When children lead their learning

Another rounds of learning conferences.

Having experienced parent teacher, 3 way conferences and learner led conferences my favourite is definitely the latter.

By documenting throughout the year the children had a rich source of artefacts ready to share with their parents.  They could find different samples to compare and show shifts over time. Having too much content is far more preferable to not having enough.

The artefacts the children chose were unique to them. By choosing what was relevant they could make deeper connections and were more confident sharing their learning.

10 minutes with the teacher is such an arbitrary number, for some families it’s too much for others not enough.

When I fell behind schedule, the kids had logged into their blogfolio to show off their artefacts of learning. There were a number of families where I didn’t really need to be there, the children were self-managing.

The conferences where the kids were talking in their mother tongue. As a teacher I don’t actually need to hear every conversation.

Showcasing learning that parents haven’t done in school is really powerful. Google challenges, where children are showcasing search skills really engages parents as for many parents using the internet to learn is still a recent phenomena.

Electronic portfolios mean content can be accessed on multiple screens – no more trying to flick between screens.

The best conferences are the ones where I don’t even need to be there the kids are confident in their learning story.