Well my two week practicum ended today and it’s back to school for me next week. What an interesting two weeks I’ve had! During the second week I was given various opportunities to teach in the classroom. I continued on with my small group novel study this week and almost all of the students have now finished the book. This experience was very beneficial as I got to work closely with a group of students and see them grow in such a short period of time. In addition to the novel study, I taught the morning messages, as well as ran the weekly spelling test. With regards to full lessons, I taught a math lesson, an inquiry lesson, and a P.E. lesson. From the math lesson I got to see how much preparation goes into one lesson and I received some great feedback as to what I can improve on. The inquiry lesson I taught was on the provinces and territories of Canada where I took the class on a “bus trip” across the country followed by the students making their own maps based on the mapping criteria we created last week. This lesson went surprisingly well and the students and I had a great time. I also taught a P.E. lesson which was a reality check into how challenging teaching P.E. can be. During the P.E. lesson I was teaching the students ball skills (underhand and overhand) and I was finding that I was talking for quite a bit of it. I would like to work on this and research ways to maximize student activity while delivering a fundamental movement skills lesson.
In addition to the teaching I did, this week allowed me to learn more about the IB PYP program and to see IB throughout the students and the teachers. I saw a lot of the transdiciplinary theme occurring throughout the various lessons. For instance, during language arts, the students were reading about the provinces they have been studying in Inquiry. There was also a lot of Action that occurred this week in my class. The students are very excited about the current transdisciplinary theme and bring in items everyday to share. The use of the learner profile terms were also evident this week especially when a discussion was had about good decision making and how to know the difference between right and wrong. I was very impressed by my School Advisor as she can turn a negative conversation into a positive one using the learner profile. Moreover, it is good to see the information we have been taught so far at UBC about the IB program evident in the classroom. As I am gaining more insight into the IB program and how it is reflected in the staff and students I am understanding why we were told that IB is a way of life, and not an approach to teaching. I am hoping that I am reflecting the IB learner profile myself and being a good role model for my students.
Morning message mind map. The students recorded their mind map ideas in their Units of Inquiry books.
The Map of Canada I drew for our Inquiry lesson.
The bus we took to travel across Canada and the map each of the students filled out.
The Action wall.
The Remembrance Day Wreath.
Thanks Danica for your observations. You are right that IB as a way of life is certainly very apparent at your school, as it was the first of the public schools on the North Shore to become an IB World School. You said that you noted that the transdisciplinary theme was evident in a variety of different lessons. What was the impact of this on student learning? I agree that teaching P.E. is challenging! I think that it is one of the hardest subjects to teach as so much of the success of the lesson depends on classroom management. Good for you for taking a risk and jumping in!
Hi Meredith,
Thank you for your reply.
I think that the impact on student learning was that having a transdisciplinary theme brings together the entire learning experience and enforces a particular central idea. When the students were learning about navigation in various subjects, they were more excited about these subjects and I could really see engaged learning occurring. It was very exciting!