PLC_CF_PT_AG_FV

__**Welcome to the Year 8 PLC for 2014 with Claire and Amy and Josh and Fiona (in spirit)**__ Minutes will appear here each week.

**-** Positive environment for all members - Start and finish on time - Listen respectfully to each other - Each week we base our meetings around an agenda - We support each other with our teaching and lessons - Send minutes to DP and put on Wiki. ====================================== __ Agenda: __
 * __Norms: PLC__ **
 * PLC Week 3 - 13/02/2014 **

- moderating the persuasive pieces

- discussing how to minimise marking while still giving good (meaningful) feedback for Year 8 English

- briefly touch base regarding RTI. Any students who are unable to write an Expository or Persuasive text, who do __not__ have a learning difficulty need to be sent for help.
 * __Minimising marking:__**

All agree there is a lot to do. Especially with double classes.

Magazines: Propose to cut formal marking of a drafts of the two written pieces. Staff with double year 8 load face 260 pieces to mark (+wide reading journals) in the first seven weeks. Discussed purpose and referral process. Develop/finalise SMART goal – Looking at developing students’ ability to develop and expand an argument. Bring any resources to share. **27/02/14** SMART Goal: Students will be able to use appeals to reason and emotion as persuasive devices in their persuasive piece. This will be measured when marking is complete. Continued development of the Feature article rubric.
 * Diagnostic persuasive
 * Draft & Final of Persuasive
 * Draft & Final of Feature Article
 * Note for the future:** Does the magazine unit have enough merit to continue? Weighing up motivational factor for students vs extra workload and ‘chaos’ of the magazine element at the start of the year.
 * __Moderating:__**
 * Fiona:** We didn’t have your criteria sheets to see what you gave them, but we felt comfortable that the low was indeed a low, the medium was a comfortable medium and we thought your high was at the correct level too.
 * __RTI:__**
 * __Ideas for next week:__**
 * PLC Minutes:**
 * 06/03/14**

Rubric has been completed with contributions from FV. Started discussing and planning for Trash assessments and a new SMART goal.
 * 13/03/14**

Can the questions be done in a more 'as-we-go' type way, as it better suits the purpose of the skill. **20/03/14 -** Amy and Josh away sick, no PLC. **27/03/14 -** Feedback on magazines: Magazines should be swapped with Trash next year. The reading skills fit well with the wide reading unit. It would also be a more structured unit and perhaps be an easier way to settle a new class. **03/04/14 -** **Amy** will start taking minutes next term. Trash assessment: Moving towards a more 'SAC' style (in class) assessment. Visualising will be taught but the assessment task will be done at home. Writing could be two different questions to give us a better understanding of the students' levels. http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2014/apr/01/children-photography-favourite-toys-in-pictures **24/04/14 -** Looking at Trash assessment tasks and how to diagnose / formative assess students' skills. Trash summarising / questioning assessment task is complete, individual teachers are able to tweak things such as which section of the book they want to summarise etc. Visualising component of assessment is also complete. Rubrics are complete. **Formative assessment:** Live marking of summarising or questioning activities (such as in the reading skills PPT, or your own choice of activity) to identify weaker students and refer to PRTI. **01/05/14** - Post-interview day - no PLC **08/05/14 -** PLC Admin:
 * Celebration day on the last thursday of term. We'll take photos at the magazine exhibition and print out some of our rubrics/assessments for trash and use those on our 'stall'.
 * Meeting with DP next week to work on SMART goals.


 * SMART GOAL: **

We aim to have 80%+ proficiency in the 3-level questioning task. Formative assessment is identifying students to send to PRTI.

Link emailed to year 8 teachers to a google doc for a formative task for questioning.
 * Formative assessment for yr 8 teachers:**

Our current goal looks good and is based on data. Perhaps 80% is not a high enough aim?
 * 15/05/14 -**
 * SMART Goal meeting in the theatrette.**

Based on TEEL Paragraph writing for ‘The Giver’ Use writing task from Trash as formative assessment to see what strengths/opportunities to improve exist and then develop our next goal from that. We need to set out the strategies and actions that we'll use to achieve this, whose responsibility it will be and the timeline. Also need to consider what will be the evidence of effectiveness. All
 * Next SMART goal:**
 * Strategies and actions:**
 * Explicitly teach TEEL structure and quoting evidence
 * Provide opportunites for practice
 * Provide quality feedback
 * Note-taking to identify themes and ideas
 * Responsibility:**

Term 3 (specifics for each strategy and the goal overall TBA)
 * Timeline:**

Action steps become part of formative assessment, need evidence for each action to see whether it's working.
 * Evidence of effectiveness:**

__**22/5/14**__

How do we teach Big Ideas. There is a powerpoint on the server. -Focus on poverty, corruption, friendship, justice, morals (for the stronger kids)

Formative assessment- Mind map on big idea- explain big idea- link it to a quote. This will be good in determining if the student understands big ideas without having to assess writing skills (rational being a student might understand the big idea but be unable to write well).

Mind map made and should be on server by end of day.

Powerpoint on TEEL for Trash created- this is for the summative assessment

Evidence for effectiveness discussed regarding smart goal- We will use the TEEL paragraphs for Trash as a basis for our data.


 * 29/05/14**

Planned our presentation for the PLC 'show day'. Rubrics, smart goals, student work, iMovie interviews, etc. Next week: Moderating marking on Trash work.

An idea for Dystopian writing folio piece (from PT and GY in the notebook PD)


 * SAMR Level ||  GANAG Stage:

Goal… Access Prior Knowledge...   New Info… Apply… Goal / Summary... || Pedagogical Focus:

Access

Interact / Collaborate

Make & Create ||  Tech Tool/s / Apps  || Make/Create || Inspiration - for mind mapping before they start.
 * Modification ENGLISH || Apply knowledge of features of dystopias - The Giver unit. || Collaborate

Mindmap plus plan = formative assessment task

Google Docs - for writing the story

Google forms for submission - iBook. Can publish (real audience) Can incorporate an iMovie film trailer / other items. THink about movie trailer and the timing of the cinematic release - makes the 'real audience' more of a reality. ||
 * Modification ||  ||   ||   ||
 * Modification

MATHEMATICS ||  ||   ||   || Plus consider the idea of an iBook portfolio of a range of tasks and pieces, either as part of the assessment for The Giver, or as a modified way of producing the writing folio.
 * Modification ||  ||   ||   ||
 * Modification ||  ||   ||   ||

__**Thursday 12/06/14**__ Feedback and reflection on Trash. __TEEL -__ Good, but can't give the test to them too 'cold'. AG and PT found that giving them a practice run on the same topic beforehand was successful. __Summarising -__ Mixed opinions on usefulness / effectiveness. It's too low-level to spend that much time on, it's not rigorous enough to justify the time spent and not worth being part of the main assessment. Teaching the skills separately allows you to isolate what it is that kids are struggling with and where to focus teaching. A good diagnostic tool. The assessment model is good in that it takes pressure off having to finish the book. Perhaps we need more structure in the technique of summarising. Different ways to help kids get use out of it if they don't instinctively 'get it'.
 * Against: **
 * For:**
 * Interesting:**

__**Reflection on Magazines:**__ Getting all the kids to write on the same persuasive issue is good because you can support and help them plan and give them evidence etc. Fiona's work on feature article powerpoint was great. A negative of them writing on the same issue is that it doesn't really fit the magazine model because it won't fit their theme. In the feature article we need to use more models to get them familiar. We had often thought it a good idea to have a more structured unit (Trash) at the start of the year, also as the skills match up with wide reading. Rather than the more chaotic magazines unit. But the benefit of having in-class assessment leading into reports was great - very convenient. Although, having said that, maybe having reports as a deadline might mean that they are more likely to hand in their magazine pieces. We talked about how the 'group' element of magazines is what sends it a bit ratty. Idea suggested that we could perhaps all work as a class on a theme, and then maybe produce one huge class magazine.
 * For:**
 * Against:**
 * Interesting:**

__**Reflection on wide reading:**__ The workload in getting it going and marking it is really huge if you have two classes. it's an extra two hours
 * For:**
 * Against:**
 * Interesting:**

__**17/07/14**__ Looked at what formative assessment we could use in the early part of the unit (as well as Examination Day). Prepared a formative assessment including reciprocal teaching skills and a TEEL paragraph. On the server in The Giver folder. Details emailed to yr 8. Discussed unit general outline - several TEEL paragraphs, leading to an essay. Also thought we could include a quesitoning/summarising/visualising 'test' half way through to remind that those skills are essential.

__**24/07/14**__ We reviewed the dystopian writing folio task and put it on the server in the Writing Folio folder. We developed a peer assessment rubric for that task and put it on the server in the Writing Folio folder. Details emailed.

__**31/07/14**__ We have sorted through some of the resources on the server and arranged some tasks based on word choice/mood, and dystopian settings. Meeting was fairly disrupted due to exciting news. It's Indigenous literacy day on Sep 3rd. For that week, CF suggests we could do an awareness raising activity (rather than another fundraiser) drawing attention to indigenous authors. Barb has put things on display. We'll think about any other contributions.

__**14/8/14**__ Discussed Indigenous Literacy Week- email sent to Barb/Wendy/Aneta about collecting books. Started a flow chart for The Giver. To get students to think about how a utopia started off as a dystopia.

__**21/08/14**__ Hope to have a screening of The Giver at VSSEC towards the end of the year. Depending on DVD release date. This week developed three powerpoints focussed on improving quote usage, particularly providing context and linking the quote to the big idea. (Not quite finished) These to be finished and sent around.

__**04/09/14 - PLC Cancelled - PDP week**__

__**11/09/14**__ Discussed with Terri Campbell changing Alice in Wonderland to Satellite Boy. Located a study guide resource. http://www.metromagazine.com.au/pdfs/studyguides/SGSatelliteBoyWill.pdf

__** 18/09/14 **__ Discussed the final unit of the year- Alice in Wonderland. Went through how it is taught, discussed formative assessment.

__**09/10/14**__

Created a Year 8 essay Reflection table. Discussed how to get students more engaged with the rubric, given that it will be used again for Alice.

This will allow students to actively set targets for their essay writing on Alice.


 * __30/10/14__**

Created a big ideas powerpoint which will be a scaffold for students doing the essay. This is based on the concept map we did for Trash. This concept map will form the basis for their TEEL paragraphs.

Quotes to be sent around with powerpoint.

__**6/11/14**__

Modified work for Alice in Wonderland- is there anything for students? Created resource for modified students.

__**20/11/14**__ Organised the writing folio competition and prepared certificates. Teachers to choose the best two pieces and then one from each team to be selected as a winner. Certificates go to all 'finalists'.

__**27/11/14**__ Judged winners for writing competition. We now only have to judge Burnet and Chisolm students.