Cindy Wihongi - Professional Blog

I have learnt a lot today in regards to the entire reading programme and some new resources to access reading material for my learners.  It was great to have my teaching practice both affirmed and challenged with some great ideas about how to be inclusive of new resources within a well resourced/well rounded reading programme.   I did feel really frustrated however as when I struggled to find reading material that was appropriate for the group I had hoped to ‘target’ in today’s RPI.  They are readers of approx 7-7.5 years and there didn’t seem to be a lot available.  I found the journal surf offered a huge range for more able readers and I found it difficult to negotiate the TKI website.  I did persevere with this after our day had finished and managed to find some appropriate leveled books.  Although we had hoped to find ‘sets’, I managed to find 3 texts which could ‘loosely’ be grouped based on experiencing emotions and how different experiences make...

 This survey was really insightful in finding out about the habit and attitudes of our Year 4/5 learners in Totara.  In our remote area we do have trouble with accessing public libraries but we do have a small library at school and also a well resourced book shelf in our classroom.  We also are part of the Duffy Book initiative so the students are regularly gifted books of their choice so most definitely have access to a range of texts. It was interesting that they thought that their ability of reading matched their teachers opinions but that they believed their whanau had a higher opinion of their reading ability.  This is an area that I am keen to explore a bit more.   The results re the amount and times that they read was no surprise.  It was hugely variable and it would be amazing to increase these times/amounts.  I believe that the insight into their choice of books and topics enjoyed is one way to increase this.   Feedback from men...

There is so much to learn!!  It has been a little overwhelming today with the collation of data and new places to source this from and then share in!  I can absolutely see the benefit of doing this but think the last couple of weeks with camp and sickness has added to the way I am feeling.   I am excited though about the end result of this as I can see how this allows me to understand my readers so much better and be able to cater for this through the LI’s, WALT’s and S/C that I am able to pitch based on their needs.   I look forward to using the task board but do have apprehensions about how SOME of my learners will be able to manage themselves independently.  For lots of them, this is the first year on chrome books so that in itself is proving challenging.  I just need to introduce this when I have support of TA in class and have the chance to actually ‘teach’ the learners how to use the board.  I am also excited to share with my teaching c...

  What a first day!! Feeling a little overwhelmed but also excited about how I can become a more effective teacher of reading.  The pillars of learning is a great analogy and one that I can picture and hopefully remember in order to include these aspects into my teaching of reading. Although there is so much to include in our practice, the fact that we can teach across the curriculum makes it less daunting (just a wee bit!!)  It was great to see how the survey of reading was then part of a math programme - it just requires lots of smart thinking.  Seeing how others do this is encouraging and allows me to see it is possible.   There is so much that I could take away from today but feel like I need to hear more before I run with it and it fails because I am doing too much without knowing what I am actually doing so will wait till we’ve had a couple more days before doing too much! At this stage, I need to have explicit, planned (for me) conversations with my ...

 So today has been a really interesting day and great to get some history on the empowerment aspect of Manaiakalani.  I really enjoyed Dorothy's presentation where we worked through some examples of just how empowering the ability to access information is.  Students who are able to take responsibility for some of this accessing for the whanau and even teaching their whanau is incredibly exciting - an authentic example of tuakana-teina relationship working in reverse.  The accessing of all devices and making this possible for all socio-economics within our communities is also an amazing advantage for our tamariki.  It allows for equality, which although should always be the case in education, is certainly not.  I loved the quote that Dorothy shared with us along with her wero... Based on what we have been learning about today, my statemnt would be as follows:  The greatest joy comes from Empowering students to....allow them to follow any path they may w...

So today was all about the big word.... Ubiquitous!! In a nut shell I was able to determine that this really means that all our learning needs to be rewindable and as one of the facilitators put it, 'if it's worth teaching, it's worth recording (or something along those lines!!).  I think like all of the learning that we have experienced throughout the DFI, although things take a while to get my head around and a while to set up, it is worth it once it is done.  I really feel like this in regards to the Screencastify and also the Workspace within Hapara.  I believe that given my students year group (6 and 7), they have the ability to be accountable for their learning (well most of them!) and therefore the opportunity to present learning opportunities through Workspace would be a good way to assist them with this.   As I have never used Screencastify or Workspace before, this is going to involve a bit of self-training and also perseverance.  I do think ...

It was great to hear Dorothy converse regarding connection today. This to me, is a huge part of why we communicate online or should I say, one of the massive benefits of online learning. We live within a world today where whanau are so spread out but yet their support around learning is still invaluable. To have the opportunity for them to be able to be in touch with their tamariki's learning is so crucial and so possible. When looking at our sites from Amy's screen, it became very obvious what could be viewed etc and how appealing/not appealing my site was! I have been able to look at my site today from another perspective which I feel has been great in improving my workflow as a professional. If it doesn't do what its meant to do, then its not worth having?? Having had the opportunity to begin fiddling around with my site will definitely have some benefit to both me and my learners. I feel that when I set it up, it was a matter of getting information on there. Now ...