On May 12th Cheryl, Francine and I gathered our Primary level French Immersion teachers for another round of teacher moderation.
We followed much the same format as we did with the Junior and Intermediate teachers on May 11th.
It all went remarkably smoothly. I worked with the grade 2 teachers for several hours. We took pieces of grade 2 writing and used a rubric to assess the writing's level and next steps for the student. There was an amazingly long and complex discussion about what can we reasonably expect 7 and 8 year olds to know about recycling, energy conservation and natural resource uses! Thanks girls, the discussions always intrigue and invigorate me.
Francine had the most interesting group this time. The Kindergarten teachers! It takes a special person to get a 5 year old to write in French! The Kindergarten teachers decided that our rubric (yeah, the one we've revised EVERY month since April of 2008) doesn't work for them. In retrospect, they are right and I'm not sure what we were thinking all these months! However, that means ALL the previously finished work for SK will have to be redone. ARGHH! Every piece of writing will have to be re-marked, and probably re-typed too. Boohoo. However, the group made the right choice about all this and we will get it done, somehow.
Once again, we looked at a video clip, read a monograph and celebrated our success. We had another retiree to honour too. And cake, always cake. Can't go wrong with cake.
So, thanks teachers for another crazy session of hard work and sticking your neck out. We really really appreciate it.
