2017 Inquiry.

Slide 3:  This is my second video (the first one didn’t work out). In the first one the boys said things like ‘I’m making a plane, Miss Hockly’, while the girls carefully organised theirs into colours. In this video, the boys are taking one colour (TJ has his most favourite colour - green), and the girls are sorting the sticks again. This could show that girls are more ‘wired’ to organise, or it might just have been a morning for the boys to choose their favourite colours.

Slide 4:  Guided is the key word - not simply left to play. Students need support to ensure their ‘play’ is meaningful, so that there is ‘on time’ learning.

Slide 5:  This was a question I had to ask myself. It felt a lot like they were just playing, and I was struggling to make the ‘play’ meaningful. So...I decided to change my focus. No longer would I work on ‘play-based’ learning, but I would inquire in ‘Learning with Movement’. To me, this sounds more manageable. Movement while learning is more doable, and easier, I think, to put into practise. We’ll see.

Slide 7: That says it all, really.

Slide 8:  While I’m classifying this as ‘movement’ it’s still play to some extent. I just find this idea of movement as being more…..structured (is that a good thing?). Activities can be used for lots of new (and reinforced) learning. All good, in my book.

Slide 9: I decided it was important for me to encompass these three ‘M’s.Manageable - so I feel like I have some control (some might say I should be giving this up - I’m not so sure, at this stage).Measurable - so I can see there’s progress (and perhaps it’s quicker in Maths than in other curriculum areas). Meaningful - it’s not much use being active if it has no meaning for the students (or for me, for that matter).


Slide 10:  The group were learning to identify the words for numbers. We had races to see who could do it the quickest (that really motivated some of the students). They enjoyed putting the words on top of the digits, but sort of knew when they’d made a mistake, but weren’t so sure that they’d fix it up. We continue to make progress in this - even though some take longer than others. It’s fun. It’s movement. And it’s Measurable and Meaningful. Tick, tick, tick!