SCD/Milestone Reports/Resources, Documentation and Downloads/Milestone 2 26 November 2010

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Milestone Number: 2
Regional Cluster Name Southern Central Divide
Contract Number 10-0279
Lead School/Legal Entity Waimate High School
Date 12 November 2010
National Facilitator Warren Hall
Project Director/s Trevor Storr, Pete Graham, Darren Sudlow
Facilitator/s Trevor Storr, Pete Graham, Darren Sudlow

2.2–2.5Report on the outputs for all of your Programme Outcomes for this milestone period as detailed in Schedule One:

Programme Implementation


NOTE: Report on your programme outputs in this section. An output is a planned activity that you have carried out to achieve your outcomes (for example: Principals’ workshop).

Provide a succinct explanation for planned outputs that have not been delivered and any corrective action taken (for example: Principals’ workshop did not take place due to availability of personnel. This has been rescheduled for February 2011)


What did we do and how often? Who Attended Positives or Challenges


Participant teachers, Darren Sudlow, Pete Graham, Trevor Storr, Niki Davis


  • Teachers were very positive re-forming our PD community
  • Teachers were very focussed on their work
  • Teachers attended during their own time
  • Some - a few- teachers were unable to attend
  • Teachers completed their 'institutional review'
 Completed by participant teachers, facilitated by Niki Davis, Darren Sudlow, Pete Graham, Trevor Storr
  • teachers were able to place their own elearning journey within the context of their school
  • teachers realise that elearning is challenge at pedagogical, school and system level
  • sharing and reflecting on school progress and processes can be both rewarding and uncomfortable for teachers and school leaders
  • Forum discussion facilitation
 Completed by participant teachers, facilitated by Niki Davis, Darren Sudlow, Pete Graham, Trevor Storr
  • teachers gained skills in facilitating an online asynchronous discussion
  • teachers had to research and provide key questions for the discussion
  • elearning was the discussion topic: teachers were challenged by the content as well as the medium
  • the teachers crystallised as a group during this activity
  • workload issues were signalled by some teachers
  • Pilot programme of online blended learning
 Started by participant teachers, facilitated by Niki Davis, Darren Sudlow, Pete Graham, Trevor Storr
  • Teachers have been challenged to produce a unit of work that is taught in a blended fashion
  • some teachers have completed this, while others are still planning
  • workload issues have prevented progress for some teachers
  • Support for individual teachers
  • PD days run at Waimate High School and Darfield High School
  • Participant teachers had the opportunity to attend a face-to-face day for further PD. Additionally, teachers have had f2f visits at their own schools and/or support through email, VC and telephone
 Facilitated by Niki Davis, Darren Sudlow, Pete Graham, Trevor Storr
  • Allowed teachers to reconnect with other participants
  • Allowed teachers to recieve personalised PD
  • Some teachers did not participate

2.6Report on the progress (i.e. programme effectiveness) towards achieving Programme Outcome A for this milestone period


Note: Report on your progress towards achieving your planned programme outcomes in this section. An outcome is the result of the change derived from your programme activities (outputs). Questions a–d below provide a framework (measurement, reflection, action) to support your reporting on your achievements. The intention is to inform the ongoing development of your programme. There is an understanding that progress towards your goals will not be uniform. The purpose of this milestone report is for the cluster, the national facilitator and the Ministry to gain an understanding of your progress to date, current position and future steps.


Cluster Programme Outcome

Programme Outcome A: Blended learning programmes of study are constructed that enable personalised learning


Effectiveness Indicator/s
  • Each teacher has a blended course online.
  • Each teacher has developed the necessary technological skills to take a blended approach to learning.



End of year reviewReply to each of the following points (a, b, c, d)


a. What progress has been made towards achieving these goals?

Significant progress has been made towards achieving this goal. The vast majority of teachers have learnt a considerable amount about online learning and how to implement it in a face to face situation over the course of the year. The University Course as been an integral part of this by providing continual motivation for teachers to push themselves (although this has been difficult for some, see later). Teachers have also benefited from face to face PD, in July and in smaller groups. This PD focussed on providing support for the online discussions and the planning of their online module.

Some teachers have completed a two week module of blended learning which they will report on during the face to face PD in November. Others are still in the planning stage for implementation in term one of next year.

Not all teachers have been successful in achieving this outcome. A small number have barely participated and have been rather overwhelmed by it all. A couple of others have withdrawn because of workload.

There are two major aspects to this outcome.


Aspect One: Teacher professional learning on what constitutes blended learning and how to implement it effectively

  • Institutional Review: Provided the basis for teachers to plan their online module by informing them of their school’s readiness for blended learning.
  • The July PD provided face to face support on how to implement a blended module of learning and was also used to set up the five week period of online discussion
  • Flexible face to face PD organised by the teachers, provided one day to support each other’s learning in the implementation on their pilot module
  • Individual Support: The ePrincipals travelled around schools giving one to one support for teachers who wanted it. This sometimes involved hands on PD on useful tools
  • Forum Discussions: Teachers learned more about the pedagogical questions and approaches around implementing a blended approach to learning. Learning occurred through the professional readings, the discussions around them and the hands on experience of being an online learner in a discussion based environment
  • ePortfolio: All teachers have been encouraged to keep a blog of reflections on their ePortfolio. Roughly half have done this and it has been an effective means for them to reflect, but also for ePrincipals to monitor progress.


Aspect Two: Final Product - finished pilot courses

A number of teachers have completed their pilot blended course (two week module) and are about to reflect on this. This provides tangible evidence of learning and a great opportunity for us to showcase what has been achieved this year.


b. What evidence supports this? 

"Just had an awesome day at Oxford with M, N, G, D and B, a teacher from Oxford Area school. We had a great time sharing some tips and tricks we've been using along the way. We were very privileged to see some of M's class using VLN portfolio as a way of recording a weekly learning journal. The students were all very confident in sharing their use of VLN and it has inpired me to share it with teachers at DHS that have been asking about blogs but unsure of using VLN. We were able to support each other in looking at our 3rd Assignment, the 2 week teaching block. It was a really usful time to get together in a smaller regional group to meet."
"Last Tuesday I travelled through to Oxford Area School for a days PD organised by M. Six of us spent the day sharing our particular interests and abilities in ICT. I learnt that R... allow their senior students to bring their personal laptops to school and that it has worked successfully. I think this is something we should look at at Akaroa. I know there are a number of students who want to do this. I like the idea of personal computers as it would free up more school computers. H B is the man to contact at R. I also found out about a free open source software package called italc that is downloaded and installed onto a school server . This allows an administrator to check what the students are accessing at any particular time and to take a screen shot if needed. It seems a sensible way of monitoring student use, especially as many of our senior students use computers in their study time. We learnt about Windows Skydrive which seems a little like Google Docs without the sharing. I will have a closer look. I showed them the site http://cooltoolsforschools.wikispaces.com/web 2.0 tools for classroom & school use. M and I decided to do some project work together. Next week my Year 7 class is going to do her online Moodle Course based on the My Story book 'Sabotage'. After we have done her course we will get our two classes together for some discussion & a VC session."

c. List any key lessons for the cluster?

  • The project needs to be flexible in its approach to developing teacher capacity. We have a wide variety of teachers, both in terms of skills and motivation, so we need to make sure we are meeting the needs of each individual teacher
  • The University course while challenging, has provided motivation for teachers at times when it might have normally been lacking. For a few others, it has increased workload too much
  • Teacher motivation is key.  Teachers need to want to learn.  If they have had their arm twisted to participate, they won't be successful.
  • Personalised learning is not an easy concept to grasp and implementing effectively it in a blended environment is even more challenging. Despite this, the majority of teachers understand the value of approaching learning in this way
  • The COP is an integral part of teacher learning


d. What are the next steps towards achieving the cluster goal/s?

  • We need to continue to develop the COP to support the learning of the teachers.  Feedback from teachers has indicated that the sharing of practice and learning with their colleagues has been the most effective form of PD
  • Showcase examples of teacher pilot modules to their peers and schools.  This will provide some help and motivation for those teachers who are still to implement their pilot module.  It will also demonstrate to principals what can be achieved with a blended approach to learning
  • Closely support teachers who have yet to develop their pilot module in term one next year.
  • Encourage teachers to begin working collaboratively in their online teaching spaces and show them ways this could be approached


2.7Report on the progress (i.e. programme effectiveness) towards achieving Programme Outcome B for this milestone period


Note: Report on your progress towards achieving your planned programme outcomes in this section. An outcome is the result of the change derived from your programme activities (outputs). Questions a–d below provide a framework (measurement, reflection, action) to support your reporting on your achievements. The intention is to inform the ongoing development of your programme. There is an understanding that progress towards your goals will not be uniform. The purpose of this milestone report is for the cluster, the national facilitator and the Ministry to gain an understanding of your progress to date, current position and future steps.


Cluster Programme Outcome

Programme Outcome B: Establish a sustainable community of practice that uses a blended approach to learning


Effectiveness Indicator/s
  • Communities of practice have been developed by the teachers.
  • "Teacher Leaders" have been identified for distributed leadership roles



End of year reviewReply to each of the following points (a, b, c, d)


a. What progress has been made towards achieving these goals?

Teacher particpants in the project have continued to work toward forming a community of practice (CoP). At this stage the CoP is aspiringing toward using blended learning in the classroom as opposed to reflecting on actual experience of this. The CoP itself, however, due to the use of face-to-face and online technologies, learns in a blended fashion.

The CoP has been reinforced by several key events and methods during the milestone period.

  • The f2f meeting in Christchurch, 5-6 July 2010
  • The facilitating a forum activity as part of the UC course, July – September 201
  • Smaller f2f PD groups held at two schools
  • Private email conversations between participants

Overall we judge the emerging CoP to have moved just beyond being formative and is now established as a safe place through which members can express and engage with other professionals in the project. The CoP activity has been sporadic in volume and has noticeably declined toward the end of Term 3 and the beginning of Term 4. This is likely due to workload at school drawing the attention of teachers to other tasks.


b. What evidence supports this?

The f2f meeting in Christchurch was followed by an anonymous online survey for teacher participants to complete. The purpose of the survey was to find out if the format of the f2f PD days were useful. A summary of the results is shown below.

Summary of teacher survey -Christchurch PD July 2010.

Clearly, the most useful parts of the PD were sharing and connecting with others. This is a clear indication that the participants recognised the value of co-constructing knowledge in the formative CoP. Conversely, the least useful part of the PD, was the individual planning time. To quote one response:

“It was very motivating to spend time with the other teachers, and I felt very enthusiastic most of the time, even though that may seem to contradict what I said above. I liked hearing what happens in other schools and what works. The teachers who appear to have a huge variety of digital tools at their finger tips are very generous in sharing their knowledge and I find that helpful. Wish it were me! We have become more confident with our colleagues and the sharing of ideas.”

The online forum was part of the UC course. The screencast below fully describes this activity.



Screencast of the online facilitation forum activity

The Blip.tv service shut down in August, 2015,
so this copy of the video is no longer available.
Cc-sa.svg

Avoid deletion: Upload a free format version of this video to the Commons
tstorr.


Note that usernames and passwords for facilitators to observe the online forum activity which took place at http://educo.vln.school.nz/course/view.php?id=275&topic=4 are available from the project co-ordinators.

Flexible face-to-face PD took place twice (once at Waimate High School and once at Oxford Area School) during the milestone period. The purpose of these days was to allow teachers who needed face-to-face help to receive it. Some, but not all, teachers took advantage of this opportunity. The vast majority of time was spent responding to technical queries on particular aspects of ICT use rather than on pedagogical problems.

Teachers have also been contacting and helping each other more informally. We are aware of several teachers who have contacted each other by email to help each other out. These are encouraging indicators that the CoP is becoming a route for participants to help each other in changing pedagogical practice.

It is obvious from the PD activities so far that some participants are natural leaders among their peers. To what extent these individuals are reluctant leaders or 'comfortable' with their leadership varies between the individuals. We have tried in the PD to balance the needs of the individual teachers who are emerging as leaders to receive PD themselves as well as encouraging them to help others.

c. List any key lessons for the cluster?

The key lessons for the cluster are:

  • CoP's take time to be established
  • CoP's require ongoing effort and resourcing to ensure they are sustainable
  • CoP's require a definite purpose – in this case support around blended learning
  • The balance between overt imposed leadership and allowing leaders to emerge needs to taken into account when facilitators intervene in an emerging CoP.


d. What are the next steps towards achieving the cluster goal/s?

The sustainability of the emerging CoP will be a major focus for 2011 and onwards. This is required to be so as we move away from f2f PD and toward virtual methods of PD delivery. We are aware of the small size of our CoP and the need to increase the size of it to ensure its sustainability. We are presently considering how to do this and two possible ways forward are:

  • increasing the 'member/participant base in each school. This will also widen the number of teachers involved in the project in each school.
  • Establish the overlap with the emerging CoP's in the Otago/Dunedin ICTPDREC and see if it is possible to form wider CoP's.

We are still establishing the format of the PD programme for 2011 onwards and will make a firm decision by the January 2011.


The role of distributed leaders and models for developing teachers leaders in CoP's across the cluster will also need to be resolved.


2.7Report on the progress (i.e. programme effectiveness) towards achieving Programme Outcome C for this milestone period

Note: Report on your progress towards achieving your planned programme outcomes in this section. An outcome is the result of the change derived from your programme activities (outputs). Questions a–d below provide a framework (measurement, reflection, action) to support your reporting on your achievements. The intention is to inform the ongoing development of your programme. There is an understanding that progress towards your goals will not be uniform. The purpose of this milestone report is for the cluster, the national facilitator and the Ministry to gain an understanding of your progress to date, current position and future steps.


Cluster Programme Outcome

Programme Outcome C: School systems and structures have been challenged and some change has occurred


Effectiveness Indicator/s
  • the strengths and the pitfalls within individual schools and across the cluster are identified



End of year reviewReply to each of the following points (a, b, c, d)


a. What progress has been made towards achieving these goals?

Some progress has been made towards this outcome, but there is still much to do. AorakiNet and Cantatech have formally merged into one cluster for 2011 and beyond (does not include WestNet). This will go someway towards bringing the schools together and the opportunities for collaboration stronger. Schools have been kept informed of the progress of their teacher and the project as a whole. Some teachers have shared their progress with all staff and the board of trustees and have played a key role in developing some capacity within the school already. Many of the teachers are still developing their own expertise to a level where they are comfortable with sharing their learning with the school, which is understandable.

The institutional review is a key part of informing schools of how ready they are for blended learning. Teacher’s who have implemented their pilot module have also tested the capacity of their school to cope. At the moment most of the challenges have been around resourcing and in particular internet speed. One school in particular is investigating a more flexible timetable to implement more learner centred programmes.


b. What evidence supports this?

Quotes from teacher ePortfolios and institutional Reviews:

"This week I spent time at our Board of Trustees meeting informing the board of the aims of the BLP. I explained to them what personalised education was.They had also been emailed a copy of the Institutional Review.  'Some of the board members were very enthusiastic about what the BLP is trying to do. I know that a couple of board members personally would love to see the school move towards giving our students more choice of subject at a younger age. They can see Blended and Personalised learning would help this. Later this year the revisioning for our school will be taking place and the BoT are keen to have me involved with this."
'"Today my students and I were completely frustrated. Google docs wouldn't work properly and I really wondered weather all the effort to work online is worth it! This has been happening frequently lately, ever since the new version of Google Docs has come out. The internet speed seems okay but Google is very slow. Maybe fast internet will help. At the moment the MoE is connecting up schools in Christchurch. We haven't heard anything though about when we are to be connected. There is a meeting soon though next month. I must make sure that either P our network administrator or I go to it. I really feel that I'm trying to do things that our school's technology is just not up to yet. I should try to be patient."
"Concerns brought up in this document by all parties in terms of internet speed and some hardware issues, will be raised with the principal and board as the year goes on. These are issues the ICT committee are working through already and hope to have positive solutions soon.  From this document I will present it to the board once returned, and use it a start point for what I want to achieve as part of this project and as pat of my role as network manager."
"I did my presentation for staff today, using my OpenOffice format and exlpaining, to some extent, what I see happening from here. Most of the staff were very receptive, but when I went to show them some of my moodle stuff on Westnet, the site was down for maintenance, and then I couldn't access my blog! However, these things are sent to try us, and I hope it was ok. It amazes me at times how many teachers simply give up on technologies when they strike a problem. One teacher was saying that he tried to put an assessment on the Westnet moodle, and he couldn't get it to work. His solution was to give up on the moodle altogether and simply email his students copies of the work. I'm not sure how we get around problems like that, but it will certainly be part of what we need to consider for the future."
"I have read Niki's feedback and have added to this view a power point presented to our school staff. This was one of the products completed by two teachers to show the process and results so far from their Teaching as Inquiry project. The projects, which were undertaken by all staff, were a school professional development commitment and my two week blended learning course supported the staff who enrolled in my course."

c. List any key lessons for the cluster?

  • Building capacity in one teacher does not build capacity in a school
  • The readiness of our schools is diverse which means that not all our schools will benefit from the project at the same level.
  • School’s must not rely on one person to then have the responsibility of “making it happen”
  • Understanding the vision is a key part of a school’s motivation to adopt blended learning


d. What are the next steps towards achieving the cluster goal/s?

Move the emphasis away from just building capacity in the teachers to building capacity across the cluster

  • Develop a coherent plan for this to happen, which might include:
  1. Written guideline for schools on how to develop capacity. Each school is different and the approach of one school may not be right for another
  2. Using the project teachers across schools to provide PD opportunities for schools. For example the three teachers at Roncalli, Moutainview and Mt Hutt might deliver PD to teachers in the schools as a team.
  3. Widening the community of practice
  • Consult with Principals as a group to develop a common understanding of the way forward for each school and the cluster as a whole
  • Continue to have conversations on how their school will approach developing capacity with each project teacher and their principal 


2.8Report on the progress (i.e. programme effectiveness) towards achieving Programme Outcome D for this milestone period


Note: Report on your progress towards achieving your planned programme outcomes in this section. An outcome is the result of the change derived from your programme activities (outputs). Questions a–d below provide a framework (measurement, reflection, action) to support your reporting on your achievements. The intention is to inform the ongoing development of your programme. There is an understanding that progress towards your goals will not be uniform. The purpose of this milestone report is for the cluster, the national facilitator and the Ministry to gain an understanding of your progress to date, current position and future steps.


Cluster Programme Outcome

Copy one of your Programme Outcomes from your contract


Effectiveness Indicator/s

List the Effectiveness Indicators for your Programme Outcome here



End of year reviewReply to each of the following points (a, b, c, d)


a. What progress has been made towards achieving these goals?

Provide an overview of your cluster’s progress towards these goals. It should NOT be written as a series of individual school reports.


b. What evidence supports this?

You should look for evidence at the cluster administration level or get cluster schools to provide evidence that shows progress in this milestone period (e.g. teacher survey results, student/teacher voice, videos, blogs and wikis etc.)


When providing links to material posted online you should provide:

  • explicit URL’s to online evidence that supports what you have written above
  • a short written description of what evidence you think the link provides
  • usernames and passwords if they are required to view the evidence

c. List any key lessons for the cluster?


d. What are the next steps towards achieving the cluster goal/s?


2.9Executive Summary

The following PD activities for teachers took place during the milestone period:

  • 2 days face to face PD held at the University of Canterbury Department of Education on 5-6 July Teachers completed their institutional reviews
  • Teachers made progress on their blended learning pilots
  • Teachers participated in facilitating an online forum discussion
  • Teachers had the opportunity to participate in further PD held at one one 2 schools and also access support via email, phone or VC
  • Teachers had the opportunity to request f2f support from facilitators

These PD opportunities complement the PD that took place during milestone reporting period one. The University course, which provides the framework for this part of the project, has provided a very structured and intense start to our programme. This has resulted in a wide divergence of outcomes for participating teachers. Some teachers have made significant progress in both their understanding and implementation of blended learning. A few have found it too overwhelming and have made little progress. As the project has progressed some attrition has occurred which may lead to some change in the approach to building the capacity of teachers in 2011 and 2012.

There still remains the significant challenge of building the capacity of schools to implement blended learning effectively and this was always going to be the case. While we are developing strategies to meet this challenge this year’s focus was developing the teachers. We feel satisfied with where we are placed after the first year.

The original budgeting for the project over-estimated the costs associated with direct provison of teacher PD. We are now in the process of re-budgeting for 2011 and 2012 to address the future needs of the cluster. The priorities that will need to be addressed are: ensuring wider participation in the cluster - more than one teacher per school ensuring that school and cluster priorities begin to align


Some risks around the long term sustainability of the three clusters have been met recently with the amalgamation of Cantatech and AorakiNet and the appointment of Pete Graham as the full time ePrincipal for WestNet. This means that with Niki Davis, the leadership of the project will remain stable for the foreseeable future and that the project is recognised as a priority by the schools.

Greater involvement in the eLearning clusters and the VLN by the Ministry of Education would ensure the long term future of the project goals; personalised learning, blended learning and the development of communities of practice. In particular, the formal recognition of communities of schools as educational entities would significantly aid the long-term sustainability of regional clusters.

Disbursement schedule

This table should be used to account for the MoE funds only. You will need to separate out the MoE and cluster funding contributions from the budget figures in your contract


ICT Professional Development Cluster:


Southern Central Divide
Contract No. 10-0279
Milestone No.


2
To:

Neil Melhuish

e-Learning Unit

Ministry of Education

PO Box 1666

WELLINGTON


From:

Trevor Storr

Waimate High School

Paul St

Waimate



For Professional and Operational Costs:

3yr Budget Actual-to-date Cumulative %
Professional Fees $10,000 MOE funding rest is FTTE
 $3333
 33%
Professional Costs $31,150
 $14,590 47%
Operational Costs $1500
 $1040 69%
Teacher Development Costs (if relevant) $312,350
 $80,045 26%
plus Goods and Services tax $44,375 $12,584
 28%
Total $399,375 $113,259 28%

Explanation of variance of predicted expenditure of the MoE funding

The project is currently on the decreasing funding model.  We have not been able to match the activity of the project with this model and our actual spending is similar to the flat payment model.  After discussions with our national facilitator we are now requesting to transfer to the flat model for 2011-12.  The Professional costs are as expected for the decreasing funding model.  The operational costs are slightly higher than we expected but are insignificant.  The Teacher development costs are much less than we had anticipated.  This is a result of overestimating the original costs.  All planned for activities have taken place.  We originally budgeted for a 100% participation rate by teachers, but this was not the case.


Cluster Budget Contributions

Cluster contribution is in the form of facilitator funding - FTTE's.  The clusters hace contributed 1 FTTE ($75306) as in the original budget.  Therefore there is no negative variance issues.  The work of the facilitators in their roles as ePrincipals and as facilitators of the SCD project often difficult to tease apart.  The clusters will have contributed more time to the project than was originally budgeted for, particularly during term one.  Additionally, the 2 July PD days were held during the holidays and these were not charged for.


Cluster Contribution Variance Issue Impact Action Planned















When you have had your Milestone approved by your National Facilitator then you can submit it as per the instructions on page 1 of this template.

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