Continuous Feedback to Transform Learners

This week Val and I have begun the most rigorous work of the inquiry cycle. The crunch is on while we try to support all learners in taking that leap to transform themselves through their personal inquiry passion projects that tie into the overarching inquiry unit: How can we transform ourselves and others as a community of healthy living learners? Since the beginning of January students have engaged in exploring various aspects of healthy living. Now that they have a strong foundation of background knowledge they are working hard on their personal inquiry passion projects and are needing lots of descriptive feedback to support transformation. This is a huge task to manage in a classroom. Having supportive educational assistants, learning assistant teachers and librarians are important in helping to reach all students and ease the workload. However, the culture of having a community of learners to support self regulation in the classroom is essential if we are going to meet students one on one to give them descriptive feedback to transform as learners. The guidance of the 4 C's, commitment, control, communication and cooperation act as a set of foundational values to maintain a climate of support. Students self monitor their behaviour to keep themselves on track as we meet one on one with each student. The culture of a community of learners ensures the cycle of inquiry completes its spiral and students transform. 

Providing feedback to take the next step in learning

In a community of learners students also provide each other feedback to support learning.

Partnerships in Learning

Today's adventure in learning engaged the students in a dissection of a pig's lung as a way to process their understanding of how the respiratory system worked. Two student teachers from Vancouver Island University, Sara Rostron and Kelsey Brown, co-designed and co-taught the lesson to support one another through the process. This was truly an authentic experience that left students with a deep understanding of how the repiratory system works.

When new teachers enter the profession with the experience and understanding of how to collaborate and work toward improving student learning as a community, we shed the notion of being isolated in the profession and encourage the culture of professional learning communities.                                    

Coaching Inquiry to Support Transformation in Learning

Today Val and I worked with our students to support their inquiry passion projects. One of my students is passionate about dancing. She dances as one way to support a healthy living lifestyle. As part of her inquiry passion project Val arranged for the student to interview a premier ballet dancer, Jillian Vanstone, from the National Ballet in Canada. Her testimony of what it takes to be a dancer and the sacrifices she has made to attain her level of performance was enlightening for the students. The students learned a great deal about the lifestyle of a dancer. However, when you attach the learning experience to an inquiry question you enable students to take their learning to the next level. They are able to reflect on the experience and personalize it by thinking about how the experience effected their thoughts, beliefs and possibly actions. In this case the student blogged her reflection on our school blog where she demonstrated transformation. This is the kind of learning that encourages the development of metacognition among learners. They reflect on how the new experience connects to who they are, what they think and belief and decide on their next steps to take their thinking to action. See if you can pick out the transformation statements in her reflection? What has she decided to rethink in her actions?

Reflections on our SKYPE interview with Jillian Vanstone - principal dancer @ The National Ballet of Canada

Reflections from Mercedes:

Can a professanl dancer 's  lifestyle connect to our lifestyle?

I think it was an amazing experiance to meet Jillian and I had alot of support from my friends to skype her.

I learned that to be a professanl dancer you need to be very sterickt about your diet and your rest.

Her scoial life comes from her dance club. They are her community. I learned that you have to be very focued. I gess I have to check my treat eating a little more if I want to become a professal dancer.



This year I have had the opportunity to collaborate with my teacher librarian, Val, an amazing educator. She is new to our a school so is interested in developing new working relationships that support student learning in our school. Val is not only very resourceful and helpful in supporting teachers' programs, she adds an element of creativity that strengthens student learning. She takes great ideas and augments the effectiveness of the instructional design. Her infusion of rich text, capturing guest speakers through the use of technology resources and her ability to co-teach and co-design make her expertise invaluable to our school learning team. 

In five short months she is transforming the way I work with technology in the classroom. She has given me an opportunity to learn within a community of learners climate. She is patient, open to new learning ideas, she values the teams' input and strengthens our work by adding a new dimension to learning that opens the doors to new possibilities. For example, in our classroom we engage in developing personalized inquiry questions that students explore and try to justify their transformation of thoughts, beliefs and actions. The questions are designed with students' thinking about their interests and strengths then connecting them to the broader inquiry question that we design to guide our learning throughout the term and connect to the curriculum. Val has embraced supporting students with inquiry projects and has added the dimension of identifying them as inquiry passion projects. This has excited the students further and has helped them clarify how to develop inquiry questions that encourages transformation. Val sees opportunities to infuse technology that enhance the learning experience. For example, she will connect with an author to set up an opportunity for my students to interview them on skype. She has developed a school library wikki that enables students to dialogue about rich text. She is an amazing support to both students and teachers.

Val has gone beyond the traditional role of librarian and has acted as a learning coach to everyone in the school. She sees herself as a learner and a teacher and acts on this belief. She is an amazing asset to supporting us developing an innovative learning environment. How do your learning partnerships evolve?

A Common Belief



We are all learners we are all teachers. Creating an environment for learning where each of us feels valued and respected for our contributions is critical if we are going to take the necessary steps forward in the development of innovative learning environments. How we create this foundation is unique to each setting but ensuring the foundational values are honoured becomes necessary to shifting to a learning culture. What does this look like for you? How do you explicitly teach and coach this foundation to support a thriving community of learners?