Implementing Treaty Education.

Treaty Education is the newest buzzword of Saskatchewan's educational system, and, unfortunately, not enough people are taking it seriously.  As pre-service teachers, we are kind of thrown to the wolves, so to speak.  We are expected to incorporate meaningful treaty education into every lesson plan, yet we are supplied with minimal resources.  All I have ever gotten for resources is the booklet from The Office of the Treaty Commissioner – and, to be completely honest, it isn’t very valuable.  The contents are a nebulous web of important topics, however there is no way to hash these topics into subject areas.  

Seemingly, even though Treaty Education is governmentally mandated, the Treaty outcomes and the curriculum outcomes are like oil and vinegar – they work together in the sense that they make a good salad dressing to pour onto a student’s learning/life experience, but (as it stands now) no matter how hard one tries to stir them, they do not mix.  I could have one of my routines being a quick “Did’ja kno!”  fact about treaty’s up on the board, and it could count that I have integrated treaties into my lesson, but is that beneficial to anyone?  Absolutely not.  Students will not remember it, as it has no meaningful impact, and the teacher will get an unwarranted sense of self-satisfaction.  

If students are coming into our classroom with absolutely zero pre-conceived knowledge of the treaties, weaving in and integrating Treaty Education into our lessons is going to be utterly useless.  This is why I believe a compulsory Treaty Education class in, let’s say, grade 9 would be extremely beneficial.  This class would give students the foundational knowledge that other teachers can then build upon in their own classrooms.  The argument about teachers neglecting to teach treaties in their classroom because “they have all had a class on it already, so what is the point” begins to arise when the thought of a treaty based class comes up.  Personally, I don’t think this argument holds much substance – it is still a mandated part of the education profession, so teaching it is not only still necessary, but expected.  

For my ECS 410 class, we had a guest by the name of Tim Caleval come in from the Ministry of Education, and right at the end of his presentation, he touched upon the Maori people of New Zealand and how the Government of New Zealand worked hard to raise the graduation rates of these Maori people and changed the educational system to benefit them.  I see a great deal of parallels between Saskatchewan and New Zealand – the only difference is the governmental apathy of our province.  

If we work together -- get the resources, get the plans in place, and all have a mutual understanding of Treaty Education -- we can implement a meaningful way of learning with the treaties.  

Grading Behaviour.

In both my ECS 350 and ECS 410 classes, we have recently had discussions and debates on whether or not a student's behaviour should reflect their mark.  This is a really interesting topic that has opened my eyes to a viewpoint that I wouldn't have previously seen. 

During my elementary and high school careers, I was always the "good" student.  I wouldn't come late to class, I would always put a great deal of effort into assignments and hand them in on time, and I was attentive in class.  When classmates wouldn't hand things in on time, it always irked me.  I'm not entirely sure why, but it usually boiled down "if I got it done, why couldn't you".  Which I now realize is a terrible attitude.

Coming from this place, I would think I weigh behaviour quite highly.  Being a courtious student was clearly important to me.  It still is, but in a different way.  I now understand that people are different from me -- different backgrounds, different issues, as so on.

In my 350 class, we had a case study in a math class that had three very different students:

• A student that very rarely showed up and distracted others when he would, but knew what he was doing and gets 90% on every exam.
• A student who showed up every day, was okay at assignments, but did very poorly on tests
• A student who was a single mother, so she is unable to show up every day, went into the class with a grade 3 level of math, but was improving.  She now has a grade 4 math literacy level.

We were asked to discuss who should be passing the class/have the better mark in the class.  It is very strange to think about, as my intuition would say that the latter two students should be rewarded for their hard work, and the first one should be punished for not being a good student.  Now, however, the biggest question needs to be asked: who hit the outcomes of the class?  The first one did, and the other two did not.  According to outcomes, which is what educators want to strive to hit, the first student should pass the class while the other two would fail it.

Now, however, some rational can be had if we look at the Saskatchewan Curriculum's Broad Areas of Learning.  Could this first student be considered a lifelong learner or an engaged citizen?  The attitude he presents would disagree, but these BALs are not the biggest focus in the classrooms today.

My stance on this is still slightly up in the air.  I think that students need to be held accountable for their actions (late assignments, missing classes, etc) because we do want engaged citizens for the future, but people need leeway. 

Our World, Our Ways -- Assessment with an Indigenous perspective

The world of assessment is incredibly vast and the "what ifs" that plague it make unpacking it a difficult task for teachers.  While reading through chapter six of this document, many discussions from both ECS 350 and ECS 410 come to mind, as many of the things touched upon in the document link back. For example, on page 113, this list is provided:

As a result of these circumstances, Aboriginal students may be

penalized by a number of common assessment practices, including:

·        single rather than multiple assessment methods

·        inflexible deadlines (with late

penalties or “0” for incomplete

assignments)

·        time-limited assessments

·        marks awarded for class participation and effort

·        awarding zeros for incomplete or missing assignments

·        failure to match testing to teaching

·        surprising students with pop quizzes

It specifically states this for Aboriginal students (and it makes sense based on the fact that it is a document discussing teaching First Nations, Métis, and Inuit learners), but I feel as though each of these points can/should be applied to all learners.  In fact, save for the parts discussing the specific Indigenous cultural aspects, this could be applied to anyone.

Using multiple assessment methods and tools should become common practice among educators.  In our own careers as students, we have experienced that we learn differently than our classmates, and having the option to express what we have learned in different ways, whether it be oral, visual, musical, etc.

The chapter also brings up some really important sample strategies for teachers to use with their students, but to pull one out that I thought was really important, it suggests that we provide an in-class review.  Now, some people may say “well of course you would provide an in-class review, that’s only natural,” without thinking of the bigger benefits that it actually provides.  You will most certainly have students who have parents/guardians that are more than willing and able to aid in the study process.  However, not all students have these supports at home, so if you are to offer these supports, it really “levels the playing field,” so to speak.  These in-class reviews are also beneficial for every student, as they will begin to understand exactly what the teacher is looking for on the exam.  

 Assessment is still a pool of uncertainty, as we can never be sure if our practices are really benefitting every student in the long run.  Until we find a utopian school with practices in place that aid everyone, we just need to be aware of the potential of our students and continue to adapt our practices.

Knowing your Students -- Chapter 2 response.

Chapter two, in essence, describes some of the different learners that one may encounter during their time as a teacher.

This chapter indirectly touches upon one of the biggest dissonances that I have when it comes to education classes -- setting up lesson/unit plans for a hypothetical classroom.  This is not a knock against the process of lesson planning, and it's a fantastic thing to learn, but when we gear our plans towards a non-existent group of students, we won't assume that we will have an EAL student, a student who excels at a certain subject, and one who is at a shockingly low reading level.  We will gear our plans as if our classroom is full of miniature versions of ourselves.

As educators, we need to understand that we aren't going to have a classroom of clones.  Students come for different places, so we need to expect this.  Until we get to know our students -- their learning styles, their likes and dislikes, and how they generally function -- we won't know how to teach them. 

I found it very interesting that the chapter also touches upon gender.  It's fantastic that it's showing a focus on gender differences, but they don't, in my opinion, go in-depth enough.  More than two genders exist.  It's hard to accommodate everyone, but we really should open the doors to get away from the gender binary.

Response to Differentiation - Chapter One

To say that differentiation is a good thing is an understatement.  I'd be willing to go out on a limb and say that differentiated education is one of the most important things that we, as educators, need to not only understand, but also implement.  Clearly, by the book's title, the author(s) are going to be teaching us different strategies to use in terms of differentiated education, so that will certainly be nice. 

This chapter, obviously being the first one, gives a brief introduction into differentiated education.  It starts off by letting the reader know what differentiated education is, emphasizing the fact that one size does not fit all students.  The most important statement that this chapter makes is the fact that we need to know that each student has their own set of strengths.  This is something that I feel isn't recognized.  Far too often, teachers will claim to have bad students in their class, when in reality, they're just not being engaged, which reminds me of a tweet/quote from Neil deGrasse Tyson:

As a final note, I just want to add that pre-planning differentiated plans is an awful idea.  Until you've gotten to know where your students are, planning lessons around them won't work.