The last two weeks I attended my first school experience placement. This experience for me was thoroughly enjoyable, yet challenging in pushing me out of my “comfort zone”.
One strength I found I developed over the course of the two weeks was getting to know each pupil in my class (P.2/3) individually e.g. I knew every pupil by their name. I could change my register in how I spoke to the class and then how I spoke to the class teacher. When presenting ‘mini’ lessons to the class I ensured every pupil was involved, I used their names to ask questions when carrying out a “show me, tell me” lesson.
I feel I made most progress when taking smaller groups of students for reading and mathematics tasks. I enjoyed doing these tasks as I got see a variety of abilities within the class as a whole.
One development I have realised I need to work on is my teacher voice/presence. The teacher I was working with could get the class under control by using a simple ‘class call back’ e.g. the teacher would shout ‘STOP’ and the class would stop what they were doing and repeat back to her ‘COLLABORATE AND LISTEN’. Although, when I was in control of the class I found it difficult to get the attention of the whole class at once. I have took note of all the ‘class call backs’ my teacher used and hope to make use of them on my next school experience placement.
