Plan and conduct a detailed inquiry

Plan and conduct a detailed inquiry into specific aspects of your current teaching that are relevant to the hypotheses you identified in the literature.  

Reality: The latest research is out. In math and reading, students are behind where they would be after a normal year, with the most vulnerable students showing the steepest drops, according to two new reports from the consulting firm McKinsey & Company and the NWEA, a nonprofit organization that provides academic assessments. The students did not just stall early on; the setbacks accumulated over time — and continued even after many students had returned to the classroom this year. Perhaps even more troubling, the students who were most affected by the crisis were already behind their peers before the pandemic, and the added losses have pushed them further back.

What can we do to bring back and retain more students at school and develop (or sometimes ignite) their love of learning? Teachers have to collaborate to address all these needs and use our strengths to engage our tamariki along with accelerating their learning. Covid affected everyone! That's why I believe that teacher collaboration is an extremely powerful approach that can be used to not just benefit our students but support teachers' well-being too.

For teacher collaboration to be effective, we (teachers) should want to participate rather than feel like we must. Like any other skill, collaboration can be improved upon with practice. This is my and, hopefully, my team's experience and reflection on the past two terms of our collaborative work. I look forward to continuing to improve our team's practice to maximise our tamariki successes in all areas of school life and support them to become life-long motivated learners. He waka eke noa!

The focus and plan of my inquiry into teacher and student collaboration to improve learning outcomes and well-being.

• Continue to  develop and refine our shared vision and goals, team culture
• Continue to refine and reflect on our collaborative planning and creation of shared resources
• Create a habit of frequent and consistent team data analysis (formative and summative) to reflect on best practices and plan the next steps.
• Continue to develop trust and positive professional relationships. Like any relationship, collaborative teams take time to build and have the potential to increase in strength and productivity over time. 
• Collaboratively advance our professional knowledge, skills, and beliefs about student learning. 
• Model positive collaborative behaviour to our learners.