More open entry for parents at school. Computers for parents to use. Parents invited in to work in groups with children. Parents could be teachers and/or learners and children could be teachers and/or learners.
My class worked recently with a student teacher, and decided they wanted to write to the Council to persuade them to build an artesian well. We went for a walk to the local shop area to identify a great spot for the well to be built. We took photos of different options, and discussed the merits of each spot amongst the class. It was really interesting to talk with the children about how they use their community spaces. They wrote persuasive letters to the Council, and were thrilled with the detailed reply.
This experience showed me that the 'community' in terms of physical space, and in terms of the leaders of our city can make valuable contributions to my class' learning.
Amazing!! ...watching the children in the streets figuring out the "hole in the wall". Location not a barrier to learning so long as they have access to it.
In my class we had a parent approach me to say that she had run many sewing workshops in the community (Holiday Programmes) and that she would like to run one at school. She outlined what she would like to do and even provided a sewing activity for the children to do prior to her coming in. This was to give the children some sewing skills prior to starting the sewing activity with her. The children in my class are 5 and after 4 sewing workshops have almost finished their own soft toy. It is amazing how their skills have developed over the last four weeks. I feel so lucky to have such a talented parent so willing to share her skills with us. We have recently been talking at school about how we can tap into the skills of our 'expert' parents. It has been great for the kids but has also gone a long way towards developing a positive relationship with this particular parent.
Our community is our 'little pot of gold' for learning. We are out and about in the community all the time and are blessed with a wealth of local and wider community memebrs who are more than happy to share their knowledge, expertise and passion. Teachers do not need to be, and actually are not, the font of all knowledge.
Our learning community encompasses Kohanga Reo, Aoga Amata and a Conductive Education pre-schools on site.
Within the school we celebrate our various cultures by providing Samoan Language classes, Total Immersion Te Reo years 1-6 and Conductive Education.
A range of programmes to support learning that involves local business and members of the community.
And yet we are only scratching the surface of possibilities.
At our school we have a lot of community involvement and this makes our school the special place that it is. We have a knitting club every week and local people from the community come in and our students teach them to knit. Some of the adults are now teaching crochet to the students. The interactions between these adults and our students are really rich and our students bring their learning back from this club into the classroom.
Our Project Sunshine reaches out to all schools who are interested across the country. Our students plant the sunflowers and invite local schools to help then when the seeds are harvested we decorate envelopes and send them all over the country. Our students know exactly where their envelope of seeds have gone and this means a lot to them. We have even been in contact with other schools as a result of this. Many other schools and adult groups including adult refugees have come to share in our experiences.
We need to be more actively involved in the communities, kids are learning from all areas, and the community is just as important. Sometimes just having the parent groups and whanau involved in community based activities and sports teams or clubs is encouraging for the kids...
Building positive networks between the parents, schools and the communities will be awesome.
Lorraine states, that teachers are not, nor need to be the font of all knowledge and Ann suggests that there needs to be more open access for parents in schools. While I agree with these points, there has to be a willingness to engage and be actively involved with each other from both sides - school and community.
I think a cool place to learn would be one where expertise within the community is commonly known and drawn upon. That community members are seeking to be actively involved in their children's learning either through classroom participation - sharing of knowledge, providing an extra pair of hands, or even through Skype and blogging interaction, and providing outside classroom opportunities. I also think that communities need to share the initiatives. A cool place to learn will be shared responsibility for learning between school and community.
There are lots of ways to extend learning within our community - joining a sports team, children learn team work and repect for others just like being being part of a church community. Different types of clubs are availalbe in our community ie. Library these clubs perhaps need to be linked to schools so parents are aware.
Moving along the process in our LCN, our Te Awahou network in Foxton organised a meeting of all of our priority learners and their parents on an independent site in our community.
The preparation leading into this meeting was a vital step and not something to be rushed.
The aim of the meeting was to get all of the children together and share how they best learn, what are the barriers to them achieveing this and also having similar discussions with their parents.
The rich information that came from this extremely positive meeting was excellent. and the parents in particular found it extremely valuable to be able to share their ideas in a non threatening environment.
Parents feedback as to what would be vital in their child's learning has now been forwarded on to our local district council, in consideration for their design of a new library and learning hub. This week I had a visit from a Christchurch consultant who's job it is to gather community input.
Our Horowhenua District council have now committed $1 million to this new facility and our LCN have had a big part to play in this development.
Right from the start I liked the way teachers in our junior school would use the "morning talk" from kids as a way to get them to think about structure - answering who/what/why/where questions, and encouraging these questions from the other children. For senior students this personal experience out in the community can be brought into class lessons in a host of other ways - and it means children can be more alive to the learning possibilities presented by the activities they are involved in with their families/community outside of school hours. Their classmates can learn from each other's community experiences both as experiences and as ways to challenge their interpretive or reading/writing/math/art skills, etc.
We would love to hear your suggestions on what you think:
