My Casual Chain

"A causal chain is when a cause leads to an effect and that effect becomes the cause of another effect.  A leads to B. B leads to C. C leads to D.  Any intervention you design will (consciously or not) be based on a causal chain you have in mind - this is your theory of action."

Here is the link to my Casual Chain.

Restating my inquiry

At the start of my inquiry, I wanted to engage and empower my year 9 Social Studies class to ‘care’ about their local community and local curriculum because I believed it was important for them to know.   Many of the kids, although born and raised in Glen Innes, don't really know about the history of the place especially Mana Whenua history, even though they may go past these places every day.  

As I gathered evidence through student voice, looking at student work, talking to other teachers and looking at their test results,  I could see that kids were still not really understanding the importance of our local history.  Much of what we did was still based in the classroom.  My beliefs about what was important to them, wasn't really matching to what I was expecting them to do.  Here, look at a map.  Can you see how far Mauninaina is?  Look at Maungarei, it's so high.  Yep, not enough.  I did some professional reading and developed some hunches and realised my inquiry needed to shift and change.What I found was that 'engaging' needed to be explored more than just taking part in or knowing.  It need to active and dynamic and authentic.  The concept of empowerment was also something that I needed to explore further.  What power were they gaining and who was it important to. 

I sat down and discussed my inquiry with 2 experts who helped me fine tune my inquiry to allow for a more specific and clear outcome.  I started with 'How will supporting students to authentically connect with their local area and community create a sense of pride and respect in their learning?' but realised that 'creating a sense of pride' was different for everyone and can't be measured.   So I've decided to rebrand my inquiry to look at: 

How will supporting students to authentically connect with their local community create a sense of belonging and provoke action for a sustainable future?

I am going to find more authentic stories/narratives to understand and share so that kids can hear a real person talk about a real place.  I am thinking about developing a short series of lessons on the local street names of streets in our areas as a start and utilise perspective taking to build critical thinking and learning for my kids.  Hopefully this would provoke action and help guide them in the future.

#7: Testing out my Hypothesis part 2

 If students were connected to their learning then they would not less be distracted and more engaged.

• Provide highly engaging relevant lessons with variety linked to what they know
• Create enough down time to do their own work.
• Let students select music which helps them to learn.
• Offer opportunities to do group work and peer work as well as one to one.
• Bring in experts who are engaging and relate to the learning.

Recently, one of our community activists and project based learning expert Karl Bailey came in to work with my year 9 class on design based thinking and learning.  My class has been one of the lucky few who were selected to help look at challenges facing young people in our community today and to think of ways to solve it.  

A few months ago, we started by getting the kids into groups and thinking about the challenge of attendance but we could see that kids weren't engaging with the context.  Karl and I brainstormed some ideas and discussed keeping it simple and engaging.  The class is made of mostly boys and asked them what they were interested in.  The majority said gaming, eating and sports.  So we decided to do a mini project whereby the kids in their groups had to design a new sport.  

Kids found it difficult to plan and figure out the pros and cons of the design.  They just wanted to get up and play it.  So it was interesting to see how kids responded and in the end, I could see they enjoyed the planning and process of the design and some of the ideas the kids had were really exciting.

#7: Testing out my Hypothesis part 1

If students were connected to their learning then they would not less be distracted and more engaged.

• Provide highly engaging relevant lessons with variety linked to what they know

• Create enough down time to do their own work.

• Let students select music which helps them to learn.

• Offer opportunities to do group work and peer work as well as one to one.

• Bring in experts who are engaging and relate to the learning.

We have started our new year 9 Social Studies on 'Understanding our Government' and the first lesson is called 'Survivor'.  This lesson involves students working in groups to survive on a deserted island with nothing more than the clothes on their backs.  They do all the activities on a big piece of A3 paper and have to work together to complete tasks.  I take them slide by slide through the powerpoint and allow them time to discuss and complete the tasks.  I did this during one of our double periods so as not to rush the teams.

It is interesting to see how each group works.  There are 1 or 2 with obvious leaders whereas others work equally together.  Students seem to enjoy the discussions and are forced to work together and get to an agreement.  At the end of the lesson, my year 9's agreed that it was a fun activity to do and they learnt about how and why working in groups can help their learning.

Year 9 Social Studies Ngāti Paoā Landscapes Tour

On the 29th July, we finally got one of my year 9 Social Studies classes out on our Ngāti Paoā Landscapes Tour led by Matua Harley.

The day before taking them on the trip, our TIC of History Scott Mansell emailed a survey asking students the following questions and the results follow

How important do you think it is to learn about History

Do you think that the history of the local area is important

Do you think New Zealand History is boring

81% know it’s important to learn about our History and but when it comes to our local community 62% say yes whilst 38% say maybe. My thinking is that some are probably unsure as to the importance of the local curriculum.

When it comes to thinking about whether History is boring, just over half said no where just under half saying yes or maybe which I kind of expected.

So knowing this, it was important to get them out and listen to the histories that essentially were not written in text books and to have an authentic relevant perspective such as that of Mana Whenua. Matua Harley represents our local Iwi Ngāti Pāoa and had kindly offered to take our students on a local landscapes walking tour.

The feedback from students after the trip was really positive. I saw engagement and interest and at points they were so quiet, it was strange for me to see. When we talked about it back at school, 100% of the students surveyed believed it was such an important trip to engage in.

#6: Form hypotheses about teaching actions likely to accelerate student learning.

My thoughts after student feedback, talking to other staff and doing a little bit of research, here are some things I could do:

If students were connected to their learning then they would not less be distracted and more engaged.

• Provide highly engaging relevant lessons with variety linked to what they know
• Create enough down time to do their own work.
• Let students select music which helps them to learn.
• Offer opportunities to do group work and peer work as well as one to one.
• Bring in experts who are engaging and relate to the learning.

If we develop student capability of perspective-taking then we will increase understanding about the relevance and importance of our local curriculum.

• Find and use templates to enable structured perspective -taking
• Design lessons to allow students to engage with relevant perspectives
• Bring in guest speakers to provide authentic perspectives.

If we develop and improve access to local curriculum knowledge and learning then we will increase engagement and a sense of care for the community.

• Design field trips to inspire learning and to connect with the community.
  

If we increase engagement and connectedness, then students will take action to take care of their community.

• Design ways to link the learning to the student and their sense of well-being and identity.

#5: Factors that might contribute to the problem of student learning.

#5. Describe the main hypotheses you developed about factors that might contribute to this problem of student learning (e.g. particular features of teaching or out of school practices that were not as effective as they might be).

Initially the biggest barrier to learning that I identified when surveying students, reading research and literature and talking to staff was that students were easily distracted.   

After digging deeper into why this could be I’ve identified one of the aspects that might impact these distractions could be the disconnectedness students have felt to their learning and to each other because of the pandemic.  This has been especially difficulty for our Maori and Pasifika students who have been ‘harder by the pandemic’ in education.  After two years of uncertainty kids are missing consistency and connectedness in the classroom.  Each child brings their own learning experiences and building a sense of belonging and unity has been difficult. 

When I have reflected on the opportunities that the Aotearoa Histories curriculum allows us, I am mindful of what students need to know at the end of year 8 through the learning progressions.  But I wonder if these need to shift or be modify to cater for the lost time in teaching and learning over the last 2 years.  These progressions are still important to measure success in some way. 

A barrier to learning for my year 9’s is understanding what a perspective is or essentially how to see something from another person or groups’ point of view.  When learning about how people feel about our land for example, kids find it hard to connect because they often don't see themselves in the context.  They also find it difficult to relate to something that has happen a long time ago.  The learnings in the resource 'Rich Learning Opportunities Tool Guidance' have suggested the need to teach essential capabilities such as perspective-taking which helps to 'understand complex issues in our world'.  

My initial hypothesis is: If students were connected to their learning then they would not less be distracted and more engaged.

Because of further research, the hypothesis has become:

If we develop student capability of perspective-taking then we will increase understanding about the relevance and importance of our local curriculum.

If we develop and improve access to local curriculum knowledge and learning then we will increase engagement and a sense of care for the community.

If we increase engagement and connectedness, then students will take action to take care of their community.

I think these are a starting point and may shift and change as I continue on their inquiry journey.