Week 1: Reflections

What I learnt:

* In every lesson try to have a skill or learning technique which you teach to the students rather than simply teaching the content. For example, teaching techniques such as the Inquiry Process and SQ3R. Also it is important to explicitly make the students aware of the technique they are learning.

* Year 8 students take a lot longer to get through activities and set tasks compared to year 9 and 10s. They tend to get over excited and often take longer to settle down.

What went well:

* Students respond well to visual information and activities. For example, I taught a year 8 SOSE class in which I was introducing the concepts of "heroes" and villains." I had students study images of 9 famous characters such as: Harry Potter, Lord Voldemort, Batman, Cruella De Vil etc. In pairs they had to discuss and identify whether or not the character was a hero or villain and what characteristics make that person a hero or villain.

* Scaffolding and modeling. Students need examples and guidance when completing an activity or task they are unfamiliar with such as essay writing.

I will write more later... I have to get back to writing lesson plans and resources : )