Placement Day Three

 I started the day again at 8:30, which gave me time to prepare myself for the day and help out setting the first task out for the class. Today was going to be more numeracy and literacy activities to help with their upcoming SATs. 

Again the same routine played out this morning, the children were welcomed in at 8:50, the register was taken and the children were read out their choices for hot school meals to which each of the children replied with which meal they were having for the day.

Whilst Miss Boulstridge did a literacy activity of the mat with the class, I did one to one reading session with a couple of children in the class. Again, I wrote in their diaries whether they had read well or not and gave advice onto whether I thought they could be given a harder book to read or if maybe they needed to move a level down and just build up their confidence with reading. 

Once this was done, the class did the same routine of splitting to go to different classes, ready to do some numeracy.

In todays lesson, the children all sat on the mat again with their whiteboard and pen ready to answer the questions that came up on the presentation. The questions related to subtraction, addition, multiplication and division again but this time, the questions were related to going shopping and money. So for example, a question was “an apple cost 30p, a banana costs 10p, an orange costs 20p, and a bunch of grapes cost 40p. What items can I buy with 50p?”

I sat on the outskirts of the mat so that if any children were struggling, they could turn to me an ask for my help.

With this presentation done, the class was split into three groups to complete a numeracy sheet related to some of the stuff the children had leant last week. I was put with one of these groups and again, was only there as a last resort to them to help with the questions. This task didn't seem to hard for most of the children but a problem with the group I was in was that they were rushing through the questions and not reading them properly or taking them in. Because of this, they were making mistakes on questions that they were more that capable of answering. To overcome this, I try to work one on one with the children just to give them a little nudge to just read the question carefully and then answer it. This seemingly worked. 

However, within the group I was with, one of the children was just coping others work so not working out the answers herself and when I went to sit down and help her with some of the questions, she was more interested in her shoes or her pencil, almost anything but the work in front of her.

These was a frustrating position to be in as I felt the child wasn't listening to me because they didn't seem me as an authoritative figure. With this particular child, I just couldn't get her to listen or try with the questions.

When they had finished the questions the children were called down onto the mat again to have a recap on todays questions before lining up ready to go for break time.

Once back from break, the children all sat the mat ready for them to be given their next task of the day. I learnt that last week, the children had made some of their own chocolate. They had given their chocolate bar name and little branded box to put them in. With this in mind, the task the children were given were to write out a list of instructions for someone to use to make their specific chocolate. 

As a class, they went through the possible ingredients in the chocolate bars. For example, a list could be ‘milk chocolate, marshmallows, rainbow sprinkles, chocolate stars’. The class also went through what equipment was used and how they made their cardboard boxes.

When this had been discussed as a class, they went to their desks to write out this first bit of their instructions. I was put on a table of four students. Again it seemed I was in a situation where I was not seen as authoritative. The children were talking amongst themselves, over me, they were each discussing what they thought was the correct way to write the instructions out even though Miss Boulstridge had gone through it.

However, unlike the last time, I was able to gain their respect and they did listen to me and with each one I was able to work through to get them to complete their instructions as best they could. 

The class was then called down to the mat again to talk through the actual instructions of making the chocolate. For example:

1. Get a bowl and spoon
2. Break your milk chocolate into small pieces into the bowl
3. With help from an adult, microwave the chocolate…

The children were then asked to sit back at their desks again and write out their instructions.

With that it was time for lunch and for the children to be escorted to the lunch hall.

I found new challenges with today. It is becoming more aware to me that I am not someone that some of the children look up to as a teacher or even an assistant and so my authority is lost to them because they don't want to listen to me and see no consequence with not doing as I say. 

However, with saying that, I am still enjoying helping the children and working through the tasks of the day to help them towards their SATs papers.