Evaluation

Evaluation Unit X

I chose college one because I had been thinking about teaching for a while I was thinking about looking for a placement just before unit x started. I knew this was the college I wanted to choose straight away but I wanted to work with high school age or college so maybe an 11-18 age range.

Initially I was really nervous when I found out we would be mixed with other students from other courses, I usually work on my own on projects that is how I prefer to work. I enjoyed the first the tasks before Easter and found that doing an activity with people I didn’t know helped us get to know each other. I especially enjoyed making the totem poles I felt like we all started to show our course specific skills but also our transferable skills in that workshop

The lectures I enjoyed most were DACA and I really wanted to do that placement after the lecture. The school seemed like a really inspiring and enthusiastic place. START was also really inspiring the ways they help people get confidence in them and confidence to help other people.

The workshops after Easter were really fun; I especially enjoyed the sweet and origami tasks. We were all getting to know each other better then. The tasks helped us think about the limits the people in our chosen associations might have also ideas about cost, practicality and how the workshops might benefit the people. I preferred working in a two opposed to a whole group.

I chose the primary school because it was something I had considered but really didn’t know if it was for me, so I though while the opportunity was there I would take it. I was very nervous of teaching children I didn’t know what to expect. I missed the first visit to Northenden primary school due to my dad being ill so I was worried that I had missed out and I wasn’t prepared for the first workshop. The first day I visited the primary school I was so nervous but luckily the other group members helped me out and I was able to participate in teaching the children how to make origami frogs. After that workshop I became more confidant within my team and teaching the children, I think all the workshops were appropriate to the children’s learning levels.

We decided on the theme of space after a meeting with the teacher and came up with the idea of creating a box that would fit on to the playground wall, it would have different sized holes cut in to it these would be targets for the children to throw balls in and score points. We came up with the idea of getting the children to do a workshop where they created their own alien which would then be transferred on to the box to decorate it. We created a slide show to let them look at different types of aliens and how they could do anything they wanted and make there aliens personal to them. We noticed they liked to copy each other’s ideas a lot so they were given prompt cards stating how many arms, legs and eyes the alien had or the shape of their body. I really enjoyed that workshop I worked with the children helping them to consider the composition of their aliens and the textures, colours, marks and techniques they could use.

The last workshop we decided to do after a tutorial, some of the group wanted to get on with making the playground piece and others myself included wanted to carry on gaining experience in the school. I had to think about the reasons why I decided to join this college and that was to decide whether or not teaching was for me and whether I would want to consider it as a career.

We decided that the children needed something to follow on from the designing an alien workshop, we decided to create 3D planets made from two pieces of foam board slotted together. Also we wanted to see how it was to teach a year three class and asked if we could shadow the teacher in the morning for reading, maths and science. You could see how hard it was to be a teacher and the lessons were squeezed in to one hour slots, it made me think about whether I would want to teach all the lessons or just art and design and I don’t think I could handle all of them. We had more involvement with the children this time giving them a presentation on the solar system and then introducing the learning objective to them, which was to design and create a planet in a group. Most of the workshops had been done as individual tasks and we thought it would be a good idea to see how they worked in a group and how they interacted. However we didn’t make enough planets for all five tables so I decided to draw a rocket and gathered materials for the children to do a collage. Paint was a bad idea, the children just went crazy with it and I had to talk to them and keep reminding them they were a team and they had to consult each other before they did something. In the end they all worked really well and produced a fantastic collage I was really proud of them and myself, that was the most challenging workshop I had done with them but we had it finished on time and had met the learning outcome.

In the last week or so it has been very hard to get the whole group together to work on finishing the playground piece, communication has been really bad. However a few of us got together and had a talk about what we needed to do next and how we were going to go about doing it. I feel more confident in speaking to my group now initially I didn’t really feel like a part of it because I was quite shy at first then I had time off. We have gotten all the wood and its cut to size; we have started to draw the aliens on to the wood which was really fun.

I feel like teaching is something I want to do, as much as I enjoyed the experience at the school I don’t like the idea of teaching all the subjects and would much prefer to focus on art and design. I am seriously considering applying for a PGCE after my degree is over and want to gain experience in high schools and colleges. I feel like my own personal skills have grown much more throughout this project and I have become more confidant in being part of a team and having a voice within that team. I would definitely go in to a school again and feel happy and confidant delivering a workshop.