What is it that collegial groups of excellence actually do?

I've got things on the go that are involving email conversations with a bunch of people with concepts flying left and right.  I'm learning some REALLY interesting stuff but one area I'm kind of the expert of the group.  Collegial CRTs groups are popping up and because I coordinate a very successful one, the Wodonga CRT Support Network, I'm getting asked exactly why the Wodonga network works so well when other collegial groups in education often struggle a bit.

One of these people is a relatively young principal in a school of unusual size for someone of his experience.  He has excellent administrative skills and his school runs like clockwork and is very well structured in terms of budgets and programs.  He has a little bit of a problem with morale though and he's struggling to come to grips with how to improve this for his staff.  He knows that improving collegiality is the key and he knows about collegiality in a textbook sense very well. 

I have the weird feeling that I was set up.  The principal wasn't in the conversation, he was brought in by someone else and told "Talk to Mel, she knows her stuff".

He has done a lot of reading and knows about all of the technical factors of high quality collegial practice such as equity, reliability, inclusion, accountability and so on but he's struggling to understand exactly what all of that is supposed to be doing and how it's supposed to be assembled to help with the particular issues he's having.  He's come to the understanding that he has the knowledge of what to apply but lacks the wisdom of how to apply it.

He asked me point blank "What is it that a high quality collegial group actually does?"  It stumped me for two days and it was awesome!  I know precisely what they do from the inside of course and I can build new or improve existing collegial groups by looking at them and implementing what needs to be implemented.  But....  I was the teacher of teachers now and that's not what I'm used to.  When my husband and I created the Wodonga Network it was about creating a self sustaining collegial environment.  We set the framework up front with a relatively small group and as new members enter they now learn about high quality collegial practice simply by being put into a group already practicing it.  We use high quality collegial practice to teach about high quality collegial practice and I don't really have to teach it anymore, it just sort of happens all by itself. 

Teaching someone else how to understand it from outside of that framework?  That's really really different....  How do I help someone else understand how to do it?  Usually I use the concept of community and it's generally enough to get small points across but when you're in a top down position of delivering complete understanding you sort of end up needing to explain community too.  Of course that's anthropologist territory and what I have is a Bachelor of Education - Early Childhood so no help there...

Oddly enough, the answer came from science. 

Of course this video drew my attention because looking at punishment Vs reward is a "teachery thing".  The video has a specific message to deliver about understanding the feedback we give and how sometimes our observations on the effectiveness of the feedback we give can be incorrect simply because we live in a random world.  It's the random world part right at the end that sort of brought me to a lightbulb moment.

What successful collegial groups do is eliminate luck from our professional universe.  Can you imagine having a math problem and asking random strangers on the street for advice?  How many would you have to ask at random until you got lucky and found one who both had the answer you were looking for and willing to spend the time to explain it to you?

Collegial groups create an ordered world for us that gives us a security blanket against the unknown.  Our collegial group gives us a framework where we can go and seek answers because we interact we also learn who is able to give us the advice we need and will be aligned with who we want to be as teachers.  We can target our search and save ourselves a whole lot of time and effort.

Do we need advice on how to structure our lessons?  Do we need advice on how to deliver those lessons more effectively in the classroom?  Do we need advice on how to best support a particular student with particular issues?  Do we need professional advice on the rules and regulations of teaching?  Are we simply getting a little snowed under and need a bit of moral support?

A collegial group gives a reliable way to get each and every one of these things with luck playing as small of a part in the process as possible.

How we differ as CRTs is that Collegiality is far less common for us than other teachers.  The way we work often creates a diverse professional network, rather than a collegial group, where it can be a matter of luck on which school we are working in today is the same school where who we want to ask also works in.  Collegial CRT groups are certainly out there though and joining or starting one is a really good idea.

What many tend to rely on however is online groups such as those created on Facebook.  These don't immerse us in collegiality in the same way as in-person groups do but they still offer a place where we can go to ask questions and get answers.

This still leaves us with a little bit of a hole in that it doesn't really provide an immersive experience to learn high quality collegial practice from in it's deeper implications with Teaching.  So, for those without in-person collegial networks we are about to add to our CRT booklet with the basics of how high quality collegial practice works.

Some recent conversations with educationalists and some feedback from CRTs on our "Desirable CRT" booklet have shown us that perhaps adding to the booklet is a good idea.  As before we try not to concentrate too much on "common knowledge" types of things but touch on both creating a Network and how to participate in them to a high standard of practice.  Also just as last time we are seeking some feedback about how we have approached it and are looking for input from CRTs at various career stages as to how useful it is to you at that stage.



Obviously as a draft there's missing bits and there's some holes in the information that need plugging by adding a page or two and we'd like your input on what other topics we should include as much as anything else!

Feedback and further input can be emailed to wodongacrt@vit.vic.edu.au and your support is greatly appreciated!

Regards,

Mel.

Merry Christmas!

The shopping is done and the presents are wrapped.  The finishing touches are being made to the deserts ready for their big day!  Another year is over and another one is just about to begin.  Please travel safely and share a smile and hug with those around you.  Remember to put your feet up and relax while reminiscing about the year that has been.  

From our family to yours, we hope you have the safest, most enjoyable of holidays and look forward to seeing you all next year.

Regards, 

Mel, Paul and family

What's on the feed? Veritasium - "this will revolutionise education".

This week comes something for you Science teachers, or science buffs, out there.  A video from Veritasium, a YouTube channel dealing with understanding our universe.

About Veritasium

As will become apparent over time, my feeds are rather eclectic.  While I don't teach science as a general rule I do subscribe to a few science oriented places on the internet because the background information helps me when intelligent questions from students come out of left field.  This channel is very easy to watch (or listen to as I cook dinner and so on) and they obviously have done their research and have the backing to make effective and engaging videos.

This week's Veritasium Video;  "This will revolutionize education".

Well, I've been busy so it's actually last week's Veritasium video...  The week before maybe?  The end of the year is so close I can taste it, the lines are blurring.

This one came up on a couple of my feeds this week and struck a chord because it's something I've tried to blog about for quite a while now using exactly the same examples I was going to use. It's never seemed to come out right so I've never posted it and of course I have a bit of a different point to make overall.

Part of the post I had in mind (which this video essentially does for me) was that instead of looking at what was changing in education I wanted to take a look at the constants.  The parts of Teaching which haven't changed in many many years for teachers in spite of the changing mediums we have had access to in order to deliver information.

So to bring in a relatively new happening, we now have websites available to us that give us access to anything up to full units, semesters or years of planning for the price of relatively few dollars.  Websites like Teacher's pay Teachers, Teacher's Marketplace and even Scootle are able to remove a large portion of necessity of spending so much time for planning.

Which means that full time teachers are beginning to follow through on other people's planning.  That should sound very familiar to us CRTs because that's exactly what we do...  It forms the core of our job descriptions.

I think it's worthwhile observing how the modern age is starting to blur the lines between CRTs and other brands of teachers.  As the possibilities open up because of how the digital age is able to transmit information it's moving past the search for worksheets and other core resources and evolving to a point where the job of the CRT is going to become more normal and to some extent become more normal in the average classroom.

As CRTs though, we all inherently understand after a while that following through on someone else's lesson plan isn't as easy as it seems when observed from the outside.  When you write a lesson plan you have an inherently deep understanding of it because you know exactly what you expect the students to get out of it in intricate detail.  When you're delivering someone else's though, it can be a mad scramble of on-the-fly thinking to try and understand these deeper issues and do a good job.  You also might not have the solid knowledge surrounding the topic either, meaning if the students ask a question "out of the blue" you might not have the answer where whoever wrote the lesson probably has a higher knowledge of the general information surrounding it.  They have, after all, selected the focus of the lesson based on things they are personally knowledgeable about.

It will be interesting to see whether initiatives such as these sites that supply lesson, unit and full-year plans continue to grow or sort of plateau at some point as the issues we deal with every day become more common knowledge in mainstream teaching.

And, of course, whether it will result in a little more respect for the difficulty of what it is that CRTs do and the skills they are required to accrue in order to do it well.

Regards,

Mel.

Looking for opportunities to increase your chances of full time work.

Often I just concentrate on CRT work but every now and then I branch out a little into related topics.  I thought that since many CRTs wish to move on to full time work I'd have a little look at what I've done in my current contract position that will feed into improving how I can perform in interviews.  Now it must be mentioned that this isn't something I set out to do, it was a collision of ideas and things I do in education outside of the classroom that just led to a "light-bulb moment".

As we know there's key selection criteria and interview questions relating to the implementation of whole-school initiatives.

This isn't something that's easy for CRTs to show experience in and therefore discuss in a personal and enthusiastic way in interviews.  Especially when they only work as a "technical CRT" in daily hire work instead of also taking on contract work or having been full-time in the past.  Still... when the opportunity presents itself...

How did it all come about?

So I've had a position in a special development school for two terms as an Art teacher.  I'm not art trained but I was able to get the position, mostly because the school had decided to cancel art as they found it very difficult to hold onto art teachers.  It was only two terms and then definitely over and all that was really expected of the person who got the job was to ride it out to the end of the year when art would be replaced with another specialist area.  This made it a little uninviting to art specialists and I ended up not having to compete against them for the position.

One of the advantages of specialist positions like this is that virtually the whole school comes through your door.  It's something I didn't really think about at the time but it was kind of the first piece of the puzzle.

A couple of the students were particularly difficult to engage in anything but preferred activities (it is a special development school and these things happen).  One in particular just wanted a big sheet of paper, some paint and a roller every class and the other only wanted a big sheet of paper, some paint and brushes to make dots with and things to stamp with.  Give either student anything else to do and you just couldn't keep them at their table for more than 5 minutes.  I was looking for a gateway to help these students move beyond this and broaden their horizons a little.

In the end I chose to go with giving them an opportunity to experience purpose in what they were doing.  What I began doing is using the big sheets they were making, which they were never interested in keeping (though I did make sure a couple were saved), and using them as resources in other projects for their class.  I began by explaining to them that today they were making coloured sheets that other students would cut up to use in their work.  I was just trying to prepare them so they didn't get upset if they saw their work being "destroyed" but something fantastic happened.

Both students became a little more conscientious about how they put colours on the page.  Not always of course, but sometimes.  Where normally they would fill a page and just want another every time, I'd now occasionally catch them looking at a full page and purposefully changing it.  It's a small win to be sure but a win never the less.

Then there's something a lot of art teachers end up doing, specialty cards.  In this case it was Christmas cards.  Other specialty cards had been done in class but for christmas cards I was asked to do them in art by a number of teachers.  One of my teaching ethics is that inclusion is a very big deal for me and I had two students who weren't going to be making Christmas cards because it involved more than a roller or stamping.  So I went to the fallback position of using their sheets to use as resources to use in making cards.

I had them use all greens or all browns on a sheet for example and these were used to cut into shapes to make Christmas trees rather than using store-bought coloured paper.  By the end of the project each of these students also had a couple of cards that, while they didn't make them, they had contributed to.  Both were incredibly proud of these cards and, I must admit, they had a right to be.

I have to admit that the cards turned out looking absolutely fantastic.  They by far exceeded the expectations of everyone involved including myself and the ES staff who came with the students to the room.  The students all had very good reason to feel a sense of accomplishment from what they had produced.

Then there was a chance comment and a flashback.  As many are aware, I am a Teacher but I also work for the Victorian Curriculum Assessment Authority delivering PD for the MoneySmart Teaching program.  One of the ES staff said "wow, those are good enough to sell" and visions of one of the MoneySmart modules we like to talk about in the presentations filled my head.  It's a particularly successful module on fundraising that has been successfully implemented right down to preps.  Of course I was only sort of thinking pie in the sky and didn't really expect it to happen.

Over the course of a week however more and more people started saying "wow, we could/should sell these".  So, it ended up with me in the Prins office discussing the possibility and, well, the school had it's concert the other night and we sold 169 of them.  There's also a shoebox in the office that has to be periodically refreshed as teachers and parents buy them 10 at a time.

The cards!
 
Most of these cards are 100% the work of students and are also a collective effort.  Students of varying ability levels undertook different tasks like the example above.  The two students made paper resources to be used in the cards.  We used punches from Officeworks for some of the shapes and this was often done by students with motor skill issues.  High needs students for example, who may be wheelchair bound and have very limited movement will have had ES staff help them get the paper in the stamper for them to punch.  They also used stampers to put "Merry Christmas from Belvoir Special School" on the back of every card.  There was something for everyone to do in order to be included in the project.

Stars using stock created by the roller student.

More stars - hand cut from stock made using coloured

bubble blowing on white paper.

Painted Doilies cut into trees using sequins and stars as ornaments.

Presents using scissor-cut squares and hand-tied bows.

 Our "Made by Belvoir Students" sticker.

The benefit for my interviews.

Of course now I can discuss the implementation of whole school programs from a personal perspective and display experience at having done it.  I have pictures of the finished results and when it's all over I'll have monetary facts and figures.  That's not really all it will do for me though.

This sort of came about by accident and the story above shows how I use reflective practice in my classrooms.  It involves two challenging students who need heavy differentiation or individual programs but by reflecting on the situation and being a little inventive I was able to begin to implement a class structure that offered them an avenue to be included in what the class was doing rather just being off at a table on their own doing their own thing.

It also shows how I am able to utilise the flexible and open-to-change nature that every CRT must learn to have in a classroom setting for the benefit of students.  I didn't set out to create a fund raising activity but by being open to change and paying attention to possibilities as they presented themselves I was able to capitalise on the situation and offer better outcomes for my students without compromising on the curriculum.

I also made a mistake.  I only made Christmas cards...  Nothing with just "happy holidays" on them or reasonably blank for families to create their own holiday message for the cover...  Christmas is a big thing in my family and I made the mistake of thinking personally instead of professionally.  I found myself making an apology or two and accepting responsibility for my insensitivity to the needs of their family and their ability to equally enjoy the product of the students of the school.  This, of course, allows me to show how I am fully capable of using mistakes as learning experiences and also capable of dealing with, and being sensitive to, parents of students when issues arise.

It also allows me to shoe-horn in the fact that I also work for the VCAA as a presenter of professional development for the MoneySmart Teaching program.  More importantly it's not saying "I have this feather in my cap", instead it's showing how that experience is used in my reflective practice as a benefit to my classroom teaching.

So what am I saying here?

Of course I ended up being able to do this through an unpredictable chain of events that isn't likely to present itself to a significant number of CRTs.  The story is not going to be directly applicable to very many CRTs at all, if any.  The idea behind it though is a solid one and will be of benefit to many of us.

Sometimes, for those of us looking to move on to contract of full-time work, we want to apply for a position or run into an interview question that stumps us.  We can, of course, then go on to study up on those areas so we are able to discuss them in a technical capacity. 

We can also choose positions that are in the right time of year for us to be immersed in the full effect of assessment and performance.  We can choose a contract in a school where we know we will be involved in class presentations.  We can choose contracts in schools that we know will be having a play, concert or sports carnival while we are there and help with gaining experience of these things.  Which contracts we get can have a large effect on our interview performance of the future.  By choosing to apply for contracts that offer experiences that are not normally available to those engaged in daily CRT or up to 30-day block work we can expand our experiences.  We can begin to address those KSC or questions that used to stump us from more than a technical perspective.
 
This allows us to use contract work as a gateway to a very wide range of experiences if we choose wisely and keep an eye out for opportunities to present themselves.  We can expose ourselves to a wide variety of experiences that, after some reflection, allow us to move beyond the technical and show practical and personal examples of who we are as Teachers to address those KSCs we previously struggled with and to excel when those left-field questions get fired at us in interviews.

A bit late I know but happy job hunting everyone!

Regards,

Mel.

Sometimes it pays to be a little crazy...

The other day we were heading down to practice for the end of year school concert and I had been recruited to help walk a couple of classes to the venue.  We were using the Catholic College hall which is about a 15 minute walk, it used to be right across the road but we moved into a new school this year.  Wearing my reindeer antler headband I walked into the first classroom that was in the group I was with; the students are used to me having something "Christmasy" on by now and are getting into the Christmas mood.

One of the students had one of those small self-adhesive bows that you stick onto presents to "special them up" but the self-adhesive backing was gone.  Red of course.  He came running up to me "Mel, Mel, Mel!  You should use this as your nose, then you could be Rudolph!" and foisted it on me.  Of course we all had a good laugh as I held it over my nose.

The class' teacher waited for everything to subside and sidled up to me, "Mel, we have a bit of a problem".  Uh oh.  4 out of the 6 students in her class just didn't want to go (not an uncommon problem in special development and one that is not necessarily easy to overcome).

So I stepped forward and said "I'll make you guys a deal.  If you all come down to practice, I will wear the Rudolph nose all of the way there".

"Yeah right, Mel" came from the class, bracketed with giggles and guffaws.

I smiled with them and then went through to collect the other class we were going with.  When I re-emerged it was with the Rudolph nose firmly in place.  One quick clap to draw attention and I said "Right, Let's Go!".  After a few looks of disbelief and a few more giggles, all 6 got up and joined us, ready for the walk.  Problem solved.

As soon as their backs were turned the classroom teacher looked at me gratefully, holding her clasped hands under her chin mouthing "Thank you so much!"

What's odd is no-one snapped any embarrassing photos with their phone on the way...

You know what?  I love my job.

Regards,

Mel.

December meeting details

Hello everyone!

Our final meeting for 2014 is scheduled for Thursday 4th December in at Wodonga South Primary School Library.

Full details about the meeting can be found here:
http://wodongacrtsupportnetwork.blogspot.com.au/p/hi-everyone-next-wodonga-crt-support.html

Regards,

Mel

November Meeting details now avaliable!

Hello everyone!

Our November meeting is scheduled for Wednesday 12th November in at Wodonga South Primary School Library.

Full details about the meeting can be found here:
http://wodongacrtsupportnetwork.blogspot.com.au/p/hi-everyone-next-wodonga-crt-support.html

Regards,

Mel

The CRT story unfolding - it's truly impressive.

Back in 2008 when I first became a VIT CRT Network coordinator I had a local understanding of issues facing CRTs mostly through personal experience.  Along the way VIT helped interested coordinators become more familiar with the overall situation for CRTs as a workforce for the state (and to some extent the rest of Australia as well) through directing us to certain documents in Coordinator meetings.

Along the way we were given a document that opened like this;

Teachers working in casual relief and emergency positions (CRTs) struggle to establish an identity within the profession. The nature of their work and professional isolation often means that they are marginalised by their colleagues and perceived to be a ‘lesser’ group of teachers. While this view of CRTs may have been justified in the past, CRTs deserve to be respected, as members of the profession because all teachers registered in Victoria are now required to meet and maintain professional standards.

Dawn Colcott - VIT

It is very encouraging about how far things have come since those times with CRTs getting more and more avenues to become connected all the time.  I thought that this week I'd give people a look at one of the ways I am able to observe this process as a VIT CRT Network Coordinator.
 
When I write editorial posts on this blog about 25% of them are picked up and posted to Facebook groups, re-blogged, stuck up on pinterest and put in various forums around the traps (in a greater capacity than I do myself).  Many online things such as Blogger.com give you more "behind the scenes" statistics than just how many views and comments you are getting.  Information like geolocations of where your views are coming from by country, which links people use to come to your blog and so on.

I love watching it happen from behind the scenes not because my view counters skyrocket but because it lets me see a few really important things going on in the background.

What gets re-shared and where it goes gives me a good idea of how general populations dotted about the place are thinking.  If a topic is carried somewhere it shows you some little pocket of where that particular topic is important, what's a hot topic generally and what's not and so on.  It's a really good look at how not all CRTs have the same issues as everyone else and it's also a really good look at how CRTs function as a community.  Social media is having an enormous impact on the isolated nature of CRT work in the past.

It's sort of like those class experiments where they take a picture and then float it on Facebook as an experiment to see how it travels.  We've probably all seen them with the comments underneath about where the poster is from so the students can see where it's reached.  I just do the same thing time and time again across multiple social media outlets (blogging, Facebook, Youtube, pinterest and so on) and watch it all unfold into a big, wonderful picture.

One of the fascinating things is how some of the things I'm saying or for CRTs are being taken into pre-service teacher forums.  They are starting to understand that the way in which we work has many parallels with the nature of their Uni prac placements and the valuable source of knowledge we CRTs provide to tackle those situations in a way that will help them excel. 

This can also be seen in many Facebook groups like Relief Teaching Ideas where pre-service teachers are joining to get access to CRT advice even when they already have access to Uni lecturers, vast libraries of text books, mentors and the like.  And we just help. 

This isn't just "being nice to future colleagues" when you look from an overall perspective.  Where education frameworks are concerned there are a couple of distinct advantages.  It helps those on placement come to grips with the students quickly in order to maximise the learning advantage that those placements are meant to offer.  Universities, as a rule, also don't say too awful much about CRT work either, we are helping to fill those particular gaps.  We are also helping these CRTs to get a running start in the profession by helping them find many resources both in regards to student lessons/activities as well as classroom management and so on.

All of this just confirms something I (well, as a lot of us really) had always known.  We CRTs are here, we're valuable AND there's always a bazillion of us willing to jump on board and help.  What's going on, both visible and invisible, is a credit to CRTs and giving Australian educational bodies solid reasons to take a new and fresh look at the capability and dedication of their respective CRT cohorts.  Like any other teachers our value to education systems extends well beyond what we do in classrooms.

Having been able to watch this revolution from behind the scenes is well is truly impressive from that "education framework" perspective.  It gives me a really good look at how the traditional professional isolationism that's been associated with the nature of our role in Education has been detrimental to education as a whole, not just our ability to preserve student outcomes when the classroom teacher is away. 

We are leaving that isolationism behind and our education systems are emerging all the better for it.

Keep up the excellent work everyone!

Regards,

Mel.

What's on the Feed? Today's Schools on Diversity.

Every now and then something quite interesting pops up on my various feeds through social networks.  I thought it was a good time to start a new feature on the blog and try to bring these through on a more regular basis.  Some of our long term readers may remember that we've done link spotlights in the past and this is pretty much a renaming and upgrading of that old concept to be more inclusive of a wider range of interesting things to look at.

So here we are with "What's on the feed?"  Sometimes this will just be a look at something that you might like to add to your own feeds and at other times, like today, it will be something that I'll also want to say something about.

A couple of days ago it was a notification of a new video from "Today's Schools".  Their YouTube channel is a nice and well-rounded one with a couple of different segment types.  They have interviews with different teachers and schools, "breaking news" videos and often string videos together through the use of common themes.   Its also fairly frequent with a couple of new videos each month.  It's well worth having a look at ;).

Sometimes it astonishes me that the channel doesn't get a lot of views and it's a shame that this channel isn't utilised on a more regular basis.  Some of the stuff is pretty uninteresting sometimes but sometimes their videos are gems of wisdom.

It was a video about how a school has used diversity as a classroom resource and how doing that has allowed students to become teachers for the benefit of the local community.

Watch this video on YouTube.

This struck a cord with me personally because it's essentially about the power to achieve great things that is held within the collective capacity of a community;  Teaching a group to teach other groups to teach the community.  This helps communities to adapt to and overcome adversity through a shared strength.

This is something that the "inner circle" of the Wodonga CRT Support Network understand well as it is one of the very things the Network is founded on.  VIT created CRT Networks with the specific goal of providing a collegial arena for CRTs to meet and learn from each other.  The DEECD utilised CRT Network Coordinators to distribute funding that provides PD for CRTs.  These, of course, are where the two mainstays of the Network come from.

If the quality is kept high, these things allow CRTs to learn strategies and get access to resources that will positively effect their teaching.  They get access to quality PD opportunities for their 20 hours for registration renewal.  The goals of VIT and the DEECD are both met and we hope that each and every CRT who attends finds what we do on this front beneficial!

There is a 3rd, and less obvious but no less important, component to what we attempt to provide for our members.  Like the above we don't want the effect of what we do to end at the door of the classrooms our members teach in.  We always wanted to have a much greater impact on local education in a solid way so that our efforts gained the most positive and productive effects possible.

The Network, through the input of it's members, built a community that inspires it's members.  A community that felt confident not only in it's ability to learn from itself or the professional development workshops provided but was inspired to head out and also become inspirational to others, to become the teachers outside of the network for those inspired to learn.

Of course we worked hard in the background to enable this too.  We sourced high calibre presenters such as Michael Ymer and Karen Starkiss, forerunners in their fields.  Of course the first reason is that these presenters provide valuable knowledge that they explain easily to those attending, maximising the learning potential of our workshops.  This, however, wasn't the only reason.  These two in particular are quite well known in the local educational community because of their quality.  Because they are not brought in locally very often, it's a big deal when someone has seen them.

This generates a certain effect;  "Wow, you saw who?  Tell me all about it!".

The pupil becomes the teacher.  The wider community benefits from what we do in a solid way.

This has a resounding effect.  CRTs become better trained, they become confident and motivated, they are seen as a valuable source of information by their peers (CRT or otherwise).  CRT morale is raised allowing them to become more resilient to the everyday trials and tribulations of working as a CRT.  More local schools begin inviting more CRTs to in-school PD which begins this cycle all over again.

The Network allows us to carry each other through difficult days and difficult times.  That right there is the true power of community.

Regards,

Mel.

Now accepting Albury Area CRTs as members!

Previously we have had to limit our membership to Victorian registered CRTs because the DEECD was funding the majority of the PD we offered. We have spent some months laying groundwork to also include alternate sources of funding and PD that make us more viable to our Albury area CRT counterparts who are not dual registered. We are now accepting NSW registered CRTs from the Albury area as members!

The first step in this has been the MoneySmart Teaching PD which does not rely on DEECD funding to deliver and there are more things in the pipeline too.  Between these efforts and monthly collegial meetings we now feel we are in a position to be of solid benefit.

Please note that there will still be some opportunities you may not be able to attend if they are funded by the DEECD unless you are also registered to teach in Victoria.  We don't like this segregating line within our community of CRTs but it is a choise of either the line or not being able to support NSW CRTs as well. 

We look forward to having you on board!

Regards,

Mel.
Wodonga CRT Suport Network Coordinator.

October Meeting highlights!

Thanks everyone who attended the October meeting, I had a great time and learnt a thing or two!  For those who were unable to attend here's a few of the things that came up and resources that were shared.

This month's meeting topic was this one:

I would like everyone to choose ONE thing that they think every CRT needs to know!  It could be a strategy or a resource for their bag of tricks.  It could be a video you really want them to see or a document you think all CRTs should read.  It could be factual, practical, motivational or inspirational!

Sharing a concept:

I'll be opening with a pre-prepared statement by one of those attending (a CRT teaching Primary and one of the highly experienced members of our group):

Every CRT needs to be flexible and able to teach/adapt anything. Nowadays I use the 'one book lesson' idea where I choose a book and use that book for maths, literacy, art/craft etc. I'm at the stage where I can walk into a classroom without resources and go with what is there. If nothing is there I am still able to provide work for students by looking through their workbooks and making learning games etc from their previous work. Eg; Spelling bingo, round the world, buzz, times tables games etc.

Previous to this I carried a couple of story books and a few resources with ideas/quizzes etc that I could adapt for any grade level. I usually gathered resources aimed at grades 3 & 4 and this way I could adapt up or down as the need arose. Most often they were sourced on the internet - I just kept searching until I found what I felt was 'me' and I was comfortable in teaching. 

-Sandi

Sandi is kind of like myself and a couple of others at meetings, often what we bring to share to meetings like these doesn't get shown because we can dominate the focus as the newbies look to the more experienced members for guidance.  We sometimes prefer to hang back so everyone can bring valuable insights to the table and be included in the overall learning process, to be teachers as well as learners regardless of their career stage.

This came up only at the very end and I thought it was worth putting out there as food for thought about being a CRT.  Having talked to Sandi after the meeting concluded she wanted to stimulate discussion around the concept of teachers as individuals and the relationship between that and finding good resources for our classrooms.  It's important that we find resources that suit our individual teaching styles for them to be as effective as possible when we deliver them.

I'd like to take a moment to point out that things like this really make my day in meetings.  It shows me that people are well and truly into the spirit of being as helpful as possible for their colleagues to the point where they'll create something like this as a discussion starter.  They will spend time framing what they want they would like to bring to the table in a way that launches everyone else into thoughtful discussions.  The sharing of teaching concepts as well as resources to pass around.

Security Blankets.

  
Another member brought her emergency teaching ideas book to show us and it was great thing to have a look through.  It had a lot of great stuff in it and it was an eye opener for many.  Not just the book itself and it's activities and resources but what it had become over time. 

Opening the cover showed a bunch of post-it notes about things she'd picked up from around the place that weren't in the book to start with.  She added to it in a way that helped her to stay with the book as her main resource in a compact way (it's cover is about the size of an iPad so is easily portable!).  She also had notes scribbled in the margins about added strategies that allowed her to more effectively use the activities and it had evolved into a much more valuable resource than it started out as.  It was a really interesting look at yet another approach to building up your "bag of tricks".

She continued on to say that she doesn't really use the ideas in the book very much now, but enjoys having with her all the time.  While it was a very valuable resource in it's time, it remained an important part of her CRT tool kit.  The conversation turned to how common it actually is for CRTs to hold onto their "bag of tricks" even when they don't need them anymore as they became something more than a bundle of resources.  Some of us also owned up to doing the same, with boxes ready in the boot of our car or in a prominent place in our house, ready to delve into at a moment's notice even though we never seem to go back to them all that often.  They have become our security blankets, a source of confidence instead of a source of teaching tools.

The rest of that conversation is being reserved for a full post in it's own right ;).

The new version of this book (Emergency:  Inspirational ideas for all teachers - 2nd Ed) can still be purchased from EDSCO Educational Supplies and can be found in various university libraries (some open to the public, some not).

Websites
 
A couple of different websites were also thrown into the mix.  

The Literacy Shed (Visual Literacy).

The Bug Club (Literacy - Subscription fee - free trial available)

Monash University Dean's Lectures.
(can be hard to navigate - see also Monash Uni on YouTube).

Christmas is coming!

I also mentioned that Christmas is just around the corner and it's probably time to start looking at swapping christmasy stuff on the side rather than devoting a whole meeting to it later.  We'll continue that for the November and December meetings too.

Another member brought in Christmas activities that used buttons and other everyday resources usually found in primary school classrooms or art rooms.    The paddlepop snowflakes and button christmas trees were especially popular.  

The conversation moved through different activities you could do in the run up to Christmas, including the materials needed and where they could usually be found.

Wandered off topic...  Art came back!

We usually wander off topic at least once in meetings and in this case christmas art activities was the culprit.  The topic was clung to and there was lots of recycled art work discussed.  Of course no-one complains if a CRT uses recycled materials that were on their way to the bin and it can be very effective both educationally and visually if done the right way.  It lets you combine art/craft with sustainability for a good and well rounded lesson.  Sometimes the simplest ideas are the most effective too!

This recycled polar bear collage ticks all the boxes.  Engaging, fine motor skills, recycled materials easily accessible, minimal tools (paper, glue and scissors), stunning finished product and display item.  You could easily attach a picture book to this activity and finish with a maths activity to wrap the whole thing.
We did this with a couple of activities (the picture is of student work), drawing on our collective knowledge and understanding of learning styles, resources, engagement of students and continuation of activities and discussed how recycled art/craft is often a great place to go in primary on those days when you find yourself without a program ;).

This month was one of the smallest groups we've had in a while but that's not not a bad thing all told with many apologies received from those who wanted to attend but couldn't.  There's down sides to smaller groups of course; with more in the room more gets shared in a "take home" kind of way, the input of ideas and theories is broader in scope and there's more people to mingle with in the down times.  Smaller groups however allow for more in-depth discussion and a much more personal feel to meetings where CRTs have time to discuss interesting tangents and be more social and we don't have to rush to make sure everyone gets their turn. 

In spite of being a smaller group a LOT of great stuff came out of it (not just what's here of course) for both beginning and more experienced CRTs alike.

Note:  Only one of our members has been mentioned by name.  This is simply a product of the fact that we don't use anyone's name without express permission!  Many great ideas, some of which are mentioned here, came out of this meeting and everyone involved brought their 'A game' to the table!  If you don't mind us using your name simply let us know, we think you all deserve the credit and are only too happy to help see you get it ;).

Regards,

Mel.

Laying some groundwork - What's a "Feed" on the internet and what's a good reason to have them?

Knowing that we have some "technologically challenged" members out there sometimes I feel motivated to spread some tech ideas because "technologically challenged" is exactly where I would be if I didn't have a husband who was a self professed nerd.  Feeds is one of the things where he looked over my shoulder at my ever growing list of browser favourites and said "you know there's an easier way to do that, right?"

Before he explained it to me, I used to think feeds and email messages were just advertising to come look at stuff so the site owners can get more income from advertising.  They partly are, of course, but they are also a tool that you can use to help you make your way through the mind-boggling amount of social media out there.  I thought I'd take a moment to explain Feeds and how they can work for us as teachers.

Most of us are fairly familiar with Facebook.  We log in and stuff that our friends post (or posts in groups we have joined) appear so we can just scroll down instead of checking everyone's all individually.  That's what a "feed" is.  Most social networks have them, often sending out email notifications when new stuff enters your feed.  You can subscribe to or follow things like blogs, YouTube channels, Pinterest boards and so on.

Feeds can be a great way to get a lot of information and I find them VERY useful.  I've subscribed to a couple art boards on Pinterest because they have lots of great stuff that I want to be able to go back to when I'm searching for something specific to target X or Y in the curriculum.  When they put up something new I also get a notification and can have a quick overview through my email, go to it if it grabs my interest and then re-pin it to my own board if I think it's particularly nifty.  Using the feed makes it a quick and easy process instead of sitting down on a Saturday and going to each board I've subbed to has something new to look at.

Generally speaking, all you need in order to do that is to have an account with the social media site.  Then when you "friend", "follow" or "favourite" someone or something it will turn up in your feed.  If it stops being interesting or relevant you can take it off the list again if you think you need to.  It just helps you sort the wheat from the chaff in the massive amount of social media out there.

As teachers we tend to have an affinity with blogs, YouTube channels and so on that share our views on teaching.  Many teachers I know have a huge number of links in their browser's favourites bar and they periodically check back in to see if anything new has cropped up.  I used to be exactly the same but now Feeds are a great time saving measure for me.  I get a notification that something new is there and usually a short excerpt that helps me to decide whether it's going to be of interest to me or not.

Of course there's the downside...  I've got a Blogger account, a YouTube account and a Pinterest Account.  These I actually use so I naturally have an account.  I ALSO have an account for other social media sites that I don't actively use simply to give me access to the feed that goes along with it...  It can be a bit of a jumble of user names and passwords to remember.  Still, as a Network Coordinator I keep an eye on LOTS of stuff so my list of feeds is unusually large.  It's not likely that many will have as many as I do. 

If you use social networking sites regularly through bookmarks in your browser it might be a good idea to create an account to get access to a feed.  A YouTube account, for example, can certainly make sense for the feed alone, even if you never intend on uploading any videos.

When you are on FaceBook you naturally get access to many things like videos and articles.  Sharing them is quite active but somewhere out there there's a person who found it somewhere and created the original post that's being shared around.  Feeds help these people to find things worth sharing and by having them YOU could be the person finding things to bring to Facebook.

Of course as teachers we often are looking at "teachery things" and not all of our friends are teachers.  Bombarding them with "teachery stuff" can get old for them after a while and this weighs on many of our minds.  Belonging to interest groups on Facebook etc allows us to get around this issue.  We're sharing things with groups with a common interest on that thing.  We can become active in sharing things that like-minded people might otherwise not come into contact with.

Feeds, of course, might not be the thing for you and I certainly get notifications of stuff I'm not particularly interested in.  They might be worth it for you though... It's worth learning how to use them effectively if you think they might save you some time.

Regards,

Mel.

Is "should I work half days" the simple question it seems?

Every now and again the topic crops up about whether a CRT should work half days or hold out for a full day position instead. Accepting a half day of work stops you from accepting a full day if it's offered so the pay difference is certainly a big deal. The problem is that this is only looking at it from your end of the deal and only in an immediate way. There's dangers in making decisions based on only half of the information you need in order to make properly informed choices that benefit you overall.

Schools as a general rule want quality CRTs who are reliably available. Familiarity with a CRT simply leads to a greater incidence of settled classrooms working productively. Looking at this aspect, if a CRT is seen frequently around the school there are inherent benefits which go beyond pay issues and legal obligations to have a teacher in classrooms. CRTs which are seen around a school often enough to become familiar leads to them being viewed as "the school's teacher" rather than a CRT. This allows CRTs to access the same pool of authority as any other teacher does through the ability to enforce long-term consequences.

This authority can enable a CRT of lesser experience, and therefore their skills aren't as refined, to deliver a lesson more effectively than their more experienced counterparts who may be hampered by a higher degree of behavioural issues associated with CRT work. This makes a teacher willing to work half days more desirable than one that isn't. The school is able to institute the CRT as one of "their teachers" .

Being the most skilled available on the day is simply not enough to guarantee you will be offered the work on offer on any given day.

So when considered in the greater context of how much you earn in a year than in a day; while you potentially receive more pay on the day (there is no guarantee that you will get a full day instead) you are also risking less work on an ongoing basis which means you will quite possibly earn less money over time.

As an inexperienced teacher, the bonus in this is that through this you gain more work and therefore gain a higher level of experience in any set period of time. Taking half days in specific schools is an excellent strategy to receive more work and help you catch up to more experienced colleagues. Make no mistake, it's not an easy job market out there at the moment and chasing a larger pay packet this week may see your yearly pay less than it could have been and also be detrimental to your overall career because of the amount of experience you are able to accumulate.

My personal advice to any CRT is to NEVER flatly refuse half days for any reason. Instead, signal your preference to not work half days but tell the school/s you are available for "break glass in case of emergency" situations. You are proactively showing that you are a team player who genuinely cares about the schools you work in and when push comes to shove you will support that school and their students even though you obviously have concerns about your own hip pocket.

Teaching is not a job, it is a CAREER. In some ways CRTs need to pay a little more attention to certain aspects than other types of teachers. Making decisions when looking at it like you would a 'job' where you just turn up and perform a series of tasks which you get paid for is a very easy way to make decisions that end up making things worse in the long run rather than better.

When looking at it as a career instead of a job, loyalty is a MASSIVELY EFFECTIVE tool for CRTs in career productivity, advancement and longevity.

When I first started I essentially took the first position offered to me no matter how far I had to travel or otherwise inconvenient it was. I was spread across multiple schools in multiple areas and had a solid chance to build a name for myself within the CRT and School communities. After that I was able to begin picking and choosing the schools I worked for without damaging my long term prospects.

I also took a one year contract doing literacy for half a day a week. This, of course, barred me from being able to accept any conflicting contracts and in that year my overall income certainly suffered because of it (though not by as much as you'd think). At the same time, that year of experience gave me fabulous insights as it allowed me to focus on literacy and refine my skills.

That in turn allowed me to develop my own Literacy PD workshop.

View this Video on Youtube.

Which then saw me working for the VCAA presenting the MoneySmart professional development workshop.

View this video on YouTube.

I am certainly no longer "the typical CRT" and I can tell you that my average yearly earnings are all the better off for it too.

I sometimes harp on about Teaching is a Profession and being a career and that we, as CRTs, are still professionals even though many just treat us like we're doing "a job".  Remembering that we are Teachers and therefore members of a profession, refusing to just consider ourselves as part time public servants like so many others do, helps us make informed decisions that effectively improve our future in Teaching.

As someone who specialises in helping CRTs to excel I assure you that this one key point is a fulcrum on which many other things can be levered.

Don't think I'm saying you MUST work half days, that's an individual choice that each CRT should be making based on their own circumstances.  The choice on whether to work half days or not, however, should be made in an informed way that empowers you to proactively influence the direction your career takes.

Regards,

Mel.

October Meeting details

Hello everyone!

Our October meeting is scheduled for Thursday 16th October in at Wodonga South Primary School Library.

Full details about the meeting can be found here:
http://wodongacrtsupportnetwork.blogspot.com.au/p/hi-everyone-next-wodonga-crt-support.html

Regards,

Mel

Victorian School Holidays are here!

Hola!

I'd just like to take this opportunity to wish everyone a safe and happy holidays whether you are traveling or staying local.

Rest, reinvigorate and have a wonderful time!

Regards,

Mel.

CRT career advancement and coordinating CRT Networks.

I've often mentioned that being a VIT CRT Network Coordinator has been a valuable asset to local CRTs with the Network providing valuable learning and support to local CRTs.  What follows shouldn't be taken in a way that takes any value out of this aspect of being a coordinator.  Network coordinators provide a valuable service for local CRTs that both help them remain registered to teach and to excel in the role of CRT.

That being said there's another aspect to being a CRT Network Coordinator which is the opportunities it offers for the advancement of your own career.  Keeping this aspect of the position in mind as I progressed, and watching for opportunities to appear, I have been able to take more than one step forward.  First and foremost I am a career CRT, and I love being a CRT, but let's face it; as a CRT we often have some downtime that we could be filling with other pursuits.

Still, even if you intend to move on to full-time work there are still many distinct advantages.

First and foremost it is a fantastic opportunity to improve your people skills.  In the 6 years I have been a CRT Network Coordinator I have liaised with colleagues, schools, VIT, the DEECD, the AEU, workshop presenters, PD venues, caterers, accommodation providers and so on.  These experiences both within the education and business communities have honed my skills over time.  Not a day goes by where I don't use these skills in my CRT career whether it be with colleagues, schools or parents.

Having to cooperate with this wide range of people within the educational community it's also given me a keen insight into how Education is put together in Victoria that CRTs don't often get access to.  It has given me a far better understanding of my role as a CRT in Victorian schools and has allowed me to identify areas of my skills that I need to hone in order to become a desirable CRT and the confidence to do so.  These key aspects have also allowed me to make the transition from mainstream schools into Special Development education through experience rather than a qualification.  It gave me the freedom to make this transition when I felt ready to do so.

Lastly, it shouldn't be ignored that as a CRT Network Coordinator I have gained leadership experience.  Selecting appropriate professional development opportunities, assisting in raising the morale level of 100's of teachers and building an educational community.  It has also given me an insight into understanding the logistics of education such as providing a valuable education within tight budgets and other factors that potentially limit the education that our students will receive.

For those looking to move up the educational leadership ladder in a full-time career, being a CRT Network Coordinator provides you with valuable leadership experience to help boost you up the chain of leadership.  The obvious example of course is being a daily organiser where your keen understanding of CRTs as a workforce will serve you well in treating CRTs in a way that gets the most out of their capability for the school you work for.  Another is lead in team teaching.  You've now got experience in driving discussions, perhaps even sorting the wheat from the chaff in selecting PD, which will be valuable assets in the role.

Many of the experiences are directly applicable to leadership positions in schools and they've served me well on more than one occasion during longer contracts.

But what if you intend to remain a CRT as I have?

As mentioned above, being a CRT Network Coordinator has both widened and strengthened my list of contacts in my professional network and this has allowed some exciting moves for me.

It began when the Wodonga Network was relatively small and we were mostly holding monthly meetings.  We held collegial discussions around resources we swapped.  Resource trading was basically a vehicle to drive educational discussions by comparing the relative values of resources in different situations and manipulating those resources to better suit our particular needs.  At the time I was teaching a half a day a week in Special Development doing VCAL Literacy.

It was a bit of a shock to me but the resources and activities I had designed for special development were proving very popular for mainstream teachers.  I was used to sharing and discussing resources in a collegial way but I wasn't really used to being bombarded by questions about the resources I brought with me.  It was perhaps the first time that I understood that I had a bit of a unique opportunity to share what I had learnt in Spec Development education because the transition to Mainstream schools turned out to be valuable and effective.

This turned into my first actual PD presentation;  "Literacy Games".  It focuses on certain aspects of games, why and how they motivate students (and children in general) and how I incorporated those themes into my pedagogy.

View this video on YouTube.

This step was generated by opportunity.  I had built a Network of over 150 CRTs that provided me with an opportunity to present this PD to my peers.  As it is built around the way I teach, it is naturally slanted towards the rigors of working as a primary CRT (though it has since made a transition, becoming valuable for classroom teachers as well).

I have now run this PD multiple times in multiple locations, always receiving very positive feedback.  This opportunity has allowed me to combine my teaching ability as well as the collegial/people skills of being a Network Coordinator into a set of effective skills for presenting professional development for Teachers.

Then, earlier this year, there were a couple sessions of MoneySmart presentations being held locally.  As it was free I put it out to the Wodonga Network and a group of us attended one of the sessions together.  The presentation was being delivered by the MoneySmart project manager and I made sure to thank him for the presentation on behalf of the Network and have a bit of a deeper discussion about the MoneySmart program.

I walked out of the conversation with a potential new position with the VCAA.  I have an extensive professional network including teachers and schools, knowledge about local educational needs and was also an experienced presenter of professional development for teachers.  It took a little bit of work but this weekend just gone the training wheels came off for my new position with the MoneySmart program in the VCAA:

View this video on YouTube.

The interesting part about this is that up until a short time ago the MoneySmart program was not available directly to CRTs unless they attended a public presentation or through contact with a school.  The program has been structured in a way that is valuable for classroom teachers in many respects, relying on an initial introduction followed by collegial support on an ongoing basis which many CRTs just don't get access to.

My previous experiences as a CRT Network Coordinator and presenter of my own PD gave me valuable insight into what CRTs are looking for as a collective group and my passion for CRTs opened the door to bypass the public/school contact version of this presentation and bring it directly to CRTs.  I had both the contacts and the knowledge to make this possible and, just as importantly, successful.  Something that I am increasingly discovering is quite rare in the higher echelons of education.
 
The best part?  The nature of this new position allows me to remain everything I have been in the past.  A a parent, a CRT and a CRT Network Coordinator.  I have been able to select my opportunities for advancement in a way that suits how I want my career to progress.  I didn't have to give up CRT work to become a Network Coordinator.  I didn't have to give up being a Network Coordinator to become a presenter.  I didn't have to give up presenting my own PD to also present for the VCAA.

I have been able to advance at each stage without giving up the things I wanted to be doing.

Of course this isn't the only thing I've done on the side.  I have my own blog, a YouTube channel and also a store on Teachers Pay Teachers to sell resources that I create.  While the blog and the YouTube channel are labours of love and I don't make that much money from them, they have certainly provided me with valuable experiences and insights along the way.  The Teachers Pay Teachers store does provide an income (not huge by any means) but again it's been a gold mine of insights and experience.

These are things I doubt I would have accomplished if I hadn't been a CRT and a CRT Network Coordinator.  The combination of available time, the experiences I have gained and the professional network I have built for myself along the way have proved invaluable in getting me to this point.

While this is about my journey, it's not really about me.  The first thing I hope everyone would get from this in a general way is that being a "Career CRT" is by no means a dead end job and it doesn't have to stunt your career.  Adopting the perspective that sporadic work is as much a benefit as it is a hindrance and can free you up to excel in so many aspects of Teaching.

The second is about being a CRT Network Coordinator.  Often I have made the comment that it's a voluntary position rather than a paid one (most of the time anyway, in Vic where the system is in place there are opportunities to be paid via the DEECD in a limited fashion).  In spite of the position being a voluntary one, and certainly rewarding in an other-than-monetary way, that doesn't mean that it's not going to benefit your career in a major way in the long run too.

Being a CRT Network Coordinator has launched and supported my career in such an array of ways.  I have been able to provide an arena for other CRTs to gain the knowledge and support to excel as well as getting the knowledge and support to excel myself.  While CRT Networks are currently only run through educational institutions in Victoria in an official capacity, my hope is that they would spread to other states and offer many more CRTs the same opportunities I had access to.

Even if your state does not officially support CRT Networks, and honestly speaking you should be pushing for your state to do so, collegial groups are an excellent source of knowledge and collegial support.  They will still begin to step you into a position to gain leadership skills and they will still put you in a position to begin looking at launching your career in exciting and unexpected directions.
Writing about my journey is my way of showing the possibilities open to you as a CRT if you pay attention to what the world is offering you.  My path is described here proving it's perfectly possible to seek out an exciting career as a CRT.  The other important part is that the path doesn't have to be the one I have chosen, it is up to you to choose where it can take you whether you stay in education or take those experiences from education and spreading your talents out into other sectors. 

Yes, I am still a CRT.  I even heavily identify with being a CRT as a part of who I am as a professional.  In the end though your job title just doesn't sum up your talents and capabilities and it can be a serious mistake to let it limit the options you see opening up before you.
Regards,

Mel.

The MoneySmart Financial Literacy PD has now concluded.

Thank you everyone for your attendance of and enthusiasm in this PD workshop.

You can view the feedback video and after PD report here.


Regards,

Paul Lichnovsky
Wodonga CRT Support Network 2IC.

PD update: MoneySmart Financial Literacy.

MoneySmart presentation - Shepparton 2014

Numbers have now been finalised for the MoneySmart PD to be held in Wodonga this weekend (Sat 13 Sept 2014).

There are still a couple of places left but otherwise seat availability will be down to cancellations.

Full details can be found here:

http://wodongacrtsupportnetworkpd.blogspot.com.au/p/moneysmart-teaching-professional.html

Regards,

Mel.

Cardboard, wool, foil painting

Another activity I found to take into my Spec Ed art room but would also work well in primary is painting on foil.  It's not my idea and the place where I found it can be found on my Pinterest.  I just thought I'd share why I chose it and the results!

This is a three step activity that covers lots of different sensory materials and fine motor skills as well as the manipulation of materials.

For each student you will need:

• a piece of cardboard
• a piece of aluminium foil just larger than the piece of cardboard

Shared resources are:

• wool
• paint with some dish washing liquid mixed in (makes the paint stick to the foil).

Step one.  Have small cuts along the edges of the cardboard.  Using a length of wool to make a pattern across the cardboard.

Step two.  Cover the front (or patterned side) of cardboard with aluminium foil, securing is at the back with either sticky tape or masking tape.

Then feel across the front for the wool patterns.  Run your fingers along the wool, making it stand out in the foil.

Step three.  Paint each section in the pattern in a different colour.

TIP:  Paint on its own will not stick to the foil.  Mix some dish washing liquid with the paint.  I used the cheap brand and it did the trick beautifully.

This is a great 45 minute activity for middle to upper primary school students.  The use of every day items to produce an interesting multi-step piece of art work kept students engaged to the end.

The stringing of the cardboard was the step most students found the trickiest.  Understanding how to weave the wool and use the slits in the edge of the cardboard challenged student thinking.

The reason I chose it for my Spec Dev art room is that it's all very tactile with everything having a different feel (and in the case of the foil there's also the sound).  The card, wool and foil all give different sensations which the students found very engaging.  Running your hands over the foil afterwards to create the geometric shapes to paint provided yet another tactile sensation.

The multi-step process (rather than just being painting) also changes the activity regularly which keeps it interesting and catered to certain students I have with quite short attention spans.  It kept them on task by providing a new goal at each step.

The last reason was the big one.  Many of my students do very well when the activity is very regimented and, while I always include steps so that the students can personalise their work, this one has a very liberal approach even though the method remains a constant.

Winding the wool around the cardboard even proved to be a roadblock for some.  "How do I do it Mel?" I got in every class.  This is exactly what I was aiming for, to move outside of that heavily structured way that things are done in their activities, and often their lives, introducing them to an element of randomness some of them don't often get.  Some of them I had look at the work of others on the table and others I took for a wander of the room to have a look at the wide variety of results the other students were producing, using the work of their classmates to inspire their own creativity.

Sometimes it's good for everyone involved to have those boundaries pushed a little.  In this case, for example, some of the students were put on the path towards a new concept regarding creativity.  Their classmates, who those having trouble observed for inspiration, got the chance to be inspiring to their peers.  In a few cases some even dived into the opportunity to be the expert and take on the role of teacher, explaining how they wound their wool and why, how to wind it to make certain shapes (squares, triangles, rectangles etc) and so on.

Of course it was also an easy one to differentiate to varying year levels looking at different aspects of the curriculum by changing aspects such as using primary colours or secondary colours and so on.  For my classes in Spec Dev, where one class can cross curriculum boundaries very easily, this ability to differentiate on the fly is something I am constantly on the lookout for.  

It is very important to me that my students participate in the same basic activity as on a personal level it helps to promote class unity.  It's not always possible because of the Spec Dev arena I am working in, certain students simply need to be far more individually catered for, but getting as close as possible is always a primary goal.  It also avoids the challenging behaviour that can arise when you hear "but I want to do what Timmy is doing!".  

The last thing on this list is that it helps the students focus on their own work.  When everyone is doing almost the same thing it is less distracting as there's not so much "different to look at" when glancing around the room.  It relates directly to their own work so, as has been discussed, it can be inspirational to them and encourage them to think outside of their own box.  At the same time it is "far less attention grabbing" when all students are focused on the same task.  This particular aspect is serving me very well in keeping students engaged in and enjoying their own work.

All in all I felt this was an exceptionally worthwhile activity for a range of classes in the school I'm working at.

Regards,

Mel.