2.1 Curriculum | My journey as a student teacher

Another semester that went too quickly!

As expected, I have given up my job to concentrate on University and to be able to focus 100% on my placement.

Semester 2 was spent focussing on Pedagogy and the Curriculum. I already knew a bit about pedagogy but mostly in an Early Years setting. This did give me a slight head start when it came to research and starting my reading list.

As i said in my last post we had spent a little time doing dance and ICT classes. I really enjoyed learning more about the content of the curriculum and the different subject areas. I have always enjoyed Social Studies and I was looking forward to being able to teach those parts of the curriculum when I started placement. The Maths classes were informative and we were shown ways in which we could make Maths fun for our pupils. Science and Technologies were interesting, informative and enjoyable. The cakes we made in technologies may not have gone to plan but they were edible!

Another subject I really enjoyed when I was at school was Modern Languages. I started learning French in Primary 3 and continued this until Sixth year. When I saw the elective module choices last semester I straight away decided to pick a language. I initially went in to French but due to the large gap I had taken away from speaking the language I found it too fast paced but due to my school qualifications I could not drop down another level. I decided to switch to a language I had never really come in to contact before and that was Spanish. I missed 3 weeks which made me a little worried that I would fall behind but I had nothing to worry about. I found out that I still enjoyed learning a new language and actually, I am really good at it. I can’t wait to start bringing Modern Languages in to the classroom and hope I can ignite a spark in another child who may enjoy languages too.

I’m a walking cliche. I have always wanted to teach and now I am almost through my first year with just 3 weeks of placement to go!

It’s the start of semester 2. There were a couple of timetable glitches which immediately sent me in to panic mode….”How will I work”, “when will I spend time with my own children?”. Luckily my employer has been accommodating and my husband has the flexibility in his working day that he can help with the children and the general household duties.

My New Years resolution is to spend more time with family. We’ve been spending much more time outdoors, at the park. We’ve introduced board game night so that I have time to chat to my children about their week and when my timetable allows I can still attend that karate class or school assembly. I’m already a very organised person but I will have to be a lot more organised in my home life this semester.

My placement is in a smaller school in a village. This terrified me to start with as it is something completely different to what I am used to. However, I have now done some research on the school and I think I will enjoy the small school aspect where the local community has lots of involvement and less children who’s names i have to remember.

So far I have had an animation class. This was fun and different. When I was at school our IT didn’t exist until secondary school. That’s me now showing my age! To have all of these resources at our finger tips is fantastic and I look forward to bringing these lessons in to my own classroom.

I’ve participated in a dance class. First thing on a Friday morning is not what I expected but it wasn’t too hard going and seeing where classes like these can slot in to the Curriculum for Excellence is good.

We’ve had some overviews of language and literacy and professional practice. Going through these lectures has made me think more about what I remember from Primary School and that parts of that I can bring in to my own lessons. It has also helped me to become more reflective.

When I first saw the timetable I wondered why I decided to do this as a mother of two and I am sure this wont be the first or last time I feel like this in the next four years. I just have to keep remembering that it is a very short period of time in the rest of my life and what I can bring to children in my future classes will far outweigh the work I have to put in to my degree.

I will be practicing my lesson plans on my daughter to see how well they go so hopefully that gives me a head start!