Parvin Peivandi, IB reflection, Jan. 27^th, 2015

Today we explored more about the interdisciplinary units. We brainstormed in groups of three and we shared our ideas about how we can make interdisciplinary units between two or more subjects. I was feeling more free and creative in this way as I enjoyed collaborating with my peers in different subject areas. Most teacher candidates came up with interesting ideas for interdisciplinary units. I found art is the most flexible subject that can be aligned with other different subject areas. To my viewpoint, every subject area can be expanded and challenged by using art. Particularly I was thinking of sculpture as a medium that can be employed in all subjects. Folded papers and making flat paper to a 3D form is an easy fun activity for visualizing DNA or cells in Biology. In French or other languages, art can be a starter for writing a well thought reflection paper in a different language.

I came up with the idea of using literature and English language as the starting point for making a sculpture. Illustrating a piece of poetry for a book cover is another example. All sorts of interdisciplinary ideas are there and I am very passionate to explore these possibilities in my unit plans.

Parvin Peivandi, IB reflection, Jan.21^st, 2015

This IB seminar was about revising IB unit planner and also interdisciplinary units. In this seminar I learned how to make interdisciplinary units in IB unit planning. I liked the idea that interdisciplinary units are based on the interdisciplinary understanding between two or more subjects. This is what I have learned in other courses in education program that those projects or questions that need the student to use his/her previous knowledge are the most valuable projects or questions. In interdisciplinary unit, student has to use the knowledge of one subject as a foundation of her/his thought and then apply this knowledge to the new context of a second subject. Both designing a high quality interdisciplinary unit and participating in it, needs huge amount of creativity.

I learned also that Interdisciplinary units are developed in grade groups by horizontal planning and at least one unit must be developed per year of the program. I feel so excited about designing interdisciplinary units because I think these units improve the Meta cognition skills of the students and add variety to the subject areas. To my viewpoint, the idea of joining two subjects together by key concept, global context and ATL skills, guide teachers to design interesting unit plans.

Interdisciplinary unit plans help the students to synthesize and integrate the knowledge that they have acquired from different sources. These units make the students reflect on their own thought and the process of meaning making and problem solving at the same time. This is why Interdisciplinary units prepare our students as efficient communicators.

Parvin Peivandi, IB Reflection, Jan 14^th, 2015

Peer Assessment of the summative tasks was another valuable experience in IB seminar this week. I found some of the IB task sheets of my peers were assessing too many things at the same time that seemed confusing for me. I was thinking of ESL students in our future classrooms and how they feel when they are confronted with the complex assessment tools like this that they do not exactly know what is the expectations of their teacher and where are they going. As we have studied in assessment course 310B, in a high quality education, assessment is overlapping the instruction and if the assessment tool is not explicit, it does not have so much educational value. The assessment task sheets are not merely for grading tasks, but they are designed to improving the students’ learning outcomes. A high quality assessment is the beginning of instruction and measures specific aspects of learning outcomes and performances. Typically two criteria should be selected in IB task sheets and the objectives should be clearly described. I asked myself how complexity of assessment task sheets might affect validity, reliability and fairness of the assessment. If some students do not understand the concept of the instruction and content of assessment, they cannot respond properly to the assessment and their performance does not show their real capability of the task. I think making high quality task sheets in IB needs practice and knowledge of the students’ behavior and understanding. Strong rubric and assessment task sheets have a student friendly language and are combined with different assessment tools to measure the students’ learning in different occasions.

Parvin Peivandi, IB Reflection, Jan 6^th, 2015

In this IB seminar, there was a time for peer assessment of the IB unit planner. I found that was a very valuable experience that we could look at our classmate’s unit plans and learn from their specific strategy in unit planning. For me, observing different unit plans from diverse subject areas was instructive. By reflecting on some one else’s assignment, we could also improve our own units. I like to use this method more often in my future classroom.

We also have chance to chat with each other about the different parts of the unit plans including key concept and global context. Key concept is the main focus of each unit, so it needs more attention to select the right key concept for the specific outcomes of our units. IB education also pays attention to global aspect of the education to prepare individuals for active participation in real world and cross-cultural interactions. As my inquiry question is about international minded education, I have selected identities and relationship as my global context. This is very close to my inquiry statement. I think weaving the threads of my inquiry statement into my unit plans is a great decision that makes me more motivated to be on the same track and do research about the global minded education in art curriculum.

Oct 29^th, first week of practicum, Parvin Peivandi

This week, I learned a lot by observing my teacher’s methodology and also observing the students in different art classes. Observation for me was not only practice of looking, but also listening to my inner voice, finding the passion which was silently there and waiting to emerge.

I feel art classroom has a lot for me to reflect, to inquire and apply what I have learned as an artist and teacher in my life and art class is a place in which I can find a meeting point between my curiosity for learning and my compassion toward others. I was melting in the art class in a way that I did not want to visit other classes; moments were frozen for me that even I had forgotten my inquiry question about multiculturalism for a while. I realized that great teachers like my SA, have a huge impact on the students. They can improve the students’ motivation toward learning and increase the sense of respect and understanding amongst them. I got the answer to my inquiry question when I saw my SA one time was wearing a t-shirt with calligraphy of a specific culture. That was the meaning of international mindedness for me, bringing the sense of respect and understanding for all. That was the reason why the students and I were feeling great in the class. Mr. Sinclair respected all the people in the class equally and supported our learning in different ways. I am eager to learn more from him.

Parvin Peivandi

October 9^th, 2014, IB reflection

In this IB seminar, I find the connection between BC’s art PLOs and the IB’s learning objectives. It was an interesting journey to find out these connections between the BC art curriculum and MYP objectives. Although the class activity provided an opportunity to learn these connections, I explored these connections further in an actual IB classroom setting in St Johns MYP art class. In this class, the art teacher : Sandra Hall handed in her lesson plan with detailed descriptions of the PLOs and IB’s objectives. Her teaching demonstrated the high level of proficiency in IB MYP education with regards to the key concepts and learning objectives in the lesson plan. I observed how IB’s theories and practice came together in her practice to form a uniformed IB teaching experience. At the end of the class, she encouraged students to develop the concept further by inquiry and writing reflective paper about their works.

Parvin Peivandi

October 2^nd, 2014, IB reflection

In this IB seminar, I thought more profoundly about my statement of inquiry and the level that this question occupies in the world. I asked myself Is this a factual question or conceptual question?. Definitely my question is not from a debatable or provocative nature as I have always been interested in self-expression and concepts in my art practice or teaching. I start my inquiry question with how and I ask myself another question in relation to my inquiry question, ”how my inquiry question scaffold objectives that students should strive to achieve?” My original inquiry question is about the identity and relationships and analyzes the big idea of how students understand and engage with the identity in different contexts. I consider this inquiry question as a great question to start with and I aim to develop it further in my lesson plans and practice.

Parvin Peivandi

Sep 25^th 2014, IB reflection

As we are more close to our practicum, we are more focused on our curriculum and lesson plans in IB. In this seminar, I further explored the key concept of the statement of inquiry which is the heart of the IB’s inquiry. How I can make the statement of inquiry for my unit plans? Where should I start? I find how statement of inquiry is shaped by a key concept that I have started my ideas with it. Identity and transformation has been always my interest. By considering the fact that this key concept is connected to another concept which may have other ideas or concept in itself, I thought about related concepts and finally the context in which the concept and related concept find meaning.

Regarding my key concept as the identity, I consider the global contexts. identities and relationships are my inquiries in this global context and I developed my statement of inquiry by considering that “how identities are transformed in different contexts or relationships” How can I teach identities and relationships in IB?. I start my journey from here.

Parvin Peivandi

Sep 17^th, 2014, IB reflection

The difference between understanding and awareness in today’s IB seminar got me reflecting on the classrooms settings that I have been there as a student. As we know, understanding is beyond the awareness and in order to understand some one, one needs to put him/herself in place of others and show empathy, but how much in reality we see this understanding is happening? I think some teachers do not consider the composition of their classes as an important factor in their teaching strategies. They can observe the diverse body of the students and their different needs in order to facilitate their learning. For example by applying the scaffolding techniques or the zone of proximal development they can pair up different abled students with keen students in groups. The students with different needs like ESL students can benefit from this approach and learn the language more easily. More over, more friendship and understanding happens in collaborative works. But as I have seen in most classes, students join those people whom they like most and shape an intercultural group in the classroom. As IB aims to develop intercultural understanding among students, students from different backgrounds should have opportunity to interact with the dominant group in the classroom and learn from them. The majority group also should learn that there are always valuable aspects in other cultures too that they can learn or get awareness of them. This is great that IB has focused on both awareness and understanding in the education.

Parvin Peivandi

IB reflection paper, Sep 11^th,2014

As an international student, I feel more connected to the idea of the international mindedness as one of the learning objectives in IB education. Due to the multicultural nature of the schools in Canada,I think BC’s schools should have more international approach to education . As Harper et.al state in their reading:Beyond food, festivals and flags, multicultural education in Canada is just scratching the surface of some cultures and are summarized in displaying some masks, art forms or food festivals.

As we know every student needs a sense of affirmation that will mirror back from the other individuals in the public sphere. This sense of affirmation brings a self esteem and determination with itself which is necessary in the student’s social emotional learning. This is the reason that why there is so much emphasize in IB education on international mindedness and developing care and respect toward others who are part of our educational cycle.

As we know Exclusion of some students with different cultures and backgrounds from the activities or curriculum, make the educational system imbalanced and in favor of a specific group. If the social justice is not observed at schools, the educational goals remain unsatisfied as a whole. But how far we can go in changing the curriculum? How much opportunity are we given by the educational leaders in Canada?