No, Not another Lecture!

Here we are in term 2 and our collaborative inquiry groups have had a re-shuffle.
We have 4 wonderful  PD providers whom I was able to book in for our meeting afternoons, so teachers have been regrouped to make the most of the professional development that suits them.

This is has become a very high PD input term, and not what teaching inquiry is supposed to be so heavily based on. I will have to make sure this is redressed next term. What is also a concern with top down PD, is the impact is has (or doesn't have) on learning for teachers.

This Learning pyramid (from the National Training Laboratory, Bethel Maine), shows different retention rates for training.

What we need to do is make sure that we don't waste teachers' time, and lose opportunities for learning by providing the wrong type of PD. This also applies to  the clever experts we bring in to support out teachers.




The different content areas for the collaborative group meetings include

• Jannie Van Hees and her research into dialogic classrooms and explicit teaching or writing for year 5-8 students.
• GaTE definitions and provisions from Core Education aimed at specialist teachers and middle-senior students
• Junior Literacy acquisition for low decile schools
• Rubrics for success with Dorothy Burt

This is also supported by PD provided to the staff as a whole in staff meetings on blogging, the SAMR model, and SOLO.

Our PD training is aimed at the top 5 levels, and we are lucky to be able to draw on wonderful trainers and experts from within the school as well as externally to deliver this. My challenge now is to ensure there is practise by doing and teachers sharing this learning.