Learning by Design: Intentional Practice in Secondary Classrooms

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Designing learning in a digital space isn’t about using technology for its own sake. It’s about being intentional with our choices—using digital tools to deepen engagement, amplify student voice, and connect learning to the world beyond the classroom.

This year, I’ve been fortunate to work with teachers from across the curriculum. One of the defining strengths of secondary teaching is the depth of subject expertise each teacher brings. Many have worked in industry or the commercial sector before entering education, and they carry that real-world experience directly into their classroom practice.

Take Abby, for example. A Social Sciences and History teacher, she brings both subject expertise and professional experience into her teaching. Having worked for several years with the Department of Conservation and in the environment and tourism sector, Abby is intentional about designing learning that helps students grapple with real-world issues — including how power operates, how decisions are made, and how systems shape people’s lives.

A Learn, Create, Share moment

Yr 10 Government systems

Learn
In Social Sciences, Abby’s students were exploring different systems of government. They built a shared understanding of how power operates by examining systems such as democracy, dictatorship, and authoritarianism. Students investigated how leaders come to power, how authority is exercised, and the role citizens play within each system, using contemporary and historical examples to ground their thinking.

Create
Students then chose a country — or designed one of their own — and applied their learning by developing a set of rules based on a chosen government system. Their task required them to clearly define the system, explain how power is acquired and exercised, outline decision-making processes, and identify key characteristics such as citizen rights and the rule of law. Some students used digital tools to visualise their ideas, others to structure explanations or present comparisons. The focus remained on clarity of thinking and depth of understanding, with technology supporting how ideas were organised and communicated.

Share
Students shared their work with their peers, explaining the logic behind their systems and responding to questions and challenges. Abby also embedded a voting form into the class site, allowing student choices to be captured and displayed in real time. Seeing the results update as votes were cast added an element of fun while deepening engagement with ideas about participation and decision-making.

Moments like this are a reminder that effective digital design is less about the tools we use and more about the intentional choices we make — choices that deepen engagement, amplify student voice, and connect learning to the world beyond the classroom.

 

Teachers as Designers of Learning

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Over the past few years, I’ve seen a quiet but powerful transformation happening in our classrooms. As teachers, we’re no longer just delivering content — we’re designing learning experiences. The shift to digital classrooms has made this change both possible and necessary.

In a connected learning environment, our role has evolved. We’re curators, coaches, and creative partners in our students’ learning journeys. Instead of standing at the front of the room explaining, we’re building spaces — often online — where students can explore, create, and share their thinking in authentic ways.

This shift doesn’t happen overnight. It grows through small, intentional changes: designing a collaborative document instead of a worksheet, creating a shared class blog, or using digital tools to give students a real audience for their work. Over time, these practices reshape how students see themselves as learners — and how we see ourselves as teachers.

In my work across secondary schools, I’ve seen the power of digital learning to remove barriers. Students who might once have been quiet in class find their voice through blogging or creative digital storytelling. Teachers discover new ways to provide feedback and see learning unfold in real time. And perhaps most importantly, schools are becoming places where creativity and collaboration sit alongside curriculum and assessment.

How do you backup your files?

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Back up is one of the easiest things you can do for yourself to avoid the stress that follows when you realise you’ve lost that document you just spent hours on or those gorgeous photos of your wee munchkin when they were 2.  A good rule of thumb is to have 3, 4 or even 5 back-ups of file storage in different places so if you loose one, get it stolen or it crashes your work is safely stored where you can retrieve it relatively easily.   I learnt this lesson the hard way.  I thought I was covered with an external hard drive which I used to store all my photos rather than on my computer, it died one day with no warning along with 400 photos.

A good back-up system would be something like an external hard drive, files on a memory stick and/or CD, as well as files stored in the “Clouds”  If you’re new to the term cloud computing you’re obviously not taking advantage of a great service that often comes free.  Cloud storage put simply is a storage service held on a remote server.  Some sites like Box.net offer a free storage for up to 1 GB, open a free account, create your online directory, then upload those important files.  Box.net also gives you the ability to collaborate with others which is great if you have a joint project at hand or are happy to share your resources.  There’s also a whole host of applications you can add to your account which for example gives you the tools to be able to edit your files on the go or from your phone.  If you require more than the 1GB storage you can upgrade for a reasonable fee, and at last you get have your head in the clouds.

Cloud storage is a good safeguard if you have to give a presentation or a lesson and you’ve left your memory stick at home, provided you remember to upload your latest versions you’ll always be well prepared.

Term 1 online toolkits

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My toolkit offering this term was looking at Google Class site design for secondary school teachers.  I find one of the important considerations when developing a class site is taking into account teacher’s workflow.   It’s not unusual for high school teachers to teach more than one subject area.  For that reason, I recommend teachers (who are new to class sites), use one site for all their classes.  Use top level pages for each class or year level and subpages for all the content thereafter.

An introduction to yourself and quick links from the homepage makes for a great landing page.  Ideally, your homepage is an ever-changing space that shows what is currently being taught, and relevant notices.

Ensuring everything within the site is visible is easily established with a class site folder and the permissions set to ‘anyone with the link can view’.  Then it’s only a matter of moving files into that folder or using Google Drive shortcuts (Shift + Z).  Organising your files in this way will save you time in the long run and, you won’t have emails from people requesting access to your resources.

Aside from your class site, the other valuable component for making teaching visible is Hapara Teacher Dashboard.  Many teachers like to use Hapara workspaces for setting assignments and work.  The key thing to remember here is to publish your Hapara workspace then grab the URL link and add it to your class site.  Now you have an efficient one stop learning hub in your class site.

The recording from my toolkit Secondary School Class Site Design, goes into the ideal set up in more detail.

The promise of a new school year

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There’s nothing better than the start of a new school year for me.  It’s a chance to initiate some fresh ideas and be inspired.  Inspiration can come from a variety of sources, often from those I work alongside like my dear friend Ria.

Ria has been a friend of mine for over 25 years.  Our kids were toddlers together, and as we were close neighbours, they got to play together frequently.

Ria has been a teacher for over 30 years, she’s one of the best.  Highly creative in her approach and passionate about her causes.  A stand out example for me was how she motivated a group of Kerikeri High School students to form a team. They called themselves the RAG (Recycling Action Group).  This was an after school project, where students gathered up all the rubbish around the school and over the course of a few weeks they build an art sculpture utilising the collected rubbish, in the middle of the school thoroughfare.  Nobody announced what was happening, but as the sculpture grew and grew, students became curious about this new formation taking place in the school grounds.  Students across the school were quite shocked to see how much rubbish was accumulated throughout the school day.  It prompted some changes to how students dispose of rubbish and what items are non-recyclable.  The RAG group made short educational films to inform people about the impact rubbish has on the environment.   This was largely a student led project.

Ria’s most recent and highly significant achievement was receiving her Doctorate last year.  Her research and thesis drew attention to the lack of educational focus and resources around the teaching of climate change particularly in high schools.

In Ria’s presentation Climate Change Education, (see below) she highlighted how empowering it would be “if every student left high school with an understanding of mitigation (reducing greenhouse gas emissions) adaptation (preparing for the predictable impacts of climate change) and an eye of innovation in the face of climate change.”

Ria poses the question, “How can secondary educators better engage students with sustainability education?”

I’m interested in hearing from teachers within the Manaiakalani network who would like the opportunity to collaborate on something that is meaningful for our students and builds their knowledge base on how they can get engaged in response to climate change.  Leave me a comment or get in touch via email: kerry.boyde-preece@manaiakalani.org

Climate Change Education, Dr Ria Bright from nzaee on Vimeo.

Organise your ideas

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Diagrams, Flowcharts and More

If you have some new ideas that you’d like to get off the ground and want some help to  organise yourself www.gliffy.com just might have the answer.  Gliffy is full of user-friendly applications that will have you presenting yourself in the most professional way.  Whether you have an idea for a web site, designing a floor plan for your dream home or need to demonstrate how you’re going to get that project done on time, Gliffy rests all your tools at your finger tips.

Set up a free user account and choose from a simple interface to create your slick diagram.  Tools are a familiar click and drag format, and of course there’s the ability to save your work which can then be stored for later retrieval or you can invite someone to work collaboratively on the project with you.    You can export your work as jpeg or png files or embed the file using the share code.  Students will love the ease at which they can create visual images that communicate their ideas and diagrams.

Brainstorming Ideas

Whilst brainstorming is a not a new concept, bubbl.us helps brainstorming sessions to be more dynamic and interactive.  Colourful, quick and easy to use Bubbl.us allows you to work collaboratively online, email, print, or embed your mind map into your website.   You don’t have to sign up for a free account to be able to use it, but doing so will give you the ability to save your work and invite others to work on your mindmaps with you.

Online Publishing site

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Everyone has a book inside them just waiting for the right time to be written down.  If you’ve contemplated the idea of creating your own publication, but never thought it would make it past a publishers eye Yudu.com.  could be the anwser to your prayers.   To use the Yudu’s online publishing tool simply create a free account and upload your files, Google Slides, PDF, Word(.doc), Powerpoint(.ppt), Excel or Open Office equivalents.  You will need to upload your document in it’s entirety, with all your pages in their correct order.    Keep fonts simple in your documents or you may have some display issues.  If you really want to use fancy fonts, save them as an image.  As a general rule of thumb it’s best to keep to the ” web font family’.  Choose the type of publications you want to make, then save to your library.   You’re then ready to share with others either by a direct email link, embed into your web site or make your publication public and save to Yudu’s library.

When you’re ready for an upgrade you’ll want to take advantage of Yudu’s Plus which gives you the added features of being able to embed video into your books, add audio, edit pages and sell your publication.

Yudu’s library is extensive with thousands of e-books and magazines and all kinds of subjects.  While viewing publications you can also add your own bookmarks, highlight text and add a small note by simply dragging the notepad onto the publication.  You can also save your favourites to your library.  Roll your mouse over the tools when viewing to see how you can share this document, download or print.

The Future of Personalisation

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Have you ever wondered where personalisation might be leading us? I certainly have and if it means less cost to the environment by reducing waste I’m all for it. Like a lot of people there’s nothing more satisfying to me than stepping away from mass consumerism and having something unique especially if it’s my own creation. This gorgeous video by nueve ojos shows the potential of how that might work in the future and if you are of the creative ilk you’ll definitely want to check out this great kiwi company Ponoko.com This one stop digital shop is a haven for design professionals and those who want to try out their creative skills without the start up costs associated with a new business. Create an online account and you can upload your designs to your digital showroom, but unlike other design stores the designer pays absolutely nothing until someone buys your design. There is also a forum for sharing and communicating ideas with other designers from around the world. Some designs are offered free, to get you started. Alternatively you can pay a designer for their digital design, download it and add your own touch to it. So whether you want to create a one off personalised present or take it more seriously it’s well worth a look, Ponoko.com

Full Printed from nueveojos on Vimeo.

 

Effective coaching

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During the July school holidays, I’ve taken the opportunity to catch up on a whole lot of admin for the coming term.  I’ve also given myself time to reflect on my own professional practice.  With that in mind, I’ve reviewed tracking docs that I have with those teachers that I’m working with and added a few prompts for them to consider in terms of their goals, what’s worked and what hasn’t gone so well.

I’m also applying for Google Trainer Certification and in the process, came across this article by Grant Wiggins, Seven Keys to Effective Feedback  (2012).  Wiggins, highlights one of the key elements to good feedback is to leverage off a defined goal.  It’s a dominate theme I like to apply in my coaching practice.  The ubiquitous nature of online learning and the plethora of approaches available to teachers invites us, tempts us even to want to try them all.  Personally, I can easily get drawn into a rabbit hole of ideas and options, but keeping my eye on the goal helps me and the teachers I’m working with stay focused to achieve our objectives.

Wiggins, also advocated for feedback to be given in a timely manner.  I’d do this each time I meet with a teacher, a quick debrief at the end of a lesson, followed by an email before the next session.  When time allows, meeting during a non-contact period allows us to have a conversation in detail about what’s worked well and next steps.  This ongoing and consistent manner, reflecting on identified goals should lead to a satisfying outcome for all involved.  A win, win situation.

The stories we tell ourselves

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I recently attended the PPTA Te Wehengarua Education Conference 2023 which was held in Tāmaki Makaurau, Auckland.  It was exciting to be amongst educators from across New Zealand and Australia to share ideas and best practice.  The speakers were fabulous and not just from the education sector.

Jehan Casinader, an award winning journalist and mental health advocate spoke about how the stories we tell ourselves shape our future.  There are a significant number of New Zealand children growing up in difficult circumstances who lack a positive healthy and hopeful story upon which to build their life.   His book This Is Not How It Ends: How Rewriting Your Story Can Save Your Life was written while he was navigating his own way out of depression.  Through that period, Jehan came to the understanding that  “what happens in life is less important than the story we tell about it” and that the stories we tell ourselves can always be changed.  He suggested it’s about switching the story from what’s wrong with you to what’s happened to you.  From there, how could you tell a different story using the same facts? 

Our interpretation of what actually happened may not be true, perhaps there were elements missing that we weren’t aware of like the influence from other people on us.  He posed another question, who’s writing your story?  Are we truly in charge of our narrative or have we handed that authority over to someone else?  Remembering that we have within us the power to change our stories, and rewrite a positive narrative can help us to take back some power.

Encouraging young people to question the stories they tell themselves by asking “If your life was a Hollywood movie, what character would you be playing in your life right now?”, can be a starting a point for more conversation and understanding.

Through the process of changing the story we can find hope, we can find a new direction, we can find peace within ourselves.  A good story is one in which the main character comes out a better, richer and more whole person.