WEEK FIVE REFLECTIONS (26/3/2012 – 30/3/2012)

History

This week I had my first lesson observation by my second Cooperating Teacher Ms Nurashikin. The focus of the tutorials was introducing my students to the basic requirements and techniques of writing essay paragraphs using the PEEL framework. Clearly this was a relatively dry and technical topic and, although a necessary component of the History syllabus, may end up boring the students after a short while. As such, my solution was to insert some thinking exercises (e.g. evaluations of sample topic sentences) into the lessons to get the students actively involved, as well as assess how much they had understood the lesson content. In the event, my students generally proved to be highly motivated and showed great interest in the lesson, probably because they understood the importance of mastering essay writing skills in the History examinations. I was particularly pleased by how my students were able to quickly grasp the essence of writing essay paragraphs and ask highly relevant and intelligent questions about the topic. As such, my next step would therefore be to incorporate more hands-on practice in order to hone their ability to write good essay paragraphs and internalise the skills and techniques over time..

Project Work

For the PW lecture and tutorials this week, the emphasis was on familiarising the students with the essential components of the Preliminary Ideas (PI) as well as the assessment criteria. In this respect, the PW teachers discussed the different PI components in great detail, paying great attention to the importance of innovation and originality, and also showed students some sample PI formats for reference. One particularly interesting way of inducting the students into the PI process was to get them to evaluate a sample PI proposal in terms of its originality, feasibility and manageability. From their subsequent group presentations, it was obvious that the students were good in highlighting the flaws in the proposal but had much room for improvement in coming up with constructive solutions to remedy the flaws. Hence, the latter area is probably something which the PW teachers and the students have to consciously work on over the coming weeks.      

Hockey (Boys)

This was the first week when I observed the responsibilities of a teacher taking charge of a CCA as part of my NIE requirements. My initial feelings were one of dread, as the training sessions were frequent (twice or thrice per week) and usually lasting till late in the evening. Moreover, the incidence of injuries was pretty high due to the nature and competitiveness of the sports itself. However, having participated in their team talks (conducted after each training session), I was truly touched by the students’ dedication and devotion to hockey and inspired by their determination to do well in the upcoming inter-school competition. An added motivation for them is the danger of the disbanding of the hockey team should they perform poorly, primarily due to budget constraints. Therefore, I have resolved to try my best to assist the boys to the best of my ability and forge close bonds with them, so as to give them the full confidence of my support as their teacher in their valiant endeavours.

WEEK FOUR REFLECTIONS (19/3/2012 – 23/3/2012)

History

This was the week when I had my first formal lesson observations from both my CT (on Tuesday) and my NIES (on Friday). Surprisingly, I did not feel apprehensive or worried about the observations and this was demonstrated in my generally smooth conduct of the lessons. This may be partly due to my increasing confidence in my teaching abilities, coupled with the intensive and extensive preparations that I had made, which naturally enhanced my self-belief as a teacher even with the formal lesson observations. Moreover, the students in the two classes being observed were by far the best of the H2 History cohort in terms of learning attitudes and aptitudes. Hence I had ample reasons to feel confident about my teaching performances in these two tutorial classes.

On another note, this was the first time that I was conducting a source inquiry lesson with the focus on teaching for historical understanding. In many respects, the lesson outcome was better than I had expected. The students were clearly familiar with the idea of using sources in the study of history as well as the incorporation of relevant contextual or background knowledge. More importantly, I was pleasantly surprised that most of them had little difficulty in reading and understanding the sources, as demonstrated in the source-based written assignments which they had to submit at the end of each tutorial lesson. Therefore, I am seriously considering infusing the use of sources into my lessons over the long term so as to inject more variety into the tutorial sessions as well as maintain the emphasis on teaching for historical inquiry, which is the fundamental basis of the history discipline.       

Project Work

For PW, this was the week when the questions were released to the students. On the teachers’ part, the focus was naturally on highlighting the key requirements of PW, its assessment criteria and some important submission deadlines. Since the students’ first job was to come up with the Preliminary Ideas for their group projects, teachers had to explain clearly to students the meaningful of key terms like “innovative” and “insightful” in order to ensure that they were on the right track when brainstorming their ideas. In short, this was only the start of what for the students would surely be a long and difficult process of self-discovery and hard work to complete their PW assignments. 

WEEK TWO REFLECTIONS (5/3/2012 – 9/3/2012)

History

Even though this was only the second week of my formal History lessons with my students, I would say that on the whole I felt a strong sense of achievement. This was primarily because I was very confident that I had effectively won over all my H2 History students and gained their acceptance of me as their teacher. Having already left behind a relatively good impression during the first week of lecture and tutorials, I was very pleased with the conduct of my lecture in which students were able to learn something meaningful and also enjoy the learning process at the same time. I came to realise that inserting interesting anecdotes jokes into the lecture was one of my key strengths in being able to hold the students’ attention throughout the lecture. While I again overestimated the time available to cover my intended lecture content, it was unquestionably a highly positive teaching episode for me. 

For my tutorials with the H2 students, I could sense the beginning of a strong rapport between me and my students as they proved to be increasingly open to sharing their opinions and participating in class discussions. My teaching style evidently appealed to them, as I had a distinctive preference for using interesting animations and pictures in my visually impressive Prezi presentations. When coupled with my ability to liven up the lessons with interesting and relevant historical anecdotes, I certainly believed that I had discovered the perfect formula that was ideally suited to my personal teaching style and beliefs. The next challenge for me would be to improve on my questioning techniques in order to better stimulate students’ critical thinking skills during my lessons.

The one major blot on my experience this week was my first tutorial with the H1 students. In many respects, it was a relatively demoralising experience as I did not get the feeling that the students had accepted me as their teacher. At times I really struggled to get them to concentrate on my lesson, mainly due to the rather dry and technical nature of the tutorial topic. The hot weather and relatively poor ventilation in the classroom did not help matters either. This was my first teaching experience with a H1 History class and it was undoubtedly a massive challenge for me, both in terms of teaching content and pedagogy. Nevertheless, one bright spot was the willingness of a few students to ask me questions and clarify their doubts, which in the process allowed me to ascertain that I had pitched the lesson appropriately at their level of understanding. My next step would be to think of ways to try and engage their interest in the tutorial class so as to facilitate the teaching and learning process for both teacher and students.      

   

Project Work

This week I observed my first Project Work (PW) lecture in PJC. The focus of the lecture was a step-by-step guide to using certain information technology (IT) tools, specifically Microsoft Word, Microsoft PowerPoint and Boolean operators in internet search engines. Clearly this was an extremely dry topic for both teachers and students who were familiar with these tools, but the fact that this lecture had to be conducted in the first place drummed home an important learning point for me: we should never have a blanket assumption that all students are necessarily IT-savvy and proficient in the use of various IT tools. Thus, however boring the lecture may be, it was still relevant to the students’ PW assignment.

The PW tutorial was a lot more interesting, as I got the opportunity to be the co-assessor for the students’ presentations of their mini-PW projects (which served as a form of preparation for the actual PW assignment). While the quality of their different groups’ ideas differed widely, what struck me most was the ability of the students to deliver generally fluent and confident oral presentations, particularly in terms of the pace of their presentations, pronunciations, enunciations and intonations. Many of them also demonstrated clear evidence of having done extensive preparations and rehearsals for their individual presentations, which certainly bode well for their handling of the actual PW assignment after the term break.

WEEK ONE REFLECTIONS (27/2/2012 – 02/03/2012)

History

This was the week when I formally took on my teaching duties with respect to lectures and tutorials. Compared to my contract teaching experience at PJC last year, I actually felt a stronger sense of excitement and anticipation for this practicum teaching stint. One key reason was my knowledge of the appropriate teaching pedagogies which I had learnt in NIE and greater awareness of how I could employ them during my lessons, which naturally enhanced my confidence as a trainee teacher. In addition, I personally felt the need to live up to the high expectations and the demonstration of confidence in me by my cooperating teacher, who after all had effectively given me de facto control over the teaching of the JC1 H2 History students. Hence, I would say that I had a clear understanding and sense of purpose as to what I aimed to achieve in my practicum.

Reflecting on my first lecture, I was generally pleased with the relatively smooth fashion in which the lesson was conducted. For one thing, I was able to handle the pressure of facing a large group of students and speaking confidently and intelligently about the lesson content. At the same time, I was able to adhere closely to my lesson plan and deliver the lecture with minimal hiccups. That said, the unexpected shortening of my lecture period due to the extended morning assembly meant that my original lecture and tutorial lesson plans had to be modified on the spot since I ended up only covering half of my intended lecture content. In this respect, I realised that I would definitely need to factor in such contingencies in my future lessons in order to avoid a possible panic attack on my part, and ideally balance between dealing with time constraints and sticking closely to my lesson plans.

For my first tutorials, I made a special effort to try and remember the students’ names as a first step towards establishing good rapport with them. The genuinely happy expressions that were displayed on the students’ faces when I was able to remember their names outside of class (e.g. at the school canteen) in a way showed that I was moving in the right direction. While I did not actually conduct full-scale ice-breaker sessions, the self-introductions by the students did provide me with important insights into their mindsets and worldviews, which could be potentially useful to me as their teacher over the long term. However, since my first tutorials were focusing on covering the rest of the lecture content, it was primarily conducted using direct instruction from me. I would be the first to acknowledge that this was not an ideal way of conducting a tutorial, which in my opinion should place a stronger emphasis on the stimulation of student’s critical thinking and argumentative skills, and also encourage active student participation in discussions. As such, I will certainly need to revise and refine my teaching approach regarding my future tutorial sessions.       

        

Project Work

The lesson observation for my scheduled Project Work class this week was cancelled due to the PJC Walkathon 2012.