This can partially be attributed to the recent changes we have all had to make because of the pandemic. However, there has been an increasing willingness to venture back into our communities and connect with people, whereas pandemic health and safety protocols, unfortunately, dictated much of what our students could and could not do. To a greater extent, perhaps one of the major factors behind the disconnect between talk and action is that our school culture has also shifted. It speaks to the need to have on-going discussions about what the Learner Profile traits are and what agency looks like in our classrooms - at the level where teachers and admin can design their curriculum, and more importantly at the level where students are able to find and create opportunities for themselves to exemplify these traits. 

While many students have, in casual conversation and in guided class discussions, articulated a desire to make an impact, the next steps we can take to encourage taking action would be to make ourselves (mentors) available if they need help, offering resources and connecting students to appropriate individuals/organizations towards which their action can impact. Additionally, I think that having the parent community become knowledgeable about what action looks like can also support this shift. It can be helpful for parents to understand the different forms of action so they can recognize when their child is exploring possibilities outside of the classroom. 

In my previous school we worked with the DP and students were engaged in all sorts of actions as part of CAS and the links were clearly established between what we were seeing in the classrooms and what students chose to dedicate their time to for CAS hours. I feel this knowledge is something I need to keep in mind now that I am teaching the PYP.

Some next steps would be to have this discussion with my students. As we dive into our second unit, perhaps we could give some examples of some possible actions that could be taken as a class or in smaller groups, but the idea would be to elicit this from them and work with them to make it possible. Creating change is what leads you to believe that change is in fact possible. We have all experienced this first hand. Perhaps a way to do this is to begin with changes at the classroom/school level. These changes would hopefully empower students to see that they can make a difference and perhaps then they would be willing to take on bigger challenges.

I see the circle on page 9 as a step-by step guide - initially it would be teacher -guided. Then it would be teacher-initiated, then student-initiated and hopefully we can arrive at student-initiated and led.

 

I have been present in many classroom discussions and learning activities where students demonstrate their commitment to learning. Therefore, I could assume that most of the actions taking place at the school are participatory. If this is the case, I would love to see us promote other types of action, such as advocacy and social justice. 

 

I look forward to working directly with our fifth-grade students in order to support their actions and also in order to understand better where we are at as a school. Hopefully, once I engage with their learning more actively (so far, I have worked mostly with teachers outside the classroom), I will get to see other types of action that are less obviously visible. 

We need to practice goal-setting and monitoring of learning with students. This is new to teachers and students and will take some time.