My Beliefs About How Students Learn Best

Day 1 of the Reflect and Renew Blog Challenge from Reflective Teacher @TeachThought 

It's not often we sit down and have to articulate our beliefs about the way we teach and our students learn but I believe it's one of the most important, and often neglected, parts of what we do.  I wonder if we take it for granted that we know what we're doing and we do what we do, but it's not until we pull apart the why of what we're doing that we start to perhaps question and challenge those beliefs.
For me it helps me to be a reflective practitioner and to be very clear about what I'm doing and why.  Having said that, I think it's also incredibly important to be open to new ideas and ways of thinking and to challenge your beliefs - sometimes on a daily basis - so that you are constantly striving to be the best you can be and to meet the needs of every individual student you come in contact with.

I've started by creating a list and it's one I'll keep returning to, and adding to, this year.

1.  Involve the students in the learning process at ALL stages - from planning through to assessment.  They are the key part of the process, don't leave them out.  Students must be at the heart of everything we do.

2.  Listen to your students - Student Voice is one of the most powerful tools we have at our disposal.  Discussion in the learning environment is crucial. Silent classrooms where learning is not being created together are not powerful learning environments.  Teacher talk needs to be monitored too.

3.  Be prepared to be a learner alongside and with your students - "We are all teachers and we are all learners in our learning environment."

4.  Embrace and harness the power of technology but be very clear about the learning and teaching first BEFORE including it in your learning and teaching.

5.  Learning must be relevant and connected to the world outside the classroom - break down those classroom walls by creating real and relevant connctions.  As teachers, we need to be relevant and connected too.  Worksheets don't cut it for me.

6.  Feedback is key but it needs to be the right kind of feedback - check out a presentation from my Masters research from 2011.  They also need time to digest, process and act on the feedback.

7.  We need to teach the skills our students need - including the digital ones.  Don't assume that they are  'Digital Natives' and can handle all technology willingly and confidently.  Yes, they've grown up with it, surrounded by it, but often not with a specific learning focus as critical thinkers and users of
technology in their learning.  Help them learn these skills and become confident users of tech.

8.  Be careful of how you use praise and of what 'type' you are using. Carol Dweck and James Nottingham are my guides on this.

9.  Students - and teachers - must be absolutely clear about what is to be learned and why.  They need to be able to articulate this.  Clarity in the Classroom is written around this and has taught me so much over the years.

10.  Above all, students learn best when they know that you care about and respect them; that  you value them as individual human beings and not just as 'the class' or 'the student', etc.  

Here's a clip from Carol Dweck which focuses on the Growth Mindset and the role of Praise.  The more I read of her work, the more I know I have to keep learning in order to help my students learn best.

On Being a Connected Educator and Why I'm Grateful for the Connections...

Day 16 of the Attitude of Gratitude Reflective Teacher @TeachThought Blog Challenge...


Why I'm So Very Grateful To Be A...

Connected locally and globally to inspirational teachers and learners
One way to challenge and push your own learning through different viewpoints
New ideas and learning are created through connection and collaboration
Never alone in this fabulous and challenging profession
Energised by conversation, support, humour and collaboration
Constantly supported to be the best you can be
There to support and encourage others
Energising personalities abound!
Developing new understandings about learning and teaching

Experimenting with new thinking and ideas to improve practice
Depending on your connected educators PLN for insight and discussion
Unending learning
Challenged to be reflective about your practice and clear in your thinking
Articulating practice through additional viewpoints and questions
Thankful and grateful for opportunities and connections
Original thinkers and learners inspire and challenge me
Reflective practice is at our core for the sake of our students

In My Teaching Career, I am Grateful to Have Learned...

Day 14 of the Attitude of Gratitude Reflective Teacher @TeachThought Blog Challenge...

1.  "We are all teachers and we are all learners in our learning environment."
Quote written by 8 and 9 year-olds a few years ago.  They taught me a great deal when they came up with this one.  I hang onto it every day.  It helps me remember that we are all sharing this learning journey and creating new learning together.

2.  You are never going to 'catch up' so stop putting pressure on yourself to do this!
There is ALWAYS going to be more to do.  You will burn yourself out if you try to catch up constantly and even worse, try to get ahead, whether it's with planning, or whatever.  Planning, by nature, is an adaptable day-to-day proposition.  That's what is so fantastic about what we do.  Our students' learning changes rapidly, and so does ours.  Are you there for your students? Do you care for and respect them and take time to get to know the awesome human beings they are.  Do you take time out to talk with them?  You could be using this time for planning and paperwork!  Really, though, let's refocus and put the students back at the heart of what we do - focus on them.  Yes, planning is important so that learning needs are met, but letting students know how much you value and appreciate them is key and, for me, the most important aspect of what we do.  I need all of them to know that they matter.

3.  You don't know what you don't know.
You don't have to know everything!  You're not expected to.  You're a learner too - that's what is so cool about what we do.  We get to explore thinking and new ideas and learning every single day and spark that love of learning in our students.  How cool is that??!!

4.  That you need to trust that you are doing the absolute best for your students and that's there's always more to learn to meet their needs.
We put a lot of pressure on ourselves - are we doing enough? What can we do better?  Are we meeting individual student needs - both learning and social?  Are we good enough?  We're our own toughest critics, especially those of us who have perfectionist tendencies!  We need to ease up a little.  Often we're so good at boosting and encouraging others.  We need to be our own champions sometimes too.

5.  Connections are key - human connections and passion for what we do.  
You can have all the knowledge and skills in the world, but if you aren't passionate about what you do and you can't connect with your students on a human level and know them as special and unique individuals then maybe this isn't the best profession for you.  If it's all about the grades and assessment then we're missing the point. 

It's So Hard to State our Strengths But We're Experts at Listing our Faults...

Day 5 of the Attitude of Gratitude Reflective Teacher @TeachThought Blog Challenge...


It can be very confronting when we're asked what our strengths are. We don't like to 'brag' or show off.  We're often incredibly skilled at discussing our faults though - and often at length. Why is this?  We are very good at encouraging our students to state their strengths so why do we find it so difficult to 'practice what we preach'?

The blog challenge this month is all about celebrating what we do and finding the positives.

I'd hope that two of my strengths are resilience and the ability to learn from being wrong.  I've blogged on the last one before back in 2011.  That reflection was triggered by watching a very inspirational TED Talk on the power of being wrong / of failing and I've included the video again because it's always a good reminder for me when my perfectionist tendencies get too out of control!



I think being able to say that you're wrong and learn from mistakes is one of the key strengths we all need.  I know I've learned so much more from being wrong than from being right - not always easy lessons but they've played an incredibly important part in helping me to constantly improve in what I do as a learner and as a teacher.

Resilience is also something I've worked on - and I've not always been very good at this.  I can be oversensitive and take things too personally and I used to find it difficult to bounce back from hiccups or roadblocks as I like to think of them.  I am my harshest critic!  Over the years this has improved and the last year taught me that you need to be resilient to deal with these roadblocks.  I've always bounced back from any challenges but it's sometimes taken a while.  Working incredibly hard on this area has benefited not only me but more importantly - I hope - those around me.

#reflectiveteacher #edblognz

What does connected education mean to me?

Thoughtful Thursdays at the Te@chThought Community

We've just completed our first month-long blogging challenge as part of the Te@chThought community and it was one of the most inspirational experiences ever!  One of the top bonuses was that I made a new friend in my colleague Beth Leidolf, an inspirational educator from the US.  Together we ran the challenge and are now working on developing the community further during Connected Educator Month and beyond!


Our first post for Thoughtful Thursdays at TeachThought is all about what Connected Education means to us. The Popplet below shares my thinking about how important being a Connected Educator is to me and how powerful all these connections are.  Each and every connection plays a powerful and important role in my continuing development as a teacher.

#ce14 #cenz14 #ceoz