Megan Bassett

Next steps on the path of a life long learner.

Month: October 2020

C2C Conference

October 26, 2020 / / 0 Comments

I was fortunate to be able to attend the C2C conference this past Friday. One of the most influential sessions that I got to participate in was the “How Do We Know” taking place-based learning outside.

 

The learning:

The first thing that was highlighted during this session was the importance of creating core routines to make learning outside productive. I feel like we have all experienced teachers trying to take students outside with a specific goal, but because the students were not use to it or did not have all their instructions, yet the kids went crazy. The routine that the leaders laid:

  • Land acknowledgement – Connecting students to the place they are in and bringing attention to was here before.
  • Remind students of the purpose of the excursion and set up the boundaries and expectations.
  • Utilize all the senses.
  • Pre-teaching – Highlights the intent or purpose of the excursion, and the reason it is best done outside the classroom.
  • Debriefing – what did they learn from the excursion and why is it important
  • Risk Assessment – Either created by the teacher or with the help of students as well.

I found this was a useful list, as I have never tried to take students outside. However, I feel like I it would be easy to forget to do all of these things. What stood out to me the most, or what I will take forward is the importance of the pre-teachings. I think this resonates to me because I was one of those students who liked to stay inside and would be always wondering why we are bothering to go outside. So, I think it is important to explain the reason for the activity being outside. I would also like to highlight the mental health aspects of going outside. I haven’t researched into the effects of being in nature, but I felt it when I started taking walks during the pandemic, and it is a practice that I have made a daily necessity.

 

The activity:

The activity that we did in this session was to go outside and find evidence of autumn or winter. Using what ever means you want, including taking examples, samples, or pictures, video etc.

The leaders explained that even this simple of an activity can hit on many different curricular competencies depending on what kind of pre-teaching and debriefing that you give the class. For example, this activity can meet competencies  including scientific method, scientific inquiry, interpreting local environment, assessment of qualitative and quantitative data,  experiencing and interpreting local environment,  and even conservation.

The assessment:

Lastly, they showed us some examples of how to assess this assignment.

  • 4-point quantitative scale based on the number of observations that students brought back to class.
  • 4-point qualitative scale ranked based on student’s quality, depth of description and observations.
  • Single point scale where students rank their effort and quality of data based on examples set out by the teach

However, they emphasized that  there was no specific way to assess this activity. It could have fallen under either formative or summative depending on the intent behind the lesson and where it fell within the unit or semester. .

Personally, I feel like activities similar would be a formative activity because adding time limitation and a grade may take away to the experience. Whereas, I would like students to engage in using all of their senses to explore the world, and find their evidence. For example, referring back to Dr. Pink’s video on motivation, when motivation is reward based people usually preform worse to the task, and for some reason it shuts down creativity. So,  making it a summative assessment may inhibit the students ability to perceive the world in the same way.

On the other hand,  the way I would approach summative activities would be with a more controlled way or with  a backup plan, so if they didn’t find something they could still complete the rest of it.  Some examples that my break out group thought of that I plan on using in the future was  thin layer chromatography with leaf extracts to examine pigments, and making mushroom prints on paper and then examining their spores with the microscope. These can have a planned back up where there are samples that the students can use that I already had collected.

Overall this was a very instructive and thought provoking session!

My views on Curriculum and Assessment

October 26, 2020 / / 0 Comments

I have gone through high school, my undergrad and currently the education program; and I have seen a variety of ways that our educators have presented, motivated, and graded their curriculum.

During elementary school and high school, the content of the curriculum was presented as a product. The view of curriculum as a product refers to the idea that there were specific objectives that students had to meet. This led to teaching of specific set of information set up through specific learning experiences and then a specific grading criterion. The way in which I experienced this was with the mannnny work sheets through elementary school and mannny textbook practice problems through high school, that allowed us as student to output the product of our learning (content of the curriculum).

In university, I felt that the curriculum was similar that it had a rigid structure of content, grading, and learning intentions. However, the way that it was outlined was different. In university, the curriculum was viewed as a syllabus. This means that the curriculum was listed in the syllabus, very specifically in what topic would be covered, in what order, with what assessment. Whereas, in elementary and high school because these outlines were not always evident.

In the education program, we have looked at the way that curriculum is being taught today in the new (to me) BC curriculum. During this examination it seems that this curriculum is a praxis. Praxis, meaning that the curriculum is a flexible, movable, set of ideas where teachers want to achieve certain things in the classroom but there is room for growth and differentiation. For example, this curriculum highlights a teacher’s ability to be adaptable and reactive to what is going on in their classrooms. The teachers must act in response to the children learning. Then critically assess moving forward with a lesson, go back if they don’t get it, build off it if is going really well; in order to foster student’s inquiry and experimentation. Furthermore, the teacher must try and appeal to student’s intrinsic motivation- or desire to learn for the sake of learning.

The BC curriculum being a praxis allow for us to move away from the reward-based motivation system that is typically associated with curriculum structured as product or syllabus. Daniel Pink mentioned that reward-based learning is not enough to motivate and can even inhibit a person’s ability to reform a task. This idea of trying to get a reward takes over our ability to think critically. I have experienced this. In high school, I had one math teacher who would put a riddle, puzzle, or word problem on the board. The fastest one to solve the problem would get a candy. But I felt every time I would become flustered and couldn’t really think past the first way, I tried the problem.

After watching Daniel Pink’s video, I thought of how students probably feel when they are writing tests, where the stakes are a lot higher than a piece of candy.  When scholarships, GPA, and post secondary admission are on the line, a student is probably inhibiting their own ability to write that test from stress and anxiety alone. So, it makes sense how test anxiety be such a prevalent issue in our school system. I think it is for this reason that there has a been a push towards more formative and gradeless assessment. However, what I really wonder about is how you still produce summative assessment without grades. Since using words like “extending” compared to “A” or “86” can seem to mean the same thing when the grading system has been ingrained in our expectation of school. I think that there will have to be a real cognitive shift in teachers, kids, and parents in order to get to a point where it becomes second nature.

For now, as I continue to learn about assessment and curriculum, I think I would use a lot of formative assessment. Allowing kids to learn, receive feedback, and adapt. I don’t feel a student has to be summative assessed while they are learning, because knowing myself, I don’t want to be judged on something I have not had time to wrap my mind around. However, at the end of a unit or what not, I think coming up with a variety of ways for students to show their learning will make it more accessible than just a test. We know every student is different and should have an opportunity to represent their learning in a way that is meaningful to them.

One month in to my BEd- and I’ve learned a lot.

October 8, 2020 / / 2 Comments

One month in the teaching program, and it has been nothing like my undergraduate degree.

Biggest learning experiences about teaching and learning.

First, the teaching program is structured in a pass / fail system. What I found the most interesting about the pass / fail system is that it has made me a lot more open to learning. I feel removing the concept of grades takes off the pressure of trying to be perfect. Which in turn allows you to be able to learn and internalize the material in a meaningful way.

I found in my undergraduate degree that most students were working towards getting into the medical program, dentistry, etc. So, it had a highly competitive culture around test scores, presentations, and overall grade point average. Since the focus was on the grades rather than the learning, I felt like information that we learned was memorized and regurgitated on the test, and then dumped out of your head to make room for the next set of content. Furthermore, I found that I was closed off and unreceptive to doing anything outside of content that would be tested. Which is kind of sad really.

However, in the teaching program, doing the writing assignments, listening to the guest speakers, and even researching for interest sake, all in the name of learning has been a real breath of fresh air.  I also feel that the passion of our instructors also has impacted the way that I have viewed this new system. Therefore, I want to implement the atmosphere, passion, and philosophy of teaching and learning that I am experiencing into my future classrooms.

Expected learning so far.

The expected learning can be generalized into 3 categories.

  • The old way is not always the best way.
  • Teachers need to be open to learn and adapt in order to make the classroom better place for all children.
  • Changes occurring within the BC curriculum to de-colonializing and indigenizing our education system to work towards reconciliation.

When we look through the history of the Canadian Education system there are obvious horrific offenses that have occurred towards many marginalized groups in Canada. What is common in all of them is that the structure of the colonial education system is not inclusive and needs to be changed. Currently, the education system is trying to understand the diversity within the classroom and how to teach in a way to support each student’s individuality rather than try to assimilate or isolate people that are different, which was the previous method. One way in which they are doing this, is by re-structuring the BC curriculum around the First Peoples Principles of Learning. These principles are full of wisdom. The First Peoples Principles of Learning represent values of individuality, flexibility, adaptability. Therefore, teachers need to learn this philosophy and adapt their teaching style so all students in the classroom can be represented and feel successful. The implementation of the First Peoples Principles of Learning, inclusion, and demystification of Indigenous Knowledge allows for a forward’s path towards truth and reconciliation. Furthermore, the use of professional development days can give teachers the necessary training and opportunities to learn so that they know how to implement this into their classroom. Moreover, the process of de-colonizing and indigenizing education will be a lot of work but will have an amazing impact on the quality of education that the future generations will have it we do the work now.

What I have learned about myself.

One thing I have learned about myself, is a feeling of resistance to some of the teaching philosophies present and their implementation in high school sciences. However, I feel acknowledging these biases and hesitation are really highlighting the depth to which western/ colonial structure of what education is has is built into my cognitive processes. What I am doing is actively approaching these hesitations and understand why I feel that way, and then restructuring it. So, I brainstormed with my husband project ideas or different approaches to some concepts to foster their creativity, intuition, and inquiry while still covering some content.

What really solidify the fact that I must approach these apprehensions head on was in my observational practicum. I found in that in the class I was observing was probably the textbook definition of a teacher. It was a lecture, fill in notes, practice and done. There were no connections to the world outside or even to the students in the classroom. So, what I learned about myself, is that I need to challenge myself, to apply the principles we have learned so far to create connection, creativity, individuality, and inquiry into my future classroom.

Indigenous Day of Learning

October 1, 2020 / / 0 Comments

I found the keynote speaker at our indigenous day of learning enlightening. Dr. Dustin Louie showed his passion about reconciliation, de-colonialization and indigenization. He gave the audience a very structured approach to what teacher can do to apply this to their classroom. Dr. Louie explained that we need to start with de-colonializing, which involve 3 main ways we need to reshape our mindset and our educational system.

First of, we must let the indigenous people shape their own identity and share it with the world. Currently, the picture of “what it means to be indigenous” has been shaped by colonials, and that affects the ways that indigenous people see themselves. So, to decolonialize we need to allow Indigenous people to rediscover and define their authentic identity. Secondly, we need to break down the white supremacy built into our society. This idea he explained is that every system, including the education system has been built to benefit white people. So, to try and produce equality in an unequal system is not going to work. Therefore, we need to start breaking down these supremist structure and bring in other perspectives to make it an equal playing field. Lastly, he explained, to do these two things we need to first get rid of the idea of western neutrality. Western neutrality is a concept of western methods are the best way of doing and that it benefits everyone. For example, if we are using Western neutrality, and someone presents a new perspective, it won’t be heard since anything different is viewed as wrong, too much work, or just not how thins are done. So, we need to do a lot of cognitive work to interrupt biases and truly listen and see the value in other viewpoints.

I found these three ways to approach de-colonializing important to understand going forward in the teaching program, because we have to understand that these three embarrassing cognitive processes have been built into us (being part of the people raised with western/colonial views), and actively work against it. The hardest part is going to be recognizing the unconscious biases that we will find yourself sinking into because it is “easier”. So, what we must do is introspection and really question the purpose of our education system, lessons, assignments, and think if there is another way of doing this. I think at this point is when we can do something meaningful and start working towards de-colonizing.

One idea that Dr. Louie mentioned that I hope to apply to my teaching practicums is that non-aboriginal teachers and teacher candidates don’t have to be scared to teach indigenous knowledge for fear of doing something wrong. He recommended building relationships and approaching it with humility. And if you make a mistake, then apologize and make a mend. We are all human and all make mistakes. But being too scared to teach the content isn’t going to get us anywhere.

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