Blogging to document children's learning

This centre uses blogger like you would not believe...I was so impressed with how they were using it I was asking Katrina for a few 'how to tips'. The children's learning is recorded through observation and published to their own individual blog. These are shared with families and the administration functions are shared with families so they can share the observations with the wider family and friends. You can see the tags/labels down the right hand side of the photo - the teachers tag each post entry so that if you wanted to track a particular series of learning areas or goals you could. I like that idea. All the informtion is there through the observations to write up a narrative assessment (learning story) over time. I really hope the centre takes this next step with assessment. 

When the new Alberta Curriculum comes out they could just add the principles and goals for learning to the labels/tags - makes life really easy.

Paint exploration

I am grateful to Debra and the Kinder Campus community for allowing me to photograph the displays in the centre that have children's images and learning encounters. This is one way this centre makes children's experiences and thinking visible. 

The teachers have taken the time to articulate the preparation that went in to this experience, including having a look at renowned painters. You will see that the teachers were noticing, recognising and responding to children's curiosities in the experience. The children's comments are captured alongside the encounter. 

 "That's abstract art"

Meeting with Angela - The power of home visits

Angela hosted me for an hour and a half this afternoon - meeting with me to discuss the life of the centre. It felt very familiar....as far as I can tell, Angela is leader/manager of multiple spaces in the centre and has been there for 25 years (Margy told me that....yes...I had a coffee and chat with Dr Margy Whalley for a hour and a half:O). We started off with passing on some communication to the staff - to get a sense of how full on it is at this place, there was a Skype meeting with a group from USA at 4pm and the time had been changed. Then we got to sit together over a herbal tea to discuss the life of the centre according to Angela. There is so much going on here in amongst a lot of changes in the political agenda for education.

Home visits - a window into culture and identity
Home visits are an important feature of the activities of the teachers. The teachers visit to meet the child in their own space and to enable them to engage in conversations about things relating to the environment of the child when at the centre....the loop concept.
One idea was to take photographs of the doors of where the children live while visiting so there is an image to revisit. it also helps children explain to others where they live and opportunities for story telling and rich language experiences. There are two 'traveller' communities that have children attending so I was intrigued about how this works. It is important for teachers to 'be with children and families' in their spaces and to get a sense of the culture of the family through being in their home. 

This is a blast from the past for us - something we would do for all families in the 90's. Could this be a way to strengthen relationships? The teachers have half a day per week for professional time (AKA non contact) - and children are gone by 3.30pm - staff work until 4.30pm so visits are done in this time. 

Assessment
Teachers here have learning stories and have had numerous exchanges with Wendy Lee and Margaret Carr over the past 10-15 years (at least). The documentation on the walls had a very familiar feeling to NZ and even looked like what I see in many services. I want to explore a bit more the approaches to assessment and how decisions about planning for learning are made. I scratched the surface today and will research more tomorrow and Friday. I had better pace myself.
There are some crazy things happening in the education system over here. I don't want to rant about them here too much as I have only been introduced to the ideas and if my understandings are right - it is ridiculous!! Lets just say that the team at Pen Green have found ways to stay true to their approach and frameworks as well as accommodate the needs of the external evaluators. This is an important lesson for us all.

Presentation - Kate Hayward - Assistant Director Research Base

Main points for me from presentation:

• Community and engagement (community development approach) - Parents know their children best. Need to work with parents in ways that share knowledge about the child, and they need to be able to share their knowledge through genuine dialogue.
• P.I.C.L - Parents engaged in their Childs learning
• Use video a lot to understand what children are doing 
• Community is really important if you want to make a difference in the lives of children. Resistance is good as at least you know people have a passionate point of view about something.
• There are 120 staff across the whole organisation - social services, health and education working together for families
• targeting of interventions can often be thought of to be a deficit model - challenge the thinking is a way of working (not a programme) - engagement with communities and working with each other.
• Parents make decisions and lead assessment conversations. How do you understand your community?
• Kate referred to our 5 questions - Do you know me? what do you know about your community? Do you hear me? Can I trust you? Is this place fair for me? Do you let me fly?
• Develop things here that parents have been leading the assessment of need. Parents tell the service what they think is important and distributing the power. 

Beliefs and values about working with parents?

• Negotiating this and owning what ours are.
• What you believe affects how you work with a family
• Meet - 'The Pen Green Loop' - there is some connection here to our 'Helical Vortex' concept - anyway - it is about how what happens in each of the settings impacts on the other through observations by both and having a shared dialogue - this is both formal and informal.

Settling children and families into the centre - strengthening connections.

• There is a two week setting period where the child is supported to transition into the centre - not only by parents - all significant adults/siblings can be involved in settling the child. I thought this was great as the teachers get to meet and observe the ways the child interacts with these 'significant others' and build on these observations to strengthen a relationship with the child incrementally over time (albeit 2 weeks). It is a way to create memories with children at the centre, levering off the emotional connections the child has with these important people. Stroke of genius I think and not putting the pressure on parents only, inclusive of a variety of people in the life of the child. The possibilities are endless - Uncle, Aunty, neighbour, grandparent, older sibling.....Imaging the insights you would get into the life of the child through observing and sharing time together.
• A way to get to know and understand the child
• After 6 weeks at the centre - the teachers share a video clip about the child's engagement at the centre
• For children attending longer, there can be several clips. There are PICL groups where parents are invited to come and watch video clips of their children (collectively watching clips of each others children). Parents are able to watch the clips together and share ideas. 
• For some families, they meet 1:1 as well - again this is formal or informal - the team at Pen Green work hard to make it manageable.

Main frameworks - shared language to discuss learning:

• Notice, recognising and responding
• Wellbeing - Leavers levels of involvement 
• Schema