Within the TDT Task booklet there was an activity on Mindfulness. I decided not to complete this task as others were of more interest and I had already completed a number of tasks to make up the 30hrs. However, throughout the module I have been interested in what mindfulness is and thought I would give it a go. I had already downloaded an app ‘Headspace’ ages ago but never actually used so this is the app I decided to try out.
After signing up and creating an account, I began the free trial activities available. It is a set of 10 which you’re encouraged to do on a daily basis. This however proved to be quite challenging to actually do. I felt that when I did it in the morning, it made me more tired and wanting to have a nap so I decided to use it at night, as a wind down from the day. I found this actually helped me drop off to sleep a bit easier, especially as some days were quite busy and stressful & it can take a wee while to switch off!
This is however something I would like to give another go and try to do it everyday as sometimes I would forget. I would also like to read up about it and if possible see/implement it in practice as I have heard a lot of positive things about doing Mindfulness within the classroom and the benefits it has on children and young people.
Spend some time looking at the vast resources around the area of food and health provided by Education Scotland. Choose two areas and resources that you could use in the classroom.
Evidence: Identify two resources that you could use in future practice and reflect on how they could help to identify skills development for the learner.
Personal Thoughts:
Maureen’s input about food & health was of great interest. I personally learnt a lot of new information regarding balanced diets & healthy eating, reasons for food choices and also resources available to practitioners and schools. Following her input I looked further into the resources & support material available on Education Scotland for practitioners hoping to cover this HWB area in a classroom context.
Learn to play ‘The Equality Game’ and organise a game with other members of the wider MA programme. Consider how you could use this in the classroom to promote fairness and build relationships. You will find more information about the game via the weblink below. Reflect on the appropriateness of this activity and decide how it links to HWB.
Evidence: Take some photos of your volunteer group and write a reflection on how this could be used in the classroom and impact it could have. Evaluate the enjoyment, effectiveness and impact of using this game using feedback from your volunteer group.
The Equality Game
This game is designed to ‘further critical discussion about the nature of equality, fair treatment, and who gets to define such standards.’
The attached video is just a short extract of the full game; later we also split the group into children & adults and added the concept of using money to pay for the sweets. Similar themes to those identified in the article by Arnold-Foster (2015) were raised in our discussion these included the idea that: equal happiness may not be the same as equal distribution. If you have earned your money you deserve to be rewarded for your hard work, however it might be hard to know whether a person has worked hard. Some people start off with more or less money depending on birth and this has nothing to do with hard work. Although our discussion did not reach this point, Arnold-Foster (2015) suggests that further discussion might lead to the idea that:
‘Smarties should still be shared out equally, irrespective of spending power.’ ‘Or perhaps there should be a minimum that everyone receives, with the lucky few being able to supplement his or her supply by buying extra?’
A lesson based around the game and the following experiences and outcomes could lead to further discussions, lessons and activities relating to money, poverty and social justice. For older children (upper school) current political topics such as the distribution of wealth or the cutting of tax credits and benefits could connect this game to a real-life context.
On reflection of our own experience of playing the game we felt that it could be an enjoyable and effective way to introduce topics such as fairness and wealth distribution. We felt that this activity could be used in a lesson built around the following experiences & outcomes from HWB:
Through contributing my views, time and talents, I play a part in bringing about positive change in my school and wider community. HWB 0-13a / HWB 1-13a / HWB 2-13a / HWB 3-13a / HWB 4-13a
As I explore the rights to which I and others are entitled, I am able to exercise these rights appropriately and accept the responsibilities that go with them. I show respect for the rights of others. HWB 0-09a / HWB 1-09a / HWB 2-09a / HWB 3-09a / HWB 4-09a
Personal Thoughts:
This was an interesting activity to try out. Unfortunately due to time constraints, at the time of writing this post, I was unable to get a volunteer group together to test it out. This therefore had implications on the results of the activity however a few of us improvised and did it together to gain some experience of it. The smarties were also replaced with minstrels however I don’t believe this influenced the activity itself.
To familiarise myself with the nature of the activity, I read the article which was provided (link above). I found this quite an easy read as it was simple to understand and clearly set out – due to the way in which newspaper articles are produced. After reading the article, I discussed the activity with a peer of mine to ensure we had both understood it clearly.
Following a discussion with some others in the module class, we decided that we would give it a go to enable us to experience the activity, even though it was not a blind volunteer group. I feel that due to this we were all aware of what the aim of the activity was and therefore almost knew the type of thing to say/outcome – influencing the discussion/end result.
With this taken in to consideration, I believe that if ‘The Equality Game’ was implemented in a classroom environment, with children, the response would’ve been very different. I would anticipate that there would have been much more discussion and disputes among the group about what they believe is fair. In relation to the effectiveness, I believe this type of activity encourages the children to have a voice and argue their point of view. It would also enable children to develop an understanding of other people’s viewpoints and formulate their own ideas. Encouraging healthy debates, in a controlled manner, enables each individual to develop many skills including communication, reasoning and acknowledgement of different perspectives.
I believe that this type of activity would be effective with any age group whom you may be working with. For example, if done with younger children it may challenge them slightly more due to them still being quite egocentric in their thinking. However, if done with older children, or even adults, the discussion may go more in depth and raise points about why they believe they are more worthy of more – eg. their job, money, status etc.
Participating in this activity myself was quite fun! However, knowing it was being filmed took me out of my comfort zone and I feel if it had not been getting filmed, I may have gotten more involved in debating the issue. This is something I quite enjoy; expressing my own opinion whilst engaging in quality dialogue with others offering differing viewpoints. Considering the other participants I feel that they may have been in a similar position.
I am hoping that I will be able to carry this activity out again BUT with a group of individuals who are unaware of the activity and therefore give a better insight to the effectiveness/impact. If possible, I hope to do this before the assignment hand-in date, however it is definitely something I would like to try out in my future career or even whilst out on my upcoming practice if possible/appropriate.
A short, edited, video clip of the activity can be viewed. The sound quality is quite poor due to the iPad being placed quite far away from the group –
Evidence: Collect copies of your energisers and reflect on how you could use these effectively within the classroom
Personal Thoughts:
This activity was quite good fun to do as we were able to participate and try the activities out for ourselves. It provided us with an opportunity to have a wee break from just thinking and writing up tasks and actually have some ‘time-out’. There are a vast amount of activities which practitioners can use in order to engage children and young people. One activity came after going along to the ‘Chat Happy’ workshop and discussing different ways of aiding children & young people’s mental wellbeing – we felt this would be a good one to use as we all love a good laugh sometimes!
We decided on 3 activities and wrote them up, however came across some other ones which we thought were really good and active/engaging. Instead of writing these up we have attached links to them in the word document and also videoed one to show we gave it a go! This was quite a challenge for myself. I am very uncoordinated, have no sense of rhythm and struggle to do more than 1 thing at once BUT … I persevered and eventually managed to get the whole of it right (not caught on camera) but an almost perfect one was captioned! Whilst looking through the numerous videos, some of the expressions provided some humour; therefore a short clip has been produced to show the bumpy process we went through before finally feeling a huge sense of achievement in the activity! I think from the look on our faces at the end give an indication of how we felt …
A series of three linked lessons to explore the concept of conflict and conflict resolution with a Primary 2 class.
Evidence – Write up a curriculum plan and identify learning intentions, success criteria, assessment, activities and resources.
Personal Thoughts:
This task was quite challenging as it was specific to early years and therefore the way in which it is carried out would have to be quite simple/easy vocab etc. However I feel through discussing all our ideas we began to form a better understanding of what we hoped the children would learn and then how. We recognised that in order for the children to achieve what we wanted them to learn (LI) it would be best to have the same LI for all 3 lessons. Again due to lack of experience in observing such a lesson being discussed/delivered whilst out on practice we found it slightly difficult.
Choose a story book and build up a lesson around any of the curricular areas of HWB. Make up a practical activity the children could do in class related to the book. Write up the lesson plan – writing out E andO, Learning Intention, Success criteria, assessment and activities.
Evidence: A copy of the completed lesson outline.
Personal Thoughts:
We decided to focus on physical changes in the body due to our inexperience of observing such a lesson and having a feeling of uncertainty and slight anxiety about teaching puberty with the children we may be working with. This therefore was a good reason we felt for doing the task this way to aid our professional development. We found it a little difficult to find a story book however kept coming across the books mentioned in the document. Due to focusing on puberty and changes in the body for the children working on second level we felt this type of book would be more appropriate which may enable the children to read independently; gaining information and answers to questions they may have.
Childs Hill School and Restorative Approaches: this video presents an overview of a whole school Restorative Approach (13mins13). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJWgayvuWXw
Evidence -:
Create a PowerPoint that can be used to explain Restorative Approaches to a Primary 7 class and the role that they can play in supporting a whole school approach.
Personal Thoughts:
This task was quite interesting to complete, it enabled us to think about practical ways in which we could inform pupils about Restorative Approaches in a way we thought would be appropriate. It was however quite difficult to decide what and how much to put in as it is a huge area which can be explored, even just for practitioners! This therefore meant it took slightly longer than the time stated due to deciding how to condense it to include what we felt was important. We felt that we must engage the pupils somehow and therefore decided to do a similar activity to the one we did in the input as we found this beneficial to relating it to real life situations. I feel that it is however very much an approach that requires a lot of time and effort to be put in, in order for it to be as effective and successful as it can be. It was definitely something of interest to me as I have never come across it in any of my placements so far – hopefully this may change as I continue through my professional career.
The task can be viewed as an attached PowerPoint –
The attached images are scanned in copies of an activity sheet which can be used if the suggested activity (in PowerPoint) was carried out in a school/class environment –
Choose a piece of music and consider how you could use this in a HWB lesson about mental health.
Evidence: Write up a lesson outline plan (with learning intentions, success criteria, assessment and activities), include the music used. (1 hour)
In addition to the previous music task we completed, we felt that as a nice activity which could be done with a class of any stage to increase positive mental wellbeing amongst children and young people would involve them reflecting weekly on positive things in their life or something which has made them feel good during that week. I believe an activity like this would be beneficial as the children can look back on it whenever they feel unhappy or sad at any point.
I recently saw this picture of a worksheet being shared on a social media site. I thought I would add it in to show that something similar could be used if done with a class of your own –
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up the 30hrs. However, throughout the module I have been interested in what mindfulness is and thought I would give it a go. I had already downloaded an app ‘Headspace’ ages ago but never actually used so this is the app I decided to try out.
