When I look at my current interdisciplinary connections, it seems like a good network to have. And even though my team members or the learning Support assistants may not necessarily bring content knowledge on to the table for every discussion/ collaboration, their varied perspectives definitely help me to look at a challenge or a potential solution in a new light. "Knowledge is perceived within experience and cannot be separated from the personal meaning given to it by the individual" (Crowell,1995 p.13)
However, it is undeniable that within our team of 6 teachers and definitely within the entire teaching staff, we have specialists who bring with them a wide variety of knowledge and expertise. All teachers within the school seem to be aware of 'who knows what' and can shoulder tap colleagues for impromptu discussions and advice regarding content knowledge and creative ideas for getting the knowledge across.
In New Zealand primary schools, the interdisciplinary approach has definitely been palpable for the past decade or so. Though I have not seen a reference to Howard Gardner's Theory of Multiple Intelligences in any of the readings for this post, I cannot help but make a connection between the two. I remember planning Topic Units of study in not so distant a past, that had to include activities related to the MI framework, which automatically resulted in interdisciplinary learning.
We do not seem to use that any more, however, the Inquiry Units that our learners do definitely have as many curriculum areas integrated into them as possible. In fact, a really powerful Inquiry teaching/learning model doesn't have a pre- conceived structure. It allows learners to branch out into any curriculum area that their questions and learning pathways lead them to.
In that light, what connections could I strengthen and / or create to facilitate this kind of learning for my students?
My Potential Interdisciplinary connection
I am finding it hard to narrow this down to one connection as all of the connections come with their own benefits and there would be different occasions or needs arising when any of them may be required to be strengthened.
It is also true that all the potential connections I have mentioned are experts or agencies that I have got some kind of a connection with and have collaborated with in the past.
For this post, I will focus on a tutor from the outside agency SPELD whom I have collaborated with very successfully last year regarding a dyslexic student I had in my class.
This tutor comes to work in our school with individuals or small groups of students who are facing challenges in Reading and Writing tasks. Literacy is a strength of mine and also my area of specialisation.
But, when it comes to something as specific as Dyslexia, I must admit my knowledge is limited to the material the Ministry of Education puts out for us. and even then, it requires hours of wading through materials and posts to cull and find what would work for each individual child.
But this particular tutor is highly experienced and has seen dyslexia remedial measures in action. she knows what works and what doesn't.
Liaising with her last year broadened my understanding of the process of language acquisition by the brain to a great extent. She had given me tips and tricks of how to integrate the child back into the classroom and how to deal with his anxiety and insecurities about Reading and Writing. Though that child is no longer with me this year, I do have a couple of learners who are not making the expected progress in Literacy and are responding to some techniques I had used with my student last year.
Challenges in the way of joint planning and sustained collaboration
Last year, she was working with my student during a time when I had my Classroom Release Time. I was giving a part of that time to observe those lessons and to seek clarification. She, kindly enough , did not mind my presence and neither did my student. We were also using ten minutes of our lunch hours twice a week to catch up , look at his work and to set goals.
This was sustainable as it was just for a term.
This year, she has at least 3 students ( only one of them is from my class ). so she is considerably busier.
I have taken up more responsibilities during the school day resulting in many more meetings and preparation work during the school week.
However, she is quite keen to collaborate with me again as she finds my input about the student's progress as a guiding factor and can plan her lessons accordingly.
So, face to face collaboration would be rare and might only happen whenever our timetable's match.
However, we are a GAFE school and a lot of our collaboration and team planning is already through the GAFE platform.
So, we could start a collaborative process exchanging material, anecdotes, ideas and even videos of lessons taken by her that I could learn from.
Yes, this would require some time commitment on our part. But it would also offer the flexibility of posting on GAFE outside of school hours.
This would be a starting point for me in strengthening and building upon my Interdisciplinary Professional Connections.
References: 1. Crowell,1995 p.13
2. http://www.niu.edu/facdev/_pdf/guide/learning/howard_gardner_theory_multiple_intelligences.pdf
3.http://acrlog.org/2015/05/14/a-conceptual-model-for-interdisciplinary-collaboration./
4. https://app.themindlab.com/media/32979/view
No comments:
Post a Comment