Ottawa 2 day cc institute

Some thoughts

-2 days makes all the difference in the world when what we are talking about is a major shift in practice at the secondary level

-at this point I am thinking that we not accept one day sessions however will hold judgement until I do the 2 more to follow

-what is definitely the case is ensuring that those attending want to be there -this was the case in Ottawa and it is so evident  -solid engagement throughout the
32 days


-innovations
-we had small groups evolve their grouped questions into one that they articulated
-these ended up being a bit run on  -so I think the idea of shifting the work to the participants here is a good intention -I am not sure about the result  -maybe indicate to them that they can split questions so that they are focusing on one thing
-unfortunately we did not come back to these questions (maybe because they were so complex -run on)

 KARS video dissection as per stages of inquiry
-I think this made it clearer what inquiry is all about

Focus on PBL sequence
-had each course group map out a possible PBL project related to their curriculum
-they found it challenging and most were not wiling to include an audience beyond the classroom
-need to map out some specific examples to share

What make something boring for
-brainstormed this list

CC challenges
-did this as small group work and then shared
-better than just the slide list


R4R
-the goal here is to get these people into the database finding resources that might be useful so that is where most energy needs to be spent
-stick to cc focus as examples for the overview
-for secondary the interest is videos and learning programs
-for this group they were in grade/course groups and searched on that basis and then shared what they found and what was of value
-Resource on Frogs was noted as prompting the teaching of all topics in the grade 10 course in an integrated way
Climate change photos was identified as including many of the strategies
-


Concept mapping
-have upped the learning process here
-more direct instruction
-follow up analysis by different groups

new sequence for next time
-dict instruction on protocols and example
1. in your group prepare a cc map on causes of human induced climate change
-list concepts in an area off to the side that your group thinks are relevant
-bring into the map in order of importance
-looked for linked concepts and add these accordingly

-self assess for protocol, clarity, number of concepts and relationships
 2. groups review other group's cc and add stickies for protocol, misconceptions, questions

-as a whole group -where would you take the learning?
-might also do this with each individual doing a concept map first

Day 2  sequence

welcome back -find your high 5 partner and share most nb from yesteday

-slide  -shallow to deep cc ed

-expanding on some dots insights
-NORCASN math vieo -
-never work harder...


Resources
-r4r intro
-time for grade/subject grousp to dig in and find what is useful/relevant to them
-shareing

Concept Maping part 2
-your group goes toa map other than your own
-peer review for protocol
-misconcpetions
-clarity
-debrief

Community Partners
-example -Ecolgy Ottawa -visit website

Project based learning
-examples
-plan one for your course

lunch

-demo of software for online group concept mapping -Doug

videos
-alternative secondary practice
-choose your opwn teach
skateboad factory

Shifting to inquiry
-KARS video and analysisi  -break down into steps from page 71 and72 in DOTs
-or examine Teching Tean about CC
-authentic inqury -prompted options of a walk and talk to review this -most took it

Online survey

KBC 2

closing circle -where to from here   -good ending as it was all positive

Other notes
-note some comments on individuals wanting more specifics -get the feeling that they are looking for the silver bullet on cc learning -and that does not exist  -as per specifics -they got a lot of strategies and a lot of specific lesson ideas (r4r and green teacher book)  -but these individuals might be looking for an easy way out that does not challenge the conventional teaching framework
-that mindset takes more than 2 days to get by -an extended -practice-sharing among colleagues-practice scenario might be the trick

Feb. 16 CC Institute Niagara - 1 day

Today we really tried to be responsive to the teacher experience and I think the majority of the group left feeling that they had both a better understanding of how to integrate cc into their teaching practices and the hope to move their teaching towards transformative practices.

There were about 5 - 8 participants who turned-off immediately or treated the day as an opportunity to do some online shopping.

From the info in the pre-institute survey, we knew they were all grade 7 & 8 teachers and from their comments they really wanted relevant student-friendly sources for local data, and RESOURCES! I would say 75% of these teachers were addressing climate change at the conventional level - if they were EVEN including climate change at all.

We framed the overall day with an inquiry approach and walked the talk of inquiry but we also moved away from trying to make the one day a thorough dive into professional inquiry as I think we can easily lose those that are not familiar with inquiry or climate change education practices when we move to quickly into metacognitive discussions.

Additions /Experiments:
The morning followed the standard inquiry session; however, in the afternoon we tried a couple of different things:

With groups doing chapter buzz summaries of dots, we had them then also consider how dots addresses some of the challenges of climate change learning. Stan this sheet and process really works well. Instead of them sort of half-energetically reporting back to the groups, we had them put their strategy on chart paper and we put them all up on the gym wall and had each group present to the whole group. Standing and presenting to the rest of the group added accountability and i noticed that each group seemed to speak a little more in depth than I have seen and the rest of the group seemed to listen more intently.

We decided to be responsive to their request for resources and planning time and created two break-out sessions. Groups then swapped.

1) Judy facilitated question-formation technique so all teachers left the institute with at least one inquiry question on climate change and had the experience of the process so they can also replicate in their classrooms.

2) I facilitated lesson-plan remodelling with two options: a) take a lesson that they currently use for climate change related expectations for grade 7 & 8 and apply one or a few of Connecting Dots to move it along the transformative practices continuum
b) their second option was to take a resource from R4R that is relevant for an upcoming lesson/unit and that ties to climate change - then once they get a handle on the R4R resource then apply the strategies within Dots to consider whether they can move the lesson along the transformative practices continuum. From conversations, I had with a few teachers this second option was helpful to give them some time to get more familiar with R4R. With two educators I spoke with they were beginning to apply a critical lens informed by Dots to the resources - which is AWESOME! This time working with R4R was quite helpful to also show teachers how to look up the pedagogical approaches and the assessment sections as in the demo I think a lot of them missed it.

In the morning and following a thread about getting students engaged from the KBC, we discussed the importance of emotions, well being, and learning about climate change. The conversation explored ways to have students experience climate change first-hand to try and invoke responses from disengaged students. After the KBC I did show the whole group some research on the impact of climate change images - that many of the images that have the highest impact (starving children in Africa) also are the images that do not foster individuals to feel able to take action.  I think as the institutes continue and teachers especially in the middle years are trying to find ways to engage their students, we should have some awareness around the dangers of fear-tactics.

I have also tried collating the learning documents into one google doc called "Documenting our Learning" and have identified the various tools and ouptuts with titles. I think then if they are interested in going back to the inquiry tools/process that were used during the day, they can find the outputs all in one doc. Then they can scan and have the visual aid to help them remember. Especially for this particular group but I think for the one days overall. This may be a more manageable documentation process for the teachers.

Misses:

The times for the institute were different than our understanding. We thought 9 - 3:30 and it was 8:30 - 3. So it was really good we were there an hour ahead of what we thought was our start time.

Not all teachers had filled out LSF's registration surveys so at the end of the day we had a lot of teachers (maybe 15) that did not have access. This created an awkward situation where we couldn't really request that only those who had received the email to stay. Krista, the curriculum consultant requested that we resend the survey to her and that she would follow-up with teachers. So hopefully we get a good response rate....it is always such a challenge if you don't have them there in the room.

Nametags - we didn't have nametags. Is it possible to include nametags in materials that LSF sends? I am sure it is and is probably my miss.

Anecdotal Evaluation on the day:
There were lots of "thank yous" and smiling faces leaving....I think they left feeling empowered but maybe that was just the relief that comes with a long weekend!

One Day Climate Chagne Peterborough

The first one day climate change PD session.

 -initial questions from this group indicated a conventional world view -a lot of them wanted content about cc to pass on to their students

-need to provide with some links for their personal/professional learning about cc in general -recommend Resilience.org  others?

-another common issue was how to engage students -should have just pointed out that students respond positively when the learning is interesting -i.e stop with the boring info transfer

-the process we follow -professional inquiry still worked with this group -they participated authentically even though overall they were not a cc knowledgeable group

  See the slides in the Peterborough folder for the order of the day.

r4r
  Included Joanne's r4r session in the morning just before lunch which allowed time to reorganize the questions. (R4R well received -which is par for the course for conventional educators -they are looking for ready made solutions and r4r has a lot of those)
-note to self -CC resources handout -this needs to be revamped to include what transformative learning strategies each of the resources uses  -also remove reference to clean nuclear

 Time factor is relevant and after doing a few of these one day sessions we will have to decide if this is worth the effort -maybe only offer 2 day -but that is yet to be determined -wait until after April 3

-as with many institutes -it does not fall into place until the second day -we lacked that opportunity

End of day reflections gave indication that the time constraints of a one day undermine what can be achieved.

-some comments
The day was more around how to change our lesson design. If you had time to show us how to write better inquiry lessons that would be great.

 I would have liked to have the learning from the afternoon be done in the morning and to have some time to collaborate and plan in the afternoon. There were some great ideas that were shared, but it is difficult to find the time to plan and organize. Need more specific learning around what inquiry looks like at the secondary level.

- Would have liked to discuss technology and key themes

 -I felt that at times, the presenters could be pushing a larger jump into experiential learning than some teachers are ready for. I felt as though, some of the learning could have been focused a little more on meeting teachers where they are currently rather than where you'd like to see us be.

Innovations

-the one slide documentation developed by Tanya -let's see what is produced on April 3
-changed the concept maping activity  -stil lnot clear as to what to do wiht the inital concpt maps that are produced by the groups -
-connecting with the county of Peterborough cc coordinator to explore community partners was beneficial -though she and most of the group probably did not get what an authentic partnership is all about -so tough to dispel conventional teaching worldviews in teachers and non teachers

Other insights
-this board is on the deep learning program  -top down -though shalt do deep learning -we offered a different approach

-a number of times it was noted however that what we were presenting was consistent with the deep learning worldview



-it might be beneficial to offer up some specific course based approaches to dealing with cc

ex take a topic and express it in terms of questions

-take  topic in a course and apply the project based cascade

-map out what a good community partnership might look like
-use page 72 and 73 to paln an inwury
-but alas these take time 

Educator to note

Aaron McFadden -looks to be the leading light of the group on applying trans formative strategies -weekly Wednesday outings, experiential learning projects
-maybe prompt a blog post on his grade 7 Wednesday outings

Burlington -HDCSB 2 Day Institute

In this Institute I used 3 different 'strands' -DOTS, Transformative Practices, and Tools.
Adding 9 Tools such as Community Partners, and Rich Questions gave opportunity to more closely highlight and examine specific supports and ways into Inquiry. This seemed to give a broader look at Inquiry which participants appreciated.
Of particular concern remains the integration of Elementary and Secondary panels. Though there was much for and directed at the secondary people, they still see themselves totally restricted by timetabling and single subject teaching assignments (and in fact they are!). Perhaps an inquiry only for Secondary people would provide them with more creative thinking time to explore their specific issues. Though the secondary people at this institute seemed to gain a lot, the above issues still remained an impediment (in their minds) for full benefit.
This group were very eager to give thought to evolving practice and seemed quite anxious to get back and work in a new way with their students and each other. They 'bonded'!

kti manitoulin

Reflections on the KTI institute                                                  Stan Kozak  November 2017
Big take aways
-Aboriginal learning based on the traditions was holistic and there is great opportunity to continue to explore how traditional insights can inspire and shape learning practices in First Nation's schools-these are rich traditions that offer so many possibilities for educators to become aware of and utilized to enhance learning -this is a great challenge since the learning curve involves evolving from conventional learning into transformative practice but in the context of what is relevant to Aboriginal cultures
-from the discussions that took place -there is great need to support advancing learning in First Nations schools -it seems that many if not most are in the conventional teaching worldview and that parents in these communities apply pressure for more of the same -when they are not working
-we heard of teachers grappling with students in communities under great stresses -an entire additional layer of complexity to those tasked with facilitating learning in these communities

What worked at this institute
-despite being somewhat overly lead -there were 4 facilitators, a program administrator and an elder, the institute was overall successful due to experiential elements outside and inside, some elements of inquiry and some drawing on the input of participants attending through which we got glimpses of Anishenabeg experiences and family experiences in previous times -relevant to learning today
-there were some significant side conversations where individual teachers grappled with their current practice and the wish to apply inquiry/outdoor practices advocated or demonstrated
-leadership of the Elder Josh was essential in bringing authentic Anishenabeg presence to the gathering -a few of the older participants had depth of experience to draw on in this regard
-KTI staff were very well organized as per the site and the meals and overall organization

Enhancements
-the institute did not follow the continually evolving LSF professional inquiry methodology so it would not be fair to apply the criteria we normally use to determine impact and effectiveness (identification of learners questions, participants taking leadership in the learning, documentation of that learning, planning for application, participation in the online sharing  of proceedings, etc)
-as per land based learning we really did not get into this in any deep way -what we focused on was learning outside -important for all early years programs  -this is important and maybe as far as the participants would be open to going
-we could have more formally identified how Anishenabeg traditions can be used to shape and inform learning outside

Walking the talk
-attention to living lightly on the land -let's plan to do recycling and compostable collection and request bringing of cups
-getting outside on day 2 would have been helpful
-fitness -we could have done some walk and talks and explained this as a way of getting our exercise and discussing important issues

Future Possibilities
Goals
Address student Motivation for learning
-an overriding goal for Indigenous learning that seems to be the place to start is  -how do we as educators create school learnings experiences  so that kids feel compelled to attend -where individuals want to attend even when they are ill, when learning is so vital to them that is central to their being -I have experienced this numerous times in my teaching achieved through one of  two ways
1.  create interesting and compelling learning scenarios -often involving audience beyond the classroom where learners see themselves as helpers to others  -or learning experiences where children are in close contact with nature -this is enticement -
2. the second approach is through  authentic inquiry where we  follow their interests -this is intrinsic

Conventional teaching often resorts to an external compelling of students to learn with rewards or punishments -not very effective
When the desire to attend school to learn has been sparked the curriculum can then be also addressed
Unfortunately learning practice in schools seems to be dominated by conventional approaches resulting in part in poor attendance.
What might the land based cultural curriculum be over the grade range?
-we could have brought attention to this great possibility for linking learning to cultural traditions and I think it could be the focus of future land based PD learning experiences
examples
-in early years the focus might be plants that are important and their sensory experiencing, learning their names in Anishinabek
-early grades -traditional shelter construction -honour ingenuity of the people in being able to live with what nature provided
-stories in context whenever possible


-cooking over an open fire experiences
-these are just some guesses on my part -so many would come from the Indigenous educators attending
-from there we would weave in the pedagogy -how to find all the curriculum based on these experiences

Guelph Youth Forum

This forum was secondary teachers and students. We conducted the day entirely from a circle. I have found that this format brings greater accountability for 'presence' and participation from all.Tables were located around the edges of the circle to access when necessary. We went outside for the opening (in a circle) and again later in the morning and as well in the afternoon to connect curriculum to nature and the built/cultural community.
This was indeed an enlightened group of secondary teachers who were very open to hearing about and thinking about evolution of practice as being one of the keys to the change they recognized as necessary. The KBC Question -"How can we engage the young people in our classes with the challenges of our time? What does it take to make that happen?" This brought a thoughtful and deep conversation. I drew their attention again back to the people in the room as being an important support team. Recognizing this they seemed willing to get to know one another on a deeper level than usual. They also were very concerned about the 'wellness' of their students (and themselves!). Empowering students becomes even more critical in this light. Perhaps these are the 'sustainability issues' we need to approach next using all of the 'pieces of the puzzle' we have offered to date under the umbrella of 'student empowerment'.
 -Pamela

Halifax Youth Forum Nov 2017

Going to Halifax is like 'Groundhog Day'. As an educator one gets the feeling it is 10 years ago. These grade 7- 12 teachers struggle with getting support from their board and administration to use the community as a venue for teaching. Going outside is seen as a 'fringe activity' and seriously questioned as to its validity. In spite of this, 21 teachers gathered in a circle at Dalhousie to contemplate such 'rebellious acts' and look for support to do just that. They were a relatively quiet group at first, but as the day wore on they began to loosen up and contribute to some wonderful conversations. As we worked they began to nod in agreement, and question, and feel supported. We went outside twice to talk about the possibilities for using the outdoors and community. They were really interested in 4 credit courses and how they could work together with other staff members to do integrated projects. We started in a circle and stayed in a circle. They talked to the whole group not just a small table group. I realized that the circle has become for me an effective way of conducting these forums for the last 2 years. Youth Forums are like a 'tasting menu' or a 'trailer' for a movie. They move quickly through a number of ideas and teachers need time between each to respond and talk to each other. I truly have become more of a 'guide on the side'. Knowing when to sit down and be quiet is as important as when to talk. This group was very interested in the r4r searchable data base. They loved the peer review feature and some wanted to contribute to the site. That is the first time that idea has come up in any Forum I have been part of. It is my opinion that there is very fertile ground in Nova Scotia for the kinds of Institutes that we have done in the past on getting outside and on inquiry and that they would be very receptive to LSF offerings.