Criterion 6

Conceptualise, plan and implement an appropriate learning programme.

Key Indicators:

• articulates clearly the aims of their teaching, gives sound professional reasons for adopting these aims, and implements them in their practice.
• Through their planning and teaching, demonstrates their knowledge and understanding of relevant content, disciplines and curriculum documents.

Reflective Question: What do I take into account when planning programmes of work for groups and individuals? 

What is the learning/teaching experience:  One of the challenges of teaching writing is that it can be challenging for children to see improvements day to day. One of the challenges for me as a teacher is to help the children catch a glimpse of progress they have made with their writing and development as writers and celebrate their learning success. I have some writers that are real battlers and just have no idea, they have little phonics knowledge and this makes writing super hard for them. This term we are really focusing on our letter sounds and phonics.

In week 8 I went out and did an observation at Rolleston Primary school where they use a Reggio Emilia approach to learning. I found it very interesting to see how their lessons worked. I was able to observe in two year 0-1 classes side by side. The literacy programme was very interesting. Writing was not modelled in one class I observed but was modelled in another class. The writing and reading programmes were joined and went through till lunch time. The teacher went from taking a writing group, then a reading group, then another writing group etc. I thought this was quite a different way of doing things but it really worked for the students learning as they were at many different levels and the teachers found it amazing for their learning and also easier for writing as like most of us teaching year 0-1 writing it is a challenge!!!

So What: What did I learn?

• I personally like having writing and then reading separate as for me it looked a bit confusing and all over the place. While the groups were working with the teacher, other children had one certain reading activity to achieve and then they could go on with reading games. A lot like our Must Do Can Do’s. There were definitely similarities in the programmes from school to school but also many differences with how their programme was run to ours.

Now What? Next Steps

• Talking tins: These can help those children who always forgot what they are going to write and make our jobs easier because we don’t have to remember for them. What they do is they child records what they are going to write onto this talking tin and then they can play back the recording so they remember what to write.
• Pobble: This website is full of amazing pictures for writing prompts, there is a new picture uploaded every day. I thought this was amazing and I spent a long time on it when I found it. I was able to find some pictures that I used for our Flight unit also and integrated it into writing. http://www.pobble365.com/

For what: What Criterion does this fulfill? Criteria 4, Criteria 5, Criteria 6, Criteria 9

What is the learning/teaching experience: One of the most difficult aspects of becoming a teacher is learning how to motivate students. It is one of the most important. Students who are not motivated will not learn effectively. They won’t retain information, they won’t participate and some of them may even become disruptive.

I have two to three students in my class that im really struggling to get motivated to learn, they either do not listen, don’t follow instructions and don’t seem to be bothered talking when im talking. I have done a bit of reading to find some ways to encourage these students to learn as they really need the help. When doing some research, I found a variety of reasons as to why my students may be unmotivated. They may feel that they have no interest in the subject, find teaching methods un-engaging or be distracted. It may appear students actually have difficulty learning and is need of special attention.

So What: What did I learn?

• While motivating students can be a tricky task, the rewards are more than worth it.
• Motivated students are more excited to learn and participate. Simply put: teaching a class full of motivates students is enjoyable for teacher and student alike.
• Some students are self-motivated, with a natural love of learning. But even with the students who do not have this natural drive, a great teacher can make learning fun and inspire them to reach their full potential.

Now What? Next Steps

• Encourage Students
• Get them involved
• Offer incentives
• Get creative
• Draw connections to real life
• Praise students in ways big and small
• Expect excellence
• Spread excitement like a virus
• Mix it up

For what: What Criterion does this fulfill? Criteria 5, Criteria 6, Criteria 7, Criteria 8

What is the learning/teaching experience:  I sat down with my Tutor teacher this week and discussed some goals for this term to focus on. A curriculum area that I always struggled with was Numeracy and at this New Entrants level I find it so tricky because there are so many different abilities and Maths has never been a strong point of mine. I really wanted to focus on maths this term so I can develop brilliant maths learning for my students. To do this my tutor and I discussed observing another teacher in the junior area and then from their taking what I see and putting into practice in my lessons. My tutor teacher can then observe me teaching maths and give me more helpful hints to develop my maths teaching skills.

As well as doing this BT reflective journal website, I also am using Appraisal connector which is shared with the Principal, tutor teacher and AP. In this my tutor and I discussed a goal that is achievable and can really help my learners. We have three goals/targets to try and achieve. A team goal, school target and personal goal. The team goal and school target have not yet been confirmed but my personal goal is: How can I improve my writing programme to develop independence and extend them as they become more confident and able? At this stage I can only really imagine a few of mine as independent writers but it will be really rewarding to achieve this goal.

So What: What did I learn?

• To develop and improve my practise observe others to get new ideas.
• Create goals to succeed and motivate

Now What? Next Steps

• Organize to observe maths and take ideas to put into my own practise
• Reflect on the goals I have created.

For what: What Criterion does this fulfill? Criteria 1, Criteria 4, Criteria 5, Criteria 6, Criteria 12

What is the learning/teaching experience: One word after this week, ‘Overwhelmed’. Wow what a week, 20 New entrants first full week at school oh my goodness. They are just gorgeous and I have lovely parents on board also. The week began off smoothly of course there were lots of tears as parents left on the first day. But they settled fine we spent the day learning about routines and rules of the school. I tried to keep to a normal class programme as well as I could on the first day. We did some writing, poetry for reading and maths. By the end of Monday the children were just exhausted the tears began flowing and they were all done for the day. Come Wednesday it was a school “Start-up Party” my class were very overwhelmed by the day with the whole school being involved. A lot of them didn’t cope at all and really struggled with all these bigger children around. They were exhausted come Thursday with over half the class randomly crying at different times. I thought I was going to need some help as majority of the children were all at once so upset I managed thank goodness and even I was exhausted come this day. The afternoon was spent watching Maths and phonics YouTube clips and the students didn’t even move. Friday we had a very cruised day lots of fun activities the children explored the classroom, we did some dance, and played some games outside.

This week I have thought to myself: “Am I good enough for this” “Am I doing something wrong” “Why do they keep crying, how can I make them feel better” “Where do I start with their learning they are all so different” “Sooooooo overwhelmed”. They have come into school so different to my students last year that were the same age but their knowledge is completely different I have students that have no idea what their name looks like, or any letters of the alphabet. I was talking to a friend and they mentioned, the children I had last year have come straight from Kindy or preschool. A majority of these children have come from holidays so some of their knowledge has gone. It totally made sense! I defiantly have my work cut out for me this year. But one thing with this New Entrant level is that they are soaks, they take everything in you tell them.

So What: What did I learn?

• Take one day at a time
• Adjust the programme when needed. At this stage, putting on an educational you tube clip is worth it. When they have nothing left.
• 5 year olds are soaks, they will take everything in.

Now What? Next Steps

• Keep creating a fun and welcoming classroom.
• Observe how the students are learning and their behaviour if something isn’t working, make changes.

For what: What Criterion does this fulfill? Criteria 4, Criteria 6, Criteria 7, Criteria 8.

What is the learning/teaching experience: This week has been jam-packed and definitely out of our normal routine. The students had a trip to imagination station, we had life education and beginning our Athletics practice. As well as it was a long weekend so, we packed so much into just four days.

Organizing a first class trip was full on, there was permission forms that needed to be returned, parent help slips and health forms. Getting all these back was actually easier than I thought. Having notebooks in their reading folders for communication with parents definitely helped with this. Adding in friendly reminders to parents to bring back forms. Being a New Entrant class I had about 70% of parent help forms come back saying they would love to come on the trip. Unfortunately, I could only take 4 parents. So some had to miss out. I was so disappointed I wasn’t able to attend our first school trip due to having an appointment. Another teacher that the children new took them and they had a blast. It was an easy transition as I emailed the parents explaining that this teacher was attending. Worked out well. My students were so well behaved and they told me all about it when they got back.

So What: What did I learn?

• Organization is important for school trips
• My students are very off with their behaviour when not in normal routines, some of them cannot cope.
• I work with such supportive staff to help when things like appointments pop up and cannot be avoided.

 Now What? Next Steps

• Bind all the health profiles so I have these all together and if I need to refer to them its an easy process.
• On the next trip make sure I take new parents, so all have the opportunity to come.

For what: What Criterion does this fulfill?  Criteria 1, Criteria 2, Criteria 5, Criteria 6.

What is the learning/teaching experience: I did a reading observation in Room 3. This was great. It was good to see I am on the right track with my reading lessons (See notes under observation tab). Click Link to view observation notes READING OBSERVATION

So What: What did I learn?

• Ideas for ‘must do’ and ‘can do’ to add to the list for children when I am not reading with them so they stay focused on something.
• Approaches to when I’m working with reading groups. E.g end of lessons because they are such a hurry to get through I quite often just complete the guided reading without a conclusion.
• Finishing questions for example what were the characters of the story?

Now What? Next Steps

• Include these tips into my practise
• Create more resources for Must Do, Can Do’s

For what: What Criterion does this fulfill? Criteria 4, Criteria 6

What is the learning/teaching experience: Had my first school entry assessment get together with a parent this week. I was actually so nervous! It was such a casual meeting just to talk about where this student was at, how they went in their SEA and what they can do at home to help. I guess it is just that worry about what if they aren’t happy with what I say. Not that there was anything negative to say you just never know with some parents. Overall, it went very well and their mum was very happy with how the student is going as am I. Plenty more SEA catch up with parents to go! I call them catch ups as they aren’t very formal.

So What: What did I learn?

• Communication is important with Parents/caregivers and whanau as there is only so much you can do at school, students also need to learn skills at home to be the best they can be.

Now What? Next Steps

• Identify the needs of students and put into my planning as tasks students can do during reading, writing maths.
• Create resources to help with gaps that are missing.
• Focus on students phonological awareness (make time for this)

For what: What Criterion does this fulfill? Criteria 1, Criteria 6, Criteria 7, Criteria 8, Criteria 9, Criteria 11

What is the learning/teaching experience : This week my tutor teacher and I sat down and discussed team and personal goals for the year.

Team Goal: Further developing Discovery to suit the needs of our children. We are currently changing the way Discovery is run over the five classes and having 5 ‘subjects’ that students can choose to attend. Cooking, science, art, music and sport. Students have the opportunity to sign into an area they would like to discover and have a go at. There are 30 spaces at each activity that students need to opt into an area and if the space is full they find something else to look at. Mrs B and myself are doing cooking to start with. We made it very simple and students made toast and choose either jam or honey to put on it. After the first week which was a bit of trial and era we found ways to develop it further by adding other activities to it such as bringing in the kitchen toys to go with the theme so they could play with these while they wait. Our next cooking item is popcorn so students are going to create and decorate a holder to put their popcorn in.

School Target: Improving the level of readers at year 0-1 to be reading at green after 1 year of school (When turning 6). Many of my students in room 1 are not even close to this and are just beginning to identify high frequency words which is a great start. Working on their wonder words and focusing on their reading will definitely help them achieve this.

Personal Goal: So many personal goals to think about I think I have to begin with one that has stood out for me is to have a better understanding on how to teach writing to emergent writers and to extent them as they become more confident and able.

So What: What did I learn?

• Reflections are key
• To think about how I can improve my practise to achieve these goals
• Differentiated teaching as best as we can, teachers must know their students well enough to adapt their teaching approaches and methods to the ability of the children.

Now What? Next Steps

• Research how I can improve my practise.
• Look for and research ideas for my target children. Create resources to improve their high frequency word knowledge.

For what: What Criterion does this fulfil? Criteria 4 Criteria 6 Criteria 9 Criteria 12

What is the learning/teaching experience: This week I began doing some iKan testing and it was very interesting seeing how they went with this. I also looked at their school entry reports. Some students were a lot easy to mark than others. As some students have been at school for longer obviously and its interesting these students are all within a month of age but their knowledge and mannerisms are so different.

In Maths we have currently been looking at statistics and which objects have less, more etc. It’s amazing how much they have learned in such a small amount of time. It’s a great feeling when they can talk about and identify it so easily when they are discussing graphs. Makes me feel quite proud. Maths  is definitely not my strongest subject as I didn’t have much experience in maths during my student teaching. It is a curriculum area I feel I am lacking in terms of content knowledge and how to teach it for this age group. Yes, I know what I need to teach, but lack the knowledge and confidence with this area for example where to start, what materials to use, what activities to begin with. This is definitely a goal for me to gain more confidence with my maths teaching. In regards to that I feel humbled that I have so many amazing people to learn from and ask questions.

So What: What did I learn?

• How to read maths testing
• Every school’s assessment is different
• Ask for guidance and help if I need to.
• How different capabilities, students can have at this age.

Now What? Next Steps

• Look into professional development around numeracy.
• Use the NZ maths website to help guide
• Continue to ask questions
• Observe different teachers teaching maths.

For what: What Criterion does this fulfill? Criteria 2 Criteria 6 Criteria 8 Criteria 9 Criteria 11

What is the learning/teaching experience?: One of the challenges I’ve been having since I began is whether to do my planning online or paper copies. I have used google docs a lot on my practicums and then on my last practicum I used a hard copy and it worked just as well. I decided to go with a hard copy to begin with for my planning this term and then will look next term if I will do them online. I’m a visual learner

so having a planning booklet in front of me where I can scribble on and write notes about students is a good start out for me and use it is a working document at this stage.

So What: What did I learn?

• I don’t have restrictions to do planning certain ways as we did at Uni and I am able to do them the way I prefer.
• I can only become a better teacher if I am willing to adapt, change and learn and try new strategies.

Now What? Next Steps

• Make necessary changes to planning.

For what: This Fulfill these criteria  Criterion 4, Criterion 6

What: The staff are so amazing, helpful and friendly they make me feel so welcome and a part of the team. Still have to pinch myself thinking that I’m actually a teacher and not a student teacher anymore. It’s quite surreal 3 years doing this degree and here I am.

I have taken a lot of what I learnt and developed during my last practicum and put it into my classroom practice which has definitely been an advantage and very helpful, by developing similar routines, classroom layout etc. This week was all about creating classroom routines, such as the morning they put their reading folders in the correct box, drink bottles and lunch boxes on the bench, jackets in the jersey box and bags in the cloakroom. Doing this in the morning encourages the students to be self-managers.

Still some very upset children in the mornings as parents walk out the door. But as soon as they are gone the tears have disappeared thank goodness, it was chaos! When some wouldn’t settle for a while. I had a student that tried to do a runner but managed to settle her! Oh goodness.

Had my first release day this week which involved cutting, laminating, cutting, REPEAT! Making resources for the classroom, was very successful but again not enough hours in the day! My mentor teacher is amazing and such a great help! He found all the resources for me a “million” pieces of paper filled with numeracy and reading activities. Saved me a lot of time. I also had a chance to sort out some maths equipment, made lots of labels and created a newsletter. The classroom is coming along.

So What: The biggest challenge this week was Thursday, the day of school visits. I felt like I was super organized this week as I learnt a lot last week of how the school visits went. I had 5 visiting this week. I also had a new student begin who is only with us for 4 weeks. This student is a year older than the rest of the class. But he had a teacher aide working alongside him at his other school so it was best he came into room 1. It was a bit stressful having him come in on the Thursday with no stationary or anything and then my five visitors. Unlike last week where I had my mentor in class to help greet the parents. I also had a parent stay the whole time during the visits which distracted some of the other students as well. 

Now What: It’s all a learning experience! I’m learning alongside my learners every day.

For What: This Fulfills these criteria  Criterion 2 Criterion 6 Criterion 8

What is the learning/teaching experience?: Oh my goodness it has all happened so fast, cannot wipe this smile off my face that I have been given this opportunity to work in such an amazing school.

Spent the holidays turning room 1 a blank canvas into a warm bright colourful classroom, there is a way to go with needing student’s art work etc, on the walls to make it look loved, it is all coming together.Of course the thoughts are going through my head “Am I good enough? do I know enough? what are the students and parents going to be like?” A thousand questions going through my head but as my life motto goes “I got this”.

Began this week in the Room 1 new entrants class with 6 students, some very worried and scared children to begin with. Lots of tears this first week as parents left them and took the students a while to settle in. Definitely a learning curve for me as my mother said I was exactly the same when I began school.  Very overwhelming for them a whole new experience. They had been on visits before the holidays but this was a whole day- week at school they had to get through. That first day was definitely a learning curve for me, it was such a strange feeling knowing this classroom was mine, I didn’t have an associate teacher watching my moves all the time. I had these students walking into the classroom, that I was going to teach and their parents that I would share their children’s development and success with. With only 6 children the days have been very slow as they finish things fast. They are all at the same beginning level and no groups developed yet for obvious reasons, needed to have lots of extra activities prepared to fill in the day.

I didn’t have a release day this first week as my students being very new we thought it might be best if they just had me for the week instead of being overwhelmed with a new person coming in. I was lucky enough to have my tutor teacher come in and give me a hand with finding resources and I was able to ask questions while he was there. He also helped me out with the school visits I had three new students coming in for their visits, and felt I was so un organized as they came in during the middle of writing. With some help I got through it and learnt a lot on how to manage next time and I thought it ran smoothly considering I was so overwhelmed and stressed with the experience but bring on next week it will be all under control.

So What: What did I learn

1. Teachers are always learning and developing. 
2. Always reflect on my practice.
3. It is okay for lessons to not run perfectly. 

Now What: Next steps 

1. Continue to set up and develop routines.
2. Continue to refine my own teaching and pedagogy. 

For What: This Fulfill these criteria  Criterion 4, Criterion 6, Criterion 8

 

 

WEEK FIVE TERM THREE REFLECTION: WRITING

WEEK SIX TERM THREE REFLECTION: SETTING GOALS

WEEK SEVEN TERM THREE REFLECTION: A FEW WEEKS IN

WEEK EIGHT TERM THREE REFLECTION: THE FINISH STRAIGHT

WEEK NINE TERM THREE REFLECTION: THE LAST POST OF TERM 3