Ciaran and I generated mostly the same answers. We both thought that the teacher in the first video had the tendency to ramble which could result in unfocused children. However, we agreed that all members of the classroom could see and hear him. We both agreed that sometimes his body language was closed off by folding his arms etc.
I was not majorly surprised by the videos. However, I found it interesting that the teacher in the last video recorded her lessons. From my point of view, this is a very useful technique – you would be able to take note of certain areas for improvement and identify strengths within yourself.
I did not find the evaluating tasks too hard. This is because I could pause the videos and have time to prepare answers to evaluation points. I will probably find it more difficult to undertake this task on placement as it will be difficult to be observing all that is going on. Also, I would not want to offend the person I’m working with.
If I could take one thing from the videos and use it in my placement, it would be the way the Year 3 teacher demonstrated his engagement with pupils by crouching down to their eyelevel. This demonstrates positive communication and is an effective way of getting a student to focus.
I am looking forward to going out on placement and gaining more experience as a student teacher. I’m excited to test the waters and observe real classroom scenarios. It all does seem a bit daunting at the moment, but I’m sure I’ll settle in nicely after a couple of nerve-racking days. I’m looking forward to viewing different teaching techniques and getting to know the pupils in the classroom.
