Friday 22 June 2018

Create - Reflect - More Teacher Feedback


Now that the year 10 curriculum is nearly completed (I've been chipping away at it for a long time.. like.. all of 2017..) I have shown what's been created to the Tamaki College science department again. It has been tweaked and pulled and pushed around as I gathered more student voice and teacher voice, learnt about SOLO and different literacy strategies, and it's time for a final check before we let year 10 at it!

I asked the science department "which websites were being used in 2017?" and they answered Third Rock, Web of Life, and Sound and Light (these are all my old creations and Third Rock in particular seems popular with students.).

I asked them "is this new format I've designed something the science department would be interested in using?" and they responded "yes, it looks good but it might not meet the new Tamaki College learning area site requirements. Some changes may be required in that area."

To this I shrugged. The swap from Google old sites to new sites is not something I saw coming, and by the time I asked the department to review all of my work there was too much on there to spend time converting. And, to be honest, after an entire year of working on this, I couldn't be bothered doing all the extra work for a formatting niggle that wouldn't affect the teaching or learning.

Graham has since elected to convert my "old" Google site across to New sites as he teaches the new year 10 curriculum, which has spread the conversion work out for him across the year and ensured that Tamaki College has a copy of the site for themselves, should I ever leave the school. So, win-win.

I also asked "looking at what has been created, what changes would you (as experts in Chemistry and Physics, with me representing Biology) like made to the year 9 and 10 learning outcomes and content to be covered, that have been created so far?"

Answers included:

Year 10 Physics - the Electricity and Magnetism unit: Learning outcomes all needed to change to 1. Current and voltage, 2. Circuits and 3. Ohm's law.

Year 9 Physics - teachers wanted the Pressure unit to move into year 10 and the Energy unit to year 9, as pressure is seen as more difficult and is covered in the year 11 Mechanics unit - better to learn it closer to the time.

My final question was "before I start to build the site for year 9, what changes would you like made to the year 9 learning outcomes and content to be covered that I have brainstormed?" 

Answers included:

That the two year 9 units titled Particles, and Matter, need to always be taught together as they support and complete the learning of each other.

In the Particles unit learning outcomes needed to change to: 1. Elements, 2. Atoms and 3. Mixtures.

Year 9 physics was also adjusted, so that the Electricity unit includes 1. Static Electricity and Electrons, 2. Current and Resistance and 3. Circuits. This way students encounter circuits and currents across two years and increase their knowledge in year 10.

Shirley also pointed out that the year 9 Forces unit in physics only focussed on two of Newton's laws (I had thought they were the most important for now) but that there are actually three and they should be exposed to that in year 9.

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