knowledge,+skills+and+understanding

=Knowledge, Skills and Understanding=

Collaboration
inquiry stage - exploration (finding out) - ART Photos of students working making puppets. The students were very focused on their task. They were able to follow the instructions to design their puppet by drawing an outline. Lots of assistance given by the students to each other, very happy to stop making their puppet, to help someone else. They were also keen to state that they were helping. The students all were able to explain what they had done, and why their puppet looked a certain way. I was surprised by the amount of collaboration. When a student and done something original, the students wanted to hear how it was done and get them to help them.
 * __communicating and collaborating__**



inquiry stage - exploration (finding out) Hot Potato Activity - culture This activity was planned for the students to see what they knew about each other's culture. We also wanted to see if they could identify any stereotypes in their thinking and if the student who is from that culture could explain why it is a stereotype or not. This developed the students meta cognition skills. The students had to identify why they thought what they did and why they thought the way they did. They also had to draw on the prior knowledge of cultures and their peers in the class who were from that culture.



responses from this activity:



video of students responding if they agree or disagree, why they wrote those statements.

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get Damian or Amanda to reflect on this activity....


 * __reflecting and planning__**

inquiry stage - exploration (finding out) Y charts - putting themselves in the shoes of Cuc Lam - a refugee from Vietnam.

reflection on reflective practice page.

__**thinking and working creatively**__

inquiry stage - exploration (finding out) - ART All students had to plan their puppets - design brief. Creativity - own designs, chose colour for body, personality touches - hair etc, all own choice.





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inquiry stage - exploration (finding out) The lay it on the line activity was very interesting just to see what the students were thinking. Damian and I were amazed by the stereotypes that the students have of their own country. They also find some of the concepts difficult, such as what a city was, so there was some teaching going on. I think giving the students the chance to express what they think and accepting their responses whether we agree or disagree has helped their confidence. More students want to have a go, I think this would be part of the classroom routine section as well. It is interesting to hear students use words such as respect etc in their small groups, they are transferring it to other learning areas. This activity ended up being a good learning activity for stereotypes. We discussed stereotypes after and some of the students knew what they were and others didn't. They also could identify why they have stereotypes - what influences them, which is a huge step in their thinking!

__**exploring, experiment and creating new knowledge**__ inquiry stage - exploration (finding out) Australian pictures (what I think an Australian is) This activity also was an eye opener as to why this unit is important and toget the students to think about why they think the way they do. The students were given the task to draw an Australian. We didn't say what type of Australian, just a person. It was interesting to see the pictures that they drew. many of the pictures had people with hats on, shorts, Australian flags, males!. We did not think that we would get that response. I wonder if we worded the task differently if they would have thought to draw themselves?







Final Product 25/6/08 Inquiry Stage - Discoveries, Creating and sharing the treasure

At this stage the students needed to think about what they had find out about what Australians have in common. They then worked with a small group to storyboard their presentation. They had the choice of creating a book, powerpoint, imovie, garageband. It has been interesting to watch the students work together as they had to firstly agree on a format, then agree on what was going into their presentation. All the groups have worked cooperatively to complete their presentation. One thing we did after the first time they worked with their group was to get them to think about how their group worked. I gave them a list of questions and then they needed to reflect in their journals. We got great responses, they really thought about how they could improve and what team skills they used.

for end product examples - see student learning