PROJECTS: Votes and Voices & Continental Games

School Name: Clarkson Primary School

Teacher’s Name: Tinelle Smith

Year Group: 4/5

Number of students: 25

Creative’s Name: Naomi Bell

Creative Practice: (Writer/Visual Artist)

Main Curriculum Focus

Term 2: HASS/Civics and Citizenship

Term 3: HASS/Geography

Cross-curricular Links: English

Cross-curricular Links: Design Technology

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CONTEXT

Clarkson Primary School is located within the North Metropolitan educational region of Perth. It caters for approximately 280 students from kindergarten to Year 6. The school has a rich cultural diversity with 30% of students from language backgrounds other than English. Approximately 15% of the students are of indigenous origin.

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WHAT WE DID  

TERM 2:

Our project aimed to teach students key concepts related to Civics and Citizenship, using slam poetry as a medium for expressing ideas and understandings. Each session began with a collaborative warm-up activity, followed by focused discussion, varied short burst writing and slam poetry exercises. The program was to culminate in a slam poetry event where students performed their pieces to the class – well that was our goal. This was a huge challenge for many of the students, but we did end up with a class poem that everyone contributed to with their poetry writing and their voice performance.

TERM 3:

This term the students were keen to make a game to demonstrate their learning. Our learning area focus was geography with the curriculum focus on South America for the Year 5’s and Africa for the Year 4’s. The children formed their own groups of 4-5 students, effectively and efficiently a significant step up from the beginning of our journey. We presented each group with the same size box with the challenge to construct a Continental Board Game. They researched, shared information, discussed their game design, negotiated roles (usually smoothly, but not always – we were nearby), and they crafted and created their game. some used the box just as a container, others used the box as part of the game, each was quite different. All groups were successful in presenting (proudly) their game and showing their Year 6 buddy class how to play

“I didn’t think we would be able to do this. I am proud of what we have made.” (Student)

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How did we make the curriculum come alive?

The students had told us from the start that they not only liked, but were quite good at art, particularly drawing. In addition, they liked a wide variety of sport. They also made it clear they didn’t much like writing. Our recipe involved big dollops of their strengths and interests regularly interspersed with medicinal measures of our identified curriculum and learning habits the class teacher had identified. We mixed things up with; elements of moving, a balance of individual, partner and group tasks, hands on materials, novelty, challenge, and a little bit of silly. For example, as a warm-up, we explored ways of moving in low, medium, and high positions and then matched them with our voices by using low, medium, and high pitched and volume creating a link to performing our poetry. In Term 3, the hands-on nature of the task and the opportunity to bring their own design to life engaged the students, observable in our high energy on task behaviour and much less dysregulation than we had to negotiate in the previous term.

“I felt nervous about doing Creative Schools before we started. It was great not being the lead and getting a chance to observe my students. I enjoyed watching them grow in confidence, become more resilient, learn to compromise, and negotiate and for some students to develop leadership.” (Teacher)

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How did we make the 5 Habits of Learning come alive?

The classroom teacher had identified Collaborative as the main habit to focus on. The students were able to work with a partner but found small group work particularly challenging. Our warm-ups were a great way to introduce the students to the learning habits. The warm-ups were always a hit, and most children engaged in them enthusiastically. We would complete our activities and follow that up with a discussion on what they had done to complete the tasks successfully. The children then had a list of behaviours and attitudes, and we would identify which habit we had employed.  When the session intentions had been shared, we would identify the habit we would ‘grow’ during that session. The session ended with our reflections on how well we thought we done, what worked well or did not and better if...?

“I used to think Creative Schools would be art and drawing, now I know there are different ways of being creative.” (Student)

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How did we activate student voice and learner agency?

We began our journey with the students identifying their strengths and interests. We designed our activities to incorporate their strengths as they had the opportunity to practise and grow in confidence with the new skills they were learning. We repeated warm-ups frequently to help the children with low/irregular attendance start sessions with a point of familiarity. We incorporated a variety of learning routines that gave opportunities for the children to clarify, ask questions, share their opinions and insights. For example: Cares, Concerns, Questions, Comments (Check in at lesson beginning). Additionally, Thinking Routines – What makes you say that? Explanation Game, ‘And...?’ (encouraging the children to tell you more). As the children became familiar with the format of our sessions, they were given opportunities to choose materials and methods of presentation – this was negotiated with students explaining and justifying their choices.

“I like doing our outside warm-ups, I can feel head is clear as I walk back into class.” (Student)

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WHAT WAS THE IMPACT?

Student:

The student's growth in confidence was significant. Our first discussions saw a few students dominating the discussion with limited ideas put forward. By the end of our sessions most children were contributing regularly, voicing their ideas, and justifying their opinions. The amount of task related conversation increased and dysregulated behaviour decreased. The children embraced new opportunities, particularly outside learning, learning can be fun, mistakes are ok. They began to lead the learning with some children leading our favourite warm-ups. They were more resilient and had grown in their ability to handle friendship issues that impacted on their learning.

Teacher:

It has been a great experience to work in partnership and create opportunities I would be reluctant to take on with just one teacher in the room. I can explore the possibilities of working with other staff members to provide this type of learning beyond the project. The Creative Schools experience has given me a base that I can continue to grow from and it’s good to have had another teacher to talk to that has had the same opportunity but has done something quite different.

Creative:

It has been great working with Tinelle. One of the things that underpinned the success of our project is the positive relationship she has built with her students. The level of trust she has with the students has been visible and impacted in some way on every session. She modelled how being listened to was so important for the children in her class.  In the first term of the project, it was important to let go of our expectations, build relationships, slowdown and give the children time to tell their stories. It was tough sometimes in the beginning but working in partnership and becoming ‘in sync’ created the solid foundation of trust and acceptance that allowed the children to flourish.

“It wasn’t always easy in the beginning. Like the kids we tried, made mistakes, had wins, failed, reflected, and grew from the process. It was a joy to see the students so proud of themselves and what they had accomplished.” (Creative Practitioner)

“I love seeing the students having fun and learning through play. It gives the kids permission to let go. Some of these kids have really tough lives and have to grow up beyond their years. I am looking at implementing the Creative Schools program in the junior years next year.” (Principal)

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