Preparation for Teaching and Learning Guidelines 2021
If you missed it, this is the link to watch the webinar and read the new guidance that was launched in April 2021.
https://ncca.ie/en/primary/preparation/
When I posted about this on Facebook the other day, lots of people asked if they could see a filled in version of my plans as it was easier to visualise it that way. I'm happy to share because I am a big believer in not reinventing the wheel but please just know I have no expertise in this at all, this is just what I've taken from the webinar and the guidance and I just wanted to try it out and see. Up to now I felt my plans were for the cigire whereas doing them this way they are much more concise and much more useful to me day to day. I'm sure there'll be plenty kinks to sort out as time goes on but with the support we are due to get from PDST from September, I'm hopeful it's a step in the right direction for us!
In the webinar, they talk about visible, invisible and recorded preparation. I am only thinking at the moment about the recorded short-term preparation. (Anything you see in bold type is copied and pasted from the Guidelines/ FAQ document.)
Recorded preparation is any documentation which supports teachers’ ongoing practice and reflection. This documentation can include short-term and longterm documentation, student support plans/IEPs, assessment data, cuntas míosúil, end of year reports, personal notes, documentation from other professionals and outside agencies, etc.
Recorded preparation is first and foremost for the teacher, and therefore should be useful, purposeful and practical. While naturally displaying similarities with the work of colleagues, a teacher’s recorded preparation is personal and bespoke. Recorded preparation refers directly to the curriculum, identifying selected Learning Outcomes which are guiding preparation. It should provide clarity on the focus of learning for children during a series of learning experiences.
All recorded preparation, signaling the broad direction and focus of learning for the children, needs to be understood as tentative and dynamic. It does not need to over-elaborate on what may occur in the learning environment.
Through your knowledge of the children and their prior learning, and with reference to the curriculum, identify the focus of new learning. Identify the learning experiences chosen to support all children in progressing this learning. Identify the ways in which their progress will be assessed and monitored.
So, what I am taking from that is that there are going to be three main headings in my short term plan:
With that in mind, here is what I have done for SESE. The learning experiences in this plan are from the Folens Explorers plans. I am not using the "Resources" box to list books/ equipment or anything, it is purely for me to have quick access to links/ files on my Google Drive.
https://ncca.ie/en/primary/preparation/
When I posted about this on Facebook the other day, lots of people asked if they could see a filled in version of my plans as it was easier to visualise it that way. I'm happy to share because I am a big believer in not reinventing the wheel but please just know I have no expertise in this at all, this is just what I've taken from the webinar and the guidance and I just wanted to try it out and see. Up to now I felt my plans were for the cigire whereas doing them this way they are much more concise and much more useful to me day to day. I'm sure there'll be plenty kinks to sort out as time goes on but with the support we are due to get from PDST from September, I'm hopeful it's a step in the right direction for us!
In the webinar, they talk about visible, invisible and recorded preparation. I am only thinking at the moment about the recorded short-term preparation. (Anything you see in bold type is copied and pasted from the Guidelines/ FAQ document.)
Recorded preparation is any documentation which supports teachers’ ongoing practice and reflection. This documentation can include short-term and longterm documentation, student support plans/IEPs, assessment data, cuntas míosúil, end of year reports, personal notes, documentation from other professionals and outside agencies, etc.
Recorded preparation is first and foremost for the teacher, and therefore should be useful, purposeful and practical. While naturally displaying similarities with the work of colleagues, a teacher’s recorded preparation is personal and bespoke. Recorded preparation refers directly to the curriculum, identifying selected Learning Outcomes which are guiding preparation. It should provide clarity on the focus of learning for children during a series of learning experiences.
All recorded preparation, signaling the broad direction and focus of learning for the children, needs to be understood as tentative and dynamic. It does not need to over-elaborate on what may occur in the learning environment.
Through your knowledge of the children and their prior learning, and with reference to the curriculum, identify the focus of new learning. Identify the learning experiences chosen to support all children in progressing this learning. Identify the ways in which their progress will be assessed and monitored.
So, what I am taking from that is that there are going to be three main headings in my short term plan:
- Focus of New Learning
- Learning Experiences
- Assessment
With that in mind, here is what I have done for SESE. The learning experiences in this plan are from the Folens Explorers plans. I am not using the "Resources" box to list books/ equipment or anything, it is purely for me to have quick access to links/ files on my Google Drive.
The impression I got in the webinar about assessment was that they didn't want just the list of assessment strategies we've all been quoting for years (teacher designed tasks and tests/ teacher observation/ standardised tests/ questioning etc), they wanted to know how you will actually know if the children have achieved the new learning you have set out to teach them, so for every focus of new learning I have listed 1 or 2 ways of checking/ monitoring that learning. These SESE ones are quite vague but I've been more specific in the core subjects.
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Planning for the PLC
We all know the Department aren't a fan of us using "generic" schemes of work from the publishing companies. I do understand that we all have to plan for the children in front of us, but in my view, the newer schemes have been written with the PLC in mind so why shouldn't we use them as a base and tweak and change where necessary? I'm a big fan of not reinventing the wheel! I don't do every single thing that's suggested in the Over the Moon scheme, I do what suits me and my class and add or take out things as necessary.
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I'm glad they put this in. I think in one of the PLC training days they were suggesting 2-3 Learning Outcomes per strand per fortnight which can be a lot, particularly for Gaeilge. I was, up to now,putting in the Strand, Element, Learning outcome title and the general description of the learning outcome but I changed it this fortnight. So e.g. for Oral Language I'm doing LO 5: Vocabulary and this is the description of that LO that I would have had (some of) in my plan: "Use different strategies such as a speaker’s gestures, tone of voice, known words, pictures, sentence structure, definitions and descriptions to acquire and show understanding of new words and to include other languages where appropriate. Use sophisticated oral vocabulary and phrases, including the language of text, topic and subject-specific language, and express and use decontextualized language."
I changed that to read "By interacting with the OL poster, genre story, teacher and peers during class discussions, the children will encounter and use new vocabulary relating to “The Zoo”. |
I'm not sure why I started putting in questions in the assessment section, it just seemed like the quickest way to describe what I wanted! I'm also not sure how much of that assessment then should you subsequently be taking notes on. I would take note if a child was having particular difficulty with something, but there's no way I am doing checklists for each bit of new learning! I guess that goes towards the invisible preparation for next time? The text that is in blue is just links to websites/ documents on my Google Drive because I do my plans in Google Docs. As you'll see below, my Music plan is much more concise!
There is a lot more to "unpack" (I hate that word!) when it comes to this new guidance. They have other suggestions and headings for Long Term Planning but I'm definitely not ready to tackle that yet. I'd love to get a handle on this in the run up to the summer and be able to hit the ground running with it in September. By getting rid of all the extra boxes that I had in my fortnightly and just giving bullet point lists and no extra flowery language for the sake of it, this fortnightly plan runs to 7 pages long whereas the last few were 14 - 15. This weekend it did take me every bit as long as it would have to do the 14 pages with all the changes and figuring out but I am hopeful next fortnight will be a much quicker experience and if/ when the cigire comes to call I will be only too happy to say that I have tried this "new" way and would be very eager to hear their feedback on it!