Placement – Page 2 – UWS BA ePDPs

Placement Reflection

During the two weeks of placement, I was privileged enough to observe within many classes. This allowed me to see many different stages throughout the school environment. I worked with small groups on certain topics such as maths, literacy and art. This meant I could get a better understanding of the things the pupils were struggling with. I was involved throughout all lessons giving assistance to any pupils who needed it which allowed me to get to know the pupils better.

The areas of the curriculum that I observed were maths, literacy, topic, science and outdoor learning. By doing this, it gave me ideas and strategies for the future. Challenging behaviour was an issue in some classes but the class teacher helped to think about ways to help and calm the pupils down. It allowed me to use the communication skills highlighted in Uni to be put to good practice.

By being in the staff room, it meant I could contribute to discussions and get any of my questions answered. It also made me feel included in the school as a whole. By also staying at the school when the children left meant I could see the structure and organisation a teacher needs and how important is it. I also went with the children to the assembly on both Fridays which showed me the work being produced in many classes. It also became apparent to me how together the school was and how helpful they were to the people around them.

The whole school placement made aware to me the things I need to work on such as trying to find methods to keep all children on task and not spend most time with specific children. Also making sure all children are concentrating by making sure certain pupils don’t dominate. I need to also think about developing the skill in being a reflective practitioner as this is a very important skill to have and use in the teaching profession. Positives to take away from the experience is that I engaged well with the children and adults within the school and remained professional throughout.

Situated Communication Study Task – Feedback

Continue reading “Situated Communication Study Task – Feedback”

After watching the video with my partner Julia, we compared our notes which were closely aligned. We observed that the teacher spoke at a suitable volume and pace while using language appropriate to the age and stage of children in the group. We recorded areas of improvement, he struggled to get the class’ attention and lacked positive body language; this could be improved by standing up demonstrating more authority over the class. The teacher therefore has areas of improvement in the non-verbal communication category although he did maintain eye contact with pupils. We both realised how important it is to reflect on personal and peers teaching practice as you can improve from watching back on yourself.

I was surprised that in the video the teacher did not stand up, I felt this gave the class a more relaxed feel and this is possibly why he struggled to gain the children’s attention. My partner had the same notes about the body language of the teacher due to the lack of standing up therefore there was a lack of engagement with the class.

I did not find this study task difficult; I found the task very useful and interesting as the video was a practice to observe a fellow teacher in a classroom environment. I will take this experience of observation forward to placement which will assist personal reflection and peer observation.

I am clear about the difference between feedback and judgement. Feedback is the foundation of improving teaching skills and is more positive than negative. It consists of improvements and suggestions you can take on board to enhance your teaching. Judgement in my opinion is more critical and negative which can lead to the person receiving it having low self-esteem and possibly decreasing their confidence.

The suggestion that I would take from this task to my forthcoming placement would be to ensure that I take feedback constructively to progress my teaching practice and improve my skills.

I am looking forward to placement as I enjoy being in a classroom environment. I have had many positive experiences in schools which I have helped in and all the teachers are very appreciative of assistance. I am looking forward to observing a variety of various aspects of teaching and observing lessons in a wide range of classes.

Reference List:

TED Talks Education (2013) BILL GATES: Teachers need real feedback[Online] Available at: https://www.ted.com/talks/bill_gates_teachers_need_real_feedback#t-70065

Behaviour2Learn (2011) Behaving With Cowley – Classroom Routines[Online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4v5UVdyu8Y4&feature=youtu.be

EDCHAT (2013) Relationships for Learning – Effective Feedback [Online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWBW_cbP86Q&feature=youtu.be

3RD FEB – AROUND THE WORLD

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27TH JAN – YEARS OF COMPULSORY EDUCATION

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Health and Safety Checklist

Below: this is an example of one of the clips that are in most classrooms/ICT suites etc. If there is an emergency, one of the pupils would be instructed to take this to the Office to alert them of the emergency situation.

Reflections on Placement.

On the week beginning the 31st of October I went on my first of many weeks of placement within the BA Education course. I went to a small primary school minutes away from me and learned a lot whilst I was there. I really enjoyed my placement and am looking forward to the next one. … Continue reading “Reflections on Placement.”

Strengths

I realised that I was more confident at interacting with pupils and staff than I thought I would be. I consistently was able to communicate clearly and loudly enough for pupils to hear and understand what I was saying. In addition to this I also made eye contact with who I was communicating with and used positive body language all week. For example I was not sitting with my arms crossed. As I was in every class in the school throughout the week from nursery all the way to primary 7 I realised that I was able to adapt my language to suit the pupil that I was talking to with ease. The staff within the school were all very welcoming and encouraging which gave me more confidence to push myself outside my comfort zone when communicating and approaching the pupils and other members of staff.

Area of Most Progress

The area that I feel I progressed the most in was simply my confidence. At first I thought that children would rather interact with their own teacher who they are used to rather than me but as the week went on I realised that the pupils also valued my opinion and wanted my help as well. In addition to this I noticed at the beginning of the week that I was not really using hand gestures a lot which may have come across as showing that I was not as enthusiastic as I wanted to show. I worked on this throughout the week and by the Friday I felt as though this had significantly improved, and will continue to improve with the more practice that I get.

Areas Requiring Progress

During the week I had to complete two self evaluations. I found this challenging as it was hard to judge what I had done well and what I had not done well as I can not see myself communicating from an outsiders point of view. However the help of the peer evaluation and advice from teachers assured me I was on the right track with my self evaluation. Furthermore, I had a bad habit of asking pupils a question and not giving them enough time to think of an answer, instead giving them another question to help them answer the initial question. I have learned that it is important to allow children to think and give them time as they can not always come up with an answer straight away.

Action Plan

As my next placement is a long time away I want to work on my communication skills in my everyday life so that when the next placement comes around I am more than prepared to go feeling very confident in my communication skills. In order to do so I think my part-time job will come in very handy as it involves serving customers and also being out on the shop floor welcoming customers and interacting with them. I think this will massively increase my communication skills as I will be able to get a lot of practice with a huge range of people. In addition to this I will also get to practice my communication skills with the upcoming situated communication presentation assignment, which will test my skills in front of an audience, something which I do not have a lot of practice in. The previous points mentioned should help me to strive to be a more effective communicator in the future.

Reflections on Placement

Now that my BA1 one week placement is over, I can now look back and reflect. I had an extraordinary week with many learning curves which I will take on board with me through my whole teaching career. As Monday, … Continue reading →

Now that my BA1 one week placement is over, I can now look back and reflect. I had an extraordinary week with many learning curves which I will take on board with me through my whole teaching career.

As Monday, the 31^st was quickly approaching, my nerves were starting to kick in. I was anxious to begin my first day as a student teacher and worried I wasn’t going to make the impression I needing to make. After all, first impressions are cruical. It was like going for a job interview only this time 100 times more nerve wracking. As I prepared my tasks the night before, I remined myself that to succeed I must fling myself into the deep end I give everything I have. I knew the week ahead will be an experience I will never forget and one I had to grasp with both hands to gain the experience I needed.

Strength

One area of strength I identified through my self-evaluation check list was an element of communication which was the pitch and tone of my voice. I had the opportunity to work with a small group of primary one children during literacy. The task I had was to introduce a new book to the children, ask them to identify the pictures in the book to describe the story. All children seemed to be engaged throughout the lesson and they also seemed to be following the lesson. I tried to make the instructions as clear as possible throughout the lesson. I encouraged turn taking and no shouting out. I also encouraged the children to ask questions to help further their learning. My peer mentioned that I had a “soft tone” when working with the children and commented that I spoke clearly at an adequate volume to suit the size of the group.

Area of most progress

I think the area I made a lot of progress was communicating with parents. This is something I have hardly had an opportunity to do, and I would like to have more experience in. However, placement allowed me to further this skill. I took part in an after-school session which was linked to the Scottish Attainment Challenge. This session invited parents to come into the school to work on maths with their children. This furthered the parent’s knowledge on what their children were learning in the classroom and helped the parents assist their child with their homework. I had the chance to interact with some parents and ask them questions about their involvement in the school. Some parents commented that they weren’t too great at maths their selves so these sessions helped their learning as well as their child. I enjoyed working with the parents as this was a different insight to the child’s learning at home

Areas Requiring Progress

One area requiring progress would be my nonverbal communication. When working with the primary sevens I realised that I was very standoffish and not that confident. I also found myself not sitting in the correct place when I took a group lesson in literacy. The class teacher gave me some informal feedback on how to correct this and ensured me that I don’t have to be nervous.

Action Plan

Throughout my years of being a student teacher I aim striving to gain as many experiences as I can to further my skills, knowledge and communication skills. I am a strong believer in no matter how old we are, we are still learning every step of the way. I will take guidance from the informal feedback I received and I will also take guidance from the peer observation. I will research and keep on top of how to communicate positively and effectively and I will also practice. I will aim to be a reflective practitioner.

BA1 Placement Complete!

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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 … Continue reading →

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.

Reflection on Placement

The school I visited for my 1st year week long placement was a small rural primary school with an incorporated nursery that had approximately two dozen pupils split into two classes; P1-3 and P4-7. I worked alongside both teachers and a fellow student throughout the week, interacting with all the pupils of the school and … Continue reading Reflection on Placement →

The school I visited for my 1^st year week long placement was a small rural primary school with an incorporated nursery that had approximately two dozen pupils split into two classes; P1-3 and P4-7. I worked alongside both teachers and a fellow student throughout the week, interacting with all the pupils of the school and of the nursery as well as interacting with the teachers in the classroom and staffroom.

Strengths

I would say that my main strength is that I am an effective communicator, I can effectively explain to children what their tasks are and what is expected of them throughout these tasks. I can also successfully describe to a child the steps for getting to the correct answer of a question using creative and interactive methods. For example, there was one child; let’s call her Jane. Now jane was stuck on the following mental question 5 – ? = 0, she was struggling to mentally subtract to get to zero. I came up with the idea to use concrete material (pencils) to physically show the calculation needed, the situation went as follows.

Jane – I’m stuck on this question (5 – ? = 0)

Myself – alright, well if I have 5 pencils (holding 5 pencils in my hand) but I don’t want any, how many do you have to take away from me so that I have no pencils.

Jane – I’m not sure

Myself – ok well you take them from me, physically take the pencils out my hand and count as you do so.

Jane – one (takes away 1 pencil), two (takes away another pencil), three (takes away another), four (takes away another), five (takes away the last pencil, looks up and smiles). Five, the answers five.

Myself – well done that was good.

I used this process repeatedly when Jane became stuck on similar questions and also when other students in the class became confused as well.

Area of Most Progress

I would say that my confidence in working with the children, using behavioural management techniques and also interacting with the teachers on a professional level as I had never experienced anything like that before progressed as the week went on. At first I struggled with interacting with the children as I didn’t know them, as in the school I previously did work experience in I knew 90% of the students which made connecting with them particularly easy, but in this case I had no prior knowledge of any of the children which made me less confident in interacting with them. This lack of confidence did however decrease over the course of the placement as I spent more and more time with the children every day and built up trust. I also became more confident in using behavioural management techniques as the week progressed as in the beginning I was reluctant and unsure whether to use them as I am only a student and I am not yet qualified so don’t have the authority to punish bad behaviour. I was however reassured by the teacher that if I saw any bad behaviour I was to deal with it in a manner I saw fit, this usually consisted of me having a quiet word with the misbehaving pupil. Interacting with the teachers on a professional level was quite difficult to get my head around at first because I had never experienced anything like it before, but after a few days I realised that I was viewed as an equal to the teachers and was trusted with personal and sensitive information about the students and was also asked for my opinion on situations and how to handle them.

Area Requiring Progress

I would say that the area that needs the most improvement is my ability to self-reflect on my experiences. At the moment I can reflect and find all the negatives of what do but I really struggle with identifying the positive aspects, this is probably due to a lack of self-confidence and self-worth. This lack of confidence also affects my ability to present in front of my peers. Children that are younger than me and my elders don’t make me nervous at all but when it comes to presenting to a group of people my own age that I don’t know or aren’t comfortable around I get really nervous and sometimes I’m even ill from the stress. So this is one area that I would really like to improve on as it will be relevant to my future career and experiences.

Action Plan

My plan of action is to film myself presenting to groups and watch it back and note down what I did well and what I didn’t do so well, I’ll also do this when I’m in everyday situations such as paying for shopping. This practise in everyday and formal settings will give me the chance to review everything I do right and wrong and should hopefully help me get better at giving myself positive feedback. For the confidence side of presenting I’m going to practise talking in front of a mirror and also build myself up to presenting to groups I am uncomfortable rather than jumping in at the deep in.