C&Pa Explicit Teaching [5]

July 24, 2022

Explicit teaching might take place at the beginning of the lesson, for e.g. through writing modelling where the expert behaviours and techniques that writers used are made explicit to the ākonga as the kaihapai role models the decisions he/she makes as a writer. Writing is a cognitive act which can be difficult to access and understand in its’s complexities so through modelling we make this cognitive act explicit to our ākonga (Loane, 2017).

Explicit teaching might take place at the conclusion of a lesson, where as kaihapai we scaffold children to make connections between the learning they have experienced, the learning of other ākonga in the group and the big learning ideas from the curriculum. In mathematics we call this the connect (Smith et al, 2009).

Explicit teaching might be a planned lesson with the whole class, for e.g. in an instructional conceptual warm up such as quick images or a choral count. It might be a planned lesson with a group of ākonga during guided reading or writing conferencing or it might be 1:1 where you as the kaiako scaffold a students learning through individual conferencing, feedback and feed forward.

Read: Smith, M. S., Hughes, E. K., Engle, R. A., & Stein, M. K. (2009). Orchestrating discussions. Mathematics Teaching in the Middle School, 14(9), 548-556.

Literacy

Reading Comprehension: What do kaiako need to know?

Reading comprehension is “the of simultaneously extracting and constructing meaning through interaction and involvement with written language” (Snow, 2002 pg. 11)

Reading without comprehension would be a largely pointless task.

…when we are explicitly teaching comprehension we identify the purpose (learning intention) for the particular lesson…

Check out this link to comprehension in TKI (NZCER) for additional resources including ways to use concept maps.

Selecting an assessment tool – TKI Resources

Progressive Achievement Tests (PATs) assess students’ Mathematics, Listening Comprehension, Punctuation and Grammar, Reading Comprehension, and Reading Vocabulary. PATs are a series of standardised tests developed specifically for use in New Zealand schools.

Comprehension Strategies

Tompkins et al. (2019) has an awesome compendium (e-book earlier edition) of useful strategies.

Literacy-for-the-21st-century-Compendium-of-instructional-procedures Download

Cloze testing involves deleting words from a text selection and asking students to replace them on the basis of remaining content.

Delete content words to encourage meaning use, function words to encourage syntax use, delete letter/letter clusters to encourage graphophonic use.

Important point: there is some evidence that indicates cloze may only promote comprehension at the sentence level and may not contribute to an overall understanding of the whole text.

Maze

A maze task is similar to cloze but instead of a blank space where the reader has to find a suitable word the task provides 3 or 4 options to choose from. For example, The girl climbed the dog/tree/car in the playground.

Retelling

The child verbally retells the story after reading.

Three Level Guide

(Loane, 2010, 2017, pp. 76-99)

A Three-Level Guide is a way of exploring a text in relation to literal comprehension, inferential comprehension, and evaluative comprehension.

Step One

Read the text – Monday morning (Loane, 2017, pp. 73-74)
- Everyone has their own copy

Give ākonga the option of whether they want to listen or read the text silently to self

Discuss broadly
- Is there anything you want to discuss about this?
- Is there anything you are confused about?

Step Two

Read and respond to the first set of statements (literal statements)

o These relate directly to the text

o Your job is to agree or disagree with each statement

o Find evidence in the text to support your claim

o Discuss responses

*Loane has crafted questions for this text at each level on p. 76.

Step Three

Read and respond to the second set of statements (inferential statements)

o It is possible to find evidence in the text but that is in the form of clues which you will have to connect together (reading between the lines)

o Your job is to agree or disagree with each statement

o Find evidence in the text to support your claim

o Discuss responses

Step Four

Read and respond to the third set of statements (evaluative statements)

o These as you to bring your own knowledge to the text

o Your job is to agree or disagree with each statement

o Provide evidence to support your claim

o Discuss responses – note there may be differing responses that are correct

Further reading about 3 Level Guides is in Loane (2017, pp. 76-99). This will guide you on the types of questions to craft for each stage.

Graphic Organisers

A graphic organiser is a visual representation of information. …sketch how you might use this to explore an aspect of a narrative such as a myth, legend, or fairytale.

1. Venn Diagram

2. Flow Map

Used to show sequence and cause and effect.

3. Glyph

A glyph is a way of representing data visually. Most often done with a picture to colour or they can also be done as a drawing.

Questioning with Bloom’s Taxonomy

…another resource for developing questions and encouraging critical thinking – Bloom’s taxonomy.

Use a Google search to find a diagram of Bloom’s Taxonomy (there are many). Select a diagram that includes verbs in each level of the taxonomy. Refer to the diagram throughout this section.

Select a picture book or well-known ākonga’s story and develop a question from each stage of Bloom’s Taxonomy that you can use with ākonga to promote their comprehension of the text. Use the verbs in the taxonomy diagram to help you.
Consider the questions you have developed. Could these be used to deepen comprehension in other fields – for example of visual art, performance, video?

As kaiako it is common to rely on familiar patterns of communication. Bloom’s Taxonomy offers an opportunity for us to break old habits and therefore enhance the learning of ākonga as we provide multiple ways to access and think about a text.

Blooms’ Taxonomy can be used as a tool to support ākonga to develop their own questions about texts too. In the process of developing questions, they have to first have an understanding of the text.

Literacy

Reading Response

A reading response is a writing task that asks ākonga to demonstrate their comprehension of the text. As they write their response ākonga may show how they have engaged and connected with the text, they may reveal their understanding of the author’s point of view, explore elements of literature such as language use, plot, character, and setting, and engage in prediction and or speculation.

Procedure

This section is designed to be experiential so follow along and complete each of the steps below in order.

Step 1: Engaging with text

s you read, pay attention to –

· the thoughts that float through your mind.

· you may want to make a few notes or use journaling so you remember those fleeting thoughts

Step 2: Learning about writing a reading response

Write 1 or 2 paragraphs that capture your personal response to the story.

Planning for Reading and Writing Persuasive Text

Persuasive texts contain information but it is presented and organised in ways that are designed to influence the readers towards a particular view of the content and sometimes to take a particular action (e.g. to buy something, to join a group, to support a cause). The skills in reading persuasive texts include attending to the connotations of language used to identify and analyse the position being promoted.

Persuasion Strategies:

Start things off: More easily persuaded to complete something that has already been started
Help Them Imagine:Paint a vivid picture of what might be gained-or lost
Stress Their Loss: More persuaded by what we might lose than what we might gain
Give First: Psychological conditioning to return a favour
Over-Ask: The second request seems more reasonable
Be Funny: If you laugh with me you’ll like me better
Use “We”
Majority Rules: Everybody’s doing it
Have Good Timing: i.e. Just after being thanked is a good time to make a request
Positive labelling You did a great job last time. You’ll do even better this time.”

Pāngarau: Mathematics

Choral counts can be used right up to secondary school as a conceptual warm up which supports students to hear (ka rongo), see (ka kite), understand (ka hangaia) and enjoy the many patterns in mathematics.

what is the role of the kaiako when ākonga are ‘doing’ mathematics? How can we as kaiako scaffold the ‘doing’ of mathematics to develop deeper understandings. We cannot underestimate this role, careful planning is key.

A recent report by the Royal Society Te Apārangi Expert Advisory Panel (2021) on improving mathematics and statistics learning in Aotearoa has recommended sweeping changes across the education system with a key concern of addressing the inequities at play for diverse learners when accessing mathematics learning. The work to refresh the curriculum is currently underway.

Explicit Teaching in Mathematics

A key goal when planning for explicit teaching is to highlight the connection between the children’s strategies which they use to solve a complex task and the big mathematical ideas. Scaffolding children to see the connections will support them to understand the big ideas. The doing of mathematics provides the context for children to build deep conceptual understandings.

read module 5:

Van de Walle

Marian Small

NCTM

the connect is an authentic way to build on children’s existing mathematical thinking and knowledge and any combined new understandings made through productive and collaborative group work. The connect is viewed as the most important phase of the lesson, allowing enough time to do it justice and planning for it in a specific way is key to ensure the learning goal is met and children learn ‘something’ from the process. This moves us away from a specific ‘learning intention/outcome’ that children should achieve (or not) approach to one which is focused on progressing ALL children’s mathematical understandings of big ideas from where they are at.

Planning for the Connect

In the planning phase:

· Be clear about the big mathematical ideas at the heart of your task.

· Where does this fit in the curriculum (AO’s, Elaborations and Key Maths ideas)

· Anticipate as many strategies that you think will emerge when the children work collaboratively to solve the problem.

· Anticipate the misconceptions children may hold which may impact how they solve the prolem (use Van de Walle to support you)

In the solving phase:

· Use the above planning to guide you as you listen and notice what children do when they are solving the problem. What mathematical thinking is emerging?

· Sequence the sharing back phase of the lesson so that each strategy or part strategy builds on the previous to highlight the key mathematical idea.

· Here you have the perfect tool to shape your connect around and to progress children’s thinking.

Planning for your connect:

· What is your learning goal for this lesson?

· Refer back to the key mathematical idea that you want the children to learn about?

· What questions will you ask to scaffold their thinking and extend their learning?

· Try to keep your questions open and try not to lead them or tell them where possible.

· In the connect there is a place for modelling or teaching a concept if it doesn’t emerge organically.

Eliciting Connections:

· Questions you might ask in your connect:

Q: What do you notice about the ways the group (s) solved the problem.

silent think time, then “turn and talk to the person next to you”

Then students share back and teacher writes some of connections on the board.

Q: What do you notice is the same or different about these solutions,,,,

· Connect time is used to push to generalising:

Q: What do you notice about the numbers/operations in this strategy compared to this strategy?

Q: So what would happen if we changed the numbers like so….would either of these solution strategies still work? (Lesser numbers and/or higher numbers, hanging one number)

Q: What did you notice when we multiplied?

S: The final number was bigger.

T: Yes, a big idea in mathematics is that when we multiply whole numbers the final number is bigger than the first number… (do the same for commutative property, associative property, etc)

· If students need to learn a new strategy or consolidate one, teacher actions in connect are:

T: “Last year when I did this problem, a group came up with a different way of solving this problem. I am going to explain how they did that, step by step the same way that you explain to the group”

Teacher then explains new strategy.

· The connect is a time where you can explicitly tell or name a mathematical idea, or truth etc. But it is a fluid part of lesson and must be planned for.

· Use talk moves to elicit thinking and develop a shared understanding of the key ideas.

Plan for a reflection:

Finally reflect, a brief oral reflection in any shape is a nice way to conclude the lesson. It might be related to the learning outcome, the KC, the Socio group norms, the maths practices or the big idea. Choose one reflection focus, use think, pair, share to have tamariki reflect in their own words to finish the lesson

Crucial to a successful solve and connect phase of the lesson is children’s developing use of Mathematical Practices, our job as Kaiako is to explicitly teach and facilitate children’s use of these as they explain, justify, represent and generalise their mathematical thinking. Doing so ensures children make their thinking clear for everyone. It ensures that all children have access to each others thinking which will support understanding and learning.

Mathematical practices

Mathematical practices are grounded within collective practices. These practices involve reasoned performative and conversational actions and occur in social and cultural activity systems and amongst multiple participants. Ākonga learning and the use of proficient mathematical practices are both dependent on how kaiako structure classroom participation and communication patterns. In other words, kaiako have a key role to play in ensuring ākonga can learn and use essential mathematical practices. Inquiry and challenge support both emergence and change in the mathematical practices ākonga use.

Mathematical explanations are statements that commence from well-reasoned conjectures. These conjectures, although provisional, are statements that present a mathematical position the explainer is taking. They make visible and available for clarification, or challenge, aspects in the reasoning that may not be obvious to listeners. … It is the kaiako who establishes how ākonga participate in developing, using and analysing mathematical explanations, as well as using questions and prompts which shape the explanations ākonga make.

Mathematical justifications; Explanatory justification is constructed and reconstructed when teachers press their ākonga to take specific positions to make reasoned claims. To develop justified claims, it is important to construct classroom cultures which provide participants in the dialogue with space for extended thinking.

Mathematical generalisations; The need to validate mathematical claims through explanation and justification scaffolds the development of generalised models of mathematical reasoning. … Numerous studies have shown that explicit focusing of ākonga discussion on the relationships between numbers properties and operations resulted in their powerful construction of generalisations. The kaiako use of mathematical tasks which focus on relational reasoning (e.g., relational statements which use the equals sign) is also important to provoke rich classroom dialogue and provide kaiako with insight into ākonga reasoning.

Mathematical representations: Mathematical representations are important social tools which are used to mediate individual and collective reasoning within classroom communities. … When ākonga are engaging in inquiry and argumentation effective kaiako draw on the different representational forms individuals use to make the reasoning public and accessible for community exploration and use.

Mathematical languages and definitions: Negotiating mathematical meaning is dependent on ākonga access to a mathematical discourse and register appropriate to the classroom community. Ākonga who display mathematical literacy are able to use the language of mathematics to maintain meaning within the context of its construction, in its form or mode of argumentation and matched to audience needs.

Communication to Engage Diverse Learners: Choral Counts

Communication to Engage Diverse Learners: Revisited

Ākonga talk in mathematics classrooms: …When ākonga make their thinking explicit, kaiako have access to information about what ākonga know and what they need to learn. Ākonga need to learn how to explain their mathematical thinking…

Kaiako role in ākonga talk: Kaiako promote mathematically productive talk through structuring kaiako-to-ākonga interactions and ākonga-to-ākonga interactions and the use of specific talk moves. Talk moves are defined by Chapin and O’Connor (2007) as “simple conversational actions that have the potential to make discussion productive” (p. 119). By now talk moves should be an embedded approach in your pedagogy for inclusion and participation. You should continue to work on practicing and reflecting on your use of Revoicing – by kaiako and/or other ākonga, Asking ākonga to repeat what another ākonga has said, Eliciting reasoning – do you agree? Why/why not? Asking ākonga to add on, Kaiako wait time and turn and talk; Way and Bobis, (2017).

instructional activity (IA)

Introduction to planning for Choral Count Warm Ups.

Choral Counting

In choral counting, the teacher leads the class in a verbal count typically recording the count so that children can hear, see and talk about patterns. The teacher decides what to count by, in what direction, where to start and end (and the teacher makes decisions about how to record the count). As children engage in the count, they note patterns they are noticing in the count. This activity builds number sense, knowledge of place value, reinforces vocabulary such as even, odd, multiple, and builds a range of computational skills across the operations. It provides teachers with access to student thinking that can be used to leverage, extend and connect mathematical reasoning.

Counts can be as easy or sophisticated as you want: For example with young children you might even start by counting by 1 either forward or backwards starting from say 3, 1, or 19. Here are some examples of counts that include fractions, whole numbers and decimals.

Count by 1, start at 180, count to 230

Count by 10, start at 66, count to 266

Count by 7/8

Count by 0.004, start at 53.280

Count by 0.99, start at 1

Count by 2, start at 0

Count by 4 starting at 4

Count by 12 starting at 0

Count by 11, start at 77,

Count backwards by 25 starting at 725

Count by 1 ¾ starting at 1 ¼.

Count by 1.5 starting at 4;

Count by 1 ½ starting at 0

An example Counting by 10s starting at 6 with children:

(before you start the count, record a few rows of 10 dots on the board to guide you as your record the count)

6. 16. 26. 36. 46. 56. 66. 76. 86. 96.

106. 116. 126. 136. 146. 156. 166. 176. 186. 196.

206. 216. 226. . . . . . . .

You might stop the count at 226, and then provide a chance for students to think about patterns they notice, and share with a partner.

Children in the class noticed that the unit (and tens) digits in the columns stay the same. You might then want to ask them why they think this is so – some children will talk about adding 100 as we move down the column and discussion might lead to the fact that each time we move down a row, we have also counted on 10 lots of 10. This could be recorded as:

36 + 10 + 10 + 10 + 10 + 10 + 10 + 10 + 10 + 10 + 10 = 136

or as 36 + (10 x 10) = 136

or as 36 + 100 = 136.

You can use this discussion to ask children to predict a later term(s)

6 16 26 36 46 56 66 76 86 96

106 116 126 136 146 156 166 176 186 196

206 216 226

And then continue the count to see if the prediction is correct.

Children will see simple and complex patterns, using rows, columns and diagonals. Look at the protocol sheet for more guidelines about how to structure the discussion.

Here are some suggestions about different ways to wrap up a count:

We’ll end our count here. Today we found patterns.

Note any rules or conjectures or generalizations that were generated: For example say “Every time we count by 4s, starting at 4, happens.”

I wonder if this pattern will repeat when we reach ___. That’s an idea to think about today.

How might this count help you when you are multiplying by _____

Next time we count, let’s try to think about why pattern works.

Connect to upcoming work: For example, say “Let’s see if our work with division will help us figure out whether 84 ÷ 4 is 21 or 25.”

Tonight for homework, see if you can continue

Turrou, A. C., Franke, M. L., & Johnson, N. (2017). Choral counting. Teaching Children Mathematics, 24(2), 128-135.

What is interesting when you design a Choral Count activity is to think about where to start, where to stop and look at patterns, or to give children time to predict the next number, and how far to take the count.

Learning Languages

mātauranga Māori (Māori knowledge)

Rod Ellis’ (2005) ten principles that underpin a Second Language Acquisition (SLA) pedagogical approach and critique our own enactments of Te Reo and mātauranga Māori in light of these ten principles.

Weaving Te Reo and Te Ao Māori and iCLT principles.

intercultural Communicative Language Teaching (iCLT)

iCLT principle 1 integrates language and culture from the beginning
iCLT principle 2 engages learners in genuine social interaction
iCLT principle 3 encourages and develops an exploratory and reflective approach to culture and culture-in-language
iCLT principle 4 fosters explicit comparisons and connections between languages and cultures
iCLT principle 5 acknowledges and responds appropriately to diverse learners and learning contexts
iCLT principle 6 emphasises intercultural communicative competence rather than native-speaker competence
https://seniorsecondary.tki.org.nz/Learning-languages/Learning-programme-design

REMEMBER: The focus of iCLT pedagogy is not to ensure NATIVE SPEAKER LINGUISTIC FLUENCY in Te Reo. Your role as primary school teachers in mainstream NZ schools is to scaffold the learning of a target language and culture, in this case Te Reo and Te Ao Māori, to develop ākonga INTERCULTURAL COMPETENCY.

Source: Ellis, R. (2005). Instructed Second Language Acquisition. A Literature Review. Ministry of Education.

Ellis (2005) 10 Principles of Effective Second Language Acquisition

Principle 1: Instruction needs to ensure that learners develop both a rich repertoire of formulaic expressions and a rule-based competence.

Formulaic expressions: aligns with a notional-functional pedagogical approach (see Module 2 example: Notion – Ordering food at a cafe, restaurant, eating at a BBQ, dinner table, hangi; Function – ‘Understanding and asking for’ information; i.e. Can I have the steak?’ Actual Language – Where is the menu? What’s for dinner? Formulaic expressions/Language patterns: ‘Can I have…’; ‘Would you like peas?’

Rule-based competence: focuses on the systematic teaching of pre-selected structures (using a range of sentences structure

Principle 2: Instruction needs to ensure that learners focus predominantly on meaning.

Teachers need to focus on scaffolding students to focus on pragmatic meaning. This aligns with a task-based approach to the teaching of a second language

Focusing predominantly on meaning means that teachers and ākonga need to view the second language that they are learning as a tool for communicating and to function as communicators.

Principle 3: Instructions needs to ensure that learners also focus on form.

A ‘focus on forms’ instructional approach has five options and usually consists of a combination of the following:

1. Explicit instruction

a. Didactic (deductive): students are provided with an explanation of the form (i.e. sentence structure/phrase/word).

b. Discovery (inductive): students are provided with second language data that illustrate the form (i.e. sentence structure/phrase/word) and are asked to work out how the form works for themselves.

2. Implicit instruction (i.e. infer how a form works without awareness; rote)

a. Non-enhanced input: second language data is presented to students without any special attempt to draw their attention to the targeted form (i.e. sentence structure/phrase/word).

b. The targeted form (i.e. sentence structure/phrase/word) is highlighted in some way (i.e. using italics) to induce noticing.

3. Structured input: second language input that is manipulated in particular ways to push learners to become dependent on form (i.e. sentence structure/phrase/word) and structure to get meaning (supplying information, surveys, matching).

4. Production practice: Instruction requires learners to produce sentences containing the targeted form.

a. Controlled: Students are given guidance in producing sentences containing the targeted form (i.e. by filling in blanks in sentences or transforming sentences).

b. Functional: Students are required to produce their own sentences containing the targeted form in some kind of situational context.

5. Corrective feedback: Instruction consists of feedback responding to students’ efforts to produce the targeted structure.

a. Implicit: Feedback models the correct form without explicitly indicating that the student has made an error.

b. Explicit: The feedback makes it clear to the student that an error has been made.

Principle 4: Instruction needs to be predominantly directed at developing implicit knowledge of the second language while not neglecting explicit knowledge.

Implicit knowledge is seen as the ‘glue’ that underlies students’ ability to communicate fluently and confidently in a second language. It is intuitive and procedural knowledge that is not normally accessed automatically in fluent performance and that cannot be verbalised.

Principle 5: Instruction needs to take into account learners’ ‘built-in syllabus’.

Built-in syllabus refers to ākonga having an innate predisposition to acquire language. Ākonga possess an internal mechanism, of unknown nature, which enables him/her/they/them from the limited data available to them to construct a grammar of a particular language.

What are the implications for instruction as a teacher?

– Make sure your teaching closely matches where ākonga are at in terms of their built-in syllabus. Use a task-based teaching approach that makes no attempt to predetermine the linguistic content of a lesson.

– Teach a second language explicitly ensuring that ākonga are developmentally ready to acquire specific language features.

Principle 6: Successful instructed language learning requires extensive second language input.

‘Language learning, whether it occurs in a naturalistic or an instructed context, is a slow and labour-intensive process. Children acquiring their L1 take between two and five years to achieve full grammatical competence, during which time they are exposed to massive amounts of input’’ (Ellis, 2005, p. 38).

‘…a substantial portion of the variance in speed of acquisition of children can be accounted for by the amount and the quality of the input they receive. The same is undoubtedly true of L2 acquisition. If learners do not receive exposure to the target language they cannot acquire it. In general, the more exposure they receive, the more and the faster they will learn’ (Ellis, 2005, p. 38).

Structured Language Acquisition Principles #7-10

Principle 7: Successful instructed language learning also requires opportunities for output.

Give ākonga the opportunity to PRODUCE language both orally and in written form. While input is important, giving ākonga opportunities for output are valued because:

a. Learner production of language serves to generate better input (i.e. from teachers) through the feedback that learners’ efforts at language production elicit.

b. It obliges ākonga to pay attention to grammar use.

c. It allows ākonga to test out target language grammar through feedback when they make mistakes.

d. It helps ākonga develop ‘personal voice’ by steering conversations in the target language on to topics that they are interested in and contributing to.

Principle 8: The opportunity to interact in the second language is central to developing second language proficiency.

In Ellis’ review he cited Johnson’s (1995) four key requirements for a second language acquisition-rich classroom.

a. Create contexts of language use where ākonga have a reason to attend to language.

b. Provide opportunities for learners to use the language to express their own personal meanings. Connect second language acquisition to the worlds and lives of ākonga.

c. Help ākonga to participate in language-related activities that are beyond their current level of proficiency (this is different from instruction…how?)

d. Offer ākonga a full range of contexts that care for immersion and production in the target language.

Principle 9: Instruction needs to take account of individual differences in learners.

Language learning will be more successful when:

a. The instruction is matched to that of ākonga aptitude for learning.

b. Ākonga are motivated.

Principle 10: In assessing learners’ second language proficiency it is important to examine free as well as controlled production.

Free constructed response is the best measure of ākonga’s second language proficiency as it is this that corresponds most closely to the kind of language use found outside the classroom.

Controlled constructed responses are best elicited by means of task…

Hauora and Physical Education: Mental Health Education

Mental Health Issues within New Zealand Schools

In our role as kaiako however, we are well placed to make a difference for our students’ mental health. There is evidence that teaching ākonga about mental health, and helping them to develop strategies for supporting their personal mental health can have a positive and protective impact on wellbeing (Taylor, Oberle, Durlak, & Weissberg, 2017).

Some of the most prominent areas relating to mental health that are currently being addressed in New Zealand primary schools are bullying, the role of Māori and cultural identity, and sexuality education (Fitzpatrick et all, 2018).

Bullying

International research such as TiMSS, and PISA have consistently shown that New Zealand has significantly higher rates of bullying than many other countries (Fitzpatrick et all, 2018).

Māori Cultural Identity

A strong cultural identity and sense of pride is frequently associated with stronger mental health outcomes for people from many different cultures. This is particularly true for Māori ākonga in Aotearoa. Research has shown that Māori students do well in contexts where “being Māori” is affirmed and celebrated. Ākonga with a strong sense of Māori cultural identity have been found to experience improved wellbeing and reduced symptoms of depression compared to those who do not (Williams et al, 2019).

Sexuality Education

The importance of understanding and creating inclusive spaces for children to understand and express their sexual identity has become more prominent in recent years in Aotearoa. Issues such as gender identity, sexism, homophobia, and abuse are inextricably intertwined with mental health (Fitzpatrick et all, 2018).

A Whole School Approach to Addressing Mental Health Issues

A Framework for Promoting Mental Health in School (Hornby and Atkinson, 2010. P4)

*NB: PSE is a Personal and Social Education Programme*

… mental health is located in social, political, and historical contexts that are often completely out of the control of individuals. Developing supportive environments for students acts as a protective method for addressing mental health issues (Fitzpatrick et all, 2018).

The Role of SENCO and Whānau

It should be noted that external agencies and community/whānau are central to this model. As a classroom teacher, your school SENCO (Specialist Education Needs Coordinator) will usually be your first point of call if you have concerns about a student’s mental health. A SENCO’s role is to ensure that children with special educational needs within a school receive the support that they need.