Term 4 - Week 3

Soooo Orana Park was a success! I felt this was organised well and the children had a great day. Whooo!

I am thinking more and more about my practice and changes that I can make for next year.
Something I am really considering is setting a job chart for children. The state of the classroom and the shelves is not being looked after and this just adds an extra job.

I am also thinking about displaying the writing process in a fun and inviting way. I have seen this on line. I would love to adapt it so that it fits with the Belfast school writing process. I like how it clearly shows where the children are working. This similar to what some of the other teachers are doing at this school. It would fit in well with my programme as we spend more that 1 day on a piece of writing.

Term 4 - Week 2

It has been a great week so far. The children are working so well. I am seeing so much progress. It is great.

As I have said before, my goal is writing at this point. I feel I have a few great writing sessions this term. I am trying really hard to end Maths on time so I can start writing promptly. So far this has been great. The children are having at least 20 minutes of writing time and sometimes we even have time for sharing. I have felt that my conferencing has been stronger as I have more time. I have been able to teach some guided writing sessions and I have also been able to roam and conference with more students.

 I have organised the school trip this term to Orana park for the syndicate. This has involved me creating a newsletter, completing the RAMs, arranging for buses to be booked and booking the dates for Orana park. I had to organise the documentation for the teachers so that they were organised. I have found this quite stressful as I do feel responsible for the organisation of the trip and I wanted this to be run as smooth as possible. However I have really enjoyed taking on board extra responsibilities and contributing to the team. Our trip is not until Friday. I am looking forward to this tho my fingers are crossed for the weather to be good!

Term 4 - Week 1

Term 4 Ahhhhh! It has come round too fast!

I have thought a lot over the holidays about my practice and feedback from parents. Last week I posted about a parent's concerns relating to the reading log book. I have realised that this is something that has gone on the back burner a little bit. I am making more effort to check and sticker the books for each night read. I am making sure that the children are seeing me do this to provoke a bit more motivation.

My big focus this term is Writing. I want to get better at my time management during writing time. I find that some lessons run late and this runs into writing time. Therefore I need to cut my modelling time shorter otherwise there is not much time allocated for writing and then my conferencing time goes out the window! This week has been amazing for time management. Yesterday the children had a full modeled session as well as 20 minutes of silent writing time. We even had time to do a writing circle. This is where all children bring their writing to the mat and we have some children share their writing. As a writers circle the children show respect towards others and they provide feedback by saying 2 things they liked and one way that child could improve their writing. I am recording the children who have shared so that it is fair and all children will eventually get a turn.

I find it a challenge to assess writing and establish children's writing levels. My tutor and moderated all of our children's writing to check that our assessment is fair and consistent. I have found that this as made my assessment clearer and more fair.

I created a game for Mathematics called "I have...Who has..." This is game that targets number knowledge and place value. At the end of the holidays some of my children pulled out this game and played it independently. It was great to see the children do this.