My Professional Inquiry has unfortunately been a bit on the back-burner after a hectic Term 2. On Tuesday of last week however, I was lucky enough to attend the Manaiakalani School Leaders PLG, and this has given me renewed inspiration to bolster my Oral Language programme. There were numerous topics of note, but I particularly want to record here, my thoughts on the presentation made to us by Dr Jannie Van Hees.
Jannie showed us a presentation on 'Our Children as Conversationalists'. She talked about the importance of talking WITH someone, or CHAINLINKING the conversation. I was made to consider the benefits of the sharing news and asking questions format that I have been working with earlier in the year. There is so much more to learn to become a true conversationalist!
This is going to form the basis of my Inquiry for the remainder of the year. I plan to explicitly teach what a conversation is and practice some of the numerous possible responses one can make, with the children in my class. Once this has become an established part of the class dynamics, I can see myself strengthening the DMiC part of my programme, where conversation is currently lacking.
I have reflected on my own conversations with my children at home, and the richness of the language that they have been exposed to their whole lives. I have always believed in speaking to children in varied and complex forms, rarely dumbing down my language unless absolutely necessary for immediate understanding. I like to think that the children in my class are exposed to the same richness of language as my children at home, however, this is probably not entirely the case.
Following Jannie's structured powerpoint presentation, I will begin by explicitly teaching 'conversation' in my class. I will post back here at the end of the term with how this is progressing!
