2 Prof. Knowledge & Understanding – Page 4 – Tales of a Newly Qualified Teacher

October 2, 2015December 6, 2015

My Maths Mindset

Just after starting th MathAnxiety (2) e Discovering Mathematics elections, we were asked to do a maths anxiety questionnaire and reflect upon our maths anxiety. Therefore, this is my blog post on my maths mindset.

I feel my maths anxiety is overall quite low just now. I am fine, and actually quite enjoy, to listen to maths lectures and tutorials. I do not mind doing maths assessments that I am prepared for and aren’t graded such as the OMA. However, I feel more anxious doing examinations that are graded – this isn’t just maths related. The last time I felt like this was in standard grade maths. I quite enjoy the relaxed yet challenging atmosphere my standard grade maths teacher created. This is the way I wish to portray maths in my own classroom. maths

However, I dropped out of higher maths after two weeks because of the anxiety that I would not be able to cope with the level of mathematics and the stress of higher maths. After two weeks, I was feeling extremely anxious that the mathematics was too difficult and I would not get the support I needed to pass the exam.

I feel that maths is approached with a lot less anxiety and stress in university – it is a lot more relaxed atmosphere which is how I hope to convey it within my classroom as a teacher. I remember in primary 7 having a teacher on their probationary year and being very scared to answer any maths question in his class in case I got the answer wrong and was told so in front of the entire class. I feel that show me boards like we used in the lecture today is a good way for only me, as the teacher, to see how everyone is getting on with the topic without shaming them in front of their peers.

October 2, 2015October 2, 2015

The “Running Revolution” in Stirling.

For this blog post, I am going to look at Outdoor Education in particular comparing Sweden and the UK (in particular St Ninians, Stirling).

After our lecture inputs Brenda, I found myself in awe at Sweden and their approach to learning. I am very keen to learn more about outdoor education and this is what I intend to do with my learning from life placement this year hopefully as well as just getting a part time job with links to outdoor learning.

I found myself eager to complete the TDT tasks for the comparative education with Sweden yesterday and realised how far behind the UK actually are in terms of outdoor education. I remember being in primary seven and the class asking to go and learn outside about a topic and being told we couldn’t as it hadn’t been risk assessed. However, Sweden on the other hand, totally trust their system, pupils and most importantly the teachers to not do anything that would cause huge amounts of risk.

Today however, I just read an article (The Running Revolution) about a school in Stirling, Scotland which prompted this blog post. St Ninians School have recently made the news around Scotland for the fact they now have no children with childhood obesity and they have also managed to increase concentration in class. Their secret. The great outdoors. As cringey as that sounds – it works in Sweden and it is clearly working in Stirling. In Sweden, the teachers state that getting outdoors for at least half of the school day in preschool Running builds good health in children. Whilst at St Ninians this has proved that even getting outdoor for a small part of the day has improved the health of children by reducing the amount of children with childhood obesity to zero. St Ninians have spent the last three years having a daily mile – this is where they get their children outside to walk or run a mile every day. The teachers choose when in the day they do it, whenever fits best with their timetable for the day. The only thing that stops the classes doing their daily mile is heavy rain or ice.

The teachers and the children both clearly benefit from this scheme – the teachers have commented on how much the children enjoy going out for the daily mile or it would not be maintainable with their enjoyment. The teachers and children both benefit from the increased focus and concentration in the classroom as well. Therefore it shows that taking 15 minutes away from teaching time can clearly impact positively on the learning time in the class. In Sweden, the teachers cannot believe that the children especially in early years education are not getting outdoors to play and enjoy childhood. St Ninians, Stirling clearly are edging towards this aspect of outdoor education and enjoyment with the children at their school with even just a very small proportion of the day.

In my opinion, I believe that this shows that outdoor education clearly positively impacts on the learning, health and concentration of children at school. Both Sweden and Stirling have been able to prove this statement. Sweden tops European League tables in literacy by the age of 10 and Stirling have been able to banish childhood obesity from their schools. Other schools in the UK are beginning to take notice to Outdoor Learning, more now due to the success at St Ninians which is a positive but slow start compared to Sweden.

I have left a link to the Guardian newspaper in a hyperlink above in case anyone wishes to find up a little bit more about St Ninians and their daily mile.

October 2, 2015October 2, 2015

Blackboard to Glow Transition

After our ICT lecture with Derek on the ePortfolio transition to the VLE Blackboard to Glow Blogs, I have decided to blog the changes. Last year in MA1 we had a bit of a disastrous time using blackboard for our ePortfolio, the lack of engagement with the ePortfolio showed because of this.

The blackboard ePortfolio was a long list of pages with no interconnectivity between them, this meant that the students had to write and copy and paste anything they wanted to feature in more than one page. However, on the Glow blogs, students can categorise one blog post onto as many pages as they wish as well as linking each blog post to the professional standards.

The Glow blogs allows easier sifting through posts. In the ePortfolio on blackboard, there was endless pages and posts getting lost throughout the pages which I can only believe made life difficult for the advisor of studies and markers to look through and find the relevance of each post. However, on the glow blogs ePortfolio, the blog posts can be tagged and categorised into different pages and professional standards which means that the posts can be found with a lot more ease in my opinion.

I personally think that adding links, different blogs/ePortfolio’s, media I think is a lot easier on the glow blogs than the ePortfolio from blackboard. I think adding links, videos, pictures is more straight forward on glow blogs than it was on the ePortfolio, I never once added a video or picture to my old ePortfolio but I will not hesitate to add to my new ePortfolio.

Overall, in my own opinion, I definitely prefer the new glow blog ePortfolio over the blackboard ePortfolio and I think this will show especially with the MA2 engagement in the ePortfolio.

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: