Swedish school uses innovative design for learning

I am fortunate to be the recipient of the Auckland Principal Association / ASB Principal Travel Fellowship, 2014.
My travel to Europe and Scandinavia will enable me  to explore how modern school designs reflect; the changing nature of learning, influence changes in the ways that teachers teach, engage diverse learners and meet current and future educational needs. My travel fellowship will enable me to explore recent trends in thinking about learning and design in new schools and what this looks like in practice. 

I plan to be in Scandinavia in June this year where I will be looking at the relationship between school design and pedagogy. 
I hope that I will be able to visit  this Vittra  school in Stockholm, Sweden. These students learn in a open learning environment with latest computer technology.

I am very lucky to have some great contacts to put me in contact with innovative schools in Scandinavia (Lene Jensby Lange, Autens, Denmark) and UK (Terry White, CEFPI, London)

 I wonder how the learning happens in the new environments  that I will view.

-How does the physical design support e-learning 
-What ways is personalising learning through e-learning supported by the physical design
-What are the types of teaching and learning have emerged in the new spaces
-What are the relationships between the virtual and built environments.

I hope that my learning from the travel fellowship will influence our future building design at Freemans Bay School. 

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Metacognitive Strategies

I was interested in this slide which found on @visiblelearning site on Twitter. This Twitter feed relates to  John Hattie's seminars on Visible Learning and his recent research on the same.

We believe that metacognitve strategies are central to student learning. At Freemans Bay School metacognitive strategies are specifically taught through Habits of Mind and  Assessment for Learning pedagogy.

At this stage of the year, students, supported by their teachers post explicit goals on KnowledgeNET (Learning Management System). The goals are broken down with success criteria. Students know what they need to learn, their next steps to achieve that learning and strategies for getting there.

As the learning progresses they can reflect on progress on the success criteria and post this up to share  and interact with parents and peers.

Metacognition is an explicit component of our teaching and learning process.