Giving and receiving feedback Blog Stage 2

Much like in blog stage 1, I have found that both giving and receiving feedback has been of great benefit to me.

 

In terms of my feedback to my group members Samantha and Kyra, I have tried as best I can to give them feedback that will help them improve not only their ILA units for their students but also ways in which they can improve their blog posts to better reflect the excellent work they have done throughout the semester.

 

In Samantha’s case I gave feedback in relation to her bibliography suggesting that an extra column be incorporated to include which blog post the item was used in. This I feel will help her readers link different readings to different subjects and make it easier to find what exactly they may be looking for.

 

The advice I gave Kyra was to perhaps think of a different or newer way of doing a “:research journal”. My suggestion was use a blog and make the contents of the journal be more student driven. Instead of giving her students the topics to write in their journal, instead let them write what they want. Another suggestion was to have the students work through theirs and other peoples blogs and leave comments, creating a form of online class discussion about the topic at hand.

 

 

I have not received any feedback at the moment of this post except for Kyra’s suggestion of using the post it note exit card strategy to have my students critically reflect on what they have learned. This is something that I have looked into and might adjust for the future but for the moment I feel that by having them keep it short and simple with these post it note questions/statements I am really seeing what my students are thinking at that moment. Having them use a different exit card to write something critical though would be a good change of pace.

 

I was also very pleased with the feedback I received from Mandy Lupton for my presentation. I have really felt proud of the way in which my students and I have worked through this ILA so far and to have Mandy realise that from only a short presentation meant that I have obviously done a good job.

 

As my ILA is not finished, there is still a number of reflective activities I will need to partake in once it is all done and finished. The first will be a feedback activity that I will have my students fill out. This will include questions about what they learned, what they enjoyed and most importantly for me, what they enjoyed about the way I taught the unit. After this I will have a peer teacher from the school take a look over the work of my students and myself and give me feedback on how they thought the whole process went. That will include looking over this blog and my lesson plans.

 

This type of reflection will only help to strengthen my future practice as teacher.

 

At the end of a long journey

Questionnaire 3

 

1. Take some time to think about your topic. Now write down what you know about it.

 

Nothing has really changed from my previous answers to this question. I have not gained any new insights into inquiry based learning although I have learned a few different models of how it is planned and run.

 

 

 

2. How interested are you in this topic? Check () one box that best matches your interest.

a great deal ☐

 

3. How much do you know about this topic? Check () one box that best matches how much you know.

a great deal ☐

 

4. Thinking back on your research project, what did you find easiest to do? Please mention as many things as you like.

 

I found it easy to plan and create assessment tasks for my students.

I found it easy to justify the reasons why I did certain things.

 

5. Thinking back on your research project, what did you find most difficult to do? Please mention as many things as you like.

 

I did not find anything too hard except the period of time we had.

I found it hard to find other resources other than the ones I already knew to justify my position.

 

 

6. What did you learn in doing this research project?

 

I have learned some excellent new strategies for searching through the internet and other note taking.

I have learned never to underestimate the creative spirit of 12 and 13 year olds.

 

 

7. How do you now feel about your research? Check () one box that best matches how you feel.

Happy – I’m really happy with how it turned out ☐

Where to next with the ILA?

What worked

 

There were three things that I feel have worked extremely well so far in my ILA and they are:

1. The use of ICT’s to create a new and exciting work space for the students. Most of their work in school is centred around book work or in creating something that needs to be physically handed in. Giving the students the chance to work entirely in the digital world has allowed them to use their own knowledge about the internet and its tool to create some really great pieces of work.
2. The extra time I put into teaching the students how to research properly. This was something I added after the first questionnaire. Ever since these lessons and along with some small group work on note taking, the students all feel much better about their ability to not only find lots of information but also find the correct information that is relevant to their task at hand.
3. Finally, I have been pleased with the extra formative work I plotted out for the students to help them better prepare themselves for picking their own creative way to present their work. Because I have placed such a huge emphasis on the children experimenting with many different presentation web 2.0 tools I have been able to see some fantastic and really individualised work from my students where in the past I may have just seen 27 variations of the same poster or power point presentation.

 

What did not work

 

To be honest, there is not really anything that did not work, although there are things I would do differently that I will talk about later in the post. All the tasks so far have been engaging and the students have enjoyed it. My lessons have led to some great discussions and there has not been anything that on reflection has been missing or needed extra work. All in all I have been very pleased with the ILA so far.

 

What I would do differently

 

Although the unit so far has been a complete success and something that I will use again with another group of students in future years, there is still a number of things that I could do to not change, but augment the current plan as is.

• Add something to the very start of the the unit to help engage my students quicker. The results from the first questionnaire showed that nearly half the students were not too excited about the topic at the start of the unit. However these same students soon changed their minds in questionnaire 2. This shows me that the work is engaging and interesting but that I did not introduce the topic in as stimulating way as I could have. Whether that involves some sort of excursion to perhaps the museum or maybe a talk from a leader in the community or school (Local party member or principle of the school?). By engaging my students quicker and getting them excited sooner the discussions we are having now could be made even deeper for the next group.
• Have the students do more work in groups. This does not be an assessment task but could be simple role plays or discussions based on questions I asked. I feel that the unit is good but it does lean more towards individual work. This needs to change because leadership requires both leaders and followers and by creating small groups in my classroom we could start to see and comment on certain leadership roles being created and changed every day.
• As I said in a previous blog post, I want to move even further away from giving my students answers. This is not something I would change in the ILA but more what I would change about my teaching methodology. There are times when I need to give explicit instruction but there were multiple times when I simply gave the students the answers. I need to find the correct balance.

How does the ILA fit?

Curriculum

 

My ILA did not fit into the Australian Curriculum as it stands now, but relates to outcomes 3.3 and 4.3 from the Health and Physical Education Learning Area in the South Australian Curriculum (SACSA, 2007) that is still being used until the Australian Curriculum is fully implemented.

 

In terms of the Australian Curriculum however, there are some key aspects that my ILA has seized upon in the Australian Curriuclum. Those two things are these.

 

“Activities that foster critical and creative thinking should include both independent and collaborative tasks, and entail some sort of transition or tension between ways of thinking. They should be challenging and engaging, and contain approaches that are within the ability range of the learners, but also challenge them to think logically, reason, be open-minded, seek alternatives, tolerate ambiguity, inquire into possibilities, be innovative risk-takers and use their imagination.” (ACARA 1, 2011)

 

“Students develop knowledge, skills and dispositions around ICT and its use, and the ability to transfer these across environments and applications. They learn to use ICT with confidence, care and consideration, understanding its possibilities, limitations and impact on individuals, groups and communities.” (ACARA 2, 2011)

 

The first quote deals with the way in which my students have been asked to think critically, not only about the information they have found, but also about the way in which they wish to present that information. The overriding question of my ILA means that there is no right or wrong answer, the students have struggled with this concept but have over the course of the unit really come to understand that they have been challenged to make up their mind and form an opinion. By giving them the chance to become risk takers and creative with their presentation I have hopefully given them the confidence to justify their thinking and reasoning behind their answer to the question of “Are great leaders made or born?”

 

The second quote deals with the heavy influence of ICT in my unit. Nearly everything we in this unit, outside of discussion is based entirely on computers. Students are creating digital pieces of artwork, using in depth research strategies and constantly communicating their ideas and beliefs through the use of a personal blog. Not only am I giving them a chance to work in the digital field and with multiple types of ICT, but I am also teaching them how to be respectful towards other on the internet while giving them the tools to be future online collaborators in blogs and wikis of their own.

 

Kath Murdoch’s Inquiry Method

 

In my inquiry based approach to teaching the students have been given a chance to go through different stages of learning. Kath Murdoch (1998) has labelled these sections as Tuning in, finding out, sorting out and going further. Each of these stages, except for going further, will have assessment tasks mixed in with class and homework. Each stage involves a different kind of thinking and engagement.

 

Tuning In: In this stage the students are introduced to the subject but not given any new information about it. Instead this is the time where questions are instead asked of the students. What do they know about the subject? What do they want to know about the subject? In this section of our ILA the students were given the alphabet key task where they were asked to name a leader for each letter of the alphabet. This allowed them to see how many leaders they did, or did not know while also getting g them excitied or engaged by teasing them with the knowledge they already know. This section of our ILA was also when we started our class blogs and started to really get some essential questions for the entire unit mapped out together as a class.

 

Finding Out: This section of the model requires the students to start researching by themselves. In this stage they are given multiple tasks that allow them to research as many different subjects as possible so that when the time comes to choose their final research topic, they can select from anything they have spent the time “finding out” about. The ILA my class has been working on has involved a lot of small research questions and tasks that are mostly open ended so that there is minor limitations on the research they can do.

 

Sorting Out: In this section of Murdochs Model, the students are asked to sort out all the information they found in the last section and start to focus their attention on one topic. This is the final stage that is assessed and culminates in an assessment piece of the students choice.

 

Overall by using Kath Murdoch’s inquiry model I feel that this unit of work is both informative and important for the students. Not only that but it is tailored to them as digital natives (O’Connell et al. 2010) and is hopefully creating a “learning space where students can enjoy democratic social interaction with mediators and mentors, allowing the conversation to flow between formal and informal zones” (O’Connell et al. 2010) By choosing an inquiry based pedagogy the teacher can also act as that mediator between students as they question and investigate the aspects of leadership that interest them the most. Importantly “the emphasis in the inquiry approach moves from the view that knowledge is something that is taught to knowledge as learned” (Murdoch, 1998, p.5).

 

Blooms Revised Taxonomy

 

 

My students, through their work in this unit have up to this date shown a real mix of higher order and lower order thinking skills when it comes to blooms taxonomy. Some of my students (The “keys to leadership” example from another blog post) clearly is already in the Evaluating and Creating. She has not only found information, filtered it for what she needs but has managed to create an individual and highly creative way to show her findings.

 

Other students are still further down the order in the understanding and applying stages as they are still sorting out their information and struggling to find ways in which to express their own thinking without simply retelling facts they have found. This is still acceptable however because those students do not want to simply restate facts but are actively exploring ways in which to better analyse their information.

 

Perhaps the most encouraging part of the ILA so far is that there is very few students still in the remembering stage. Most of the students are looking to find out their own answers and with the exception of one or two students most want to think deeper about this topic and are not happy to simply follow the crowd. As a teacher I have been very pleased with the way in which my students have participated in this unit of work.

 

References

 

• ACARA 1. (2011). Critical and Creative Thinking. Retrieved November 1, 2012, from http://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/GeneralCapabilities/Critical-and-creative-thinking/Introduction/Background
• ACARA 2. (2011). Scope of ICT Capability. Retrieved November 1, 2012, from http://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/GeneralCapabilities/Information-and-Communication-Technology-capability/Introduction/Scope-of-ICT-capability
• Murdoch K. (1998), Classroom Connections: Strategies for Integrated Learning, Eleanor Curtain Publishing, Praharn
• O’Connell, Judy and Groom, Dean. (2010). Connect, communicate, collaborate : learning in a changing world, Camberwell: ACER
• SACSA (2007). Health and Physical Education Learning Area. Retrieved November 1, 2012 from http://www.sacsa.sa.edu.au/ATT/%7BF51C47E3-B6F3-4765-83C3-0E27FF5DD952%7D/R-10_H&PE.pdf

 

What action was taken?

After Questionnaire 1

 

After the results of questionnaire 1 were collected and analysed and along with my own observations and the statements and questions on the exit card post it notes I chose to adjust my ILA program by making two changes.

 

1. To extend the unit by an extra week so that I could give the students some explicit instruction on how to both use information search engines such as Google and Bing along with also spending some time in the library researching some random topics in the library. These lessons did not follow an inquiry method, instead were completely teacher driven and their purpose was to teach my students the needed experience and skills in research that they did not have before.
2. The second change I made was to add in another formative task that involved my students picking their own form of presentation. This task was added because the students had shown no ability to move forward with their major task as they were not used to having so much freedom in terms of their creativity and so I wanted to let them have a task that was not super important (not graded) to their grades but would allow them to experiment and try different things.

 

After Questionnaire 2

I decided not to make many changes to my ILA after questionnaire 2 because I truly feel that my ILA is moving along at the perfect pace. My students are engaged and enjoying the work and with the addition of extra explicit work on researching and note taking I have started to see a real relevance in the type of information that my students are finding instead of the big blocks of text they were finding before. Instead of changing the ILA I decided to focus on two things that I as a teacher can work on to make sure the ILA continues to move ahead in the correct manner.

1. First is to give less explicit instruction to my students and become more a guiding figure. I still find myself giving my information the information too much instead of challenging them to do the research themselves.
2. The second thing I want to do is continue to work on note taking and research skills, but to do it with more of a focus. This would include taking students in small teacher directed sessions where we work on a specific aspect of note taking or research that I know those 4-8 students are not comfortable with.

What does it all mean?

Results from Questionnaire 1 (10 subjects)

 

Take some time to think about your topic. Now write down what you know about it.

Relevant Answers:

• Leaders are strong.
• Leaders need to be organised.
• Some people are just naturally good leaders

How interested are you in this topic?

• 2 voted “A great deal”
• 4 voted “quite a lot”
• 4 voted “not much”

How much do you know about this topic?

• 1 voted “A great deal”
• 1 voted “quite alot”
• 6 voted “not much”
• 3 voted “nothing”

Analysis

 

There are a number of interesting points that I was able to take out from the first section of the questionnaire.

• They are starting to recognise the traits of good leadership.
• Students see good leaders as a product of birth, not experience.
• Not many of the students are excited or engaged with the topic.
• Students know very little about the subject.

 

When you do research, what do you generally find easy to do? Please mention as many things as you like.

Relevant Answers:

• Ask a teacher
• Find out facts

When you do research, what do you generally find difficult to do? Please mention as many things as you like.

Relevant Answers:

• Use Google.
• Find information in books.
• Remember everything.

 

Analysis

This is the most important section of the questionnaire and this information is what gave me the most input when it came to making changes to my ILA. The important facts that came out of this questionnaire for me were:

• Students are still reliant on myself, as the teacher, to direct them and give them the answers.
• Students find it hard to find facts when left to themselves.
• Google is not seen as a resource, instead many students find it hard to sift through and filter through all the search results.
• To go along with this, students are unable to find and locate relevant information in books.
• Students find it hard to remember everything they research.

 

These points lead me to believe that the students have had little to no training in effective note taking, instead relying on information to be readily available to them from a teacher or parental figure. This is reflected in the fact that many base their research around “asking” for help instead of actively finding the information themselves.

 

 

Results from Questionnaire 2 (10 subjects)

 

Take some time to think about your topic. Now write down what you know about it.

Relevant Answers:

• Some leaders are natural leaders and some seem to grow into it.
• Leaders make a difference
• It is hard being a leader
• Not all leaders are liked

How interested are you in this topic?

• 4 voted “A great deal”
• 4 voted “quite a lot”
• 1 voted “not much”
• 1 voted “not at all”

How much do you know about this topic?

• 3 voted “A great deal”
• 4 voted “quite alot”
• 2 voted “not much”
• 1 voted “nothing”

Analysis

Important notes taken from these questions:

• Students are starting to question their original thoughts about leadership
• Students are starting to think deeper about what being a leader means. They are moving beyond just the traits of good leadership and starting to look at the ramifications of being a good leader.
• Students have become more engaged with the topic.
• Students are starting to feel confident about their own knowledge in the subject matter.

 

Thinking of your research so far – what did you find easy to do? Please mention as many things as you like.

Relevant Answers:

• Decide who to do my research on.
• Find lots of information about my leader.

Thinking of your research so far – what did you find difficult to do? Please mention as many things as you like.

Relevant Answers:

• Find the right information.
• How to write down the information properly.
• Stay on task.

Analysis

Important notes taken from these questions:

• Students find it easy to decide who to do their research on and to find lots of information about that leader.
• The students, despite being able to find lots of information about their chosen leader, are still struggling to filter the relevant information from the non-relevant.
• Students are also struggling with how to present that information and turn it into their own words.
• Students are finding it hard to stay on task because of the independent nature of the work and a lack of time management ability.

 

How do you feel about your research so far?

• 2 voted “frustrated”
• 1 voted “overwhelmed”
• 1 voted “confused”
• 7 voted “confident”

 

Analysis

The group as a whole feels quite confident with how they are going. From my own observations of the students when researching and working on the task, I believe that more of these students are in the frustrated column but were worried about my reaction if they put that down.

 

Observation Analysis

Students started off the unit a little flat. First class discussion about the question, “Are great leaders born or made?” was one sided with nearly the entire class believing that leaders are born as great leaders. Due to this belief when questions were asked of them students felt they already had the answer and did not want to think any more about it.

 

Students have really struggled with finding information for themselves. Most of the students expected to be given all the information and then try to sift through it, much like a comprehension activity. When taken to the computer room for a research lesson, students were unable to properly use Google, mostly resorting to typing in full questions such as “When was Alexander the Great born and where?”. These type of search strategies led to frustration which quickly turned into apathy as the students gave up.

 

After giving the students some explicit instruction on how to use google properly, students were able to find information much easier. The more capable students thrived and enjoyed tutoring their struggling friends.

 

The students became stressed when given too much freedom in choosing their form of presentation. Many of them wanted to fall back on a simple poster or power point presentation. New formative tasks were created and given to the students to help them explore other options. The students were told that these tasks would not be graded (other than effort) and that it was their chance to experiment with as many presentation styles as they liked. Some of the results were amazing and the students have really started to embrace the freedom that they first were worried about.

 

 

This is an example of one students work. The task was to present what they have learnt about leadership using a web 2.0 tool. This student used the tool survey monkey to survey the entire class, asking them to write down the three words they believe described a good leader. From these results, she used the tool tagxedo to create a word cloud in the shape of key using all the words the students chose.

 

She called this presentation “The Keys to Leadership” and it could possibly be my favourite piece of work a student has ever done for me.

 

Exit Cards Analysis

At the end of certain lessons each student was given a post it note. They could either choose to write a question that they wanted an answer to or they could write down something that they learnt that lesson.

 

This started off quite hard to push onto the students and the first few times this strategy was used the students would only write down something they learned.

 

As the unit has progressed though, the students have started to ask more and more questions and some of these questions have then led to great class and group discussions. The students have even asked that if we use the same strategy again if I could create a wall for them to post their questions onto in the classroom so they can see what others have asked. This is a great idea and something that we have started to do already.

Where did it all come from?

First of all, it is important to note that my ILA has not actually finished yet. Time constraints within the school along with extra curricular activities for my students such as festival choir along with growth and development sessions have meant I have had to push my ILA timetable backwards. The due date for the final assessment my students will hand in to me is Thursday November 15^th. This means that my information is still continuing to filter in and over the course of this blog I will try to explain as much of the data as possible.

 

What is the data however? So far I have collected numerous different types of data, which you can see below.

• Questionnaire 1 & 2
• Photos of students work
• Observations
• Exit cards from students.

 

Questionnaire 1 & 2: These were completed by the students roughly 1/3^rd and 2/3^rd’s of the way through the ILA. Students were sent home with a letter from myself to the parents asking for permission to survey their students with the knowledge that their names and the name of the school would never become known. Despite this, only 10 of the 27 students returned the notice so those were the 10 that I surveyed. This data was used to get a general feeling of the students attitudes towards both the topic and the workload set for them.

 

Photos of students works: A number of photos of students work was collected and stored. Some of these works were summative, but most were formative assessment tasks that helped me determine how far along the students were with the inquiry process. By giving a lot of formative assessment tasks I was able to adapt and change the summative tasks so that the students had a better way to communicate their learning and new found knowledge about leadership.

EXAMPLE OF STUDENT WORK

Observations: Throughout the entire ILA process I have been collecting notes on each student. This has taken the form of a simple excel sheet that looks very similar to the example below. This has allowed me to see the whole class and the different aspects of the ILA in a simple snapshot.

 

Note: This is a fabrication example. None of these names are real and the grades are not based on any students.

 

Name of Student	Research Skills	Understanding	Attitude to topic
Steven	At standard	Above Standard	At standard
Bethany	Below standard	At standard	Above Standard
Joanna	Below standard	Below standard	Below standard

 

Exit Cards from Students: A simple yet extremely helpful way to end lessons. At the end of certain lessons each student was given a post it note. They could either choose to write a question that they wanted an answer to or they could write down something that they learnt that lesson. These were then handed in to me at the end of the lesson. These helped me determine what my students did and did not know along with helping me plan future lessons and also gave them a chance to solidify their own thoughts or try to expand on them by asking questions they don’t know the answers to.

ILA Presentation

Here is my presentation of y ILA results. Hope you enjoy.

 

Critical reflection on giving and receiving feedback

Giving and Receiving Feedback Critical Reflection

 

Giving and receiving feedback can be both a rewarding and frustrating task. The rewards include a better understanding of the task through peer criticism and observation while the frustrations can come when feedback is ambiguous and not critical or focused enough.

Taking this into consideration I found that giving feedback on the blog posts of Kyra Stewart to be a rewarding process as I feel I was able to give effective feedback that had a purpose and focus. I feel that my feedback on her ILA proposal in particular should be of a great value to her moving forward. I was able to use my own knowledge of inquiry based planning to help give practical suggestions on how she could move the learning further into the hands of her students via giving them a choice of research topics while also mixing her unit into her everyday classroom instead of merely keeping it enclosed within the library walls.

The feedback I received from Samantha was short but pointed me in the right direction on how to improve and adjust my blog in the future so that if future employers search my digital footprint they will be faced with my learning journey here. I really liked her idea of a table showing my search history and this will be something I look to include when time permits to really round off the expert search sections of my blog.

Finally, in the reading by Black and Williams (2004) found in my annotated bibliography I was interested in a feedback strategy which they labelled the “hamburger method”. This was a form of verbal feedback that could easily be transported into the written form. Basically it describes the feedback you give as a hamburger. The two buns on the outside are complements about the work while the meat in the middle, the most important part of the burger, is the criticism.

A very short example of this feedback would be.

“I really liked the way your titles were clear to understand and easy to find. However your body of text under these titles was sometimes not in line with the title itself. Despite this your framework for your blog is fantastic and with small tweaks to the information you could really improve it.”

In the above fabricated example, I have given feedback in a complement, criticism, complement manner. I am unsure if this feedback strategy would be successful with older students but it is something I will be looking to test out in my own classroom in the near future with my grade 6 and 7 students.

Looking Forward – Questionnaire 2

Questionnaire 2

 

1. Take some time to think about your topic. Now write down what you know about it.

 

• Setting up an inquiry based classroom can be a long and hard process. Particularly if the students are used to having there information given to them.
• Teachers role is to be the facilitator of the information instead of the giver.
• Students are taught to be self sufficient learners.
• The end goal of any inquiry unit should be for the students to have learnt something that interests them and that they want to learn about instead of something they feel they learn because they “have to”
• Assessment and learning is collaborative between the teacher and student.

 

2. How interested are you in this topic? Check () one box that best matches your interest.

 

quite a bit

 

3. How much do you know about this topic? Check () one box that best matches how much you know.

quite a bit

 

4 . Thinking of your research so far – what did you find easy to do? Please mention as many things as you like.

• Plan my ILA.
• Find resources explaining what inquiry based learning is

 

5. Thinking of your research so far – what did you find difficult to do? Please mention as many things as you like.

• Finding resources that help me set up an inquiry based classrooms
• Find resources that link between my ILA focus question and inquiry based methodologies.

6 . How do you feel about your research so far? Check () one box that best matches how you feel.

 

Confused – I don’t really know what I’m looking for