Methven Primary School

VISION: Making Pathways To The Stars

Focus Report On Writing

Presented by:
Rosie Robinson

BoT Meeting Date:
Ooctober 2014

Update:
Classroom teachers have made an Overall Teacher Judgement (OTJ) based on a range of writing
samples - writing books, online entries (weeblys, Office 365), and mid-year e-asTTle data.
Assessment tools are used to support data collection
e-asTTle
Peters Spelling
Essential Word Lists
Literacy Learning Progressions
National Standards - Writing
One of the MPS targets this year is focusing on a cohort of Year 6 boys who were identified as
writing well below and below at the end of 2013. Data illustrates that out of these year 6 boys
currently 79% are achieving at or above and 21% below or well below.
Data below includes students from Year One who have been at school for more than 6 months
Year 6 students (225 students).


The 2013 cohort includes: 0 ORRS students, 15 ELL students and 4 transient students
The 2014 results include: 0 ORRS students, 19 ELLP students,


WELL
BELOW
BELOW AT ABOVE
Nov
2013
Nov
2014
Nov 2013 Nov
2014
Nov 2013 Nov
2014
Nov 2013 Nov
2014
Nov
2013
Nov
2014
Students
8
(4%)
12
(5%)
41
(19%)
29
(13%)
130
(61%)
148
(66%)
34
(16%)
35
(15%)
213 225


Strengths and Weaknesses:
Strengths
Overall our school data shows that our tail end has had a slight shift to the right we have a greater
number of students achieving at or above in writing, than in 2013 - 164 (77%) and 183 (81%).

The breakdown of data is as follows:
73% of Year 6 students are at or above in writing
65% of Year 5 students are at or above in writing
85% of Year 4 students are at or above in writing
74% of Year 3 students are at or above in writing
89% of Year 2 students are at or above in writing
100% of Year 1 (students who have been at school for longer than 6 months) are at or above in
writing


Gail Loan Professional Development
In May most staff took the opportunity to attend a Professional Development day facilitated by
Gail Loan. Gail is an independent consultant in schools, tutoring and coaching school leaders
and teachers in the development of literacy. Of particular interest to our staff was her approach
to memoirs and gaining the writers interest with ideas and motivation. Our Mid Year writing
moderation results illustrate the increase in student attainment with their ideas.

School Wide Writing Moderation (see attached report from moderation)
In June all students from Year 2 to Year 6 were involved with a whole school e-asTTle writing
sample. As a staff we worked together to ensure that our marking of writing was consistent
across the school. Samples were distributed evenly amongst teachers (rather than marking
own class) and were assigned by numbers (rather than names), to reduce subjectivity. This
process saw staff discuss and articulate why scores were given to particular pieces of writing.
A further piece of writing will be moderated in Term 4 across the school, where comparisons will
be drawn between the two whole school writing samples.

Cohort of boys in Year 6
This group consisted of 14 boys in Year 6. Half of these students in the cohort are now achieving
at their expected writing level.
One student who was below left MPS this year.
The results indicate a shift of the majority of students from below to at National Standard. One
student has moved from well below to below. The two students who remain at well below are
both identified as Maori and are both receiving additional support in the school Literacy Support
and Teacher Aide.

Well Below Below At Above
Nov 13 June
14
Nov 13 June
14
Nov 13 June
14
Nov 13 June
14
Nov 13 June
14
3
(21%)
2
(15%)
11
(79%)
4
(31%)
0 7
(54%)
0 0 14 13


Interchange (Year 5 & 6)
This year the Year 5&6 teachers have opted for an interchange in literacy. This has supported
teachers to specialise in a different literacy area. Keryn is currently teaching writing to all year
5 & 6 students and Stu is teaching reading. By enabling specialising in these fields, is
enabling the teacher to better meet the needs of specific students and the results are
supporting this type of Interchange.

Inquiry Based Integrated Programmes
Inquiry based programmes provide a real purpose for writing. It also provides students with a
wide vocabulary of topic based words that hey can use in their written texts. Inquiry also provides
students with a range of tools to use for the production of texts (eg. Tablets, weebly, blogs) and in the
presentation of texts (wordle, comic life, key-note).







Maori Students (21)
59% of Maori students are currently achieving at or above the National Standards.
6 out of the 22 students identified as Maori have been at MPS less than 12 months (mostly senior
school).

A cohort of 22 pupils (9f, 13m) 2013
A cohort of 22 pupils (8f, 14m) in 2014
WELL BELOW BELOW AT ABOVE
Nov 2013 June 2014 Nov 2013 June 2014 Nov 2013 June 2014 Nov 2013 June 2014
2 (9) 4 (18%) 2 (9) 5 (23%) 10 (46) 10 (45%) 8 (36) 3 (14%)


Weaknesses

Phonetic Knowledge
When analysing writing samples, the inconsistencies of letter/sound association is a concern.
Many of our students who are achieving well below and below in their writing have difficulty
hearing sounds and being able to put these sounds in sequence. As a school we are currently
trialling the Multi-Lit programme to improve the sound knowledge (phonetic awareness) in some
students. We are still in early days of this programme, but data is suggesting that this programme
accelerates phonemic knowledge. Looking at further school wide phonetic programmes would be
beneficial.

School Wide Moderation
This data clearly indicates two skill areas of the E-asTTle writing rubric that we will work on
within the school. In the Junior area punctuation is an area for further teaching, and building
up vocabulary in the Senior area of the school will support our students attainment in writing.

Teacher Development
Writing is an area of the curriculum that teachers often feel needs further development. This is
due to the nature of writing being subjective how it appeals to the reader. Writing also
incorporates personal responses. Ako (reciprocal teacher and student learning) is fundamental
to the writing process and this is a developmental continuum for teachers and students needs
to be built up for confidence to be established. Continual writing professional development is
needed to ensure teachers have the knowledge and confidence to deliver a meaningful writing
programme.

Links and Documentation:
http://www.minedu.govt.nz/theMinistry/EducationInNewZealand/EducationLegislation/TheNationalAd
ministrationGuidelinesNAGs.aspx#NAG1
Discussion:
Many resources are available to support teachers in developing exciting writing programmes.

There are various tools for assessing where students are at in relation to their expected levels
of attainment. Sometimes the volume of tools become confusing as they are all presented in
different formats and use different terminology.

Data trends are consistent this half year, with that from end of year 2013, with a change from
77% in 2013 to 81% in 2014 of students at or above their expected achievement level in
Writing.

Across the school we have developed some kid speak learning goals for achievement at
different levels of the curriculum. These still need to be tweaked and then will be used
consistently across the school.

The staff have spent quite some time moderating our e-asTTle writing marking. This is making
the scores more consistent. The staff have also undertaken marking of different year samples
in order for teachers to see the different stages of the writing progressions. This will continue
to be done twice a year (Term 2 and Term 4) to ensure consistency across this curriculum
area.

Using the Teaching as Inquiry Process http://nzcurriculum.tki.org.nz/Curriculum-stories/Case-
studies/Teachers-as-learners-Inquiry/Teaching-as-inquiry to ensure that student learning is at
the core of our programme development is vital.

The Future:
Continued support for classroom teacher in providing in-class programmes.
Continued commitment from the BOT to fund Teacher Aides to support teachers and Students to
ensure every child gets the support they need.
Continues support for Professional Development in Writing.
Continued monitoring of students who receive support through out their schooling at MPS