Mentoring New Teachers

I was fortunate to be asked to go on the the 4 day trip to Rawhiti Marae in November. I went with about 20 Māori students from Kata O'Donnell's tutor class and 3 other teachers. The purpose of the trip was to familiarise the students with Māori tikanga in a remote settlement on Māori land which is quite different from what they are accustomed to. Activities were run by WaiNot Tourism and featured a forest walk, snorkelling, fishing with nets, cooking pippis on the beach, swimming and jet ski riding. The students were kept busy from 7.45am until about 10pm at night. It was a great way for them to bond together well away from school and to have new experiences learning new skills. What did I learn from This? I learned more about ways of working with Māori students,the importance of tikanga, eating, sleeping and working together. It was fascinating to be in such a remote untouched environment and to see how the students behaved and related differently fro...

I have spent a number of years running workshops for & mentoring PRTs now PCTs. Behaviour Management was always the thing that they struggled with in their first year. The answer is always in developing learning-focused relationships. The PCTs have been attending PLD on Positive Behaviour for Learning run by the local RTLB Service. Following are some great diagrams on de-escalating behaviour in the classroom. The big question - how do your actions escalate or de-escalate the situation. Generally, if the teacher remains calm, the class will remain calm & vice versa.

At the beginning of a new term, it is always good to revisit the expectations you made the term before. Some may have become routine, some may have to be lifted as the previous ones have been achieved and new behaviours may have emerged with expectations to go with these. These expectations come from Chapter 4 of  Positive Behaviour for Learning(PB4L) Every school needs a consistent, positive approach to addressing behaviour. The PB4L approach is based on the results of research (Alberto & Troutman 2012) This research tells us that: all social behaviour both appropriate & inappropriate is learned students do not learn better ways of behaving through punitive consequences. to learn better ways of behaving, students must be taught replacement behaviours. to retain new behaviours, students must be given specific, positive feedback & opportunities to practise in a variety of school settings. Checklist for promoting positive behaviours: HERE  . TKI

A few weeks back one of the Teach First Mathematics trainees organised a field trip of her Year 9 & 10 classes to the film "Hidden Figures" which involves 3 African American women in the 1960s who were brilliant at Mathematics and worked for Nasa " The story of a team of African-American women mathematicians who served a vital role in NASA during the early years of the US space program"   http://www.imdb.com/title/tt4846340/ .  She felt that it would inspire the students in Maths. It was a steep learning curve for her as she had not realised how much organisation is needed but it was a huge success and good on her for being innovative. The students enjoyed the film, clapping when one of the women won a promotion. It was also a history lesson for the students in the effects of segregation in America at the time. We didn't lose any students walking to the train, getting off the train or left at the cinema. They behaved well. On the last day of term a gro...