Staff Meeting - Gail Loane - Wednesday 24th August 2016

Andrew Jackson piece

- Use of the 5 senses

- Description - Factual

- No personal response/opinion

Leaf Description

Thin veins stretch out connecting the holey flesh.

Mouldy brown and green in colour.

Old and fragile, it looks as if it could fall apart at the slightest touch.

Dirt clings to it's skin.

Eco-literacy

- Connect with the simple

- What are the possibilities to get children quickly writing?

- Create a challenge for them e.g. try not to use 'I' or 'my'

Look at a piece of student writing and decide what can be improved/what needs to be worked on and then think about how this can be incorporated into your teaching.

Murray Gadd - Research on writing

What makes teachers effective? - Three most important are highlighted.

- Expectations - Vision of achievement - How is this communicated to the students?

- Learning Goals - What do teachers think about when they create goals for/with students?

- Learning Tasks - How are they set up? Specific tasks for specific learning.

- Direct instruction - Explicit teaching.

- Responding to students work - Feedback/feedforward - Is it clear?

- Motivating and challenging learners

- Organisation and management - Differentiation - If it is a whole-class lesson aim for 100% student engagement/need.

- Self-regulation - Actions the teachers take to give students a sense of ownership/responsibility.

Developing student agency - use of the book 'Choice Words'

- Learning intentions are too broad - stick to using a learning focus for each lesson.

Memoir - Model - Piano Rock by Gavin Bishop

Give background to hook the students in.

- Make them aware that there is a person behind the model.

Read for meaning - picture aids can be used to ensure 100% understanding from all students.

Use of visual contrast - use colouring pencils to colour for each paragraph - look at what colour each paragraph makes you feel.

Make students aware of the deliberate choices that author's make - Allow them to discover this.

Pick one sentence for students to imitate, e.g. The creek, white with ice, had patches of black where someone before me had...

(white with ice = adjectival phrase)

Plan: Students to brainstorm 4 nouns e.g. window, duvet, light, floor.

- Come up with a full sentence before they move away to write independently.

Success Criteria: Include one sentence with a noun and a descriptor after the noun.

Ensure to teach all different types of writing:

- Shared

- Guided

- Independent

- Collaborative