Monday 18th January 2010 – Thursday 22nd January 2010 Week three.
Monday 18th January 2010
Today will be a day I will never forget as I taught my first ever lesson! And guess what? It was the group I observed last week which were not very well behaved! Lets reflect on what I said about this group last week “Monday afternoon I observed a group and wow! What a very loud group! With one student very loud and outspoken slouched on her chair! So been thinking about class management today and the question that I’m asking is; what could I have done to help her learn?” (Webber, P, Monday 11-01-10). So today some could say it was the baptism of fire! With other teachers reporting difficulties with this group, I knew I had to be firm from the beginning. And the lesson went really well. Despite a group learning agreement being agreed within the class, there were some issues, one student had their phone on their desk stating ‘I must have this with me because my child in nursery and the nursery need my number if there is an emergency”. One other student was eating a flake and told me” I must eat I’m pregnant and have cravings’. So these issues I must learn to address more effectively! However students seemed to warm to me as the lesson progressed! The students and I had a laugh over me constantly saying ‘yea’ after I have finished my sentence! I remember something from the Petty book and that sometimes you must be prepared to be laughed at by students. So I guess it’s natural. But a very effective start and one of the students said “You’re going to be a brilliant teacher you understand how to treat people” another students said “You’re fair”. I agreed with my mentor that I will have an appointment to see the technician on how to upload my slides of lessons on to their moodle system (our MLE equivalent) as she does not know how to do it. I’ve also prepared some lesson plans today as well. So been a busy day today. With my first observation tomorrow! I’m ensuring that I have all my resources ready.
Tuesday 19th January 2010
Well today was the big day. It was observation day. And it went well! With my mentor giving me a 2 on the grading sheet. That is the 2nd highest you can get. The teaching experience has started now! And what I learnt today from my first observation is to be prepared. Thus my 300 word evaluation will be on the theme ‘general planning’. I must have all the resources available and enough worksheets! My mentor spoke to me after the class and believed my class management skills were excellent! I had the challenge at the beginning of the lesson with mobile phones but the class settled down. My mentor was unsure about how to fill in the observation sheet so she will be contacting Janet Oti tomorrow to find out. As I need these sheets to go into my professional practice portfolio.
Wednesday 20th January 2010 THE GOOD AND THE BAD!
Today started with me covering the same topic with to a different group (mature students) and the lesson went excellently with me getting more confident and making jokes with students! One student told me “You’re going to do brill.” So a great couple of days! However the afternoon was the most difficult one I’ve faced so far. The students were fine, really engaged! And I felt the lesson went well, but the teacher who sat in on the class had other things to say, firstly in praise she said “I came across as confident, and have a nature gift of inspiration”, However she gave me a lot of criticism! Let start with what she said I asked a student to read from PowerPoint and then I read back over what she said! She told me “aren’t in school.” She asked why am I using aims and objectives when students don’t understand what these mean? In future I must use ‘today we are going to cover’. On my PowerPoint I wrote accessed but it should have been assessed. She wanted to see more passion in me. In the middle of the lesson the students had a break and she told me this. So it did dent my confidence in the middle part of lesson! However I felt that I could recover. As the session went on the class seemed to get more involved. The feedback of the students were good, but the teacher at the end told me “There were loads of spelling mistakes on PowerPoint” She told me ‘nothing was linked to health and social care’. She criticised me by asking them to write on the whiteboard their responses to the exercise containing list male typical jobs! She said that was below their level! Also told me not to read directly off the PowerPoint! Students can read she told me! She also told me to not to mention I work in Morrisions as it sets a bad example. I felt very lonely when she was giving me this feedback! She did tell me that I had interesting ideas and controlled the class very well. However did these comments help me or hinder me? She also told me not to put students on the spot! However after reading Petty’s book maybe there are contrasting ideas here? As Petty believed that putting students on the spot was a worthwhile exercise! Next week for her lesson I have got to do the Race Relations Act! I was so confident yesterday but today was an excellent morning and a bad afternoon. I have to realise I’m only 3 days into my trainee teacher practice, so I must use common sense here! And get my head up for tomorrow
Thursday 21st January 2010
Today I met my Thursday groups for the first time and they were nice! Today I arranged all my files and tried to get them organised! So today was a productive day.
NUMBER OF TEACHING HOURS ACHIEVED THIS WEEK: 11hours.
Number of hours required to do at close of the week: 139 hours.
Monday 11th January 2010 – Thursday 14th January 2010 Week two
Monday 11 –01 – 10.
Today I met my mentor for the first time and sat with her and the head of department and discussed my teaching hours for next week! And now have got 11 hours of teaching! So next week will be the start of my teaching career! I’ve got to take a lesson next week on health and genetics! Cystic Fibrosis, so my task for the next week is to revise this area! Also other teachers are coming up to me explaining their modules for me to plan for those lessons as well! One module I am taking is the equal rights and diversity module! So will need to re-cap on legislation! Other lessons I will be taking is about students work placements such as their placements policy and procedures. Monday afternoon I observed a group and wow! What a very loud group! With one student very loud and outspoken sloughed on her chair! So been thinking about class management today and questions I’m asking are; what could I have done to help her learn? But today was a very productive day with timetable agreed! I’ve sent this to Janet Oti to let her know what days I’m there for observation!
Tuesday 12 –01 -10.
Today first thing it has been a free period so I prepared my 1st lesson plan for the BTEC group which is about genetics and health promotion module! The lesson plan was typed up and it took around an hour! When I was writing up plan I weren’t sure if certain things would work, e.g. group work i’ve set, preparing leaflets for extension tasks, how long is it going to be, will it be too short or too long? I’ve agreed with my mentor that next Tuesday will be my 1st observation done by her! So the pressure is on! 1st ever teach! 1st ever assessment! The next thing to do for this lesson is to prepare the PowerPoint!
Wednesday 13-01-10.
College closed due to snow. However all staff were told to work from home so today I’ve prepared my PowerPoint presentation for next week’s BTEC Class! Also written up the module year plan so I’ve planned each lesson from now to end of term for Unit 12 BTEC group I am taking! Also designated my own file to this module! What I am aiming to do now is plan for the following weeks lesson on this BTEC Course! And unsure that all materials for next week’s lesson are ready so. E.g. handouts, etc.
Thursday 14-01-10
Prepared lesson plans for next weeks lessons!
Blog 2
The beginning of the journey.
Monday 4th January 2010 – Thursday 7th January 2010 Week One
Monday 4-01-10.
Today was the first day at work placement at the college Ystrad Mynach. I started my journey to become a fully qualified teacher at FE by attending the staff meeting, which takes place every Monday and brings all the staff together with the head of the department to discuss any issues taking place at that current time or in the near future. This week’s meeting was about moving over to e-registers, which is basically a new computer system that enables teachers to conduct registers interactively this will get rid of the old paper registers. There was some concern over this and staff were told that if they have any problems to keep using the paper registers for the time being. After that I was shown where you sign in and how you use the photocopier. Today I was scheduled to meet my mentor but unfortunately she is off this week with sickness. So this week I’ve been sitting in with other teachers lessons observing and picking up some useful advice; one teacher told to always plan an extension task for each lesson, so e.g. word search, crosswords etc. She gave some useful websites such as: www.helenhudspith.com or www.tes.co.uk. She told me to add this to any lesson plan for a back up. Also you can differentiate between students by making some extension tasks more difficult and some a bit easier. So my first task is too access these websites and to have a go at creating some extension tasks. I’ve also learnt from her not to always use PowerPoint; she called it ‘death by PowerPoint’ and suggested using a wide variety of tools! She used fill the gaps on her worksheet-; she missed out words for students to fill in to keep them involved, she suggested that worksheets with loads of notes go in the file unread so by making students work for themselves keeps the student involved and motivated. It has been an interesting start to my PGCE placement! At the moment I have a provisional timetable so next week I think I’m having a different one and hope to meet my mentor next week!
Tuesday 05-01-10.
Today there was a lot of snow and I only observed one lesson after this lesson all students were sent home due to extreme weather conditions!
Wednesday and Thursday 06-01-10/07-01-10.
College closed due to Snow.