MIT Day 3

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After following the inquiry cycle for six month, today the Manaiakalani Innovative Teachers met to present our tools. These were designed to provide somewhat of a solution to the problems that our inquiries were based around.

I was particularly interested in hearing about Kariene’s tool, not only because it is concerned with writing, but because I have visited her cluster in Northland and I am particularly interested in following their journey with the Manaiakalani Kaupapa. She has focussed on creating a website that shows other educators how to teach writing in an engaging, collaborative and rewindable way.

I could immediately see the value in her site. It connects seamlessly with her inquiry about accelerating students learning in writing and it will hold a plethora of resources and information to support teachers. It contains the kind of information that was invaluable to me during my MDTA sessions; how to use technology to enhance teaching. For teachers who new to the learn, create, share cycle or a 1:1 classroom, this can be extremely daunting. Even for those educators who are technologically savvy, using technology in a purposeful way can be challenging.
This does mean, however, that Kariene has a mammoth task on her hands. We all shared concern around the time that is required to complete the site, but I believe that it will be well worth the hard work. I would be interested to follow the development of the site as I can see it being incredibly useful for teachers and for the outreach facilitators.

This day has been hugely beneficial for my inquiry, I have so many more ideas from seeing what my colleagues have created and their feedback has been really valuable. I am looking forward to adapting and using my tool in the next few weeks!

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