Could-Be Blogs

Posted on October 21, 2013 by Andrea Fanjoy

Each weekend, I carve out time to sit down, reflect on the week, and decide what to write about for the blog. Each weekend, I struggle with the fact that for every blog that’s written, there are easily ten that could be.

This weekend, I chose not to struggle. Here are ten events that I had the pleasure of witnessing and could have easily written more about, but won’t this time.

Our first Primary Awards Day for 2013-2014, where individual students were recognized for exceptional demonstration of our habits. It’s pretty inspiring to see how hard these 5 to 7 year-olds are working at following the three school rules, taking responsible risks, acting with empathy, showing self-control and persisting at what’s tough.
Hearing the story at a cross-country tournament this week of one of our fastest male runners, fighting for first, going neck-and-neck with a female from De La Salle, losing by a pace, but making a point of high-fiving and saying “Good race”.
Watching dozens of our students participating for the first time in the Brock University Caribou math challenge http://www.brocku.ca/caribou/
Seeing the return of the student leadership project ‘Save That Species’, an awareness-raising and highly entertaining game-show skit that informs us of endangered animals and what we can do to help them
‘Free-Hug-High-Five Friday’, another student initiative in its third year, where students, parents and teachers are greeted with a show of affection as they arrive for school.
Following our SK students on Twitter (check out our Twitter feed @KCSMatters and look for their hashtag #KCS_SK)
Learning of how hard the grade 8s are working to prepare for Remembrance Day, not because they’ve been told to but because they want to
Finding out that one of our grade 6 boys entered a contest to create a new Pokémon character, and won!
Joining our first Open House of the year and having the chance to meet and chat with parents and children keen to join KCS. I love sharing what happens here.
Watching our older students get up and speak at assembly, marveling at how confident and skilled they’ve become at public speaking over their years at KCS.

Our first Pizza Lunch, ‘Compliment Friday’, class meetings, field trips, other stories from the cross-country tournament, our girls’ basketball team and many other topics could have easily been added to the list.

A school with 413 students has a lot going on each week. With our Four Doors to Learning program at KCS, what goes on is pretty great. I look forward to explaining more when I write next weekend.

Andrea Fanjoy,
Assistant Head, Academics
You can follow Andrea on Twitter @afanjoy.

In Case You’re Wondering: Curriculum Planning By Design

Posted on September 24, 2013 by Andrea Fanjoy

I recall as an elementary student admiring the coiled manual my teacher held in her hand. Believing that book held the key to my learning, I ambled through my young non-teaching years thinking good teaching was pretty straight-forward.

Boy was I wrong.

Optimal teaching is anything but straightforward. It doesn’t come from a book, but grows thanks to the endless efforts of the teachers who deliver it, and thanks to a culture that supports them.

By now, KCS parents, you’ve already met many of the outstanding teachers at KCS. You might be wondering, however, about the culture that drives what we do. It’s worth wondering about. It explains how these teachers grow from each other’s strengths and create learning experiences that surpass anything a single teacher could deliver on their own. Here are the elements of a culture that leads to a curriculum where 1 + 1 = 3:

A foundation rooted in knowing each student’s needs, aspiring to our school mission, and a broad awareness of the tools and techniques that will help us meet both
Regular collaboration and frank conversations
A framework that meets or exceeds Ministry expectations
An environment free of practice based on doing what’s comfortable, unsupported opinion, what’s in fashion, how we were taught or what we’ve always done
An atmosphere saturated in the Habits of Mind, Body and Action, so teachers and students exercise and strengthen them through their work (Embrace learning, think flexibly, take responsible risks and do what is right are some of the stand-out Habits required in curriculum development.)
A balance between Direct Instruction, Project-Based Learning, and other learning experiences, as deemed worthy
An ever-present search for how to enrich learning, inspire a love for learning, inject critical and creative thinking, and differentiate instruction

I sure wasn’t aware of this as a young student, and don’t know that many outside of KCS faculty would be aware of it either. I do know you care a lot about what we do with your children, and thought I would share how we determine what we do, just in case you were wondering.

Andrea Fanjoy,
Assistant Head, Academics
You can follow Andrea on Twitter @afanjoy.

Summer Learning

Posted on June 11, 2013 by Andrea Fanjoy

Cubbies are cleaned. Lockers lay bare. Papers have been sifted through with favourites kept and the rest thrown out.

Summer holidays have arrived, and the weight of the academic world has been lifted for another year.

I’ve been guilty of thinking that children have it relatively easy. I can remember once pointing out to a group of teens how hard their teachers are working, leading extra-curriculars, teaching all day, marking and planning every evening. I deserved their immediate challenge. They reminded me that, in fact, students also have a lot of demands on them. They’re involved in those school extra-curriculars and more, they’re in those classes throughout the day, and they’re doing homework every evening. They have endless expectations on them for managing themselves and their work. Many regularly face misunderstanding, mistakes and reprimand in both academics and social relations. They navigate this world with the vulnerable self-esteem, self-confidence and skill set inherent in being young. Even in the best schools, the days are not easy.

Many parents and teachers bemoan the long gap between June and September. It’s true that some academic learning can take a hit. Having said that, other learning should be savoured in the summer. Because the school year doesn’t always make enough time for it, here is some of the summer learning I hope all children work hard at this holiday:

Learning through play
Learning through mistakes
Learning within one’s strengths and passions
Learning and relaxation in a healthy balance
Learning what and how you want, just for the love of it

Lots of important things are learned at school. And lots of important things are learned outside of school. Like students, teachers also learn a lot over the summer. Maybe, as a result of all their learning, more of this summer learning will work its way into the school year.

Have a wonderful, learning-filled summer.

Andrea Fanjoy,
Assistant Head, Academics
You can follow Andrea on Twitter @afanjoy.

This article will be published in the July 2013 edition of SNAP Etobicoke.

A Notion Worth Knocking

Posted on June 3, 2013 by Andrea Fanjoy

I remember the indignation. I was a grade 8 student studying for a science test. I announced with all the wisdom and conviction of a 13-year-old that it was ridiculous studying all this science. “It’s not like I’m going to be a scientist!”

No doubt I would have joined the chorus today that also argues against learning and memorizing facts. Hardly a day goes by that I don’t read or hear the argument that students don’t need to know things like they used to. Anything one needs to know can be found on the internet.

A number of reasons why this notion is incorrect quickly come to mind: students need information as fodder for critical and creative thinking; people don’t always have the internet when they need it; you can’t simultaneously Google everything you need to know to think about a complex issue; much information we learn contributes to our sense of community and identity.

Reading Kathie Nunley’s book A Student’s Brain: The Parent/Teacher Manual, I can now add another definitive reason for why this notion needs knocking. Pure and simple, having to learn anything, anything, makes your brain stronger. The more the brain takes in, the more neural pathways become established. The more those pathways are repeatedly used, the more permanent those pathways become. The more numerous, varied and permanent those pathways are, the more ways in which the brain is ready to learn everything else it’s subsequently exposed to. Much like a muscle that grows whether you’re lifting barbells or babies, the brain is a use-it-or-lose-it organ. If you want to be good at anything in life, learn everything you can.

Along the way, you might even learn what I learned when applying to university. My undergraduate, as it turned out, was in science.

Andrea Fanjoy,
Assistant Head, Academics
You can follow Andrea on Twitter @afanjoy.

This article was first published in SNAP Etobicoke, June 2013.

You Never Know Where Things Go… When You Share What You Know

Posted on April 11, 2013 by Andrea Fanjoy

Great things can start really small. When small, of course, they appear insignificant and usually go unnoticed. Small things start becoming great when they’re shared.

Here’s how this happened recently at KCS.

About a year ago, a student in grade 5 thought of a story. It could have stayed in her head, like the many stories people think up. Instead, whenever she found the spare time to do so, she started writing it out on her school computer. It turned out that the story was pretty lengthy, so she kept on writing. As it grew, her friends and teacher started to notice. It kept growing and soon I noticed.

When a student ends up writing a 76-page story, just because, it’s already clear that something great is going on. But the sharing didn’t stop there. Ms. Hoggarth, our librarian, and I started talking about what to do with a story like this. After much discussion (sharing what we knew), we came up with a new offering at KCS that has us both pretty excited. Young Authors of KCS (YAKCS) is a program designed to inspire, support and ultimately publish the work of any students in grades 4 to 8 who independently persist in writing a book. Participating students will receive expert guidance from a published author, with the exceptional opportunity to receive direct feedback from the author when manuscripts are written. Published books will be honoured with a KCS book launch, housed in our library, and copies given to the student. Books will also be given an ISBN and be registered in the National Library of Canada and the National Archives. Aspiring artists will also join this group if chosen to be illustrators.

When first announced at assembly, fifty students rushed to the library to pick up information on how to participate.

The story in the head of our original aspiring author, when unshared, was unnoticed. Because it was shared, and because it inspired subsequent sharing, her story is not only on its way to being published, but was also the catalyst for what may end up as countless more books and inspired future authors.

Share what you know. You never know where it’ll go.

Andrea Fanjoy,
Assistant Head, Academics
You can follow Andrea on Twitter @afanjoy.

Some Old School is Good School

Posted on March 5, 2013 by Andrea Fanjoy

I confess. At my school, we do some things that are very old school.

I follow what’s happening in the profession very closely. I read with interest what educators around the world are doing. I note that old-school approaches are often assumed wrong, not by research but by opinion.

These are exciting times in education, and there is a lot of room for new tools and strategies. Technology has made much that was impossible possible. Project-based learning, flat classroom projects that connect students around the world, and emphasis on 21^st century stills like collaboration and inquiry are welcome progress. I love reading about how educators around the world are using these new approaches, and love bringing much of what is new to our school.

I’m also compelled to be a voice that says there is value in some of what schools used to do. The evidence is in the students, and the fact that a restricted array of approaches will never be sufficient for all. Schools must include all that has recently shown promise, plus remember all that used to have value, and then apply them all according to the needs of each student. So, in addition to all the current practices at our school, what old-school ones have we found also meet student needs? We teach reading in many ways, but one way is through what’s called Direct Instruction, which is teacher-directed, and is the highly specific teaching of phonics, decoding and comprehension. We teach printing and cursive using a resource that is also specific to the skill, and we use it for six years in a row so that writing has a chance to develop alongside keyboarding skills. We teach math facts until students are fully fluent, allow minimal use of a calculator, and teach math concepts with clear step-by-step instruction. We have exams starting in grade 6, and put a significant effort in teaching students how to prepare for this significant challenge.

Teaching all students well requires open-mindedness to an unbounded array of tools and practices. It requires deep knowledge of each student, reflective practice, knowledge of quality research and the evidence of experience. That needs to be read more often. Whether old-school or new-school, if it helps students, it belongs.

Andrea Fanjoy,
Assistant Head, Academics
You can follow Andrea on Twitter @afanjoy.

Learning What We Don’t Want to Learn

Posted on February 19, 2013 by Andrea Fanjoy

The first Habit on our poster is ‘Embrace Learning’. Don’t let the soothing tone of the word ‘embrace’ deceive you. We could have just as easily described it as ‘Learn whether you like it or not’.

Learning can be like that. Thankfully, most of the time, and certainly at KCS, learning does feel like a warm embrace. It’s delivered by teachers who evidently care about their students and about making learning as positive as possible. And so it should be.

I’ve been reminded recently, however, about the underbelly of ‘embrace learning’, a side that was always intentionally part of that Habit, but that may have gone unnoticed, hidden in the shadows of the ever-more pleasant type of learning that is more the norm here. I’m talking about those important lessons in life that we resist, the lessons we’d prefer not to learn, but learn we should. They may challenge our character, or reveal a sandy foundation upon which we had built mighty assumptions. These lessons may arise when exams yield lower marks than expected; sometimes they arise when we’ve done something we’re later ashamed of; sometimes they will trip up students who otherwise find learning very easy, but then are faced with a topic that is annoyingly difficult to understand. Though these examples focus on the young, we’re never too old for these lessons. And while these examples focus on others, I don’t pretend to be immune.

Humans are generally a comfort-seeking lot. Daniel Willingham, cognitive scientist and author of Why Students Don’t Like School, argues that the brain strives to be as efficient as possible, lazy even, preferring to do as it wishes and not as it is forced to do. Add a dash of limited understanding, bias, immaturity, emotion, or over-confidence, and you have someone ready for one of these most humbling lessons. If they embrace it.

Most learning should feel like a warm embrace. But growing up and being our best self will include these more challenging lessons too. While decidedly uncomfortable, the reward for their steep price is broader understanding, growing maturity, more rational thought and healthy humility. Resilience, thinking flexibly and the ability to persist, three other noteworthy habits, also grow as a result.

That’s learning worth embracing.

Andrea Fanjoy,
Assistant Head, Academics
You can follow Andrea on Twitter @afanjoy.

Morning Surprise

Posted on February 6, 2013 by Derek Logan

This morning I arrived at KCS at my usual time, 7 a.m. Normally, I am one of the first people in the school. I get here early to answer emails, check phone messages, scan the newspapers, and just to have a bit of quiet time before the energy of 300+ children descend on the school. Today, as I drove into the parking lot I noticed a couple of our faculty’s cars – Mrs. Hoggarth and Mrs. Marcynuk. As I arrived at the main doors in my still sleepy state, I was greeted enthusiastically by one of our grade 5 students. Then I walked down the steps and was met by three or four other wide-awake and highly – I repeat, highly – energized grade 5/6 students. My quiet time was gone. It reminded me of the day, just over three years ago when I arrived at the front door only to be met by Dave, the project manager of our third addition, who informed me that we had a flood in our second addition (which you may recall we had to close for over six weeks). It’s amazing how quickly our state of mind can change when prompted appropriately…

These dozen students and our two faculty members were getting ready to get on a 7:15 a.m. bus to a school for Canadian Literature event. You can bet that when I was 11 or 12 years old, I would not have been so highly energized at 7 a.m. in the morning to go to such an event (probably not at 10 a.m. either!). As usual, a KCS teacher had that inspirational touch with a group of our students.

Derek Logan
Head of School

Studying Isn’t What It Used to Be

Posted on January 28, 2013 by Andrea Fanjoy

Technology, like all things in life, has sides that are both yin and yang. Studying for exams with my son in grade 8, I’m loving the yang side of it.

We counsel our students to study for two subjects a night over the three weeks before exams. The other night, my son chose to focus on history and math. For history, he announced with uncommon enthusiasm that he was going to use the Study Wiki that he and his classmates made. A wiki is a collaboratively-built online reference site, the most well-known of which is Wikipedia. KCS teachers are embracing the making and use of wikis as a meaningful tool for students to take notes and communicate learning. The fact that these notes are shared online raises the whole exercise of note-taking to a real-world relevance that it never had before and, with that, the quality of what they produce goes up. I, and many other parents, are familiar with student “notes” that are sparsely or imperfectly done, and of little support when studying. Studying with the wiki, my son worked with thorough definitions and concept maps, and played knowledge games that cover most of the content he needs to remember. This wiki is available 24/7, thus having the added benefit of not needing to be “brought home” and “returned to school”, demands that often sabotage many a well-meaning student.

Then we moved on to math. This year KCS introduced a new online math resource that offers many benefits. For the purpose of studying, the students were sent a collection of review questions. Each question page had a link to the online video and practice questions that the student could go back to if they needed a reminder of how to approach the problem. When my son didn’t understand a question, it was no longer my responsibility to figure it out and teach him what to do – I simply reminded him to go back to the video for guidance. When my son was done, he received instant feedback on which questions he answered correctly, and which were incorrect. Seeing the ones that were incorrect, we went back to the videos to find out where he took a wrong turn.

Studying well requires many things to fall in line:

having what you need, when you need it;
having quality notes that are easy to read and use, even enticing to use;
getting frequent feedback on how you are doing; and
having material available in multiple formats.

These are but a few details that make a significant difference. Any tool that makes more of these fall in line is a tool that is most welcome.

Studying at KCS truly isn’t what it used to be. While the ancient Asian concept of yin and yang has these two as complementary and balanced, studying with technology is firmly on the yang side of this balanced equation. And thank goodness. Exams, and the challenge in facing them, otherwise haven’t changed at all.

Good luck to all in grades 6 to 8, and happy (as-can-be) studying!

Andrea Fanjoy,
Assistant Head, Academics
You can follow Andrea on Twitter @afanjoy.

Exams Got You Down? Just PAUSS

Posted on January 10, 2013 by Andrea Fanjoy

The following blog first appeared one year ago. It’s as relevant now as it was then. We all face challenges from time to time, and how we face them makes all the difference. That’s where the KCS Habits come in.

At KCS, it’s our mission to develop lifelong learners with the habits to face and embrace life’s challenges. Many of our students and parents have an extra one of those challenges on their plate right now.

Exams.

Students in grades 6-8 write exams starting January 28^th. Love them or dislike them (yes, we’ve had students say they love them!), learning to prepare for and take exams is a challenge we all have to face at some point. Starting them in grade six, with ample guidance and time learning how to prepare, is the best way to start. Though a big deal, exams at KCS are also a safe opportunity to face this challenge, ‘try your best’, and learn from mistakes.

Looking at our Habits poster in my office Friday morning, I wondered which of the habits students should focus on to be successful preparing for exams. Five stood out. When written down, it became clear they made for a nice little acronym – a beacon for calm in the storm of stress that often surrounds the ‘e’ word. The acronym is PAUSS. The habits are:

Persist – this is a marathon, not a sprint

Adapt – old patterns of studying and time management likely need to change

Use past learning – use notes and old tests; use strategies that you already know to work, and avoid those that you know don’t

Show self-control – stick to the study plan; focus on the task; remember to also rest, eat well and get exercise

Strive for accuracy – follow the study keys, test yourself, aim to understand any errors

Exams inherently stir up anxiety. PAUSS, happily, does not.

If your child is writing exams, encourage them to PAUSS. And watch with pride as your child develops habits that matter. Take heart. Dread will soon be replaced with delight, and doubt will be replaced by well-earned confidence. And the unknown challenges to come will face a tougher foe.