Category Archives: 3. Prof. Skills & Abilities

Words are our master.

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The importance of language to our world is undoubtedly massive. In a lecture I attended on language the lecturer brought up the idea that society would struggle without words, it was quickly pondered but then we moved on. However in my head I could not move on, this thought stuck with me. How different would be all be, how different would our world be, without words?

As I thought I began to imagine a world without words… and I could not. the idea is so unfathomable so impossible that even my imagination could not support it. Our society would simply not cope.

Even basic communication would be a struggle. Sure, some may argue we could ‘umm’ and ‘ahh’ to form some paths of communication however there are only so many different sounds that we can make. And moreover if this was practiced by all it would be the same as using ‘words’ and so, still, we cannot see a way for our society to cope without the use of words.

I cannot fathom living in a society where there are no words to describe where you are, who you are, what you are feeling? No words to make sense of the things around you. There would be no recognition of our own surroundings without having some way to communicate and discuss what it is we were seeing.

Without words we would not be able to merely have thoughts. If you think, think about anything, I can guarantee that you will have thought of even just one word. Without words we could not be the people that we are, we would not be as advanced or as brilliant a species.

Could you even begin to imagine a mute world? Can you imagine the chaos?

This is why words are so vital to us. We simply cannot live in a world without them. This is why as teachers and equally for parents, it is so important to build up communication with children, to talk to them, to help them understand the world that they live in. To enable them to communicate, to enable them to have thoughts and opinions ,to develop their knowledge and one day allow them to become fantastic individuals.

Without words I cannot see a world where all of this is possible.

My Gentle Reminder

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I’m sure we can all agree that by February or March this year we were entirely fed up of lectures, tutorials and essays. In fact, I felt so fed up that I began to question why I was doing all of it in the first place. And then, placement came along…

Being back in the classroom, doing the job I love is just the reminder that I needed to keep me focused on my end goal and remind me why I sat through all of those lectures this year. I did it all because I love teaching, I always have. The great buzz of energy you feel when you stand in front of your class and they are looking back at you totally engrossed in what you are telling or teaching them. The ‘eureka’ moment that you see spread across a child’s face when they finally understand something they have been working on for weeks. These moments are why I love being a teacher.

Being back in the classroom this time was greatly different to before. Previously I had just been in the classroom for work experience for around a week with very little responsibility. This time around I was there for much longer with much greater responsibility and this contributed to the experience being far more rewarding. During my 6 weeks at my school I was able to see the children progress and grow. This is something which I had previously not encountered but it brought me great joy to be able to see this.

The behaviour issues in my class, and generally within the school, were extremely challenging. I felt my own skill set was really put to the test, and I had to expand my knowledge using reading. I feel my behaviour management strategies have improved greatly and I look forward to using them again and seeing how they work in different settings.

Planning lessons was a very enjoyable task for myself. I loved trying to make them exciting and engaging and used my memories of school, both good and bad, to help me to do this. It was good to look deeper into lessons which I remember and understand why I was taught in a certain way.

I now understand my own school teachers so much more. Situating myself in their role I was able to see that everything that they did was for me and my fellow peers. Every time they raised their voices slightly, wouldn’t let us chat or gave us some sort of a sanction they were doing it all to help us. To help us achieve, learn and do well in life. I could not see that as a child, but now I can, and because of this I have such great respect for them all and everything that they did for me which allowed me to be in the position I am now.

My highlight from my placement was the day of my Summative Visit. The children had been warned to be on their best behaviour as we had a visitor coming into the class. Many of the children knew that it was “Miss Burnetts boss” coming back again. They did themselves and myself proud, their behaviour was great and they engaged in the lesson and the task. I was so pleased that they had did this for me so that I could do well. And whilst I was showing my tutor out of the school my class teacher had shared with them that I was being assessed and that I had passed my placement. Earlier in the day the children and teacher had made me a card and they presented it to me when I returned to the class. As they were giving me a card they decided to sing ‘happy birthday’ which really took me by surprise. The children were so happy for me, hugging me and saying ‘well done’, giving me a cheer. They were happy that I had succeeded and wanted success for me, the same way in which I wanted success for them in their school endeavour. This was the best part of my placement, knowing that I had made such a positive impact on these children that they wanted me to succeed.

I can’t say that I am happy to have finished with placement, although I am going to enjoy some long lies. I thoroughly enjoyed my time and feel I have gained and learned so much from the experience. Ahead of me is another year of lectures and I suspect I will have the same feeling again of questioning. I will remind myself to look back at this placement and the joy I felt during it, using this as motivation to keep going. It will be another two years before I will be back in the classroom and I hope that they fly in, until then I will continue with my studies all the while keeping in mind my goal, of being back in the classroom doing the job that I love and hope to be doing for years to come.

 

Good feedback isn’t all that good.

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I think feedback is a vital component of learning and establishing ourselves in our chosen profession. Feedback is also an incredibly important of the classroom environment, whether that be from fellow colleagues, from pupils or pupil to pupil.

When we are tasked with giving feedback, the initial reactions tend to be negative, it is often seen that giving feedback is not a nice task to undertake. People often worry about being over critical or what sort of feedback they will receive themselves, and therefore they tend to focus on the positives of the piece of work they are critiquing. This is often done in the hope that others will follow suit and give positive feedback, therefore not receiving any harsh comments yourself or so that you don’t offend anybody by highlighting potential faults in their work.

However there comes a point when being overly positive is just not helpful. Being unable to highlight areas for improvement means that the person receiving your comment will think that their work needs no further improvement when perhaps it does. If someone is particularly looking for feedback in order to help them, being entirely positive will not assist at all. Yes, it will make the person feel happy that they have done a good job, but that will be the only result of over-positive responses.

We are all guilty of this, I can honestly say that I have done this myself, but it is vital to take a step back before you post and think to yourself: “If I received this, would it help me?”

We do not need to be harsh when giving negative feedback. As my mum often reminds me “It is not what you say, but how you say it” We should employ constructive criticism when critiquing others’ work. We shouldn’t just point out what it wrong, we should attempt to give suggestions on how to improve what has been written. However, although being aware of and identifying downfalls is important this shouldn’t be the sole focus of our responses. It is important to find a balance between praising and being critical.

In schools this is combated by the idea of “Two Stars and a Wish”. This idea aims to offer both positive and negative feedback in a way that shows children we are not being harsh, it is framed in the idea of a ‘wish’ which makes it seem more friendly and less critical. However as our lecturer mentioned in our input, there should not necessarily always be a wish, because we don’t always have to be critical. Some pieces of work may be good enough that a wish is not needed, but this does not mean that a wish should never be included.

Another important point is to praise when previous ‘wishes’ have been improved upon and not to persist on the same negatives, as this can hinder a child’s improvement as well as our own. People can become defeated if they are continually told that the same thing is not quite right.

When we give feedback it is important to remember that being nice is not always helpful and being critical is not always harsh. It is important to employ ‘constructive criticism’ and be aware that your comments should give the receiver opportunity to reflect upon their work and give it more strength. As a receiver of feedback you want to be given ways in which to improve otherwise the reply is’ ‘pointless’.

Before we send we must think to ourselves, “If I received this feedback, would I really appreciate it?” And remember as my mum would say “it’s not what you say, it’s how you say it”.

Remembering, Forgetting and Getting Confused.

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Based upon lecture by John Baldacchino.

Greek philosophy on learning focuses on the soul and the body. The body in ‘contingent’ and the soul is ‘necessary’. The soul is said to be omniscient and knows the grand knowledge of the world. When we are born our soul holds this information. However the soul then comes limited by the body. So it can be said that the soul without the body would be an all-powerful entity. Socrates talks of this in Plato, Meno. Throughout our lives we are continually trying to remember what the soul already knows and unlock this information. Therefore making it unlimited. It is aid that if you move more towards bodily things then the soul becomes damaged but if you maintain spirituality and focus on spiritual ideas then the soul is revived. In order to not make the body forgetful we must employ ‘aporia’ which is simply letting people make mistakes so that they can learn from them.

In terms of education I think ancient Greek philosophy is telling us that we should never give up on children who are struggling to learn because they have the knowledge within them we just have to find the right way of unlocking it.

It is also encouraging us to allow children to make mistakes so that they learn from their experiences and therefore develop a better knowledge. This relates to the guest lecture from Brendan Knight on Plato’s Cave. If the world outside the cave had been bad and cruel they would have learned this through making the mistake of going outside and therefore would know not to do the same again. The same can be applied to a mathematics sum, if they did it wrong the first time they will not tackle it in the same way again.

Sometimes as teachers we may be wise to deliberately confuse children in order that they see even more clearly in the end. They would then have to look back through the steps in great detail to understand where they went wrong and then figure out how to do it right. They would then have more advanced knowledge of the specific steps involved in comparison to if they did it right the first time and never had to look at the steps again.

Plato’s Cave

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I thoroughly enjoyed the guest lecture by Brendan Knight on Plato’s Cave. The story of Plato’s cave is that there are men bound to the cave facing the back wall. The light coming in from the entrance causes shadows to be displayed on the wall. These shadows are caused by things in the outside world – ‘reality’. These shadows are all that the men have experienced and therefore they believe it to be reality and are entirely unaware of the real world. The point is that you can only know of things you have experienced. Then one day one of the men breaks free and goes outside the cave. He is then faced with the real world and becomes aware of many different things he did not know before, for example – form, texture, colour and size. He was only able to know of these things through experience. He then tried to get the others to break free and embrace what he had saw but they did not want to go and were afraid to leave what they thought was their reality.

I think this relates to education as a metaphor for learning in the sense that those who are sceptical about learning certain topics can’t fully engage with them unless they step outside of their comfort zone (out of the cave). They can’t fully understand what they are learning (the reality) until they are taught and are become engaged and involved in the topic (experiencing the world outside the cave).

This can be applied not just to topics but social learning also.

Children who don’t engage socially or take part in the classroom are unaware of the benefits of it. If children are encouraged by teachers and brought out of their shells they will see the classroom and education in an entirely different light. This could change their outlook on education but also develop their social skills within the classroom and allow their behaviour to improve as a result.

The idea of Plato’s cave allows teachers to realise they have to allow children to experience and engage with things before they will fully understand both the benefits and the downfalls. And that the best was of learning is to experience.

This relates to be earlier post on ‘why teaching’ – that learning must be fun and exciting and involve physical activity in order to consolidate the learning. They must experience what they are learning in order to fully understand it.

You don’t teach the rules of netball and then expect children to know how to play the game. You must allow them to play and experience the rules in action so that they will fully understand it.