WFRC #7: Explain the hypotheses about teaching that you decided were MOST worth testing, and why...

“Effective teachers inquire into the relationship between what they do and what happens for students (outcomes). But effective teachers do more than simply inquire (or reflect) – they take action to improve the outcomes for students and continue to inquire into the value of these interventions.” (Aitken, 2010) If I am to effect change, I need to not only listen to feedback suggestions from my learners, observations and research findings, but need to also act upon them.

Hypothesis 1:

Am I accessing my whole teaching kete or just using the recently added ideas and strategies nearest the top?
I have taken part in a wealth of professional development that has allowed me to continually adapt and evolve my teaching practice. However, what I think I’m doing is overlooking the power of some of this learning. I need to look closely at the ideas and strategies that are embedded in my instruction and make sure I’m not relying on‘same-same’.

Hypothesis 2:

Is my instruction really explicit or do I just think it is?

This is a difficult idea to explore alone as you see and hear what you want to so will definitely be something I need to tap into the power the eyes of a ‘critical friend’ can bring. If I want an honest picture I need to make sure that when I’m being observed by my critical friend, (our Deputy Principal, Kiri Kirkpatrick), I am working with my target group, and not a group I know will paint the ‘right’ picture.

Hypothesis 3:

What am I doing to grow my student’s self efficacy?

I asked my students for honest reflections via google form in our end of term evaluation. From this I can see I need to make sure we celebrate the small successes often.

Hypothesis 4:

Is my expectation of my students high enough or am I scaffolding my students too much?

This is going to be really challenging. My target group are all students who have the learned behaviour of relying on others (teacher, teacher aid, peers) to support their learning rather than taking the risks that might not bring success. To try and build independence I have created many scaffolding frameworks, but even though I know I need to reduce the amount of scaffolding I am always worried that if I take these away too early I might impact negatively of their self efficacy.

Hypothesis 5:

Am I helping my students to see the connections how the strategies we use to make meaning in reading can be used to make meaning in maths and writing?

I know from conversations that all of my students see reading as a separate entity to maths and writing. If I want my students to see that the strategies we are developing and strengthening to help us make meaning in reading are the same skills that we use to make meaning in other curriculum areas I need to first make these links in my planning so that I remember to model this in my guided teaching. An example of this happened this week. We were using skimming and scanning skills to find information quickly and to check we had the right information in our guided reading session. To help them see how this could be used in maths I asked them to use their skimming and scanning skills
to find the maths in a written maths question.