Professional Development

Goal 1

To use basic language in class as greetings/farewells (kia ora, tēnā koe and ka kite anō). I will work on my pronunciation over the next couple of weeks. I will look into more words I can use in my vocabulary with the ākonga I have an aim to have at least 10 words I will regularly use while I am on practicum in class.

Reflection

I felt a lot more confident using te reo maori consistently through this practicum. I was not trying to get words into the lesson but had a natural flow instead. This meant that I was using te reo maori regularly where last practicum I had stopped by the end of the first week. I don't want to use te reo maori as a token in the class, to just tick a box. I still have a long journey to go on. I need to increase my vocabulary and go through more history and personal growth and identify more meaning and find more ways to incorporate te reo māori into the class situation.

In one of my science classes I was able to incorporate matauranga maori. I found a great example of native fungi and how they were used and how we might be able to use them now for antibiotics. (see the lesson plan 5/5 year 9 science -under resources). This worked well and was a great way to start the lesson using visuals of the fungi and letting the ākonga know how they were used. I need to find more examples to add to my kete for more science topics.

I feel like I have made progress in my personal journey with regards to te tiriti O Waitangi. When I was part of the MOE day I was able to be open to the material and the messages that were portrayed. I was pleased that the course so far had opened my eyes to the difficulties faced by Māori and Pasifika communities in the current education system.

I have been working hard to make my lessons inclusive to all learning styles and to open up about my experiences and stories which in turn had ākonga talk about their experiences and make connections to the material. (feedback from ākonga- resources and my practicum summary pages 1 and 5).

Goal 2

Work on my time management I am going to make sure in the lessons I am teaching that I am starting with the plan for the spell and the learning outcomes. For the last 5 minutes of the spell I will have a summary to conclude the spell and also once a week ask for feedback from the ākonga for what worked for them during the lesson.

Reflection

Working on my timings for the lesson and including structure was a progress that I made through the weeks on practicum. I slowed down the beginning and got more confident in explaining what we were going to cover in the lesson and made sure towards the end of the lesson I wrapped up the class. I felt like the classes had a better flow to them and having a closure at the end meant there was a closing for me and the ākonga. The number of classes that I had this structure increased as the practicum went on. (see the lesson observations). I found the ākonga were more confident with the tasks when there were instructions on the board as well as verbal instructions. I was working on this as well to allow a structure to the lesson to be seen in several ways.

I also worked on the number activities that I incorporated into the lesson. There were a lot more group activities for example POGIL, posters and choice boards. (see lesson plans- resource and lesson observations). At the start it was hard to not be instructing up front but to hear the conversations and the self-directed learning was teaching them the self management skills and the confidence they had in their learning was great to see.