T1/T2/T3 Comparison of what success in writing look like through the eyes of my learners...

Throughout this year I have focused on growing the self efficacy of group of reluctant writers. As I could only capture 6/8 responses in the T1/2 data comparison I chose to use the data of the same 6 students in T3. Notable changes in responses have been highlighted in yellow. I growth in content specific information that was emerging at the T2 checkpoint has continued to evolve, and there is a general consensus that in order to be a good writer across the learning areas you need to understand what it is you are being asked to do so that you can use your words to talk about and write about your thinking.

Changes I have noticed in class:

Target Students:

• settling to work quickly is the norm
• questioning is for clarity
• increased levels of confidence
• working with a buddy has once again become the preferred option at planning time with active engagement in talk/learning conversations 
• continued positivity towards new learning 
• work completion is the expected norm
• increased levels of risk taking 
• sharing work with class is the norm
• praise is owned and sought
• strengthened connections to the learning through engaged talk

Me:

• positive praise linked to previous success to engage reluctant writers
• overlooking the behaviour that accompanied disengaged learners and focusing on the task ahead. 
• continued explicit instruction
• increased front loading time so that stronger connections could be made
• timetable changes to allow time for work to be completed
• following the same teaching sequence meant familiarity with the process allowed me to reduce the level of scaffolding
• increased talk time for planning
• high expectations
• repetition of content specific language in context

T1/T2 Comparison of what success in writing look like through the eyes of my learners...

This year I have been focusing on building student self efficacy in writing. Why? Because I have a large group of reluctant writers. I know that no-one finds something they have success in boring so I have tried hard to be creative in my task design.

This DLO reflects the comparison of responses to questions I asked my target students in both Term 1 and Term 2 - (6/8 students were questioned at both checkpoint times so only these responses have been compared in this DLO). Notable changes in responses have been highlighted in yellow. I can see more content specific information emerging in their answers overall, but the part that excited me the most was that half of these target students are now seeing members of their own writing group as 'good' writers. 


Changes I have noticed in class:

Target Students:

• settling to work more quickly
• increased levels of confidence
• working with a buddy is no longer the 'go to'
• positivity towards new learning
• increased work completion levels
• increased levels of risk taking
• more willing to share work with class
• ownership of praise
• strengthened connections to the learning

Me:

• finding more opportunities for praise
• increased use of learner created exemplars from this group
• paying closer attention to explicit instruction
• calmer voice tone
• increased awareness of when I need to repeat/reinforce my instruction
• increased use of content specific language 

What does success in writing look like through the eyes of my learners...

Following on from my previous post I asked my learners what success in writing looks like. My initial thinking was that I would use padlet as my platform but realised this would remove the anonymity of my learners, so I changed to using a google form to collect my responses. The discussion around the questions I asked was rich and incredibly worthwhile. 

The presentation below reflects the questions I asked and the responses my learners gave with anonymity in tact. Out of interest I asked the people my learners identified as 'good writers' to contribute their ideas too (burgundy font). The difference in these responses is definitely reflected in the detail.

We will revisit this at the end of term 2 to see if an increased understanding of the writing process has changed any perceptions.

Learning from Research #2...

Having sought advice on my inquiry from the team at Woolf Fisher Research Centre earlier
in the year, I was given some great avenues to explore. Naomi Rosedale suggested that I
‘put aside “high stakes” associations to the achievement rubrics etc. and initially focus on
socialising a classroom environment that builds a community of writers, where risk-taking
is valued, and mistakes or misunderstanding can be brought out into the open for support
by the community…’

'Reading for Understanding' (Schoenbach, Greenleaf and Murphy) was the text suggested to me so I have begun reading about ways of “apprenticing” a
culture of literacy support. Naomi thought I would have lots of ah-ha moments as I read
this, and she was right! I have been exploring the chapter ‘Metacognitive Conversation -
Making Thinking Visible’ and have decided to share ideas that I am going to try in my
own classroom to help grow student self-efficacy and increase oral language opportunities.

Notes part #1:

Metacognitive conversation is an internal and external focus on how readers make sense
of text. (Can I apply this to writing?) Internal - noticing what is going on in their own minds
vs external - discussing what they are noticing, what stumps them and how they problem
solve. Basically it is looking inside their own minds to observe their thinking processes then
comparing their thinking with the thinking of their friends.

Studies show that when Metacognitive conversation is integrated into a teaching program
learners have become curious about how their minds work as they make connections to a
text. This process helps to demystify the reading process as they can see and hear how
their peers and their teacher work through a challenging text and can then apply that
learning themselves when facing a similar problem. Students become active agents in
their own learning journeys when talk makes thinking visible. Metacognitive Conversation
allows students to see their own thinking and the thinking of others, which in turn helps
grow efficacy as they can see how they can be successful.

Exploring Students' concepts of Writing: Students have different ideas of what success in a subject area looks like.
The example explored in the text was based on reading but I can see how this can be
adapted for a writing lesson as well. I will be asking my students:

• How can you tell if someone is a good writer?
• Who is someone you consider is a good writer? Why?
• What do you have to do to be able to write successfully in maths, reading, inquiry, tech and writing lessons?

I will use the digital platform Padlet to create a collaborative picture of what my learners
think, and will check back in with these responses at the end of each term to see if any
thinking has changed.

Analysing the data (February)...

I have chosen to measure student self efficacy levels in writing using the self evaluation attitude questions asked of them at the start of the Writing assessment. 'Very Unlike Me' is the weakest indication of the attitude domain, so it is marked as 1. 'Very Like Me' is the strongest indication of the attitude domain, so it is marked as 4 (e-asTTle help site).

This data shows is that my learners don't like writing at school, they don't believe they are good at writing and worryingly, most think I don't think they are very good at writing. While it is affronting to read, the data gives me a great starting point to help shape the changes I need to make in my teaching practise to increase student self efficacy in writing.

'For Reading, Maths and Writing there are multiple sets of attitude questions available. You can choose which set you would like during the test creation process. The relationship between motivation, interest, self-regulation, and engagement towards a subject, and the achievement in a subject is valuable information that you can use to further understand some of the factors that make up your students’ learning' (e-asTTle help site). In searching for further information on these questions I discovered a wider selection of questions (link here) that I will ask my learners via a google form. It will be interesting to see if their opinions change outside of testing conditions.

The Research and Work Programme Summary Attitude Domains in e-asTTle paper is a downloadable PDF that explains these domain this further.


March 2018 Update:

This chart represents the data analysis of e-asTTle writing following the beginning of the year assessments. The trends/gaps were analysed across the Y7/8 cohort by Kiri Kirkpatrick and myself, and will be used to inform our planning to help us meet the learning needs of the students we teach. 

Seeking clarity and embracing advice...

I had an idea of where I wanted to go with my inquiry this year but was unsure of which research pathway to walk down so I contacted Dr Rachel Williams for some advice. After a discussion with her colleagues at the Woolf Fisher Research Centre, she suggested I explore ways of building student self efficacy. This makes so much sense to me as my target group are all students I have worked with for a year, but despite my previous efforts to nurture, scaffold and develop their skills in writing, they are still achieving well below the expected norms.

When considering the language in abundance lens, I now know that I need to change my inquiry question. I am moving away from 'looking at ways I can use talk to strengthen connections and raise achievement in writing for my priority learners', to 'looking at ways stronger connections to content specific vocabulary can help overcome hindered student self efficacy in writing'.

In searching for a definition of self efficacy, I found this sabbatical report from Ted Benton (2014). In his report, Baker defines self efficacy as being, 'the strength of an individual’s belief that he or she can successfully perform a given activity or task'. This definition resonates with me as I know this is the historical barrier to learning that I need to breakdown. 

In my previous post I identified the fact that many of these learners find writing 'boring' or 'too hard'. From an inquiry perspective, if I am to accelerate achievement in writing for this group of priority leaners, I need to be obvious in my belief of their ability. They need to be able to see the partnership between my belief in their ability and my expectations of what I want them to achieve. Making this conscious change in my practise is one area I will be putting under the microscope. 

Ensuring I provide opportunities for these learners to hear, explore, understand and use a wider variety of vocabulary is another avenue I will be exploring. “The extent of a student’s oral language resources has an enabling or disabling effect on his or her... writing... In the classroom when talk.... is an integral part of literacy.... writing is enriched and expanded.” Dr Jannie van Hees, (2007)  With this in mind I plan to use oral language (talk) to build on the familiar and help these students embrace the learning.

My immediate next step will be to use the e-asTTle attitude matrix to identify how these learners feel about writing and how they perceive others (including me), feel about their writing. By gathering this data now and comparing it with the end point data for 2018 I hope to show a shift over time in self efficacy. 

New Year... New Inquiry

The new learning year brings with it a new opportunity for me to inquire into my own teaching practice. After a lot of thought I have chosen to focus my inquiry around our hardest to shift writers in Year 8. They are all boys with identified learning needs who have participated in intervention programs to try and fill the knowledge gaps that have become more and more evident, as they have progressed through their own learning journeys.

Having worked with this group last year I know the level of scaffolding that was required to help minimise the disconnects they perceive that they have with learning. These students all want to experience success in learning, but rather than take risks and trying the new, they opt for a safer route preferring to fall back on the known. This means that when data is analysed their levels of shift show minimal movement, which is the main reason I have chosen to inquire into ways I can help them strengthen their connections to writing.

Today I asked a few questions to establish how they felt about writing at school. This is recorded in the table below, (I will update the table after the assessments next week so that their e-asTTle writing levels are current for 2018). It seems that running out of ideas puts explanation writing in the 'boring' basket, a 'go-to' word that masks the fear of failure. They all said they wanted to do more of the quick write challenges that I introduced last year after a professional development session run by Jeff Anderson. None of these learners are not wanting to learn, they just do not have the confidence to try new learning as they are afraid of making a mistake. That part shocked me as I thought I encouraged a very safe learning environment where making mistakes just show we are learning to use new skills. When I clarified if they were frightened of making a mistake or just didn't want to get something wrong, I realised they simply didn't have the language to articulate that they didn't want me to think they didn't know what to do. 

These learners will happily work collaboratively but seem to lose confidence when asked to complete an independent task. My initial thinking is that I will borrow elements from the Big Write program in the UK by including a fun VCOP focus each week as vocabulary, punctuation and sentence structure are major stumbling blocks for us. Additionally I will revisit and build on the familiar quick writes we used last year, as they all experienced success with this. Talk needs to also play a huge part in helping to strengthen these connections, so my next step is to research ways that I can provide authentic learning opportunities for my learners to use the language I need to help them embed in their own knowledge kete, in context.

Ros Wilson explains the Big Write