The idea to hand over the class for students to teach each other is based on the work of a South American educational philosopher Paulo Freire, who empowered the poor by not only teaching to them to read words, but by doing so to also read the world… In short….. I teach you …. You teach me. We empower each other when we learn from each other.

And so in week 8 Room 18 again became a space where students shared their worlds of knowledge and taught each other about a great variety of things.

Students had to generate a topic of interest, present learning goals and take the class through a planned sequence of learning activities to present their work. Topics included Leonardo da Vinci, South Africa, The Rush for Gold, The horses of the Kaimanawas, London, The Race to the Pole, Our Senses, The Victorians, Maori Fibre Arts, Light, Video Games, Mythical Creatures, Rugby, The Glenn Miller Band, Technology, and Our Solar System.

The class participated in interactive power point presentations, animations, songs, web searches, quizzes, and games to demonstrate their learning.

It has been a wonderful experience to see our team grow so much in confidence and develop high impact methods to teach others. They had to manage the lesson planning sequence, IT support, transition of activities and class management to make the seminar work, and I have to say I’m so proud of what the team have accomplished. I was blown away by their commitment to quality …. All alongside doing a good chunk of their other class work as well. We do take enrichment work rather seriously here!!!!!

Here is our seminar team below……. Can’t you just see the neurons oozing from them.!!!