Monday, December 15, 2014

The first step in an online journey...

I have been in education for 16 years, teaching in the primary sector in and around Christchurch, Westport, and the United Kingdom.  I completed a 3 year Bachelor of Teaching and Learning at the University of Canterbury when I trained back in the late 90s, and also managed to take a years study leave in 2010 to complete a Post Grad Diploma in Education in Te Reo Māori-Hōaka Pounamu and for the last 4 years I have been privileged to work for CORE Education as a National Facilitator, specialising in learning with digital technologies and te reo Māori in English medium schools.

I love being challenged and have a never ending love of learning.  I am passionate about education, in fact never more before than right now.  The catalyst for my passion and drive and re-energised view of what teaching and learning is all about, is the fact that Christchurch is going through massive change & upheaval and I believe it is something to be excited about!  This is partly to do with our city rebuilding itself after our devastating earthquakes but it is also about a shift towards modern teaching and learning practices and pedagogy.

Yes change is hard and it can be scary but it also comes with amazing opportunities to do things differently and hopefully better!  In regards to education, with all the new school re-builds and changes to teaching pedagogy, I think the next few years are going to be phenomenal and I want to be involved as much as possible in walking this journey alongside those at the chalkface, our classroom teachers.  That is why I have accepted the position of Deputy Principal at Cobham Intermediate for 2015 and have decided to blog about my own personal journey.

The purpose of this blog will be to capture my thinking, learning and professional development, alongside my reflections and teacher inquiries while at the same time collecting and collating evidence to go towards to my appraisal against the registered teacher criteria.  I am a firm believer in teachers working smarter, not harder.

As a PD facilitator, I regularly facilitated staff meetings and was always sad to see and hear about the massive workload teachers had - how difficult it was to have anything additional to think about or do and the real issue was that their love for teaching was often getting depleted by the huge amount of pressure and responsibilities they had. I think we need to avoid teacher overload and burnout at all costs if possible.  One small idea that I think can help, is to try the Keep, Kill, Create framework.

'Keep, kill or create' is just my own play on words for this idea but I am certain that there will be a graphic organiser or something more official out there for this concept. You can work through this framework individually or as a team or whole staff.  It is about reflecting on what you are doing and why - what is the purpose of the task, what impact is it having, what are the benefits vs the challenges and then deciding if this is something you should KEEP=continue to do, or to KILL=dump it/stop doing it or to CREATE. Create means that either it needs to be seriously tweaked in its current form or that there is a gap that has been identified and now something needs to be created or done to fill that gap or need.  The idea behind this is that you should ideally reduce your workload by getting rid of things that don't necessarily need to be done or are having limited effect or impact, particularly on student outcomes.  Or if nothing else, just having a really open and honest conversation about what you are doing and why can be the most powerful learning experience in itself!  As teachers we encourage our kids to do things that are meaningful, not just to tick a box - perhaps its time we ourselves started to think outside that box and try to do things differently too!

11 comments:

  1. Congratulations on the new job. I enjoyed reading your first blog post. I agree that these are exciting times for education! I look forward to reading more posts next year.
    Steph Kitto

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    1. Thanks Steph, I appreciate you leaving a comment & following the blog. Have a great Xmas!

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  2. Hi Tamara, great idea this blog thingy, I will read it with interest, looking forward to working with you at our wonderful school. Have a happy Christmas with your family. See you in 2015 :)

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    1. Kia ora Nicki, lovely to see you in here reading the blog thingys! Thanks for your feedback and I can't wait to work with you and all the Cobham staff next year too. Have a safe, relaxing & merry Xmas & break!

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  3. Kia ora. Congratulations on your appointment. You blog is a fantastic idea and very inspirational. Happy birthday too

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    1. Kia ora Anna - thanks for the congrats & bday wishes! Your positive feedback was lovely & its really awesome to think someone else thinks it's a good/inspirational idea...if you decide to follow suit, let me know your blog address so I can follow your journey too!

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  4. WOW Tamara, what a fabulous first post! I thoroughly enjoyed it! You have totally nailed it with your keep, kill, create framework. I have always been such a firm believer of doing 'new innovation' INSTEAD OF tradition, so there is an element of kill in there. You also made me think of a WONDERFUL post Hazel shared with me some time ago. Although it can be focused on email, it also works well for 'life'. Do, defer, delegate or delete! It has been my saviour many a time. I sure will miss you in our team but I really look forward to following your next very exciting chapter!
    Anne K

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  5. Kia ora e hoa - thanks for reminding me of Hazel's D words, that absolutely fits in with the concept behind the Keep, Kill, Create framework and I could see that mantra as seriously helping you to prioritise your workload, thanks for sharing Anne - mwah!

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  6. It is only fair that since you follow my blog, I shall follow yours haha. All the best with the new mahi - you will be nothing less than brilliant. Keep in touch and hope to see you around! Merry Xmas - I'm off to Samoa tomorrow (finally going on annual leave!). God bless you on your journey xx

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  7. Kia ora, talofa and welcome to the blogger whānau e hoa. They say, once a blogger, always a blogger. I really enjoyed reading your first post and I totally agree with your inference behind your message, teachers work too long hours and somehow needs to be working smarter rather than harder. A philosophy I always believe in. I have already shared my congratulations with you on a personal level and I only want to share with your followers how lucky Cobham is to have you join an Ama-ZING team. Their gain our loss. Cobham Int is a mover and a shaker and I believe will be a future model of Intermediate schools in NZ. Watch this space! I look forward and will continue to follower your journey in the new year. If you ever need support with Pasifika pedagogy, call Togi...lol. Say hi to the staff especially Nicky. Keep on inspiring e hoa. Ia manuia le kerisimasi ma tausaga fou.

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    1. Talofa my friend - just want to say (here I am replying, better late than never) thank you for your blogging support, much appreciated! And don'w worry, Togi & Manu are on speed dial for Pasifika support but you are on speed dial for 'social fun' support, thought you would prefer that! :)

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