Reflection-Week 11-Final Week of Term 1!

My first term is nearly completed!!!!

I have had an observation of my reading programme by my tutor teacher Helen. This was very beneficial to me as I now understand what needs to be improved. The must do's and can do's are not working very well. A lot of children are walking around and are not focused on one activity. Also I have many children coming up to me and interrupting my reading sessions. Lastly the children are still unfamiliar with the routine of getting themselves organised for the reading session.
Reflecting on this, first week of next term all groups will have the WALT: know the routines for each reading session. This means that they come straight to the jellybean table, they get out their reading log book and put it in front of me, they pull out their book from yesterday, put their reading folders under their chair and then begin to read their book silently. I am also going to introduce C3B4ME. This will prevent the children from interrupting so much. I wondered if my instructions were not clear enough but Helen believes that my instructions are very clear and precise.
We are also planning on working collaboratively in Reading. We are going to collate all of our running records and create groups of both our classes. This will mean less groups so that we can spend more time with the reading groups and see the children more often. We are going to work together to create reading activities which will focus on comprehension. I will adapt my reading programme so that it is more structured and will be similar to how Helen has hers set up. Hopefully this plan of action will help!

I have spent this past week focusing on assessment. I would like to spend my holidays going over these assessments to check that I have the children at the correct level and that I am catering for their needs. I have done a running record on every child except one (who is currently in China) and he will be assessed next term. I have done a writing sample for all children. I have tested all of their abilities for phonics. I have also tested their spelling as I plan to begin to implement some wordlab teaching next term. Lastly I have done a pretest and post-test for the Stand Maths-Algebra.

The trip last week was fantastic! It was really well organised. I had arranged to have 6 parent helpers and had planned to keep some of my behavioural children seperated. They each had an information pack with a timetable, the names of their group, a map and copies of the two scavenger hunts. Each child had a name badge. The children are in the process of creating thank you letters for the parents who helped. These will be completed tomorrow to hand out to the parents.

Helen and I have spent sometime this week thinking about the holidays and giving the children a work book to work from. We have created this together and we have decided that it is not compulsory as the children need to have a break. I am also going to send home some books for the children to read over the holidays if they choose to.

I have had a meeting with Sonia, who is involved with the ESOL children. She has given me some help with including more oral language in my teaching of Writing. She has shown me some naughts and crosses ideas where children play this using key words and orally putting them into a sentence. This will be very helpful with the writing plan for next term, procedural writing. This way I will be able to talk about those context that are unfamiliar to the children. She is also going to help me find some sentence starters and writing prompts for the children.

Overall I am very impressed with my own personal efforts this term. I have been very organised and trying to complete jobs as soon as they come up. Therefore I have not been very stressed and have been super happy with my own work!

I am aware of some of my weaknesses and I can't wait to begin to address these next term!

Inquiry Wall

Here is an image of my Inquiry display. This was not something I've put together in 5 minutes. I have added to it over the term. It has a big visual of the children's votes for the flag referendum. This incorporates some mathematics with the telechart. It includes brainstorms that the children and I have constructed together. It also includes images of the school trip to the museum. This is great as it is a reminder for the children about what they saw. They love to see themselves in photos!!!! It's also great for those parents who didn't come along to see what the children got up to. 

Week 10

Soooo I have nearly completed my first Term!

Thinking back to the start of the term, I have realised how much the behaviour of Room 7 has improved. They are slowly becoming more settled on the mat and I am not have children standing up to come and talk to me anymore. They now know that if they want a response from me they must put up their quiet hands.

This week I have completed my first lot of parent interviews. Although I found this a little daunting for the first time I still believe that I conducted myself well and had positive comments from the parents. They agreed with the strengths I identified and they also agreed with the points of concern and the next steps. I had 5 interviews to get through and each one lasted up to 30 minutes. It was great that these went so positively.

Coming up tomorrow is our class trip to the museum. I have helped to involve parent help and grouped the children in my class. I have had to check that a RAMS form has been filled in and made sure that I have all of the children's contact details and medical information. I am looking forward to interacting with the children in an environment outside of the classroom.

Belfast School has recently had the skate park built onsite. Every Tuesday the junior syndicate are allowed to bring their scooters and helmets and have some time playing over there. Each week a teacher needs to be on duty there to watch them and take them over there. I have been volunteering each week as I enjoy watching the children have so much fun over there. I always encourage some senior children to help me monitor the children over there and to help me supervise.

Something for me to continue to work on is my Reading programme. I have limited the amount of can dos that the children can do and I have also encouraged the children to spread out and use the whole space of the room. I am still having trouble with keeping the noise level down and I am and struggling to prevent children coming up to me and interrupting the group session. I am currently thinking about my instructions and making sure that these are clear and precise. I am also thinking about talking to the children about the importance of not interrupting my reading group and C 3 B4 ME.