Manaiakalani Lead Teachers PLG - T12018

If you haven't got language, then you haven't got context.

Every time I attend a Manaiakalani PLG, I walk away inspired, challenged and sometimes perplexed.  Today's meeting was no different.  Even before the day had begun, myself and a colleague were sitting together at a table with two other chairs and we were very happy when Dr Jannie van Hees joined us at our table. I had previously sat in a few lectures by Jannie and she was good...I was excited to hear what she was going to share with us today! Even better, she was sitting with us so we could pick her brains up close and milk her attention for all that we wanted to know! Winning!

These meetings always provide opportunity for the cluster to look at itself though the data and research findings from the year before.  Today we drilled into the discoveries through the lens in our own autonomy, through the Tamaki Primary lens.  It was in some ways confronting, creating a 'data narrative', unpacking the things which negatively impacted the success of our students last year.  But, it was also gratifying identifying the things we put in place or are in the process of putting in place to lesson or nullify those impacts.  Dorothy Burt lead the first part of the PD and never fails to challenge our thinking, never letting complacency settle on the drive behind the goals of the cluster.

Inspiration started with Russel Burt talking about the importance of language and the worrying trends noticed across our communities relating to the language acquisition of our young learners.  He spoke of how students coming to school with insufficient language skills can have difficulties throughout their young lives expressing their thoughts, feelings and opinions.  Often students when found in situations where they have difficulty expressing themselves, resort to aggression and violence to show their frustration.  The Manaiakalani cluster of schools is looking for ways to tell the truth without blaming, without judging, without making people feel dumb, without being deficit, without harming anyone.   Today's Lead Teachers PLG focused on language acquisition, an area identified through data, observation and discourse across the cluster as our highest need. 
Russel's eloquent introduction to the day's learning was an appropriate segue to our main speaker of the day, 'Jannie van Hees', the specialist educator in applied linguistics and pedagogy who just happened to be sitting at our table.

The focus of Jannie's learning message was around 'Language in abundance'.  She reflected on research on children from birth to 18 and the importance of language development across that time.  Much of the time, listening to Jannie's messages, anecdotes, questions, challenges, suggestions and research...I was connecting, reflecting, consolidating, questioning and challenging her ideas and my own regarding the topic. My take-aways from the discussion largely focused on the the TRIO; Explicit attention to language, optimising environmental conditions and attention to co-contributors.  As an educator it's important to have an awareness of students 'receiving' - being available, noticed and involved...and 'producing', ensuring students have the opportunities to try out.  Below are my notes for the day...pearls of wisdom I peeled from the day. 

Language in abundance - Jannie van Hees
Its all about language...Without language we are disempowered.
From birth, it's the environment that children are born into that effects a child's gain as they grow.
Major sources for language in abundance - first 1000 days are critical learning time, using complex language and not dumbing it down (the Goldilocks zone), providing a safe supportive environment to use language, create a thirst for print, whanau conversation quality, community conversation,
What can we do to develop language within our schools? - Meaningful quality matters, quantity matters.
Most important - the TRIO - Explicit attention to language, optimising environmental conditions (exciting contexts, relevant contexts - learners deeply involved), Attention to co-contributors.
What matters, why and how? - FLOURISHING - Cognition (brain development, thinking, percieving, system and logic), concepts-knowledge (realisations and knowing understandings and enquiry), Attitude/Awareness - when I feel language empowered, I am empowered (self esteem)
FLOURISHING LEARNING - attention to and noticing, Effortful and purposeful engagement and interaction, triggering the known and connect to the new, stretching ones current language repertoire, Multiple encounters, context relevant, Facilitated through engaging mediating tools - persons, tasks, activities, sources.
PRIME SCAFFOLDERS - Co-Contributors to learning occurring.
Children talking among themselves doesn't always mean learning is taking place.  Children have to scaffold themselves, contributing to the group. Key scaffolders in English language growth - TEACHER, SELF, PRINT, VISUAL, AUDIO RESOURCES...Is the time frame within think/peer/share long enough to have depth of thought in answers/discussion taking place.
Well prepared context and delivery of learning.

• Brainstorm words - teacher front loads if language is not flowing from group
• watch a video
• Transfer video content into print - e.g podcasts translated to print.
• talk about what we've learned - taking support away - say it our own words.

Quantity matters - singular words don't always stick.  Better to deliver the concepts - knowledge through unpacking from source.
If there is not language in abundance in the resource, the teacher must provide it and build on it.  Multi-modal learning.
How do we develop teacher's ability to consistently look for language in abundance through opportunities to optimise language learning conditions?

IS IT PIFFLE...OR IS IT POWERFUL?