Collaborative Problem-solving

At Muritai School we embrace challenge and pride ourselves in our culture of collaborative problem solving. A recent example of this can be seen with the Year 3/4 teaching staff who worked collaboratively to develop observation sheets aimed to assist teachers in the decision making process for national standards. The attachment below is a screen grab of the Y4 reading observation sheet (double click on it to enlarge the image).

The observation sheet is designed to assist teachers when making overall teacher judgments. The diagram below shows how teachers intend to use observations, assessment data and the national standard together in triangulation when making an OTJ.

Teacher observations will always be subjective and depend greatly on the teacher. It is hoped that by defining and prioritizing specific areas of focus for each year group the level of subjectivity between classrooms and from year to year will be greatly reduced.

The observation sheets are by no means the perfect fix. Students each have varying knowledge, skills and attitudes across the learning areas of reading, writing and mathematics. Having to tick just one box as an overall judgment of achievement neglects to acknowledge the specific strengths and weaknesses of each student

The purpose of todays blog entry is to simply share with you an example of how our staff work collaboratively when faced with a problem to overcome. It is through such a supportive culture that I believe we are as prepared as we can be for reporting to parents at the end of this term.