MIT 2022 Project Summary

As I reflect on my participation in the Manaiakalani Innovative Teachers project (MIT) project throughout the year, I realize the growth I went through.  Through the design thinking process, I developed a formalized question about the problem I experienced and grew brave enough to put my project out there in the wider community to receive feedback in order to make it better. Here is a summary of what the process looked like. 

When our leadership team looked at our data we realized that the data was particularly low in classes where Beginner Teachers and Overseas Trained Teachers taught. I came up with the question, what could I do to help these teachers, so that they don't waste time trying to figure out what to do, as in the time wasted, our students are either taught at the wrong level or taught the wrong topic, or not taught at all, which puts them at a disadvantage. Through the design thinking process and the help of my MIT colleagues, we refined the question to this: How might we support teachers starting at a new school where there is a complex array of new learning needed to be effective in the classroom. Then the question arose, what tool could I create that will actually be of use to these teachers.

I came up with the idea of a site where new teachers could find the most important information in order to speed up their adjustment to school life. After receiving feedback on my survey that I shared on the Teacher's FB page, I determined that the 3 most important areas of concern are assessments, planning, and resources.

My prototype was very boring, had no images, had too many contrasting coloured bars, and had some very old youtube videos. In order to make my site better, I shared it with as many people as possible and took on the feedback and advice. I tried to bring in an element of fun by changing the name to Survival Kete for New Teachers, With the change of name, I could bring in some elements of a kete, therefore the drop-down menu on the images of the kete's.

I even asked for feedback from a Reading Recovery Facilitator. She reviewed my Youtube demo videos on Running Records and gave me feedback on how I could do that better. All in all, I was able to refine my prototype to what it is now, due to lots and lots of feedback from people. I had to be brave to take the feedback on board, and willing to rethink and refine my project. So how can new teachers use my site? 

When teachers open the site, they can make a copy of the tracking sheet to keep track of the new learning they have completed. 

They can then choose from either the kete drop-down menu or click on the images to take them where they want to be, either assessments, planning, or resources. 

Then it's pretty straightforward, they choose what they want to learn about. And read up, or watch videos. 

 

The site contains the following information: Information on Running Records, PAT Maths, PAT Reading, Writing Vocab, Jam, Gloss, Online assessment and data, the process of planning, online resources, and abbreviations and acronyms.

The final stage of the program was to present our projects at the Principal Wananage. Luckily we had a practice run a few weeks before in Rarotonga at the Teachers Summit. The feedback was phenomenal. One team leader came to me and said she immediately shared my site with her Beginner Teachers. I had a principal book me for PD at her school to share my tool with her Beginner Teachers. I wish I had known about the Google Analytics tool so that I could see how many people did look at my site. 

I am looking forward to sharing it with new teachers in our school, and to getting feedback from them.

Here is my presentation. 

                   

                                                                         

                                                                       Me in action.

Was it worth being part of the MIT program? Yes, 100%. I learned so much about myself and my thinking processes. I made new connections and experienced being part of something bigger than school. And best of all, I created something that can be useful to somebody and hopefully ease the feeling of being overwhelmed at the start of their teaching career. 

A massive thank you to Dorothy Burt and Matt Goodwin, for taking us through the process step by step. And thank you to KMPG for supporting us throughout the year.  

As well as my senior leadership team, colleagues, friends, and family. Thanks to your support, my project got refined into what it is now. 

If you are considering if you should apply for MIT, my advice would be to have an authentic problem, that you genuinely want to have a solution to, and not to try and come up with a solution before you designed your HMW question, and then...enjoy the journey. 

Information Literacy and Digital Citizenship with Littles (Seesaw)

 What is digital citizenship? It is a way of being, thinking, and acting on digital devices. 

NOTE: On digital devices - not just online activity. Digital Citizenship includes roles and responsibilities that need to be enforced.

Zone of proximal development - figuring out the gaps. What are the most annoying behaviours you face when trying to use digital devices with your young students?

A few that I can think of: What do I do next? How do I do this or that? Not knowing how to log in or out? Or how to use the applications. Not caring for the devices (carrying, storing, or charging). Rushing through work not knowing how to share it at a high standard, or saving it in edit mode to work on later. Inappropriate photos (silly photos, not asking). Not getting off devices when asked to. Going on the internet when not supposed to, 

How to teach: 

Device Handling 

Students are new, and they need very explicit teaching on how to handle the devices. Not just at the start of the year, but throughout the year. 

Button to Button: How to hug and hold your device. The home button on your belly button. 

Face planting: when at the table or on the carpet, put the device gently face down on the floor to wait for instructions. 

ONLY hands: no other body parts

Only YOUR device:  You can only touch your own device. Help your friends verbally. 

Only with permission from an adult:  Only go on an app with adults' permission, at home, and at school. 

Pop Ups: Here is the link to the poster template on Canva.

When you see a pop-up, STOP, and show a teacher. (New Entries and Year 1's)

Older students: Teach Common pop-ups that students can act on by themselves. 

Photography: 

Students need to learn which photos are appropriate. The first thing they learn before even taking a photo, is: "Can I take your photo?" Students practice asking each other, then take a photo, after taking the photo ask if they like this picture or should you take another one. Equip students with words. Teach students to make sure photos are clear and not blurry. Remember anyone can see the photo and it should be representing your best self. Are you willing for everybody to see it? Students then practice taking selfies. Collect ideas of what is acceptable or not acceptable photos. Students video themselves explaining what is appropriate photos. From year 2 onwards learn about which images I can use from the Internet. 

What's done is done:

Think of visual cues to know what "Done" looks like. Create a routine or checklist to help the students. Visual cues of the green tickbox as little ones forget to use it. 

Steps to be truly done. 

INFORMATION LITERACY

information literacy includes the ability to identify, find evaluate, and use information effectively. 

Teach students if images are real or fake? Students learn to think about what they see. 

Example: Looking at this image. Would it be safe for the girl to sit next to the lion like that? Do you think she is really there reading with the lion? Or do you think somebody put two pictures together to create this image? 

Here is another little activity students can do to show their understanding of what real of fake images are. Students circle the image they think is definitely not a real image, then show the one that might be real, and then find the one that is definitely a real dog image.

Then you could show students how easy it is to change images, using Canva, and change one of the body parts. 

Here is a link to safe photo options: https://www.photosforclass.com/ This site automatically adds attribution to images used. Students then learn about which images are okay to use. 

What a great workshop with lots of practical ideas. Great ideas on how to introduce digital usage to our youngest students. This will help us when we start thinking about what digital expectations students in each phase should accomplish before they move on to the next year's group. 

Survival Kete for New Teachers

t

 

Working with Tamariki with ADHD: Module 1

 I had the priviledge of attending an online workshop with Tracey Rountree, an ADHD expert. It was a very informative session. I will share the main points that stood out for me. If you have ADHD students in your class, read this...

ADHD can be broken into 3 predominant types: 

1. Primarily Inattentive - hard to tune out distraction, task jumping, not finishing work, appear bored easily, seems like not listening, very interest driven. More visible in girls. 

2. Primarily Hyperactive/Impulsive - Parts of them always moving, chatterboxes, energetic, fidgets, ants in their pants, hard to stop. More visible in boys. 

3. Combined type - inconsistent and often labelled as naughty. 

ADHD students tend to be on the higher end of IQ. Can be quite creative and could include Dyslexia, Dyscalculia etc.

Characteristics of ADHD children: 

Inattentive or hyperactive

Impulsive - not thinking of consequences, does not think of others, unablel to control themselves, mood swings, low frustration tolerance.

Inflexible - very black and white, don't understand tease of sarcasm, very aware of what is fair and just, sees things from their point of view and assumes everyone thinks like them. 

Hyper focus - has very strong interests in certain things, able to focus on special interest

Poor social skills-not able to read subtle social cues or recognise that their behaviour or actions can effect others. Not able to read facial expressions. Lack of boundaries, personal space and voice (noise) control.

Poor working memory-great long term memory, however, unable to hold information in mind to guide actions now or later. Hard to follow instructions or cope with multiple tasks. Slow response to direction (needs more time to process requests and reminders).

Disorganised - trouble sequencing what comes next or where to start. Often looses things to complete task. Issues with motivation - unable to stay on task. Loose track of time. 

Emotions -quick to get frustrated by minor annoyances. Worry too much or too long about small things. Have trouble calming down. Overly sensitive to critique. Feel excessive urgency to get/do something. 

ADHD RARELY APPEARS ON IT'S OWN: Often OCD, ODD, Sensory Processing Disorder, Tics (vocal or motor), depression, anxiety, language and learning disabilities. 

Solutions: Medication, diet, excersise. 

How will this affect me in the classroom? 

Have realistic expectations, recognise strengths. 

Priority - work on 1 or 2 issues at a time. 

Prepare - plan ahead - set procedures in place for dealing with a situation. 

Relate

Positvity

Put accomodations in place eg. allow for movement.

Training -give alternative words or actions.

Discipline - least effective - if necessary - use immediately for impact. 

Reinforce positive behaviour. 

Everyday strategies:

Build a relationship with them.

Gather info

Look for triggers

Define the expected behaviour do not assume they know. 

Post session or class rules - discuss clearly as well as consequences. 

Be prepared - plan basic activties and consequences as well as a plan B/C/D.

Redirect their attention rather than reprimand. 

Frequent positive feedback

Immediate reward and consequences

Use simple lang

verbal reminders

allow for extra movements

give appropriate supervision

give them more responsibility

ignore minor behaviours

don't back them into a corner

don't judge or get emotiona; - stay calm and stick to the facts

get them  to think about the effect of their behaviour

give them acceptable responses to use next time

don't take things personally

Make sure all of the team is on the same page - consistent language and consequences.

Digital Learning Circle

 Last term, I initiated a learning circle for improving our use of Seesaw. We are at the moment 4 teachers taking part in this. We get together for 30min every 3 weeks and set ourselves a tiny achievable goal in order to improve how we use Seesaw. We look at each other's Class Journals and highlight the posts that represent good quality posts, as well as share some ideas on how to achieve our goals. It has been really great to have this opportunity to discuss Seesaw with these ladies. 

Minutes

My goal this cycle is: By 3 Nov have pictures up of how to store devices. And teach students how to respond to our comments. 

I need to check that Totara students know how to read their message notifications and act on them.  I will share this with Sam and create space in our timetable to teach this to the students. 

Another thing I would like to do this term is to sit with Erin and create a plan of how to transition the current year 3's onto Chromebooks. My thinking is that we provide some loan chromes to their class and that they get the opportunity to log in to the device using their email address (I will ask Gretchen if it will be possible to have their emails generated earlier). In order for them to familiarise themselves with the keyboard, they can practice Typing Club and how to log into Seesaw. It will then be great if Erin (karaka) can then create a space in their timetable to talk about some aspects of the Kawa of Care, e.g. how to carry a Chromebook, how to pack it away and put it on charge, how to log out before packing it away etc. 

My next steps: 

Take some photos of the device cabinet in Totara to show how we store our devices. 

Create space on our timetable to teach how to respond to comments. 

Book a time in with Gretchen and Erin to discuss transitioning year 3's onto Chromebooks. 

MIT 2022 Survival Kete for New Teachers

 Here is my site https://sites.google.com/parkestate.school.nz/teachers-induction-template/home

Mini Meet Kuia Ako Term 3 2022

I had the opportunity to facilitate a mini meet at our school. I shared some practical ideas on writing rapid routines. 

I had 15 teachers across the Kaui Ako cluster that joined me. Padlet 

The rapid routines that I shared and modelled were: 

Adopt a word, Give me 10, Vocab jumble, Label it! Running Dictation, Pass it on, Onomatopoeia alphabet and Simile and Metaphor drawing activity.

Initially, when I asked the teachers to get ready for the running dictation, there were some hesitation and lots of frowns, but once we started everybody participated really well.

Having the hands-on workshop seemed to resonate well with everybody. They were all engaged, and there were lots of laughter.

I didn't over-plan too much, there were only 2 activities that I did not get to do.

What would I do differently next time:

Most probably start with the Running Dictation straight away to break the ice.

Have my scrap paper ready before the time, as well as setting everything up for the running dictation before the time.

Next step:

I'm wondering if a Rapid Routine part 2 should not be an option, then we can look at even more options for Rapid Routines, the ones that need a little more preparation.

Feedback from one teacher when I asked if the workshop was okay, said she can use all of it as she is only a 3rd year teacher. So... mission accomplished.

MIT 2022 Project Survival Kete Tracking

On my site for new teachers, I have a tracking system, where teachers have the option to keep track of their learning. The initial idea was to have it light and add a bit of light humour while teachers earn items for their survival kits. 

This was my initial tracking sheet that was drafted: Survival Kit for New Teachers 

Some suggestions from my principal led to this: Survival Kete for New teachers 

Some more suggestions from my principal led to this: Survival Kete for New teachers Slide (Option 1)

After feedback from an MIT Colleague: Survival Kete for New teachers

And then the final product: Survival Kit For New Teachers Tracking (Option2)

This process reminded me of Austin's Butterfly.  Through feedback and more feedback I was able to come up with something that looks more professional. A massive thank you to everybody that took the time to give me feedback!

What do you think? Option 1 or 2?

MIT 2022 KPMG Meeting 3#

 Today we had our 3rd KPMG meeting. We looked at how our project was progressing. 

I am at the phase where I am getting feedback from my colleagues. I have had great feedback from my principal where she is scrutinising the content. One of her feedbacks is that one of my videos under Running Records (RR) is a benchmark video and not good practice. I had to first figure out what she meant with a benchmark video and got the info from my DP. My solution to the problem is to video one of our Reading Recovery teachers doing a RR. Then I know the video is authentic. 

The second feedback was from my colleagues Simon. Here is a copy of his email There were 2 of the things he mentioned that I took to the team for advice. The first was another word for 'unit', to soften it a bit. The team came up with the word "kete", as teachers will gain information that they can add to their kete which I thought was very appropriate. This then created the opportunity to use a kete as an image or border. I'm not very keen on images on the site as I want it to look professional. So the images that I use will have to be chosen well. The team suggested that I rather use real photos. Some advice was given on how to take a photo from the back of people to avoid having their faces in the image. So I will have to take some photos to spice my site up a little. 

We then worked on our Pecha Kucha  (this is still a work in progress) slides for Raro and the Wananga. These slides are timed and run automatically. 20 seconds per slide, 20 slides long. 

The trick is to keep your slide neat and clean with minimum words and catchy images. Prepare just enough for 20 seconds, so that you don't go over your time and/or end up not saying enough. So I will need to practice this a lot. It was suggested that we arrange to present at a staff meeting to get the feel for it before we leave for Raro.

I'm hoping to get more feedback from my colleagues before I share my site on the Teacher's FB page to get their feedback, which will be my next step. 

MIT 2022 Where am I up to now?

I am now sharing my site with my colleagues and on my FB page in order to make sure the information on it is correct. Further, I will be sharing it on the Teachers FB page in order to determine if new teachers in NZ or beginner teachers think this will be helpful. 

I am also currently preparing my draft Pecha Kucha Slide Deck in preparation for my presentation at Raro and the wananga. While creating the slide I have to reflect on my MIT journey. The initial problem, who was affected and how I can solve it. I am hoping to get positive feedback from colleagues and staff as an early indicator that it is successful. My biggest hope will be that principals will find it good enough to actually add a link to their school sites in order to offer extra support to their beginner teachers and overseas trained teachers. 

When I looked at previous MIT teacher's videos, including a dear friend of mine, I realised how many great ideas there are out there, and wondered if teachers are aware of the great work MIT is doing and that they can tap into it. I will take the time to bring this to our teacher's attention so that they can know there are trialled and tested ideas out there that they can tap into. 

My next step is to write what I want to share while looking at my timed slides. I can't talk too long and not too little. Preparing to talk in front of a big audience. Wish me luck!

Manaiakalani Shared Staff Meeting

 On Monday I had the privilege of being one of the facilitators for a nationwide shared meeting on our inquiries. 

I met with Richard, Elfrida and Ashley. Richard is a principal, Elfrida a DP and Ashley a Beginner Teacher. 

The sharing just happened naturally. Elfrida shared how they are doing an inquiry around their new school's value of sharing. What does sharing look like for their leadership team, staff, students and community?  Richard's team is relooking at their strategic plans as school life at the moment is not what they thought it would be when they planned it last year. And Ashely is looking into how she can build up a kete of different teaching strategies. I shared with them my MIT project, Survival Kit for New teachers. 

It was good to hear that other schools have the same challenges that we do. And sharing some ideas with each other was very helpful. I shared with Ashley a link to Manaiakalani Classroom on Air site, hopefully, that will be helpful to her. 

Initially, I was a bit nervous as I wasn't sure if I would be able to facilitate leaders, but they made it really easy for me, and I learned from them how they approach an inquiry in their school. 

Seesaw Certified Educator Refresher Course

My annual Certified Educator Refresher Course.  There are so many exciting new features coming. The one that I am the most excited about is creating groups within Seesaw. No longer having to select specific students' names every time you assign an activity to them. I can't wait for it to be implemented. 

Another new function is the Seesaw Educator Toolkits. This is a dashboard for upcoming events, important links and exclusive opportunities. A lot of the refresher course was spent on how to navigate the hub. I really liked the link to information on how to train teachers. Everything is easily accessible. This will be handy for when we get new teachers not familiar with Seesaw. 

They requested some feedback in surveys and showed me a new video for pioneer teachers. What I really like about Seesaw is that they strive to make the app teacher-friendly, and every year something amazing gets added. 

MIT 2022 - Design successes and failures

 New Teachers Site 

I have had the opportunity to talk through my prototype with Mat in a one-on-one session. I found this was very helpful, especially to pull me back to what my priority should be. I was getting distracted by worrying about the look of my site, possibly out of fear of having to go back and fix everything and through that creating more work for myself. However, I was losing focus of what the most important part was and that was the content of the site. Matt advised me to finish off by collecting my content information, and later in the design thinking process, there will be space to work on what the site looks like.

He shared with me some examples of sites and advised me to try and look at as many as possible sites to get an idea of what I like. 

This site of Mrs David's had a really nice layout on the home page. You can clearly see what you will find on the site, the colours are not screaming at me, and I didn't have to scroll down to figure out what is on the page. Everything was easily visible in one glance. 

On this site, there was uniformity in the heading format. I didn't particularly like the colours, but I can see the consistency of the headings that could be valuable. 

When I am done with my content, it will be really important that I do a paper layout of what I want my site to look like. Concentrating on what will be headings and what will be subheadings, then going back to my site and adapting my layout. 

And as Matt said numerous times and remembering from my DFI course, embrace white. 

Next, I shared my progress with my principal and DP. This was a very helpful session as well, we quickly discovered that I was adding things to my site that were not relevant to my initial idea. As I was searching on the web for information I would stumble upon things that I thought could also be helpful, and ended up adding things to my site that has the potential to blow up and confuse new teachers. So they helped me to come back to my initial idea of sharing important information well, in order for new teachers to "survive" the first 6 months of their time at a new school.  They also highlighted to me that I need to look at copyrights as I made some copies out of books with the correct information, I am not 100% how I will check that and will seek their guidance on this. Michelle also shared the NZSTA site with me. I really like the neat clean look of this site. The photos are not overwhelming in colour and you can also see at one glance what is available on the site. 

Lastly, I shared my progress with the Kootuitui leadership team. The feedback was positive and sounded like it was something they could see the value of. Immediately there was a suggestion to add the Observation Survey, but I highlighted that this site has the potential to get really big, but that I want to focus on my initial main points in order to present a completed site by October. After October, I can add more and "grow" the site gradually. The leadership team will help me with feedback as soon as I have my prototype completed. 

The honest feedback from colleagues and leaders is what makes my site better. It's so easy to get distracted and move away from what I really wanted to achieve. Having the conversation and sharing my progress helps me to really think about what is the most important information. What do they see as valuable and what is dead weight. 

My goal is now to tackle the harder part of my prototype, and that is the planning unit. I want it to be really clear for new teachers without overwhelming them.

KPMG Meeting 2

 During our second KPMG meeting, we presented our progress with our prototype. This phase is calles the testing phase. "In the testing phase, you will gain feedback and insights that you may not have been able to recognize without testing your prototypes. Through these tests, you will identify aspects of your prototype that did not work well or the end user did not find functional or pleasing. These “failures” give you the opportunity to fix and improve aspects of your prototype"es.

I presented my Running Records page. 

What we discovered through the feedback process was that my initial idea was not going to work. I had the idea that I would create a template and then make a copy of it in order to adjust it specifically for my school. In this way schools could make a copy of the template and adjust it to their own school's needs, however, the red flag was raised to what often happens. When you create a copy for your own school, you only work or updated the school site version. The template get's forgotten and outdated. 

It was suggested that I create my site as an additional piece of information that can be linked to school sites. 

So focussing on the information that is applicable to all new teachers and cutting out customized information such as principals messages, school sites and contact details for specific people in the shcool. 

This makes so much more sense, because then the site will be practical and can be updated as time goes, and everybody that uses the site will see the changes. 

So the new layout on my sites first page changed to: 

Purpose of this website

Induction Tracking

    Assessment, 

    Planning,

    and Resources

Professional Blog

Classroom Organisation

I really hope this tool will be of great help to all new teachers and that it will be practical and accurate. 

As soon as I have most of my information on my site, I will send it our to colleagues to get more specific feedback. 

Testing Prototypes

MIT 2022 Progress towards prototype

During our first KMPG meeting, we drew up a plan for our prototype. We then had to go away and refine it. I presented my idea to my principal and DP just before I had to urgently leave for South Africa as my mum fell ill. I took my MIT work with me in case I had time on hand in the 48-hour flight journey and could fit in some work. Unfortunately mum passed away while I was on my way so I didn't look at this for a couple of weeks. As the dust settled and I shared about my life in NZ, MIT always came up. I shared my ideas with family members. Especially the ones involved in IT or management, herefore all the wrinkles and tears on my sheet. And when I came back to NZ and managed to go to school for 1 day before being diagnosed with COVID, I presented my idea to my Kootuitui leader. Each and every person thought my idea was good and added to it. They helped me to refine it to make it practical and user friendly. These were the inputs that stood out for me. 

Principal: It was so helpful to talk to Michelle as she had the overall knowledge of what new teachers struggle with. 

- We added how teachers can plan by tapering down from the curriculum, achievement objectives, LPF's to learning intentions in their daily planning. 

- We clarified which assessments are applicable to Manaiakalaani schools. 

- She suggested that instead of just giving links to teachers to sites that could help them with their planning, to add a little video of how to navigate these sites.

- We clarified which sites would truly be helpful to teachers in order not to confuse them.

- And lastly, she suggested that I could embed a calendar of when Manaiakalaani assessment data is due.

DP: Gretchen was my reality check. She thought the idea was great but cautioned me at it could easily get really big. We talked about what my focus or priority should be, in order to present to the principals at the end of the year. 

Anthony: Anthony is an addition to our family, he works in IT in South Africa and runs his own security company. He added that I should have a place where teachers can see who they can talk to if they get stuck. Like a helpdesk. So I decided to add emails of subject leaders or contact persons with their email addresses.

Jono: During our last MIT meeting at KPMG, I asked Jono if he had some ideas of resources that could be helpful to teachers. He gave me a few names which I wrote down. I went through each of these to determine if they were easily accessible, whether they were free or whether it was appropriate for our curriculum. I eliminated one or two.

Kootuitui Leader: Cam also liked my idea. She suggested that I could use Google Forms instead of a Google sheet for the induction track. She also offered to help me clarify my understanding of how to navigate some of the sites I suggested, in order to make Screencastify video clips. The first one we looked at was Edpotential. I realised how easy it was to navigate and understand after only a few minutes, whereas when I was just given the link and had to understand how to use it by myself, I found it quite confusing to read the data. And all it took was the clarification of what TMP01 meant, and how to find the different reports for the cluster and the school. This confirms what Michelle suggested, that a little navigation video will be very helpful to new teachers, instead of just giving the link to the site. 

This was a really interesting part of my journey as I loved sharing my idea with everybody that was willing to listen, and getting their feelings on it. Everybody felt that it was something that will be helpful and can prepare teachers better. 

Next step: I am now starting on my prototype. Creating my site and collecting all the information I need to link. Also, identifying all the abbreviations or acronyms that are important to know, I. will do this by asking the teachers and management at my school.

MIT 2020 Collecting Data

I collected data using a survey that I sent out on the teacher's FB page. Up to today, 9 April, I had 62 responses from a variety of teachers, however, most were NZ trained. 

My goal was to collect Teachers' Voice of newly appointed teachers across the country. 

With collecting the data on when teachers started teaching in NZ, I was hoping to get data around if this feeling of being overwhelmed affects a specific age group of teachers, or whether it is something all new teachers experience. 

Of the 62 teachers participating in the survey, 56 started between the years 2019 to 2022. 6 teachers started between 1997 to 2018. 

On the question What is the hardest thing about being a new teacher in an NZ school, I had a variety of answers. Most of them indicated how hard it was to get used to the workload, understand the curriculum, planning and assessment. How to cope and plan for a digital class, learning new systems and lack of support. There were a couple that referred to how what they learned at university did not prepare them for the teaching profession. And finally, teachers struggle to get work-life balance due to all the new things that they have to learn. 

It was interesting to see what they felt they needed more help with. I thought that understanding the curriculum would be the hardest thing, but then I realised it might the case for overseas trained teachers, but not necessarily for teachers that are used to the curriculum from experiencing it as a child and working with it at uni.

The 4 highest areas where they felt they needed more support were: 

Planning, Assessment, Finding Resources and Grouping Students. 

The question where I felt the most empathy was: How would you describe how you felt about all the new learning when you started as a new teacher at your school?

Of the 62 participants, 32 felt overwhelmed. Some felt frustrated, disheartened, lost and that everything was tiring. 7 still felt excited and fantastic. 

When I How do you think student achievement was impacted in the time period when you were getting your head around the curriculum, assessment, planning, etc, most answers were a bit vague. I got the sense that teachers don't want to acknowledge that their lack of understanding might have had a negative impact on their students. Answers varied from heavily impacted to not impacted at all. 

And in my last question, do you have ideas for how a school could support the orientation and induction of new teachers more efficiently and effectively, there were a few great suggestions and the following caught my eye: 

Returning teachers could have a minor pct for a year... Eg like once per month you get a chance to go watch others or have an obs taken of them

Take them through the assessment process and ensure they have access to all the information they need.

Have a structured BT program (e.g., who provides what support, requirements, same expectations of each BT/consistency), and provide all school procedures and protocols. Be open, supportive and receptive to questions, feedback and concerns from staff to management.

Supporting more with assessments and understanding the curriculum

yes, structured induction would be really good

Have PDs on school-specific programs, sites, timelines and expectations BEFORE the start!

If one could get something to read before you actually start your first day at school whether it's online or hard copy, will make you feel more at ease and will also help you to ask the right questions when you do not understand how things work at the said new school.

Have a guidebook or a scavenger hunt type list of things to find and ask about.

Perhaps orientation/induction before term starts for teacher aides and teachers. Where to find resources etc.

Was my survey useful, yes definitely, did I get all the correct data? No, unfortunately, I forgot to let the teacher's email addresses be visible, so I couldn't determine whether they were in a Manaiakalaanie school or not. 

Moving forward, I will get in touch with the Manaiakalaani MIT teachers, and create a focus group with whom I will bounce my ideas. 

Survey Responses