In Output 4 we aim to deliver user stories for Ed Tech that would support SRL teaching practices. The project aimed to match EdTech companies with 8 pilot schools, both primary and secondary education. Schools were guided in the Learning M!X concept by a GO! team (Innovation & development). Then when they designed a learning M!X of their own, Ed partners were invited to listen and co-create designs. User stories where drafted to inspire EdTech on SRL-class management.
GO! Campus Fenix is a secondary school on the outskirts of Brussels looking for a way to support pupils in taking more ownership within the learning process. During an intensive co-creation process, they are designing rules of play that support and encourage self-regulated learning among pupils. The focus here is also on the digital aspect: how can we, digitally, support and stimulate the development of self-regulated skills in classroom practice? In doing so, the school is exploring the possibilities of Smartschool, Google Classroom and Class-Id.
Atheneum Brussels stands for learning in the city with an open view on the world. The school recently moved to a new location in the center of Brussels and adopted a new organizational structure called the Flexmodel. Cooperative, self-regulating learning and coaching are the core elements of their new vision. With the help of Smartschool and Microsoft applications, they are searching for solutions to develop and encourage self-regulating skills among their students.
This Brussels secondary school consciously adopts a goal-oriented and flexible approach to learning. At Comenius, strong emphasis is placed on the development of self-regulatory skills in pupils. This allows them to plan lessons themselves according to the objectives to be achieved. This flexibility is built up naturally, because planning and self-regulation is not that easy.
Campus 't Forum, which prepares students for higher education, started 'Level Up' this school year. The aim is to gradually and thoughtfully move towards some innovative learning squares that prepare students for higher education. The team will gradually take more pupil-oriented approach this school year in which pupils will be given more ownership and responsibility to master learning content at their own pace.
This school is a small primary school consisting of preschool and first grade primary education. Within primary education, they were looking for a way of working in which the young pupils of the first grade (6-8 years old) could learn to take ownership of their own learning. Since diversity is an important feature of this school, it is obviously also very important to be able to work in a differentiated way.
The teachers, the management and the internal support staff all saw an opportunity to start working with a thematic M!X. Starting from the central theme that guides the class, the teacher chooses which learning activities - after a joint instruction by the teacher, of course - can be started independently.
To give shape to this, we are currently thinking about which sets are important, which learning activities can be addressed within each set, but also which didactic rules of play based on self-regulated skills are needed to ensure that young children can also engage in self-regulated learning. We also look at how this can be supported digitally
BS De Kn@ppe Ontdekker is a small school in the province of Limburg with a STEM profile. Due to the small scale of the school, it works with grade classes in both the second and third grades, which also provides a lot of challenges. When developing the STEM projects, the school has chosen to work with students in an inquisitive and exploratory way, both individually and together in smaller groups.
The general starting point is therefore always to start out to set success criteria - i.e. start setting the goals first. In addition, a lot of learning activities are offered in which pupils work independently and thus have to work with a clear planning. These are essential aspects that help to stimulate the children's self-regulation skills. When the 'LearningM!X concept' was presented, the teachers and management were immediately sold on applying the mixing of different ways of learning in their school situation. Sets were soon renamed islands in order to offer personalised learning activities per island.
Before getting started with the different learning activities, children are asked to scale themselves up to three levels: I do it with the teacher, I do it with a friend or use aids, or I can do it all by myself and get started without any kind of help. To allow children to take ownership of their own learning, a collaboration with Smartschool is being established.
Among other things, Smartschool provides the teacher with the added value of offering their learningM!X to pupils digitally and, on the other hand, the teacher is provided with data on which it becomes possible to provide targeted feedback - this can then be done during a child meeting or in the 'near' future also digitally.
At De Buurt primary school, together with the third-grade team, the headmaster and the policy support officer, it was decided to start working with a learningM!X. After classroom phases of prior knowledge activation, orientation, joint instruction, guided practice and a first phase of independent processing, they also consider which assignments can be further processed independently.
These activities are then included in the learning M!X moment. The pupils are then offered different learning activities in sets. These can be both processing activities of things they have already learned together and activities in which pupils independently carry out research assignments or preventively do a number of things for activities to come. During this LearnM!X moment, the phase of extended instruction is also planned for those children who need it.
At the moment, they are also looking at how Gynzy, an adaptive learning platform, could be a tool for this. The teachers are also working on drawing up school-specific didactic rules to promote self-regulated skills. This is currently being worked out step-by-step and tested in the third grade, with the aim of also being able to extend this to classes in the second and third grades of primary school over time.
MPI Helix in Lommel is a school for special education, i.e. for children with specific needs. Within the primary offering department, we are currently looking at how a thematic way of working - starting from a central theme that then guides all learning activities - could become a way of working.
The principles of thematic M!X would then be used for this. Within the different sets, differentiated learning activities could then be offered per child or groups of children. Together with some didactic rules, based on the self-regulating skills from Zimmerman's framework, this would then create new ways of approach. The next phase will also look at which digital tools can be used as a means.