Discovery Learning Idea number 1

Well, not really number one but one I found today.

Having been directed to the blog where I found the inspiring teacher below I then was directed there shortly after from another pintrest find about the True Story of the Three Little Pigs.

I can use the story and activity on Fun Friday and also use the construction part as one of my Discovery Learning time activities. I shall provide some three digit numbers and a challenge to create a building for one of the numbers.

I am sure there will be someone who will want to create an e-book with the ipad using photos and some simple sentences to document the activity!

Also found this page with picture book inspired place value activities

I love inspiring teachers

And this guy must be a hoot!

(found it on this blog, which isn't his blog btw)

There is much value in dressing up - shouldn't be hard for a good teacher really as most of our entire work life is acting after all.

‘Arohatia te Reo – cherish the language'

Kia ora!  My class has been having fun with their Māori phrases this month - I have a stock set of phrases that are in deeply embedded in my  everyday language (I even ask the cat if he wants some "miraka"...).
We have been pushing ourselves lately though - Homai (pass me) this and that - roll call in the morning with more complex range of feelings
Kei te pehea koe?  Kei te wiriwiri!
We make sure we ask Papa Maru the correct pronunciation for things (turns out I have been saying the word for pen wrong all these years...).


To commemorate Te Wiki o Te Reo Māori (Māori Language Week) this year I want to share some history about it.
It has been a 'thing' since 1975.

In the last 200 years the history of the Māori language (te reo Māori) has been one of ups and downs. At the beginning of the 19th century it was the predominant language spoken in Aotearoa/New Zealand. As more English speakers arrived in New Zealand, the Māori language was increasingly confined to Māori communities. By the mid-20th century there were concerns that the language was dying out.

Major initiatives launched from the 1980s have brought about a revival of te reo. In the early 21st century, more than 130,000 people of Māori ethnicity could speak and understand te reo, one of the three official languages of New Zealand (the others are English and New Zealand Sign Language).

I hope attitudes are changing towards this language - although I do remember having a few parents (via their children) in 2012 be very difficult about even incidental classroom use of Māori language and how sad this made me.
Always meet this with a professional attitude - "it is the law in NZ and we are officially bicultural" - followed up with my personal opinion "I love the Māori language!" - not to mention it is good for the functioning of a young brain to know more than one language (although I don't suppose it matters what language that is... it may as well be one of ours!).

Try a Māori language quiz...

In 2014 Māori Language Week is from 21-27 July; the theme is 'Te Kupu o te Wiki', 'The Word of the Week’.

On a Discovery Learning journey...

Discovery Learning PD today! Can't wait to get more creative play into our classroom programme!
More to come on this!!!

Celebrating Ourselves and our Students

Creating a culture of collaboration has lots of facets - building trust and positivity around learning can be fostered through sharing/celebrating achievements from our personal learning environments.
Trying to make this a feature of our (small) school's staff meetings.
Will be suggesting/proposing we start this as a feature of each staff meeting and have prepared something to share as a model.

Let's see if it catches on!

The importance of cleverly guided facilitating discussion.

Students don't learn anything they don't already know....

Ponder that a while.... I'll wait.

Education's Death Valley....

I especially like the point about the contradiction involving diversity...
Conformity vs diversity - our system is still geared towards - intact this still deeply ingrained ideal - conforming - as much as we hold high an ideal of celebrating diversity. How many more generations of public school children in New Zealand will be eaten by the conformity machine before we actually actively take our own steps towards ensuring we are nurturing, rewarding and realising individual diversity. I wan tot be a teacher that helps students seek out success through happiness - not through conforming and surviving in a dull job they felt forced into through a lack of options and the insipidness of conforming to the norm.