Introduction 0.3 - How to use this resource
The OER4Schools Professional Learning Resource
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Important information about how to use this resource
We envisage that using this resource means running some sort of programme at your school. You might want to just run a few session, and dip in and out of this programme. However, you may also want to run a year-long programme.
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Bi-weekly.
Different types of users
Use this in pairs e.g. as teachers
Have a pair of facilitators
Different types of materials
There are also background notes, that are useful to teachers and educators for background reading. They are usually found on separatepages or at the end of units, and are meant to provide additionalbackground information that workshop participants can read in theirown time.
There are also background notes!
In the facilitators’ version, additional notes for facilitators appearthis and is for an educator to use, for example when facilitating aworkshop or working with a class of students. It is interspersed withthe “teacher” text, to provide additional guidance on how to use theresource.
In the facilitators’ version, additional notes for facilitators appear like this!
Things to consider when facilitating workshops
Learn about ideas for facilitation
The organisation Seeds for change has good resources on facilitating workshops and meetings. If you are running this programme as a series (bi-)weekly two-hour meetings, please have a look at the short guide for facilitating meetings, or the full guide for facilitating meetings. If you are running whole day workshops, you might also want to look at the short guide for facilitating workshops, or the full guide for facilitating workshops.
Being aware of the overarching goals
What are the issues with primary education in your country? Why are people invited to the OER4schools programme?
What are teachers’ expectations? What are they expecting to learning? How will they attend? Some people will be concerned with big picture, others with detail.
Being aware of the overarching educational principles
Key interactive pedagogy. A key “interactive” principle is for the “students” to start from what they know, and then to extend that knowledge.
A key principle is taking responsibility for your own teaching and learning. This means that as a facilitator, you take responsibility for providing a successful workshop, teachers take responsibility for their learning during the workshop and their teaching practice in schools, while school students take responsibility for learning, as well as supporting each other in that process.
Jointly building an understanding of interactive teaching: For instance, at the end of Session 1, ask participants: What does interactive teaching offer you? You might return to the principles of interactive teaching as a group after a few sessions and classroom trials to see which ones are / are not being addressed.
Modelling: Some expectations about what a workshop should be like. Modelling activities in the workshop on activities planned for the classroom. (Modelling participation and interactivity at all levels.)
A key “interactive” principle is for the “students” to start from what they know, and then to extend that knowledge. We apply this to the workshop by asking the teachers about their own experience of interactive teaching.
Taking a non-judgemental stance. The facilitator should make very clear that they will not judge the views put forward, but simply make notes of the views put forward.
The programme draws on ideas from Leadership for Learning and the Index for Inclusion.
Procedural things
Timing. As a workshop facilitator, you should consider how to use the present material, and what form your workshop will take. The resource could be used in
- weekly or bi-weekly session of say 2 hours each (e.g. teacher group meetings in a school or regular scheduled sessions in a teacher education college),
- for whole day workshops,
- or a mixture of those.
You should negotiate this with the participants. We provide guidance but as a facilitator running a course based on these materials you will need to make your own plan, and evaluate this plan as you progress.
ICT use in the classroom will be introduced in the workshops. Teachers need a basic level of ICT skills, for instance how to type, how to open a web browser and open applications, how to write documents and spreadsheets, etc. If your workshop participants have no prior ICT skills, you need to allow time for them to practise those skills.
Follow-up and practical classroom activities: End each session with planning for follow-up activities, eg classroom trials, lesson planning, readings, etc. Each session has got follow-up activties which are reviewed at the start of the next session.
As the workshop facilitator, clearly signpost what is happening at each stage in the workshop. E.g. you might say “We now look at interactive teaching.“
Adapting the format of the resource to the specific context. Ideally, there would be at least the following contexts:
- Paper only. Possibly only the facilitator has a copy of the materials but ideally users do too.
- Semi-digital: There’s one computer / projects
- Fully digital: There are several computers with sound, and participants are able to watch various videos in groups.
Planning activities with the sessions
Important to plan activities within the session (especially initially) rather than having this as a follow-up activity.
ICT practice: Different-tasks group work with ICT and activity planning
Each session has got a space reserved for doing ICT practice, many of these (especially in later units) are just called "ICT practice: Different-tasks group work with ICT and activity planning".
While participants learn about their own use of ICT, it is really important that participants are aware of their own learning process. While they are learning about ICT, participants should think about how they could engage their students in the same learning process.
This of course could apply to learning anything new, but in the context of the OER4Schools programme, ICT is likely to be a completely new skill, so it's particularly important to bring awareness to the process.
Depending on the ICT availability and the number of participating teachers, it may be a good idea to draw up a timetable as to when which teachers (and classes) use the available netbooks. This ensures that
- there are no clashes, but also
- that the netbooks are used as much as possible.
It may be helpful to have this timetable on public display, and teacher "tick" their slot when they have actually used the ICT. If there is little or no use of the ICT by teachers in class, then this should be discussed, for instance in the session slot named "Connecting with overarching goals of the programme" (see below).
Connecting with overarching goals of the programme
Each session (from unit 2 onwards) has got a section called Connecting with overarching goals of the programme, which reminds participants as follows:
Open space (10 min). It's now time for the "open space", that gives you an opportunity to discuss issues that have arisen, and to relate those to the broader context of the programme. Do not just gloss over this section, but make time to raise issues, and probe the progress that you are making. You could use this space to:
- Remind yourselves of the of the Most Significant Change Technique, and e.g. collect more of your stories.
- Discuss your assessment portfolios: Is there anything that you are unsure about? Is it going well? What could be done better?
- Check on the work with the classroom assistants: Is this going well? Are there any tensions? Any observations or tips you can share?
- Reviewing individual ICT practise (such as typing practise).
- If you are preparing a presentation for other teachers, you could work on the presentation (about what you have been learning, stories emerging from MSC).
- Remind those who are doing audio diaries, to upload them.
- You could discuss any other issues that have arisen.
You will find notes and summaries of various techniques and concepts on our reference page, and you might want to refer to those for clarification during this activity if needed.
Classroom assistants
This is something that needs to be negotiated with your school well in advance of running the programme. It depends on whether you are running the programme between a few interested teachers (in which case you can make more contained arrangements with other grades), or whether you are running the programme across the whole school (in which case you will need very systematic arrangements).
You should read OER4Schools/Classroom assistants.
Portfolios
Running the first workshop
What are the issues with primary education in your country? Why are people invited to the OER4schools programme?
What are teachers’ expectations (attend for the whole year - starting off weekly)? Some people will be concerned with big picture, others with detail. Agree the day of the week for f2f meetings.
Some expectations about what a workshop should be like. Modelling activities in the workshop on activities planned for the classroom. (Modelling participation and interactivity at all levels.)
Introduce this resource and the topics within it
introduce strategies to incorporate interactive elements (things you might say, things you might do)
thinking about your own practice; do you think you’d like to try one of these new approaches?
Do you want a buddy system (pairs of teachers matched by grade or subject)?
Running the first session.
What are the educator notes here?
Setting up the room - remove tables? Chairs in circle? Tables arranged in islands?
What props are needed? Sheets of papers and pens? May be hard to find for some schools.
Ice breaker Welcome everybody to the workshop.
You start the workshop with an “ice breaker”.
We would suggest first name basis.
Icebreaker 1 (for a group of colleagues):
Stand up and sing a song together.
Icebreaker 2 (for group of participants who don’t know each other well):
People say one or two words that describe themselves (such as “funny”, “sociable”, “shy”).
OR Chat in pairs, and then introduce your neighbour to the group.
Icebreaker 3 (for either colleagues or strangers):
- people form themselves into groups of 3
- they have a conversation for no more than 3 min, 1 min each, on a specified topic, e.g. their favourite foods, what activity they are glad to be rid of and don't have to tackle today, their worst fantasy about what could go wrong as a consequence of the workshop...
- facilitator claps their hands after each minute to signal changeover; after 3 min, groups dissolve and form new groups; facilitator changes the topic at this point and after every 3 min until everyone has spoken to everyone else
- people have to stand up the whole time and move around - it is very energising, normally beginning quite quietly and ending up very loud!
- the next activity might connect with this icebreaker, for example asking volunteers to report back on their worst fantasy about what could go wrong in their classroom as a consequence of the professional development programme?!
Need a list of topics here - workshop facilitator to decide these in advance.
Consider whether there is a hierarchy among the participants?
To continue the workshop, present the aims of Unit 1.
