College Street Normal School
The Learner First (TLF)
Facilitated by: Rob Profitt-White, Dr Jo Knox & Marie Hirst
CSNS started on this journey in January 2023. The purpose of this professional development is to increase teacher knowledge and capabilities, with an aim to have some consistency of pedagogy across the school. As a staff, we ensure that our learners remain at the forefront of what we deliver to meet the curriculum.
Challenges have been minimal. This can be attributed to the well-delivered professional development sessions from Rob, Jo and Marie, over the first two terms of 2023, and the organisation of resources within our school. The biggest challenge is deciding on the task you’d like to try. There are many to choose from.
We have supported staff by allowing several weeks to try out a component of The Learner First (TLF) programme, beginning with moveNprove. This is a very quick and easy way to assess learners on the go, pre & post. Additional components undertaken are recallNreason, & revisitNretain and discussNdefend.
The components align with the Curriculum Refresh: Numeracy document and build on existing teacher knowledge and capabilities, introduce new and exciting ways to engage learners in mathematics and, the next step is how we ensure at our kura that a balanced Maths diet is provided for the learners.
The tasks are based on word problems and multichoice answers, ultimately valuing and enabling student voice so they can be steadfast in their decisions and justify the why. Tasks promote ‘Notice, Think, Wonder’ and prompt reluctant speakers to have a voice. Inferencing opportunities are incorporated in some tasks, such as slow-reveal graphs, same or different and Always, Sometimes, Never.
The feedback shared thus far has increased student participation and made assessment on the go easier. It has provided lots of game-based materials and has resulted in high engagement by learners.
Michelle Ulrich & Mara Kean
In school Leaders.
