Manaiakalani Orientation 2019

It has been an informative two days attending the Manaiakalani Orientation for the

2019 school year with speakers Dorothy Burt and Fiona Grant.  With the first day about

getting to know Manaiakalani (the hook from heaven), the emphasis was on the fact

that Manaiakalani is about the people or “he tangata” that are in it.  I also discovered

more about the Learn Create Share model and the idea of “turbocharging” learning is

also a large part of this model, which allows us to do things with technology that we

could never do before!  What I loved about the “Create” element is that Manaiakalani

seeks to involve the whole body in this process. For example, using the hands, the

feet, the heart, etc. with the brain being at the centre of it all.

There are Five Affordances of “Learn Create Share” Model:

- Engagement
- Teacher Conversations
- Cognitive Challenge
- Visibility
- Scaffolding

The idea of “Visibility” or “Visible Teaching Empowering Visible Learning” was

a highlight of the session for me.  A great deal of emphasis was on the importance

of students being able to take charge of their learning and feel empowered.  Using

visible teaching through Google class sites (that are meaningful to them!) promotes

this as students can not only direct their learning online, but can also move forward

and become prepared for what is coming next.  It was expressed that when students

can look forward and be better prepared for classroom learning, this in fact works to

save educators time so that conversations with more purpose and meaning can take

place during classroom sessions.  The importance of whanau being able to view their

child’s learning was a crucial point as well, through use of Google sites to show parents

what is happening on their child’s learning journey.

Having become a part of the Manaiakalani whanau, my next goals are to engage in

more Toolkits and complete the Digital Fluency Intensive to improve my own skills and

become more digitally-aware and able!