept a mistake, Good attitude listen, discuss, read, write, search, explore, trial and error, make new options, design new things, brainstorm, invent, create, concentrate, play games, field trips, writing brainstorming we can read, write, do pe ,E.O.T.C, camps, maths,search, new things, discuss between  us, brainstorm, make mistakes and try again and again, listen, stay on task, do field trips watching other people   learning new ideas and facts. writing songs crafting silence and concentration, watching and learning from mistakes learning from elders... singing-writing songs debates performances , plays , silent working or dramas different types of formal writing arts and stuff, crafting your imagination stories and making it better. try over again, learn from others, songs and  performances, being silent               we think create, communicate, share, learn We can make everyone happy to learn	sitting facing each other at the same level (communicating) peaceful and secure, fancy, computers, taking turns talking have our own little bubble to work in we work together as a team and sensibly share our ideas man’s cave and a girl hangout room for year 7s and 8s change resource room into music room for intermediate department gym for senior school whole school computer room to work in quietly having your own office or bubble to stay in but still communicate with each other or talking . having a quiet space for yourself or others’ private spaces have a musical room where people can sing and learn instruments. a game room-a man cave for boys and a girl’s room. dancing room where their dancing can express their feelings. sports room where people can have fun and play with other people      we could have a couple of cubicles we could use so that we could have our own space and we could work quietly. we could split a room into a couple of spaces that are soundproof and will not bother anyone else! we work as a  team        you get more action and ideas and information.You have more fun talking to your your friends. in a place where you can concentrate. TEACHER’S NOTE: Its interesting - you write a lot about collaborative learning how we can learn from each other and through discussion.  At the same time you say that its important to have your own space where you can be quiet.  You show this because when we have a lot of space upstairs, you spread out and fill it all and you still stay on task and do all the things you wrote in column 1. When you make your recommendations for what we can do with our spaces, please think about how we can use what we have to make all these things happen.  LFR
What different learning styles are there? watching other people   learning new ideas and facts. writing songs crafting silence and concentration, watching and learning from mistakes learning from elders... singing-writing songs debates performances , plays , silent working or dramas different types of formal writing arts and stuff, crafting your imagination stories and making it better. try over again, learn from others, songs and  performances, being silent               we think create,communicate,share,learn We can make everyone happy to learn We stay on task and brainstorm as many ideas we can think of. We also participate and contribute many ideas. We do the learning properly we listen so we know what to do. When we don't understand we ask the teacher for help

First and Second Order Change

We seem to be undergoing a lot of change at St Joseph's in Oamaru.

Actually, we are not changing at all.

Underlying everything at St Joseph's is relationships.  Prior to the time I was in the school, Jenny Jackson and the team, helped by our RTLB teacher Linda Schofield, underwent focused development on positive relationships for learning.  This was before PB4L but essentially, it was the same thing.  Since my time, we've consistently focused on our vision for learning - lifelong learners in the Catholic Faith and also on our Charter Goal which reads:
in 2012: Every child engaged in learning
in 2013: Every child engaged in learning for success
in 2014: Every child engaged in deep learning for success.

As each year went on we focused more and more deeply on what we actually wanted for our learners.

There's no way anyone decided - "Hey let's do digital learning or team teaching or buy some bean bags (only 4 per class) or whatever, just because everyone's doing it and its so, so modern!"

What we DID look for was examples either through research and theory, or through experience in other schools - good examples of ways teachers were engaging students in deep learning.  Plus we used our teaching as inquiry process - our own processes of teacher action research to investigate what actually did make a difference to student achievement in our school.  For myself I have found that systematic teaching of the key competencies of the New Zealand curriculum, combined with learning to learn strategies, makes a huge difference to student achievement and that has been going on for quite some time now, since at least 2008 - so nothing new there.  Combining these with digital technologies and flexible working and teaching spaces - has not, in my investigations, improved achievement which is already high but it has improved depth of achievement.  Children are more able to take the next step into making the learning their own and applying it in new situations.  To my mind, this is the most elusive aspect of teaching and learning.

In about mid 2013 we had sufficient information to make some decisions.  We decided we wanted our senior years, at that time we thought year 5+, now after listening to parents we think year 6+, to have the benefit of one to one devices - or as close to it as we can make it, from the beginning of 2015.

To the degree that individuals and/or stakeholder groups in the school or school system hold conflicting values, seek different norms, have different knowledge, or operate with varying mental models of schooling, a proposed change might represent a first-order change for some and a second-order change for others.

Waters, Marzano, and McNulty, 2003, page 7 from: http://instep.net.nz/Change-for-improvement/Sustainable-change/Four-views-of-change/First-order-vs-second-order

“First-order” change is change that is consistent with prevailing values and norms, meets with general agreement, and can be implemented using people’s existing knowledge and skills. A change becomes “second-order” when it is not obvious how it will make things better, it requires people to learn new approaches, or it conflicts with prevailing values and norms. Second-order changes require leaders to work far more deeply with staff and the community. 

The change we are presently experiencing - from the teacher's and the student's perspectives, is first order change - it does not challenge our beliefs about learning (look at the previous post below  - A Machine for Learning to see what the children think about learning).  An analogy for what is happening is it is like a snake shedding its skin.  The creature is the same in essence but it has grown and it needs to shed its skin in order to take on its new dimensions.

We have worked very hard to bring our parents along with us in this change process.  We have had parent learning huis where we have talked about SOLO and deep learning and why we need to make the practical and organisational changes we are presently going through.  We have also had a lot of discussions along the way and we have listened to our parents.  For example we first thought year 5+ for digital learning but listening to our parent feedback and concerns we have decided in 2015 we will be looking at year 6+.    But I acknowledge for many, outside of the staffroom, this is second order change.  It appears to be a change in values and beliefs.  A change in essence.  It is not.  Our essence is - every student engaged in deep learning for success.  How they get there is a moot point - it will be different from 1957, 1997, 2007, and it will be different again in 2017 and 2027.  Yet I imagine the essence of what we are trying to achieve will not vary so very much.

Minecraft St Joseph's Oamaru

The second part of the children investigating learning environments was for them to accurately map what we already had.  They had a go at doing that in term 3 but it didn't look right.  This time, as part of our maths, they children have accurately measured the school and used a scale for their maps.  Some have done it on paper, some investigated 3D modelling software but most chose to do it with Minecraft and the results are surprisingly accurate.

The next step will be to talk about improvements for learning.

Visit to Myross Bush School

Our senior learning team visited Myross Bush School in Invercargill in week 2.  We were interested in their school because they have a "traditional" school building but they have not let single-cell classrooms hold them back.  We were very grateful to them for the visit and we saw lots of interesting things.  Overall we have some very similar things happening, such as using SOLO, BYOD, and Google Docs.  We were really interested to observe how they use spaces for team teaching with one space used primarily for workshops and the other as an independent working space with a supporting teacher.  The key to making all of this work is having transparent learning progressions for students to use and a variety of robust (and dependable) means of students to evidence their learning.

One thing I'm going to change is I thought we would need to use a Google site for planning and lesson guidance as I've been doing with my class.  However, I can now see that all of that could happen as Google docs - good because can personalise them and share them with students very easily through Teacher Dashboard.  Then Google docs can be inserted into a site which will be publically available.  It means that most of the planning work can be in docs rather than a site which everyone says they prefer.  The blogs will link in to an overall Google site so they can still be a prominent point of sharing.

Myross Bush School - similar learning environment to our school (very nice sandpits and adventure playgrounds) and using their spaces creatively to engage students in active learning, through team teaching.

A Machine for Learning

A MACHINE FOR LEARNING

(thanks to Mark Osbourne for sharing the term: Machine for Learning, and the link he made to le Coubousier, which we’ve used in our inquiry)         

St Joseph’s Year 7 students consider what their learning is actually like and what ideal spaces for this could be like - this is a brainstorm from the whole class in a shared Google doc (it is not crafted writing)      

WHAT DO WE DO WHEN WE’RE LEARNING?	WHAT WOULD A PHYSICAL SPACE FOR THIS LOOK LIKE?
concentrate and communicate with others listen and discuss your ideas with the people being on task and giving 100% and not giving up sitting down somewhere and listening to each others ideas we learn from our mistakes we debate and share our ideas we take notes and learn from what others have learnt as well put your heads together and discuss ideas with each other. we think that its import to participate  and contribute ideas even if its wrong we share our ideas, discuss our options and our needs and also relate to others, listen, focus, look, think, come up with new ideas,    we like to talk and  listen to each other….and be good friends think, discuss, sing, we argue, we work with others, we get things wrong, we get to try new things. get confused but work it out understand others. we talk to others and ask for advice for good ideas to make our work even better we help with problems and answer things we talk together and help each other to get the job done we get to choose our working space. we discuss our ideas. share our ideas. we get  to  debate we work quietly we learn from our mistakes we concentrate We use MINECRAFT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! to try to answer a problem. we do drama and we do acting AND WE WRITE SONGS AND WE AND WE ENJOY USING OUR DEVICES FOR LEARNING. WE RECOMMEND THAT WE SHOULD BE ABLE TO USE MINECRAFT MORE (NO ONE USE IDEA)   talking sometimes helps if it is on task! say what we want to we help people that need help at the moment when they are  stuck enjoy and get new knowledge do acting, have debates, songs, learn new things and new instruments or activities make sure that everyone is joining in the convo and that people are included in it. Also to encourage others to give 100% and to not give up. Learn to accept a mistake, Good attitude listen, discuss, read, write, search, explore, trial and error, make new options, design new things, brainstorm, invent, create, concentrate, play games, field trips, writing brainstorming we can read, write, do pe ,E.O.T.C, camps, maths,search, new things, discuss between  us, brainstorm, make mistakes and try again and again, listen, stay on task, do field trips watching other people   learning new ideas and facts. writing songs crafting silence and concentration, watching and learning from mistakes learning from elders... singing-writing songs debates performances , plays , silent working or dramas different types of formal writing arts and stuff, crafting your imagination stories and making it better. try over again, learn from others, songs and  performances, being silent               we think create, communicate, share, learn We can make everyone happy to learn	sitting facing each other at the same level (communicating) peaceful and secure, fancy, computers, taking turns talking have our own little bubble to work in we work together as a team and sensibly share our ideas man’s cave and a girl hangout room for year 7s and 8s change resource room into music room for intermediate department gym for senior school whole school computer room to work in quietly having your own office or bubble to stay in but still communicate with each other or talking . having a quiet space for yourself or others’ private spaces have a musical room where people can sing and learn instruments. a game room-a man cave for boys and a girl’s room. dancing room where their dancing can express their feelings. sports room where people can have fun and play with other people      we could have a couple of cubicles we could use so that we could have our own space and we could work quietly. we could split a room into a couple of spaces that are soundproof and will not bother anyone else! we work as a  team        you get more action and ideas and information.You have more fun talking to your your friends. in a place where you can concentrate. TEACHER’S NOTE: Its interesting - you write a lot about collaborative learning how we can learn from each other and through discussion.  At the same time you say that its important to have your own space where you can be quiet.  You show this because when we have a lot of space upstairs, you spread out and fill it all and you still stay on task and do all the things you wrote in column 1. When you make your recommendations for what we can do with our spaces, please think about how we can use what we have to make all these things happen.  LFR
What different learning styles are there? watching other people   learning new ideas and facts. writing songs crafting silence and concentration, watching and learning from mistakes learning from elders... singing-writing songs debates performances , plays , silent working or dramas different types of formal writing arts and stuff, crafting your imagination stories and making it better. try over again, learn from others, songs and  performances, being silent               we think create,communicate,share,learn We can make everyone happy to learn We stay on task and brainstorm as many ideas we can think of. We also participate and contribute many ideas. We do the learning properly we listen so we know what to do. When we don't understand we ask the teacher for help