Current Issues in my Professional Context

Step 1: Identify the socioeconomic status of the community, organisational culture and professional environments. Use the following questions to guide your thoughts:

• Is there any statistical data that indicates the socioeconomic status of your school’s community? What does it tell you about the characteristics of the community?

Randell, G. (2012, July 17). Paparoa Street School - 17/07/2012. Retrieved February 11, 2017, from http://www.ero.govt.nz/review-reports/paparoa-street-school-17-07-2012/

This extract from our last ERO review shows some of the information about my school's socio-economic status. We are a decile ten, large, contributing primary school in urban Christchurch. The ERO report also shows the ethnicity make-up of the school. The majority of students identify as NZ European/Pāhekā. This combines to show the school is in an affluent area of town. According to Ministry of Education (2016) "decile 1 schools are the 10% of schools with the highest proportion of students from low socio-economic communities, whereas decile 10 schools are the 10% of schools with the lowest proportion of these students." The website also states that deciles are calculated based on Census data including household income and occupation. Therefore, a decile 10 rating shows that most adult members of our school community are employed in 'professional' jobs.

This information tells me that the children and parents in our community generally are from affluent backgrounds. The children live in comfortable, uncrowded homes with professional parents. As highly-educated parents, our parental community expects a high quality education for their children and are proactive in ensuring they receive it. The school is generally well supported by parents and the wider community. 

• What is the culture that the school is striving for? How is it manifested?

In Academy for SELinSchools' video (2015) Trushiem argues that if not actively developed school culture will occur by default. He states that a positive school culture occurs when a leader (usually the principal) along with key followers actively steer the school towards a certain kind of culture. In the same video Dunkelblau states the importance of staff in building a positive school culture. He states that children and families cycle through schools however staff are generally the consistent entity. I think this is particularly true in my school as we have had a high turnover of staff and leadership recently however the present staff and leadership are committed to building a positive school culture for children and teachers.

As a large primary school we pride ourselves on our family-based culture. Staff are encouraged to work with a range of children in the school through collaboration, mixed groupings, house events and social events. This enables staff to get to know many of the children in the school not just those they teach. This is also manifested through a wide range of whole-school activities e.g. assemblies, house day, sports events, reading groups and extra-curricular clubs. 

As a staff we have embraced a collaborative, open culture and now all work in fully collaborative environments. While this has come with challenges I think overall our school culture reflects many of Stoll's (1998) Norms of Improving Schools.

1. Shared goals— “we know where we’re going” - As a school and wider community we have mapped where we want our children to go with their learning by the time they leave our school. 

2. Responsibility for success— “we must succeed”- A collaborative teaching culture has meant that we feel jointly responsible for helping our children succeed in their learning. 

3. Collegiality— “we’re working on this together” - By working in collaborative groups or pairings there is a stronger sense of team in the school and a feeling of having someone 'in it' with you. 

4. Continuous improvement— “we can get better” - The culture of the staff and students is one of continuous improvement. While we celebrate success we always look at our next steps. 

5. Lifelong learning— “learning is for everyone” - This phrase is in our school motto! A pathway for lifelong learners. 

6. Risk taking— “we learn by trying something new” - Through our COPs groups we have been encouraged to try new things. This message is now filtering through our community to our parents and therefore becoming part of our culture. 

• How would you describe the professional environment in your school?

The professional environment of my school is well-supported. We are encouraged to increase our professional knowledge by networking with other teachers and schools as well as undertaking further research. As a staff we have worked hard to promote an open professional environment through the introduction of collaborative classrooms. We also use community of practice groups to share our professional successes and concerns. 

Step 2: Analyse the issues around the socioeconomic status of the community, the school culture and professional environments. Use these following questions to guide your thoughts:

• What issues arose from the socio-economic status of your school’s community? How is it similar or different from those of similar socio-economic status? How have the issues been addressed?

Recently our biggest issue that has arisen from our socio-economic status is around the concept of collaborative teaching. Two years ago we introduced collaborative teaching teams which was met with some resistance from our community. This was largely due to an idea that Martin & Terblanche (2003) identify as organisational culture. 

“Organisational culture is manifested in the typical characteristics of the organisation. It therefore refers to a set of basic assumptions that worked so well in the past that they are accepted as valid assumptions within the organisation…. The components of routine behaviour, norms, values, philosophy, rules of the game and feelings all form part of organisational culture”.

Many of our parents are highly educated themselves and hold a certain view on how education should look based on their own experiences. Talking to other high decile schools they have faced similar challenges when introducing collaboration. Lower decile schools seem to have had less resistance as there seems to be a feeling of 'the experts' i.e. teachers' know what they are doing in these communities. A trait of high decile communities is expecting the best and questioning changes. Our highly educated parents feel more empowered to question the decisions of other highly-educated professionals. However, this also worked to help build a solution as our community has the resources and willingness to access research and further information through experts to understand the reasons behind collaboration. 

• What issues arose from the professional environments in your school? How these issues impact on your practice? How have the issues been addressed?

Personally I have not had any issues with the professional environment in my school. I think through our developing open culture issues are often discussed and reworked to best suit everyone.

References:

Academy for SELinSchools. (2015, Apr 28). What is school culture and climate? [video file].Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-_NvhlcusQ

Martins, E.C. & Terblanche, F. (2003). Building organisational culture that stimulates creativity and innovation. European Journal of Innovation Management, 6(1), 64 - 74.

Ministry of Education (2016, November 29). School deciles. Retrieved February 11, 2017, from http://www.education.govt.nz/school/running-a-school/resourcing/operational-funding/school-decile-ratings/

Randell, G. (2012, July 17). Paparoa Street School - 17/07/2012. Retrieved February 11, 2017, from http://www.ero.govt.nz/review-reports/paparoa-street-school-17-07-2012/

Stoll. (1998). School Culture. School Improvement Network’s Bulletin 9. Institute of Education, University of London. Retrieved from http://www.educationalleaders.govt.nz/Culture/Understanding-school-cultures/School-Culture

My community of practice

Knox (2009) defines a community of practice as a group of people who share a passion for something they know how to do and who interact regularly to learn how to do it better. I feel this definition reflects my community of practice closely as my community is predominantly made up of teachers who are committed to learning how to provide the best education they can. 

Within my workplace I am a member of several communities of practice:

• my collaborative team
• my syndicate team
• mixed-team COPs groups

All of these groups share the same common purpose - how can we make learning better for our students - but examine this issue from different perspectives. 

Wenger (2000) states communities of practice must have three key elements to succeed, joint enterprise, mutuality and shared repertoire. He argues that through the community's joint enterprise or purpose the community builds a sense of being a competent practitioner. In my community of practice our joint enterprise is the desire to improve learning for our children. Depending on which specific community I am working in this may be more specific, e.g. improving literacy learning for children. Wenger (2000) and Knox (2009) both highlight the importance of mutuality or relationships within a community of practice. Knox (2009) states the relationship between members of a community creates a sense of belonging while Wenger (2000) explains these relationships create a sense of accountability and trust. In my community of practice, I have different relationships with different members. For example, my collaborative partner and I have a relationship built on trust and honesty that has developed over time. In other groups I am still getting to know the participants and building this relationship. A key aspect of communities of practice is to meet and discuss knowledge and ideas regularly. I feel my community of practice is very strong in this as we are always reflecting on progress and discussing how we could change our practice to increase progress further. 

The final aspect of communities of practice researchers discuss is the concept of a shared repertoire being built. In my community of practice this has been an invaluable resource to me as I seek to improve my own practice. Through our regular discussions our community has shared ideas and programmes that have worked well in different classrooms as well as evaluating programmes members are currently trying. This has led to a set of resources and ideas that all members can use if desired. 

When reflecting on my community of practice I was surprised to feel very connected to my professional community. Entering a new school year has given us the opportunity to take some slow brain time to reflect on our own practice and then return to school and share these reflections with members of my community. Although this has not been done in a formal meeting I think the informal sharing and debating has strengthened our community further. I have also been reflecting on my role in my community of practice. I always considered myself a very new member of the community however I have come to the realisation that I am one of the longest serving members of our community now! This caused me to reflect on my role and how I interact within community discussions. I feel more confident now to lead discussions and question members to help them reflect. I initially found this very hard and sought the guidance of more experienced members however now I am (surprisingly!) one of the more experienced members I am looking forward to stepping into this 'helper' role more. I think this is also reflective of how much I contribute to group discussions. In the first year of my teaching career I think I probably said 10 words during group meetings! However, now I feel I am one of the more vocal members. I think this is also a reflection of growth in my own confidence as a teacher and more clarity around my personal beliefs and pedagogy. 

Knox, B. (2009, December 4).Cultivating Communities of Practice: Making Them Grow.[video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhMPRZnRFkk

Wenger, E.(2000).Communities of practice and social learning systems.Organization,7(2), 225-246 

SAMR and TPACK Models

This is a great video explaining the different stages of the SAMR model.

In my practice I have been thinking about the way I integrate technology into the classroom. I have tried really hard to move away from the substitution stage of replacing paper with technology. In some cases some of the tasks we do are still at the substitution level (e.g. typing responses to questions) however I'm trying to develop activities at higher levels. Activities at each stage I have tried are

Augmentation:

- using google forms to collate student voice
- using google forms to create reading comprehension tasks
- using Kahoot as a summative assessment tool
- reading e-books and embedding links to comprehension tasks
- using Hapara to share work with students and students to share work with me
- students using spell check and thesaurus tools

Modification


- students collaborating on shared docs through Google Docs
- presented mind maps through Google Slides
- created multi-media presentations through Google Slides

My next goal is to increase the amount of modification I plan for and work towards redefinition in my classroom.

Useful links:

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1AaLZ5diqSdCEtlb7Mok2uQuwAAOvYImJOG32T5_I7Rw/edit#slide=id.g539cd07ab_2273

http://dailygenius.com/integrate-google-apps-with-the-samr-model/

http://ditchthattextbook.com/2014/04/03/10-ways-to-reach-samrs-redefinition-level/


Modification ideas:

- using comments function to annotate a piece of text