Seek The Truth
Posts tagged principal
Principals Office Blog: Election
5 months ago
By Wayne Bainbridge
A blog is a personal statement or opinion. Mine is about the election which for the first time in my adult voting life, I had very little interest in…almost to the point of not voting. The cup of tea saga and over reaction,the deals between National and Act and Peter Dunne leave a bad taste in your mouth and a feeling of a tainted democratic process.
That Mr Key and National have done well over the last 3 years is without doubt. Key is very good and he relates well to us all. His photo paying the pizza delivery person in shorts, bare feet and a polo on election night epitomizes his ordinary guy next door image. Tony Ryall has been a very good Health minister and Steven Joyce has been a very impressive Transport and Tertiary education minister. He gets things done
Labour have been an embarrassment to themselves and their history. For too long they didn’t realize they lost the last election. Too many policies were a tired return to the old socialist rhetoric of the 50′s and 60′s. The economic rational of raising the super age and making Kiwisaver compulsory were endorsed by every economic commentator in the country but it wasn’t sold well enough and for a long enough time. Goff surprised by running a very good campaign. Bravely, Labour
campaigned on policy not personalities but Goff was sabotaged from within.
Why didn’t he have the costings of their policies at the Christchurch Press debate…because Finance spokesman David Cunliffe either withheld them or didn’t have them ready
So, the Greens get 13 seats and NZ First 8 seats but neither could win a single electorate seat. A number of sitting MPs were dumped by the voters, sacked in fact, but parachute back into parliament on the list…the losers list!
Now Labour will try to resurrect themselves but are doomed to failure. Their party list rewarded the incompetent. The affiliated unions pay just 50 cents a member to control the constitution. The same old tired faces litter the top table. The leadership battle will further divide the party and reward the vain. What is needed is a clear out of the old and incompetent, the gender/sexual orientation representation and the union hacks.
David Lange became leader after just 3 years in parliament. He was a circuit breaker and Labour desperately needs another one. Phil Twyford/Jacinda Ardern would be a great new leadership combination, both telegenic, young, intelligent and an obvious break from the past and a metaphor for the future.
Likely to happen?
Not in a million years!
Australia continues to look better and better.
School Underachievement; the Great New Zealand Myth
8 months ago
In New Zealand, there is frequent mention made of our ‘long tail’ of educational underachievement – 20% of the school population. Schools are exhorted to do better, to work harder, to design intervention strategies and to apply National Standards as a means of positive intervention.
At Matipo Primary School (Decile 6, 410 pupils) over the last three years 92% of children right across the school, achieve at or above the National Standard in Reading. In mathematics, it is 85%. We report separately on all cohort groups; boys, girls, Maori and Pacific. There is little variation between boys and girls and Maori pupils generally out perform all the other cohort groups. Pacific children consistently underperform against all the other cohort groups (when they start school their achievement gap is at the widest point, when they leave it has narrowed markedly. In other words, school makes a difference).
We have had a number of requests to visit the school to see why Maori kids do so well here and what ‘special things’ we must do to facilitate their success. In essence, we do nothing special. As a school we are strong on engagement, expectation, personalizing learning, structure, routine and striving for excellence and achievement, encouragement and recognition of success in all areas. The reason is that most of them come from two parent, employed, middle income families. Conversely, our Pacific children come from low income backgrounds. Because of such, they live in overcrowded, shared homes with little money to ensure adequate warmth, nutrition, health care and everyday incidental learning experiences like going for a drive to the mall or the supermarket. They tend to come from homes without books.
The great New Zealand myth is that school underachievement is caused by failing schools and teachers. The real truth is that it is caused by poverty and indirectly by successive government policy. Underachievement has nothing to do with ethnicity and everything to do with socio economic status, income and poverty.
New Zealand has very high rates of child poverty, certainly amongst the OECD countries – reckoned to be between 16-20%. Paula Rebstock’s Welfare Working Group Report linked child poverty to households dependent on benefits. One in five New Zealand children live in a welfare dependent household. Robstock quotes the OECD repeatedly pointing out that if New Zealand could foucs on lifting the sole parent employment rate, it would substantially improve the child poverty rate.
My premise is that if New Zealand governments wish to improve our 20% school achievement tail, then they need to radically improve and reform the economy. New Zealand is a low wage economy with encouragement to remain so, to be internationally competitive on world markets. But at what cost to our children?
Governments need to be acting to improve employment and the economy by investing in jobs (as for Australia’s 2011 budget), by tax and welfare reform, by job creation incentives and the like.
Essentially the best way to improve school achievement of our failing children, is to reform the economy to attack the real causes of achievement failure, which is family poverty.
Recipe for a Successful School
8 months ago
In September 2011 we received an excellent Education Review Office report on the school. It was highly complementary, no compliance issues and a 4/5 year return review cycle – limited to 20% of New Zealand schools. We have had a history of positive reviews, have a healthy and growing roll and have received a number of other positive affirmations and recognitions over the years.
What is the recipe for this success? It isn’t rocket science and the recipe is not unique to this school. It is a number of relatively simple concepts which perhaps could be wrapped up under the heading ‘positive’ school culture!
Over the years, staff have had the opportunity for growth and innovation and exposure to a lot of leading minds both at courses and conferences and through school professional development.
John Hattie, Lane Clark, Mark Treadwell, Martyn Weatherill, Helen Baxter, Andy Hargreaves and Sir Ken Robinson have been major influences. Young staff in particular have had opportunities to grow professionally and to try new ideas. The school has a track record of long term, whole school professional development. Study grants and 50% subsidy for tertiary study fees have been available.
Leadership is understood. The role of the principal is to be the leading learner, leading learning. Leaders lead and make decisions. As far as possible, wide input is sought and the reasons for a decision made clear. Transparency and fairness are important. Professionalism, in all that it means, is promoted. There is an expectation that staff will be well planned and prepared and that data should inform and drive their teaching. Planning across the school has been exemplary.
Part of the success is due to strong leadership but equally critical is strong staff and actively recruiting staff members with intellect, passion, work ethic and ability to contribute to the wider corporate life of the school. Matipo is a child centred school and that is a major factor in all that we do. We have an incredible range of opportunities for children and proactive interventions. This is however a balancing act as to how much intrusion into the regular life of the classroom can be balanced against giving kids the widest extra curricular opportunities.
The school has four critical drivers or pou. These are promoted across the school and to the parent community and hopefully all staff, Board, children and parents understand these. Our drivers are engagement, achievement, excellence and care, set in a context of structure, routine and expectation. We expect all our children to do well in all learning areas as well as sport, arts, behavior, etc. Our expectations and routines are clear and there are consequences if children don’t behave in a manner consistent with the expectations. We expect and promote excellence in all areas. We expect all children to succeed and ethnicity or poverty are not accepted as barriers. We recognize and reward excellence and achievement.
Our major driver is engagement. This is one of Hattie’s ‘top ten’!
Engagement of teacher to child and of child to teachers is critical. There is an expectation that teachers will be in class before school, engaging with children. Children must know that a critical adult in their life cares about them, trusts them, believes in them.
As part of our proactivity, at the beginning of the year, all children potentially at risk of academic failure, challenging behaviors, emotional fragility or sheer boredom are identified and plugged into an intervention programme. At lunchtime, we have teachers involved in traditional duty but other teachers are involved in sports coaching, computer room, library, kapahaka, Polynesian club, strategic games, etc.
We have after school classes, opportunities to learn violin, drums, guitar, keyboard etc. All teachers identify target children. We provide home-help ‘kits’ for children not achieving.
Together, our emphasis on structure, routine, expectation, care, engagement, achievement and excellence in a proactive setting with a skilled staff, excellent resources and lots of opportunities for children, with good communication all makes up something called ‘school culture’. It has an invisibility as well as a real presence. Essentially, children are highly engaged in purposeful learning environments in a school without rules but with high expectations.
“It ain’t rocket science!”
On Politics and a House Build on Sand
11 months ago
By Wayne Bainbridge
At the time of writing the Act Party and Maori Party are in disarray and the Labour Party still on a steep slide, downwards!
As a long Labour supporter with family links back to Keir Hardy, a Scottish unionist and founder of the British Labour Party it is soul destroying to see the despair of the New Zealand Labour Party, saddled with dead wood, stagnating under union control and totally bereft of any new ideas or solutions. They have simply dusting off speeches and ideas from the 1950’s and 60’s reflecting a world that has long since passed.
Lest you think this is an attack on Labour, it is not. Our country is in extreme danger from an economic and social meltdown.
Mr Key is an absolute revelation as Prime Minister. He is very smooth, a smart operator but a populist. Take him away and National has nothing.
At a time New Zealand needs strong government and leadership, there is none. At a time we need courageous decision making, there is a void. Instead the government simply continues to borrow $350 million per week and racking up our national debt to the level of Greece and Portugal. That our credit rating will be downgraded shortly is inevitable.
At a time New Zealand needs a strong, viable opposition to stand up to the government, to question and expose and to offer alternative ideas and solutions, there is none.
Why is it important, why should we bother? Essentially, because despite record high export prices we risk economic collapse by our national debt burden. Successive governments’ simply keep spending. Too much spending is related to social policy bribes: student loans, working for families, welfare benefits. Here our economic direction and social issues intertwine.
New Zealand desperately needs to radically reform the economy. We can’t just keep giving handouts. We need to boost jobs and productivity. Much is made of poor school achievement of 20% of our children. The reality is that poor achievement is related to socio economic income and poverty. People without jobs or on low income don’t have the money to spend on good housing, warmth, good clothing, nutrition, health care and provide language/educational experiences for their children. Some families are now third generation welfare dependent. Advances in technology and world free trade means that huge numbers of jobs will be under threat.
We need new thinking and innovation and courageous decision making to totally reform the economy.
- Big ticket items like interest free student loans, Working for Families need refining.
- Our welfare system needs to be streamlined, tightened and probably subject to a time scale.
- Our whole tax system needs to be restructured.
- Financial assistance needs to be re-directed into research, development, job creation and export incentives.
- $36 million handouts to Team New Zealand and $700 million for the World Cup should never happen again.
- Government departments should be transferred to regional towns to create jobs.
These are but a few stupid thoughts from a teacher. What I do believe passionately is that if we continue our current government practices, our economy will collapse and with it will come a complete dislocation of our social structures, with large scale unemployment and the corresponding rise in crime and antisocial behavior.
Our country’s economy is the house built on sand and it is absolutely the time for strong leadership and governance and a strong opposition.
In the absence of both, political apathy and a rise in the proportion of people who won’t vote, is inevitable.
We Can See The Future
1 year ago
In a meeting with a group of teaching staff one person said “we can’t really prepare children for the future because we don’t know what the future will be”. The group agreed with this statement except for me. I believe we can see the future and we can make some effort to prepare children for it. (Readers should also see my previous website article on ’Learning for the Future’ Report of the world’s Principal’s Conference, Singapore 2009.)
I believe the future is clear, and to think otherwise constitutes a lack of self belief in our own thinking especially lateral thinking. The future will involve more of the same as well as being different.
Perhaps we shouldn’t try to view the future as concrete objects but rather mere physical possibilities. Nano technology, super conductors, neural controlled computer interface etc will all be a significant part of the future. But while technological change will be both dramatic and very different, human needs such as nutrition, shelter, care, love and recognition will remain the same.
In schools and classrooms now we can (and should) prepare children for the future by the following means;
* Use of technologies (and the possibilities) as learning, entertainment and communication tools.
* Teaching children how to learn.
* Teaching children how to think, especially higher ordered thinking.
* Providing learning opportunities for laterality.
* Encouraging open mindedness.
* Encouraging collaborative learning both locally and digitally.
* Using problem solving as a vehicle for some of the above areas.
* Teaching children how to communicate including through a foreign language.
* Interpersonal skills will become increasingly important.
* Inclusiveness of difference and preparation for a multi-cultural world.
* Knowledge of social justice and human rights issues.
* Knowledge of government systems.
To say we can’t prepare children for the future is akin to burying our heads in the sand or to say we shouldn’t teach children to read because they can use audio books.
We must prepare children for the future because we need to give them the skills and attitudes to adapt to it.
Further, I think we can make some educated guesses about what the future might be and how we can prepare children for it.
The Place & Direction of ICT at Matipo Primary
1 year ago
There is tremendous pressure on schools to be up-to-the minute with ICT and ICT advances. Collectively, millions of dollars of locally raised funds are spent on ICT In this school, the cumulative total is in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. ICT is the most expensive curriculum area in the school.
ICT expenditure is the “black hole of Calcutta”. No matter how much a school spends on ICT, the voice of Oliver is heard calling for more!
In most schools, ICT is a very expensive public relations exercise, and in some instances simply a con job.
After a lot of reflection, reading of various periodicals and articles and attendance at various conferences, the acorn has fallen on Chicken Licken’s head:
“ICT development in primary schools should be in keeping with the age of the children”.
We need to understand the reality of ICT use for 5-10 year olds and keep it simple. There is pressure from teachers to do more and buy more and keep up with new technologies when in fact we don’t use existing technologies to anywhere near their full extent.
ICT development at this school should involve;
- an introduction to the range and concept of various ICT applications and their use to support children’s learning, appropriate to the age of the child, not to adult, high school or even intermediate school uses.
- we need to introduce children to the uses of the computer, initially in terms of publishing, learning games and research to support their learning.
- we need to assist them in learning how to research and how to identify credible information, age appropriate information and how to identify key points and précis information.
- we need to assist them with publishing, editing, storing and retrieving, taking photos, accessing pictures and incorporating images into their work.
- in media, we need to expose them to the film/T.V. methodology, presenting, editing and writing.
- in particular, we need to get children to use ICT more inclusively and genuinely in their learning. ICT should be an integral part of their learning, not an adjunct.
- we do not use or harness the incredible power of the internet as a learning library. There are tremendous sites available for children and just as teachers are encouraged to do professional (hard copy) reading so they should be doing professional internet surfing. (The school website homework portal has some fabulous website links).
The future of ICT at Matipo School does not lie in constantly buying more, better or newer ICT applications.
The future needs to include;
- better care and conservation of ICT material.
- more real ownership of ICT learning by children.
- confining ICT applications consummate to the age of the children.
- teaching/learning around the areas of publishing, researching and media.
- and a major emphasis on the learning power of the Internet which will involve teacher commitment to searching suitable children’s websites.
Essential, we also need existing resources to be used to greater capacity.
Matipo Primary – Point of Difference
1 year ago
I attended a Retailers Association seminar and noted the answer to a question on what is the most important thing in marketing. While quality of service, value for money etc were important, the most important thing was the retailer’s “point of difference” – what made them special or made them stand out. At a recent seminar in Wellington on Authentic Learning at which I played a small part, I was asked a question as to what was the point of difference of our school. I thought it was a very good question and feel I answered it reasonably well but have since thought about it more and have expanded my thinking on what is the point of difference of Matipo School. For simplicity, I have tabulated my response.
- Our first point of difference is that we are an innovative and progressive school. Our school van slogan puts it succinctly – ‘school on the move’. We are committed to continuous improvement and regular reviews/audits of all aspects of the school. We were an early adopter of inquiry based learning, prime time learning concept, genuine child centred school, media production, a strong arts strand and purpose built specialist facilities, eg Arts Suite, Media Suite, playground canopy.
- We have an emphasis on a number of philosophical ‘pou’ which are firmly driven foundations of the school; inclusive practice, reflective practice, structure formality and routine, expectations, consequences, proactive identification and intervention, fostering traditions and offering broad value added options.
- In addition to our culture of innovation, we promote a culture of excellence in all that we do. We try and cultivate excellence at all levels and in all areas of the school – achievement, behaviour, campus, sport, arts etc.
- Our school is research driven and we have a strong emphasis on whole school, longitudinal professional development (again, adopted long before it became fashionable). We grow staff and expect all to be self responsible for on-going learning and to become life time learners.
- A major point of difference for us is in the strong Arts Strand. One day a week each syndicate is involved in Arts, P.E., and I.T. We are really seeing tremendous growth in dance across the school and in performance music. The 2009 production of “Bugsy Malone” was an amazing success. A number of our teachers are involved in performing arts themselves. In 2010 we are trying to raise the quality and profile of drama.
- The work of Sir Ken Robinson has inspired us to try to be a more creative school and to help grow more balanced children. We have made a major investment in I.T. and its use in contributing to 21st century learners is well embedded across the school. It is integral (rather than ancillary) to all classroom learning.
- Additionally, we have a strong Media Strand with all classes actively involved in film making and television production. Each class take weekly blocks to produce an mTV broadcast (Matipo TV) presented across the school computer network and uploaded to YouTube for wider dissemination.
- As a school we celebrate the cultures of our children with a week long Samoan Language Week and also celebrate Matariki Week as a cultural immersion. We are a 10 year Gold Partner with the Auckland Philharmonia, Trees for Survival Project since 1992 and a member of the University of Auckland Post Graduate Diploma in Teaching Consortium.
The amalgam of all these points of difference contributes to a very special school culture. At most times of the day there is not a lot of noise to be heard – kid are quietly engaged in purposely learning environments. They are happy, secure and confident. Student voice is encouraged. We have lots of value added options and opportunities for specialist groups, especially in media and the arts.
Our point of difference is actually what makes a difference.
National Standards Predicated By a Lie!
2 years ago
The rational for the introduction of National Standards was the then National Party’s education policy to raise standards and introduce plain language reporting to parents (the latter stolen from Australian Prime Minister Rudd). It’s well documented that New Zealand has a long tail of underachievement – approximately 20%. The National government’s solution was to introduce the concept of National Standards to follow Labour’s analysis of variance reporting and in the 90’s, achievement statements. Because National Standards is so fundamentally flawed and so poorly introduced, given a couple of years it will fade into oblivion. Most university academics, the teacher unions and the principals groups together with many leading educational commentators are opposed to the introduction of National Standards. The government and the media clearly support their introduction.
What was the lie on which National Standards were based? In 2007 the Education Review Office produced a report on assessment in schools. Various excerpts were selectively used to imply that schools were not doing enough to raise the achievement of children and were making poor use of assessment data to inform their teaching. The report quotes;
In about half the schools (52%) the teachers used assessment information to inform their teaching and learning programme. Less than half (44%) used worthwhile information.
This extract is the basis of the National government’s national standards and is widely quoted as their rational.
Unfortunately (as quoted by Kelvin Smythe) neither the government nor Ministry used the very next sentence in the ERO report;
“Figure 5 shows that 90% of primary schools were able to demonstrate their student’s achievements in the curriculum areas of English and Maths…….”
“Figure 6 shows 88% of primary schools were effective at demonstrating progress in English and 82% in maths”
“almost all primary schools had made literacy and numeracy key learning priorities….in most schools the teachers had built a shared understanding of how, when and why to measure student achievement in these areas”
Why then was the original selective quote so out of kilter with the original 52% figure – because it was based on the average figures for all curriculum activity like health, social studies, P.E., music etc which schools do not assess so vigorously and for which teachers produce qualitative rather than quantitative information (Kelvin Smythe).
This is the deliberate lie or distortion on which National Standards has been predicated and the facts deliberately ignored by the Ministry and their apologists. The reality is, according to ERO, that schools were assessing well and using the information to inform their teaching and to raise the achievement of the 20% tail.
A number of principals and schools were adamantly opposed to National Standards, some were in favour, but the vast majority resigned to trying to implement them but, very sensibly, asking for a year’s delay in order to implement the new initiative in an ordered, informed way. ‘No’ was the emphatic answer of the Minister and the Prime Minister.
What is the result? – A complete botch up with confusing and changing information, a lack of resources, muddled and under-resourced inservice leading to ‘non aligned’ principals walking away in despair. If National Standards is implemented at all it will be because of the good will and effort of principals and staff. The promised in-service is poorly delivered with anecdotal comments from facilitators saying “they were making up in the morning what they would say in the afternoon”. There is no money for relievers so schools have to pay $250 per day per teacher for staff who attend the courses. For some schools this may potentially cost $5000-$10,000. No teacher-only-days are authorized unlike for the introduction of NCEA and the NZ Curriculum.
Interestingly, not one person at the Ministry of Education is willing to put their hand up as authors or project directors of this ill conceived, hurried, muddled piece of party politics being transformed into political policy. It is a complete and utter farce and based on a lie, a deliberate piece of distortion.
Social Networking Websites
2 years ago
Sites such as Bebo, Facebook , Hi5, etc are useful social networking and collaborative sites for adults. However, there are real dangers involved. Most have an age restriction – usually R14 years but this is easily got around.
Almost every week there is a news item or T.V. show highlighting the dangers of predatory people – usually older men, grooming young girls for wrongful intent. They create their own online personas to lure girls into eventually meeting up with them.
The Sunday Star Times of 9th May carried a two page article about an older man who lured 15 young Indian girls by a false identity on the Internet, got them to send him candid photos of themselves, then blackmailed them with exposure to their parents. He was convicted of raping 15 of them but it is believed there were probably twice this number. (One of the girls attempted suicide).
I urge all parents to use their common sense, don’t let young children have Facebook accounts and monitor their computer usage.
Special Newsletter – National Standards
2 years ago
As you will be aware from the media and soon from a letter and pamphlet from the Prime Minister, there is much debate about the introduction of National Standards to primary schools. Because of this, I feel it necessary to state this school’s position.
We will be implementing the National Standards. I am really confident of the achievement of children at this school and know that if we are compared with other schools, we would really hold our own. If an area of weakness is found however, then it is up to us to do something about it.
Our reading results are well above the national average, our numeracy in the average band, but our spelling is down. This year, we are putting a special emphasis on spelling in order to improve it.
Schools also need to report to parents in plain language as to whether your child is achieving well above, above, at, or below the national standards.
What principals, schools, the Teachers’ Union and many leading academics from universities are saying is that the government’s examples are hasty and poor. They were written by Ministry bureaucrats, with no input from schools or actual people at the chalk face. What the schools and unions are asking for is that the introduction of national standards be delayed a year to do more work on them so that there is a better outcome and also that they be trialled to see how they work.
In summary, we’re not afraid of National Standards and will be introducing them along with the new reporting system. However, I totally agree that they should be delayed a year, re-written and trialled and believe the government has stuffed up but is too “pig headed” to admit it.
