Day 6

It’s the final day of the a day a week pracs. I asked to come on Monday, just to see how the class operates on a different day. I finished off the artwork from last week. The students had to cut out pictures of food and make a collage on their painting. Like any craft lesson it can get a little messy. Some students stuck two pictures on and said they were finished. They had to be encouraged to fill up all the spaces. The end product was pretty impressive for my first art lesson, though the paint should be watered down more.

There was one incident that really tested my behavioural management skills. One student took another student’s cut out and took ownership of it, when he finally gave it back he just tossed it at the student. I asked him many times to do it properly, becoming firmer each time. I needed to let him know that his behaviour is tolerated neither by his classroom teacher nor by me.

It is important to know how students behave so you can deal with them appropriately when they misbehave, as different strategies are required when dealing with different students.

Day 5

Since it's Catholic School's Week my class has not been getting a lot of work done. As I mentioned before, there are many disruptions that will affect the class timetable.

I taught my first lesson today. Though it was chaotic, but overall, it went well - or so my colleague teacher say. I had two stations, one for drawing and the other was for painting. I felt it was difficult to keep an eye on both groups, but I guess it will come with experience. I think I can improve on my management strategies. I handed out two pieces of paper at the beginning of the lesson - one for tracing a plate, the other for drawing patterns for the tablecloth. I thought it would be an efficient way of doing things, but forgot they were only little. Some students were confused as to which paper to use. My colleague teacher suggested, in future, I should split class in half, one group do tracing, the other drawing the patterns, thus minimising the confusion.

We also went to the local pizzeria for an excursion. The class is doing a unit called 'necessities in life', my colleague teacher discussed with the class beforehand of the restaurants they can 'open' in class, it came down to a pizza shop. It is a good experience for the students to visit the pizzeria and asks questions. We also had a few slices of pizza!

All the students were very well behaved. This brings out the management skills my colleague teacher has and how the students respect her by listening to her and be on their best behaviour. I later asked if the class will still go on an excursion if I wasn't there and she responded, "I'll ask a parent to come with us, we can't go by ourselves just in case something goes wrong" by involving the parent, we can mark off Element 7.2.3 Provide opportunities for parents and caregivers to be involved in the teaching program where appropriate of the NSW Institute of Teachers' Professional Teaching Standards.

Resource

I've created a base 10 chart to use on a SMART Board. Teachers can demonstrate place value and students are recreate the number on their own chart using concrete material. You might also get students to come up and create a number in the chart for the class to recreate. You can download it from here. Please feel free to comment so I can improve.

Day 4

I will be teaching my first lesson in my next day a week prac. The kindies will be doing a unit called "The necessities of life". My colleague teacher suggested I do a creative art class since it will be their first day back from holidays. I'm thinking to do a food collage and watered down painting of a tablecloth and a plate as a background. Will be using either candle wax or a white crayon to draw patterns in the background. Hope it all goes to plan!

Each day time is allocated for a particular group of  kindies to practice using the laptops. They go on to a site called 'starfall' it is a great site teaching children to read using phonics. Using technology is a great way to engage students to work on activities. This also lets them work on their fine motor skills when maneuvering the mouse around the screen. This marks off the NSW Institute of Teachers’ Professional Teaching Standards Element 4.1.5 Use a range of teaching strategies and resources including ICT and other technologies to foster interest and support learning.

It's a pity my day a week is on a Wednesday, most of the day is dedicated to rotational tasks which allows the students to practice their motor skills. It will be better when I start my 3 week block, that way I can experience how the classroom works on every other day.

Day 3

What a day! Students are starting to get restless now, maybe it's because holidays are coming up. Today a student was distracting others around her and not paying attention in class. My colleague teacher asked her many times and gave her warnings but she still kept on disturbing other students. She was finally sent to sit in the time out area. I believe she shouldn't be excluded from the lesson even though she still can see the board from where she was sitting. As she can play with other objects surrounding her. It might be better if the teacher moved her away from her group of friends or even moved her to the front near the teacher. That way the student can always be monitored.

For the whole day students were separated into their mixed ability group and did rotational tasks. I supervised the children doing the painting. They did a self portrait influenced by Matisse. The fun bit was they had to smear soap flakes mixed with water and paint. That covered the whole piece of paper, they then used their fingers to draw their portrait. During all that was fun, but when it was time for me to clean up, my oh my. What a mess!

Much effort is needed when planning for the day. From day one, lecturers at uni stresses to us the importance of planning.Teacher planning comes under Element 3 of the NSW Institute of Teachers’ Professional Teaching Standards. For a lesson to be success the teacher will have to plan on things such as material to be taught, questions to be asked, activities for students that finishes first and how to manage disruptive behaviour. Failing to do so is just planning to fail. The class may become out of control if the teacher does not have a succinct plan. Having said that, not everyday will go according to plan. There will be disruptions, there will be emergency meetings, there will be practice lock downs, it's just a part of life. Teachers will have to be flexible and cater to these disruptions. Thus, we'll have to plan to catch up.

Day 2

Who would have thought that observations can be so tiring!

Jan was talking in one of her tuts the other week, about different ways to mark the roll. Today the kindies had a very engaging way to do so, involving the smartboard! There were 18 spaceships on the board, each have a students name on it. The kids line up and find their name, tap on the spaceship and it flies over the finish line! I think that is a great way to incorporate ICT in marking the roll instead of the old fashion way of name calling.

Since there is, on average, about 4.5 hours of learning hours in a school day it is impossible to allocate time for each subject to meet the requirements of the BOS. So it only makes sense to integrate subjects. This in fact enriches the learning of students.

For religion today, my colleague teacher integrated English and drama into the unit. She read a book to the students and asked questions in the end. The book was about the parents' love for their children.Questions were asked to stimulate the Ss' critical thinking skills. Some examples include, what the story is about, how do you know the dad loves the child, what can you see in the picture that shows the dad loves the child, why are they holding hands. From these sorts of questions the children were able to provide a variety of answers. The students were then asked how they know their parents love them. Some students had trouble answering the question but after being prompt they were on the roll! After the discussion the students were allocated into groups that the teacher thought would work well together. The students were then asked to do a role play. In their groups of 4 or 5, they had to act out ways to show how parents love their children. It was very entertaining to watch.

It's been another day, soon enough, all my prac days will be over and eventually I'll have classes of my own.

Day 1

It was like the first day of school all over again but I soon realised there was nothing to be scared of. First time meeting my class was when I had to pick them up from the playground and take them into the classroom. The little kindies just looked curiously at me, some were brave enough to give me a big smile and wave. That was when my nerves were settled. 

My colleague teacher sure knows how to settle the class efficiently. She would compliment a student for sitting down the quickest or have the best posture. This encouraged other students to do them same because as kids, the crave to please you. She also has a point system, students are grouped according to the table they sit at. She rewards her students individually or sometimes as a group depending on their behaviour. At the end of the week, scores are tallied up to see which group received the most points, and they would get a reward.

It was obvious the teacher had total control over the class. In the event of a child misbehaving, all she needs to do is look at them in the eye and they know they've down wrong.

At one stage I was asked to read the class a story while the teacher set up the painting station. I finished the book before she finished setting up. I had to think on my toes because I still have 18 pairs of eyes on me. So I asked them about the story, what they like the most. I also tried to remember everyone's name so I won't be just pointing. I managed to accomplish that by the end of the day. Let's see if I still remember them next week! One of our readings was on Questioning. It says to always plan what questions are to be asked or else you will be standing on the spot thinking what to say next. The reading exercise I did with the class have made me realised that preparation is crucial. I may be able to wing it with the kindies but when faced with older students with more difficult work, I will need to be more prepared. Element 4.2.2 in the Professional Teaching Standards states that a competent professional Use questions and classroom discussion effectively to probe students’ understanding of the content. I will need to work on my questioning skills in order to achieve this goal.

It was evident in the class that there was a near equal if not equal teacher-student talk time. Maybe it was the activities the kindergarten have to do or maybe it was their age group, direct instruction was not used in the class.

Being in an actual classroom really open your eyes, can't wait til my next prac. I'm sure I'll learn even more as time goes by.