3rd New Beginning

Welcome, 2009. I'm a fully registered teacher with a permanent teaching position and about to start my third year of teaching.

One good thing about this career is that each new year can be seen as a fresh new start; taking all the good things from last year and adapting them, and taking all the bad things from last year and.. well adapting them.

This 'start-of-year' round I will take a mental note of student behaviours on day one, to assess for possible problem areas.  Normally students are a bit reticent on day one, slowly emerging from their shells as they get to know you.  Last year, they we're a bit too 'loose' with their own conversations during class discussions or teacher directions - this led to a whole year of struggling to have an appropriate environment where all students listened to one another and felt confident enough to take the risk of sharing to all students.  I realise now that if I see a similar 1st day lack of concern for listening to others, I will need to set some very firm routines and protocols in that first term to hopefully allow for a positive environment for sharing, learning, and discussing throughout the rest of the year.

A mixture of team-building fun but also strict expectations on behaviours during independent learning, group work, whole class work (particularly appropriate noise levels in those different situations).

Week 3 Observation

Writing
Watched a short session where focus was adding detail. Rather than pressure of writng a full story, students were to write one sentence at a time based on a teacher-set subject (house, TV show...)

One thing I was reminded of was the value of having students share their writing ideas/work to the whole class. This happened in a positive environment where students felt safe to share amongst peers.

Swimming
Observed instructional teaching of swimming, focussing on technique. Three main groups. Start with one group in, others waiting. Once each group finishes short teaching session, they're free to play at end of pool or hop out if cold.

Worked well swimming lengthwise. Four to six students at a time going from each group.