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South Okanagan Photos

Collaboration – the day your kids come home at noon

Today is Collaboration Day at Oliver Schools – buses took students home early and teachers and supervisors are in session in the first of about seven such sessions throughout the school district calendar.

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Earlier on ODN – May 9th

How do you make education better in School District #53? Better – what does that mean? Better results – better teaching and better success with students that can be measured might be one concept.

An idea doing the rounds is “inquiry time” where teachers and administrators will send the students home early and collaborate in a 90 minute session on the last Wednesday of each month during the school year. Actually it might only be 7 months of the school year.

Inquiry time is where those that teach in each school can gather, set a goal or target, identify problem areas or students having difficulty and establish a plan to work toward a better outcome.

This Learning Forum focused on a new model of collaboration at the Atrium at SOSS in Oliver. Bev Young (SD53 superintendent) presented a vision for building a culture of inquiry in our district. Some teachers and administrators presented examples of inquiry and on how they have, or might use the process in their schools.  Concerns and comments in the this session.

Is this a common process in other schools, districts or educational systems? Parents still concerned about loss of instruction time.

One story was that it take a certain time to cook a turkey but to educate a child or to find a unique way to get through some barriers you have to be innovative or artistic not prescriptive.

Inquiry time is to promote new practices to ensure superior outcomes. Most thought students will benefit and staff will enjoy a process to improve results. Some concern that not enough hours are to be designated for this purpose. Will it be top down? Will each school decide the goals and the procedures to get to the end of the process? Parents concerned about a change to regular routines and the daycare aspect of schools.

Will parents actually be involved or informed of what they are getting because of the change? What is the process going to look like. Needs group buy-in. No teacher can just be invited to participate – they have to want to be an active participant. This process could or should be school centric not district wide “sameness”.