Last week I introduced our Blended Learning project.  I have had the privilege of visiting some of our Secondary classrooms and looking at what teachers are doing to make changes to their usual practice.

In a Year 8 Maths class, the teacher has grouped students according to ability based on their previous work, introduced the topic of the day, then each group could work at a range of activities set up for them with access to online videos by the teacher and other internet resources to go over what had been presented. The teacher then worked for 20 minutes with one group who he knew needed some extra support and explanation. Students could work ahead and do extension activities, talk together in their  group about the problems to be solved, go over the teacher’s instruction via his videos, look at other videos to get a different perspective and know that they too would get some time in a small group with the teacher.

The result has been a marked increase in results over the past term as this method has been used more. Students have a higher level of engagement with the work and a growing sense of responsibility and control over the pace at which they are working and the results they are achieving.

In a Year 10 Visual Art class the students had worked with the teacher to put together the unit. It involved them choosing to study a particular artist, learn about their work then choose a social theme to focus on and by emulating the artist’s style, make a social comment.  Students had a sense of ownership of the whole project because they had helped decide how it would all go together (while still meeting curriculum requirements). They had choice about which artist and what style to focus on so could follow their own artistic interests and were free to make a social comment of their choosing.

In a Year 10 Modern History class, students regularly do a short piece of writing in response to a set question, then have to read at least three other students’ work and give it a mark against the marking criteria. This helps them to see how their work compares to that of others, forces them to think more closely about what they could have included in their own writing and engages them closely with the marking criteria so they really come to know what is required to score well. They also give feedback on the work, getting them to think critically about the responses and how they can be improved.

So, while all these are quite different, they capture in some way the important elements of a shift in focus from the teacher making all the decisions and judgements, determining the order of tasks and doing all the talking. Students are developing a sense of how they can become a stronger learner and take some control of their learning.

It is great to see GPCC teachers taking up the challenge to re-think how they might help students be better learners.

Phillip Nash

Principal