Observation Weeks

Observation Weeks

30th June, 2016

Matt discusses the value of observation time on placement and how to make the most of it.

With placement looming on the horizon for both myself and other education students all over, it is time to begin discussing it. Placement is many things to many people; to me, it is what I participate in university for, and a true test of my ability as a teacher. However, a feature of placement that will not change from year to year is the one known as the observation round/week. This is a week where teaching lessons is not the focus; instead we are to observe the processes, procedures and behaviours of the teachers we accompany. This time, especially for those students who have already taught in previous placements, may seem like a free week or a wasted one, but it provides the opportunity to promote success later in that or other placements. The following are a few short tips about getting the best out of your observation week or round. 

• Get to know the students: when you begin teaching a class, it is easy to become wrapped in making sure that the lesson works without a hitch. In such cases, it can be difficult to find the mental space and focus to really get to know the students you are teaching. Observations weeks are a great time for this. There is, generally, no obligation for you to organise or teach lessons, unless you want to, and as such more time can be devoted to this crucial area of teacher knowledge. Showing interest will help the students warm up to you, as well as providing information that will assist in your lesson planning and implementation. 

• Write down everything: some universities mandate that pre-service teachers take notes on classroom happenings as a placement-related assessment task. The fact that this is mandated can make it feel like a chore; however, it has been mandated for a reason. You have the time during an observation round to take notes about everything that you see and hear in the classroom, which will provide you with crucial information which teaching strategies and classroom management procedures are utilised in that classroom. It is also useful to revisit these notes and categorise them in the evening each day, to aide in recalling that information.

• Get to know the staff: as with learning about the students, learning about the staff (particularly your associate or supervising teacher) can only result in improving your placement performance. It will also help you to feel like part of the school community, which can be a significant factor in your overall emotional wellbeing during a placement, as anyone who has felt frozen out by staff can attest to.

• Have fun!: Now, I know that telling you to ‘have fun’, is one of the most cliché statements in the book regarding any assignment or task. However, when it comes to the observation round, it absolutely applies. Teaching lessons is fun, but it is also accompanied by some measure of stress. In the observation week or round, you are at liberty to really get involved with lessons in a way that will increase the enjoyment of both students and yourself. Put yourself out on a limb early and help wherever you can! 

These tips might be fairly basic, but I feel that they are important to revise before heading out on placement in order to get the most of the experience. For now, however, I must sign off, as myself have some placement tasks to do! Good luck to all!

- Matt

Image credit: University of Colorado 

Surprise! The Power of the Unexpected

Surprise! The power of the unexpected

27th April, 2016

Matt explores the potential for engagement and personal growth that lie in the unforeseen

During our university education, we pre-service teachers are often told about the importance of planning; planning units, planning lessons, planning the layout of our classrooms and so forth. Planning and preparation are the joint backbone of successful teaching, we are told, and I am not going to say that this is inaccurate. In fact, some of the best teachers I have seen at work are those whose planning is deep and whose preparation is complete. However, there is a foundation for successful teaching that is generally given lip-service but not explored; that of flexibility in the face of the unexpected.

Think back for a moment to times in your teaching experience where you have been honestly taken by surprise. How many of these are negative, and how many are positive? When I do so, it seems that there as many moments of positive surprise as negative. For every time I have realised that I’m missing important materials for my lesson, there has been a time where a student has stepped up to tackle content in way you wouldn’t have expected. Surprise can actually be a powerful font of personal growth and introspection, for you and your students. It is one of the more powerful emotions that we can feel in teaching, and it can be used to your advantage when applied to students.

Allow me to illustrate with two brief anecdotes:

The first concerns a student I had for a short placement who didn’t talk much. Let’s call her Sarah (not her real name of course). I spent a number of weeks in this Year 3/4 classroom, but beyond asking and answering occasional questions Sarah did not participate very much in class, at least vocally. At the time, Sarah and her classmates were studying poetry, which can be extremely dry for students. Although I was only there for a short time, I suggested to the teacher of that class that we could try to have a ‘Poetry Slam’, where each student memorises and performs a short piece of poetry as part of an in-class competition. In the days leading up to the end of my university-scheduled time there, we talked about how to read poetry; using expression, rhythm and projection and such. We provided a few set poems that they could choose from also, ranging from limericks about smelly flies to a passage from ‘The Man from Snowy River’. Although my placement ended, I promised to come back the following week to adjudicate the competition, and so I did. Imagine my surprise when Sarah, as shy as she normally was, busted out the passage from ‘The Man from Snowy River’, difficult enough for professionals, with just the right rhythm, lots of expression and in a loud voice. Not to mention that she was the only student in her class who even attempted that passage. It was a wonderful moment, and she was very deserving of her prize.

The second concerns a lesson exploring nets and faces, edges and vertices for 3-D objects. Instead of looking at pictures of the shapes or basic models and counting each, this lesson involved the students constructing their own 3-D objects from the nets and recording the faces, edges and vertices in their workbooks. This may not be an extremely innovative lesson, but the response to the somewhat unorthodox lesson was amazing. The children wanted to make one of every shape, and even requested to stay in at lunchtime to make more.

I bring attention to these anecdotes for what they taught me about the advantages of surprise. In the first situation, the surprise was mine, the teacher’s, and not only was it personally gratifying but it also showed me the potential performer that Sarah was, showing me strengths and motivation that I had not yet seen from her. If I were the full-time teacher of that class, it would show me a way to engage her in the future and promote her confidence. This was an unexpected moment rife with future potential.

The second was surprise for the students. Entering that maths lesson, none of those children expected to do something so hands-on, and the pleasant surprise was enough to engage them and likely promote their understanding of both nets and the properties of 3-D shapes.

I can’t provide a step-by-step guide to leaving room for surprise in your current or future classroom, but here are two things you can do.

1. Try not to just restrict yourself to the curriculum. Giving yourself a chance to teach something entirely different, even for just 30 minutes, can give you a chance for surprise on both sides of the teacher-student relationship.
2. Try teaching content in ways that are fresh to you and to the children. Sometimes this may not work well, but when it does both you and your students may find yourselves to be more engaged and motivated within the lesson.

I know this was a long post, but if you are still here I thank you for reading. Remember, surprise is not always a bad thing; in fact, it can be extremely interesting for you and your students.

- Matt

Where's the Drama?

Where's the Drama?

4th March, 2016

Matthew discusses the absence of Drama Education in the primary setting and talks about some of its clear benefits

In today’s post, I’d like to deviate from my usual subject matter to discuss an issue that is very close to my heart; the issue of drama education. First, some personal background. In primary school, the amount of drama (or performing arts) education I received was minimal; aside from school-wide events such as end-of-year concerts, the only time that performing arts was treated as a subject was in my final year of primary school. This was not taught by a professional performing arts teacher; it was taught by one of the usual teachers, who had some experience with performing herself (she was a good teacher, though). Although enjoyable, it was clearly not given the same attention that other artistic areas, such as visual art and music, were given, as those subjects were taught from Prep onwards.

This baffles me, because I believe that the performing arts is, out of the areas of the creative arts, the one most applicable to the widest variety of students. It has been said that drama-based subjects tend to only teach you how to recite scripts onstage, but there is so much more to it, both at a primary and secondary level. Today I will address three generalised benefits of the performing arts that I feel are not only important for all students to learn, but in the future I may speak more specifically.

1. Drama teaches about empathy. In order to play a character, any kind of character, a person must be able to some extent to place themselves in the shoes of a person who is different to them, both in personality and in situation. This happens in any form of drama, from the simplest of role-play exercises to improvisation to Shakespeare. 
2. Drama is excellent preparation for public speaking, as well as a significant confidence booster. Not only does playing a character require a person to pretend certain emotions, it requires, at least at some point, that these emotions be pretended and lines delivered in front of an audience. As a personal hobby, I help to run a youth theatre group in my local town, and I have seen many children and teenagers move from quiet and timid individuals to confident actors, able to make a fool of themselves onstage without embarrassment.
3. Finally for today, I believe that the performing arts are fantastic for developing new friendships between students, and thus improving their social skills. Creating and/or performing a piece together promotes teamwork, and requires students to negotiate with one another about characters, settings and staging. At times, other creative arts subjects, particularly art, tend to result in a large amount of solo work, whereas here the focus is collaboration.

I could spend much more time discussing the virtues of the performing arts as a way for students to grow, and I may do so in the future, but for now I ask only one thing; have a think about your creative arts experiences at school. Which subjects did you spend the most time on? Most importantly, what skills did you learn? Because although it may be uncommon, I know that I developed the most personally, rather than simply academically, by being involved in performing arts.

-Matthew

3 Ways to Encourage Participation of Students with ASD in the Classroom

Encouraging Participation of Students with ASD

12th January, 2015

Matt provides three practical tips on how to encourage students with ASD to participate in the classroom

In my last post, I began to unfold some of the basics that I have discovered for preparing a classroom for students with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), based on conversations I have had with integration aides and occupational therapists. Today I continue to explore the ways in which one can effectively teach a student with ASD, and today is about participation, both in set tasks and in classroom discussions. The strategies I will explain are by no means the only strategies; these are just a few that have come up in both my own practice and in discussions with professionals.

1. The NO HANDS UP Rule: When I first encountered this idea, it was in an article about new trends in education, and considering how entrenched our system seems to be in having students put their hands up I wasn’t surprised that I hadn’t heard of it before. Although this may have varying levels of success depending on the teacher, this strategy involves exactly what you think it does; removing ‘hands up’ responses in the classroom. We all know that the students who will regularly put up their hands in class are often those who already know the information; those who are unsure often will not respond for fear of embarrassment. This means that ‘hands up’ situations can be a source of anxiety for all students, and can be a particular issue for students with ASD. In classroom discussions, establishing the expectation that all students will respond (even if their response is ‘I’m not sure’) means that not only will you as a teacher gain a greater appreciation of the understanding of the class as a whole, but reduces anxiety when done in, for example, a circle. The student or students with ASD will know when it will be their turn to speak, and know that it is fine for them to be unsure, will reduce their anxiety at responding to classroom questions. It can even help any unsure students by showing them that others may be having issues as well.
2. Being Specific With Writing Activities: Often when asking students to complete writing activities, teachers will use open-ended prompts such as ‘What I did on the holidays’. This can be good for students in that it encourages students to write about something they know and enjoy, and through the fact that, in most cases, all students can write about something. However, such tasks can be a cause for anxiety in children with ASD due to their open-endedness; they often will not know where and how to start, and as such may not start at all. Although this may not always be appropriate for the whole class, making such writing prompts more specific and providing an opening sentence for all students to use can help to reduce anxiety as well as encourage participation in ASD students.
3. Integrating Computers into Classroom Activities: There is no shortage of talk, both in schools and university courses, about the benefits that technology can bring to a classroom. However, there are educational and participation benefits for students with ASD beyond that of those already established. Students with ASD tend to be predominantly visual learners; often they will not engage with verbal instruction alone. Computers present all information in the visual medium, and this medium can be tailored to suit the preferences of the individual, which will encourage their learning, increase their confidence and support participation. Furthermore, many educational programs can be attained that present problems in a structured fashion, with an identifiable start and finish and a set number of parts to complete; structure is important for students with ASD in all aspects of life, and such programs can be used to encourage independent work skills alongside the practice of other skills.

Thanks for checking this article out, and I hope that it has been useful to you. With our blog entering the New Year, I plan to continue writing about ASD, but also extend to other topics, the nature of which will, for now, remain a mystery. We will be releasing a new article every week for the next couple of months, so have a read. You might just learn something.

Signing off,
Matt

5 Ways to Prepare Your Classroom for Students with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)

5 Ways to Prepare Your Classroom for Students with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)

20th October, 2015

Matt talks about creating a classroom space that caters to children with ASD and passes on some tips from an Occupational Therapist 

 

When I first set out to write about students with ASD and their unique position in the school environment, I originally planned to create a top-ten or top-five list of ways to engage with such students. Upon conducting some research, however, I found that this approach was at best short-sighted. Having recently assisted in the coordination of a social skills program for primary school students with ASD, I became aware of the variance in difficulties a teacher can face with ensuring that an environment is supportive for such students.

I find it important to mention that although the creation of classroom environments conducive to the learning of those with special needs has formed part of our teacher education, it is extremely vague. Not that it wasn’t useful; it taught us about the importance of doing so (though that is common sense). It was simply that it gave little attention to specific special needs. With ASD diagnoses becoming more common in the modern day, I personally feel that learning as much as we can about catering for diverse learning needs will prove useful in our future teaching careers.

Therefore, to do my best to comprehensively cover this topic, I have decided to write a series of articles, each of which will focus on tips and advice from a professional Occupational Therapist (OT) on how to integrate children with ASD safely into the school environment and thus best provide for their learning needs.

I decided to start from the beginning; how can one prepare their classroom to be (using classic university language) a safe, supportive and inclusive environment for children with ASD. These ways will refer to mostly physical aspects of the classroom; there will be more information at another time on classroom processes. To reiterate, this is not a top-five list; each of these is equally important.

1. Bags/Lockers: As most of us can recall from our schooling days, when students go to the ‘bag area’, whether to hang up their bags, retrieve their lunch or leave school for the day, it is loud and chaotic, with students arguing, pushing and generally causing a ruckus as they try to be the first to reach their luggage. One of the first facts people learn about children with ASD is that they can become distressed when exposed to uncomfortably loud noise, and many children with ASD also dislike being touched or crowded. To avoid this as best as possible, set aside a specific bag hook or locker at the end of a row, so that the student can access their belongings without being fully subjected to the chaos.
2. Quiet Area: If your student is starting to become overwhelmed, it is important that they have a place to retreat to, where they can begin to calm down. This can be a designated area of the classroom such as a reading corner or a quiet table, or a space just outside the classroom like the hallway, an office or similar. This will depend on the preferences and requirements of the student. It may also be useful to, in the classroom, seat your student near their quiet area so that they can access it quickly and easily if needed.
3. Schedules and Timetables: Predictability and routine are very important in an ASD-friendly classroom; sudden or unexpected change, as well as not knowing what is coming next or how long activities will take, is very distressing for most such students. Schedules and timetables should therefore be prominent in your classroom and presented in a variety of formats. To further alleviate student anxiety, students can be provided with a timer to support the student and allow them to keep track of the length of activities. According to my OT consultant, these schedules are absolutely ESSENTIAL no matter the age of your student.
4. Sensory tools or objects: Tools that engage the senses, particularly the tactile sense, are very useful for helping children with ASD to maintain focus on activities, process information and keep calm. These could include safely chewable items such as pen/pencil toppers and chewy necklaces, or toys known as ‘fidget toys’ which are often bendable. If you are worried that students will become distracted, I can assure you that I have seen these in use; although sometimes they can distract other children and make it appear that a student is not listening to you when in use, it does sharpen focus, as the children in my focus group were able to easily recall information given to them as they engaged with their sensory tools.
5. Seating Position in the Classroom: This aspect does not just involve their seat at a table; this also includes seating during time on the mat, assembly and school events. It is important to optimally position your student according to a number of factors; who they are sitting with, how close they are to distractions (such as the bookshelves or computers, depending on their interests), proximity to the teacher and to sensory distractions; these can include areas of greater/lesser light, louder noise or hanging objects. As aforementioned in discussion of quiet areas, some students will prefer to be close to a door so that they can leave if required.

Although it is not simple or easy to prepare a classroom to be safe and supportive for students with ASD, with adequate preparation many uncomfortable and anxiety-inducing situations can be avoided. I hope that you have found these classroom preparation tips useful. Check out next time, where I will discuss five ways to design classroom procedures and processes to be inclusive of children with ASD.

-Matt