February 27, 2017
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Holmes Rahe Scale

After completing the Holmes Rahe scale I had a score of 108, which falls into the relatively low stress level category over the past year. However, I don’t think that this is an accurate score on a personal level as I feel that I have definitely very stressed this year with certain things ,mainly university work, body image and eating problems and personal relationship problems. I do find the tool useful, however I think that the tool is only useful if the questions relate to you and your personal circumstances, I feel that the scale doesn’t take into consideration, wider issues that may be relevant today or things that may relate to older or younger people. I know that my score would be much, much higher if the questions were related to my situation or there was a wider range of questions related to mental health problems or factors that are more prominent in our society today such as anxiety, depression, eating disorders, work loads on different age groups etc.

I combat stress in different ways, sometimes I tackle it head on and sometimes I just crumble and cry. I mainly listen to music to combat stress, however, sometimes I like to go a walk or just take a break and watch some tv. I think that it also depends on the situation and how I’m feeling at the time as sometimes if its something that has really annoyed me I get very angry and snap at people which is not good and something I am trying to tackle to get rid of this emotional reaction or I try and just count to ten, If I am upset I try and count to ten or just like to be alone.

February 27, 2017
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Mind, body and health

After reading the Pengilly & Dowd (2000) article on Stress Hardiness I have discovered more about what causes stress and also found a few ways from today’s lecture and inputs that would help combat stress.

Firstly, 5 main factors which can negatively impact our health are; loneliness, lack of social support, normative life transitions, lack of human touch/contact and major life events.

Loneliness is when we feel alone even when we are surrounded by many friends or are in a room full of people. Loneliness can cause major effects and negative impacts on our health, both mentally and physically as it can manifest itself into depression, faults in our immune system, unhealthy lifestyle choice, and can make you more susceptible to illnesses. Loneliness should not be confused with being alone as being alone is a choice and literally means being on your own with no one else with you.

Lack of social support can cause negative effects in our health as we may not have people to talk to about our stress and needs and so we may end up feeling negative about ourselves and our situation. We need a social support in order to feel loved and better about ourselves as we have the reassurance from someone else. A lack of social support may lead to lower life expectancy, longer recovery times from surgery, more need for medication in certain illnesses such as depression or medication for surgery etc.

Normative life situations can have a negative effect on our health as we may be thinking about certain life events that we worry about such as retirement or work, these may cause us stress and negativity but not as much as non-normative life situations (things that we cannot predict) for example, a death, divorce losing a job etc. These situations can have a huge impact on our health such as neurotic impairment, coronary heart disease, cancer and many more body related illnesses.

A lack of touch/human contact can have a negative impact on our health because we are not physically engaging with or touching people close to us which is important for expressing emotions and fulfilling emotional needs and comfort. The positive effects of human touch on our health are quite significant as our blood pressure lowers, our stress levels decrease and we have reduced tension. So we can clearly see why a person would need thus human contact and how they would benefit from it.

Major life events can cause negative impacts on the body as this is very similar to non normative life situations. These events are often unpredictable and can cause great stress to the body/mind, illnesses and overall poor health.

Ways to combat stress/negative impacts on our health.

Physical exercise

Finding ways to cope, such as counting to 10. Reading, walking etc.

Religion/ spirituality/ following certain beliefs

Finding support systems you can trust and talk to such as friends and family etc

Finding ways to gain control over certain situations, i.e- stressed about exams- make a study timetable.

February 13, 2017
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At risk behaviours – The Glasgow effect

‘The Glasgow effect’ is a term used to describe the relationship between Glasgow and poor health and deprivation. After reading the document I discovered that the whole idea of the document is related to income deprivation, age deprivation and sex deprivation but the main findings of the research were closely linked to deprivation overall. The study shows that Glasgow’s levels and patterns of deprivation are almost identical to those of the two other large UK cities, Liverpool and Manchester. however, despite the similarity in deprivation in these areas, Glasgow morality rates are significantly higher than Liverpool and Manchester. The findings show that lung cancer has a 27% higher mortality rate in Glasgow than the other two cities. This trend is the same for suicide, Glasgow has a 70% higher mortality rate than Manchester and Liverpool. Two other higher mortality rates in Glasgow than Manchester and Liverpool are drug and alcohol related deaths with alcohol related deaths being 2.3 times higher (alcohol) and 2.5 times higher (drugs) than Manchester and Liverpool.

Research has also show that ‘The Glasgow effect’ is not something that has always been a prominent feature in Scottish health and deprivation. Research has shown that mortality rates were not always higher than Liverpool and Manchester and that Glasgow rates can be seen improving more slowly than rates in Manchester and Liverpool in the latter part of the 20th century. This suggests that ‘The Glasgow effect’ is a relatively recent phenomenon.

Given the research carried out and considering Scottish culture, it could be determined that ‘The Glasgow effect’ could be caused by many health factors and choices/behaviours such as binge drinking, excessive alcohol consumption, love of fried food, poor diet and a lack of exercise. Cultural and/or social influences clearly contributes to the quality of life and the lifestyle that people lead within certain parts of the country and therefore significantly contributes to ‘The Glasgow effect’.

Considering my own opinion and after looking into ‘The Glasgow effect’, I believe that as a whole country generalisation, we as a country are not a healthy country, however, this is down to the individual and the individual’s choices and behaviours. In general, I do not think that Scotland is as healthy as we generally have a poor diet, a lack of exercise and a tendency to binge drink. This has led to high rates of mortality compared with the rest of Europe which could easily be changed by making small changes to our diet and lifestyle such as eating more fruit and vegetables, which has been shown to increase our quality of life and benefit our body significantly. We could also drink in moderation and not drink to just get drunk all the time. By including physical exercise such as more walking or playing sports could also help reverse the effects of ‘The Glasgow effect’.

February 7, 2017
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Societies and Lifestyles- week4

This week in the lecture we discussed inclusion and equality from a disabled point of discussion. I found it very interesting and useful to be able to learn about Allport’s scale of Prejudice and Discrimination and also learn a bit about the theorists which are relative to this field such as Nancy Fraser. I also found that religion and inclusion are linked closely together as people can be subject to discrimination, violence or verbal attacks because of their religion/race.

We also learned about the history of disability and inclusion and how disabled people were subject to mistreatment and humiliation such as being placed in asylums, harmed or being toured around in circuses but we also discussed how attitudes towards disability has changed drastically over the years and decades. In our seminar later on, we were discussing situations where children with disabilities may be discriminated against and how we could deal with these situations. It was useful to be able to use Allport’s scale to classify these examples and also think if our own examples that we have experienced ourselves.

I now feel that I have a better understanding of this topic and I feel that I would now be able to handle a situation like the ones in the seminar more effectively if they happened in my own classroom. However, I do intend to read further into this topic to further my knowledge.

February 1, 2017
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Societies and Lifestyles- week 3

This week in the lecture and tutorials with Lisa, I found the concepts of inclusion and equality very interesting as I was always under the impression that they were virtually the same thing. However, after this input, I feel that I now have a better understanding of what the two concepts are and how they are quite separate but still connected. I learned that inclusion means that everyone should be included but that equality is different as it is different from just being included in something. for example, equal opportunities for everyone, although everyone’s needs to be equal and included may be different but everyone’s needs should be catered for in order to be included and reach their full potential. I find this area of the course very interesting and look forward to learning a bit more next week in the lecture and tutorials. I will also read extra materials and do some research for myself in this area of the module.

January 28, 2017
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Societies and lifestyles- week 2

This week, I learned a lot more about religion and society. Before the lecture and tutorial I had never heard of ‘Unchurched Spirituality’, but have since learned that the term means, spirituality that is not related to or follows an organised religion and usually does not follow the doctrines of a religion. In the tutorial and independent study tasks we also learned more about the theorists behind these views such as, Max Weber, Bruce Lincoln and Karl Marx. I feel that I still don’t fully understand the works of these theorists and so will have to research more about them in my own time to gain a bit more knowledge and insight into their work and contribution to religion and society. I also enjoyed learning about the different practices and beliefs of different branches of religions, such as Jehovas Witnesses and, i.e -refusing blood and also I found some of the clips we were shown in class intriguing, i.e- the video about the church who use snakes in their beliefs and practices. I was able to see the positive and negative aspects of this. For example, the dangers of certain practices but also the benefit to that religious community such as a sense of belonging.

I think that this module is helping me to understand further about religion and the diversity of religion in society today. I am beginning to realise that there are a lot more branches of religion that I knew of in the world and I think that this will help me when in the classroom because there will probably be a mix of cultures and religion within one class. I will have a better understanding of more cultures and not be more open minded towards a much vaster variety of religions and cultures.

January 16, 2017
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Religion, Societies and Lifestyles

The lecture and tutorial today helped me gain a better insight into what religion is and how it is defined in the world. I learned that there many types of religion and that they can be split into different categories such as established religions, sects and cults. This was something I did not know before as I thought that sects and cults were not classed as religions. I also learned about some of the theorists involved in religion and this helped me to understand religion from a more academic point of view. I also understand a bit better from the lecture and independent task how religion can be influenced and interpreted by theorist views.

I feel that the notes and concepts were a bit confusing at first as it is such a heavy workload, however I feel that it will be easier to understand the concepts by reading the extra reading materials and trying to link the concepts to modern day society and religion. I also feel that I will enjoy the module and so I will find it easier to learn the concepts and theory.

I enjoyed the tutorial today as we got to share our opinions with people we didn’t perhaps speak to very often within the class. It was useful to get to hear other people’s opinion on religion and how their own faiths linked in with the information about religion and the research we had found out about the theorists.

By being a part of this module, I feel that I will gain a better understanding of religion in the world around me and may notice more aspects of religion that I did not notice before. I think that this will be useful in a primary school setting as a teacher because I think that it will be easier to adapt lessons and gain more insight to the different religions and cultures that children are part of. As a future primary teacher, I aspire to be able to make all children in my care feel comfortable expressing their beliefs and practices regarding their religion and not to feel that they cannot in other people’s presence in society.

Using what I have learned today and my previous understanding of religion, I can see how religion has an impact on societies and lifestyles. I can see from both sides that religion can be both good and challenging. I can see and understand, following Durkheim’s theory that religion brings society together and the benefits that this has. I can also see how religion can be derived and divide societies through cults and negative forces on a religion.

Overall, through the course of the lecture, independent task and the tutorial I have gained a better insight into religion and societies and lifestyles and how religion impacts society and lifestyles. I feel that I will grasps the concepts better by reading over notes and further reading. I am deeply interested in this subject and I am looking forward to learning more about the topic in the module.

December 2, 2016
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Personal response to ‘Room’

Personal response to Room

Throughout my life, I have always been a keen reader. Since around the age of six I was visiting my local library and would work my way through 3-4 books every week, even if I wasn’t properly reading them, so yes, I have always loved reading from a very young age and still do now.

I read to for pleasure when I find the time to read and when I do find the time to read for pleasure, I tend to read crime and thriller books along with mystery and fantasy books such as: The Lovely Bones, Gone Girl, Harry Potter and The Girl on the Train etc. I love reading these sort of texts/genres as I feel part of the story and I feel drawn in to the book. I also like reading these type of fiction texts as I like to see how different authors describe situations, characters and scenes in the book.

As part of my university work, I had the opportunity to read the book ‘Room’ by Emma Donoghue. I found the book very interesting and intriguing to read. I also enjoyed the book as these are the type of books I like to read with mystery and suspense in them throughout the story. I also enjoyed the book as it gave me a better insight of how some children learn and develop and how some children struggle to develop within certain situations such as neglect and lack of interaction with people and language variations. I also enjoyed the book as it highlighted the importance of interaction with children and how important it is that children need to be involved with different situations and activities, not just confined to a minimal amount of activity and limited interaction within the classroom and outside of the classroom.

I would recommend ‘Room’ to others as I think the book is very interesting and makes you want to keep reading by the nature of the story. I think that other people should read the book as it gives an insight of children’s language development in an informal way that is an accurate perception.

When reading ‘Room’, the language of the book challenged my own language skills as Jack’s language is very disjointed in the book and there are unusual language patterns. This challenged me as I have never read a book like this before. I also felt challenged when reading the book because of the darkness to the story which was quite disturbing in some ways. However, reading ‘Room’ has improved my reading skills in the sense that I feel more confident engaging with texts that are not considered normal or contain normal language patterns that may be harder to understand at first.

Reading ‘Room’ has encouraged me to read other novels of this nature as I found the book very interesting and relevant to the course I am studying. Although I do read novels already, I have never read a book like this before and thoroughly enjoyed reading the book. I will definitely be reading more books like this in future.

I only ever considered academic reading to be textbooks and journals, I never realised that these kinds of books would help with my learning at university. ‘Room’ was a very effective and useful text to engage with when learning about language acquisition and development as the book showed both sides of language development in the sense of positive and negative. For example, the book shows the negative side of language development if children are not exposed to a wide range of language and interaction. This is shown by using disjointed language. The positive aspect of language acquisition and development is then shown through Jack’s positive language development after he leaves ‘Room’. This is useful as it shows the challenges that some children may face/the different situations children are in at home which could impact on their development both inside and outside the classroom. The book also helps us to realise as future teacher’s that there may be other reasons why children are not grasping things within our classroom.

November 8, 2016
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Reflection on Placement

I found that placement was very worthwhile and beneficial for myself. I found it very useful to see the different variations of methods that teachers use and how the theory of our lectures and workshops are put into practice and context.

I found that primary schools have changed a lot over the years as there is far more interactive learning an pupil involvement rather than copying and listening. It was great to see the way that children of different ages and abilities engaged with learning.

Overall, I enjoyed my placement, however I felt that one week was not enough to gain a lot of benefit from what we have been learning at university. I felt that this may have impacted on the ability to complete the eight placement tasks to a high standard as we had such a short time to gain and condense specific information relevant to the tasks. It was challenging as classes may not have been doing any lessons on what the literacy and mathematics tasks were referring to. It was also challenging, personally for me as teachers were asking me to work with groups within classes so it was difficult to observe a wider range of pupils.

I had a very positive experience as the school I was placed in made me feel extremely welcome and relaxed. I felt that the teachers wanted me there and so this boosted my confidence which impacted on my interaction with the children and staff. I also felt extremely comfortable asking questions in the school which was beneficial and useful on placement.

Strength –

I found that my main communication strength within the classroom was the way in engaged and interacted with children and teachers and the way that I was able to vary my vocabulary and different ways of engagement when speaking to different ages and different abilities of children. An example of this is when I was working with a reading group in P1 that were not as advanced with their phonic sounds and so I still included the action after saying the word that goes with the phonic in order to show them it physically written down in a word but did not need to with another group who were more advanced. I feel comfortable in engagement as I did previous work experience in a primary school. I also found that I took a bit of a back seat in my work experience and I was more of a peer to children rather than a teacher or authority figure. Evidence of this is that I was able to speak to children easily and confidently. I also found that children knew that I was a student teacher or an authority figure as they spoke to me respectfully and appropriately whilst still being able to talk about things outside of classwork. I feel that I have established the appropriate teacher-friend balance with children in the classroom setting.

Weakness –

I found that an area of development needing to be worked on is my tone and pitch. I found that teachers pointed out that I should vary my tone a bit more and be more dramatic when working with children to keep them more engaged and enthusiastic about their work. I also found that I need to avoid using ‘yip’ and ‘a’ instead of yes and I. I was not even aware that I overuse these errors in my language.

Area of most improvement-

The area I feel that I improved most upon was not using slang words when in the classroom. This was a huge challenge for me as I have been bought up using slang words my whole life. I also found that I was able to give more clear instructions to classes by avoiding using slang, especially in the infant classes. I slowed my pace down for the infants and seen a huge improvement of their interaction with me as they had a clearer understanding of what I was asking them to do.

Strategies-

I will form an actions plan to put in place from now onwards which will also help with my next placemen. As part of my action plan I will practice giving clear, paced instructions further and not use slang words to certain audiences and not as often in general. I will also practice varying my tone and dramatizing my actions in certain situations when working with children. I will also practice saying yes and I instead of ‘yip’ and ‘a’ when working with children. I could also ask my peers and teachers for advice of how to improve my weaknesses. Another way to improve my weaknesses is trying to imitate teachers tone of voice, expressions and reactions in certain situations.

September 6, 2016
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