Wednesday 11/06/06
Prac Block Day 21

Cheryal was back today – so glad. My first class was music – which I was taking!! It was pretty exciting, but I knew I didn’t have enough planned. The music teacher didn’t give me any feed back on the lesson plan I gave her (in fact she had lost it) so I just told her it was going to be too short and to be prepared to fill it out with something (ie – compositions) and began preparing!

I hadn’t been able to find a piano score for the song that I was using, so I ended up writing my own song and giving the students the score to that. The lesson started well, and the students understood what was going on. My questioning work was a little broad and I didn’t bother writing stuff up on the board that I should have, but oh well. The students were pretty on the ball anyway.

After we listened to the songs and discussed how to write for piano, myself and Megan, the other music prac teacher, played my song for the students. They really got into it an understood what was going on with the piano writing. Apparently I could have expanded that activity more (and I probably would have) except that the second time through the song, my eyes just started watering and they didn't stop. It was so painful, I could hardly see! AHH!! It’s like teaching nightmares come true. My mascara was everywhere, I couldn’t open my eyes (I ended up finishing the song with my eyes closed!!) it was a painful experience.

Luckily there were two other teachers in the room or it could have been a very awkward legal matter, but as it was, one of the students took me down to the loos and I washed out my eyes (and all the make up off my face) while they just worked on their compositions. When I got back (with my incredibly blood shot eyes) Megan was showing them some basic chordal structures and then they worked on their compositions.

As far as me teaching – the lesson was over. I finished it up pretty well, and Megan played her composition for the students, but I felt so unsettled for the rest of the day.

Maths and maths again for the next two classes, nothing terribly eventful here (especially compared with music that morning). The students really are working well on their maths this time and about a third of each of the classes are already on their second books! Hooray! We had some more work handed in too, of which I marked the money games work. One girl hadn’t even done her final task... sad day.

The final lesson was Japanese and as I had done the lesson on pets the previous day with out my supervising teacher, I did it again with the beginners today. It was A LOT harder today simply because the sheet was in hiragana which the beginners struggle with a lot. Also, because the students are younger they are a bit more chatty than the older class.

As a result, we spent the majority of the lesson just translating the hiragana into romaji so that they students could read it. I also had some boys who simply didn’t do any more. After we had done that, I showed them how to ask each other who had pets and then had them play pet bingo with each other. It worked pretty well (although walking around the classroom and literally being lost in the sea of thirteen students (ten of which are taller than me) was an experience and a half) apart from two boys who kept wasting time and asking in English.

I ended the lesson with a quick recap on the names of animals and let the students go. My teacher (who had spent most of the lesson up the back with a glazed look on her face (long day, still sick and had a headache coming on)) said I had done well. She said there wasn’t really any other way to do the translations (hiragana to romaji) although I wonder if I couldn’t have had them work on a few animals each in groups? Oh well – something for next time.

My prac folder is stuffed full of lesson plans and resources that I have collected from the last five weeks. One week and two days to go.

Today I learnt that tissues are something that are always needed.