Week Two

Well our first week with our flexible timetable went quite well. The idea behind it is to encourage student agency, which will help the kids learn skills for life. We made plenty of tweaks as the week went on, and now after a fabulous teacher only day on Saturday, I will be making lots more changes in order to really get that student agency up and running!

Students all have maths and writing goals that they are working on in order to help them move to the next level. We spoke this week about learning being a bit like moving through a dark tunnel. If you don't know why you're doing something or where the end is, it's easy to get lost. 

So the analogy is that where we are now is the start of the tunnel, where we want to go is the end of the tunnel, our learning goals are the torches or lights that show us the way, and our success criteria are the signposts that help us check we're on the right track. I hope this will help the children understand a bit more about their learning and the purpose of what they are doing. 

Tech is Thursday and Friday this week and Monday, Thursday, Friday of week 3. The kids have been split into two groups and will either be completing a robotics unit or a hard materials unit. In the robotics unit they will be working with Edison robots and programming them to complete routines and performances, with the aim being on entering a Robocup competition at the beginning of next term.  In hard materials, they will be working with pewter and enameling and also completing some design modelling. Those in hard materials will need closed in shoes but other than that, all equipment will be provided.