Monthly Archives: April 2016

This week I took the biology 11 students outside as part of the mosses unit. It was an interesting experience and the first time that I had taught a lesson outside of the classroom. It was definitely outside of my comfort zone, but I was very lucky to have Mr. Wolfe there to guide me and give me pointers on how to make it an effective teaching strategy. Even small things like making sure that the students are not facing the light when you speak with them so that they can see what you are pointing at, I had not thought of before. Techniques to maintain effective student management, like arranging the class into a semi-circle around you so that you can see all of them at once were also very helpful. It stressed me out to have students not all stuck inside of one room where I could keep an eye on all of them simultaneously without needing to even turn around… but I’m glad I did it.

At UBC we discussed using inquiry and alternative strategies to lecturing to build student engagement. I am glad that I tried this method of teaching because I saw some students who were normally very quiet in the classroom environment suddenly leap to the front of the group, eager to participate when outdoors. Being able to see and experience science in the world around you is also very different from just learning it in the classroom and I hope it will become a memorable experience for them. In the future I also hope to find more ways to get students engaged in science and learning outside of the classroom. One big regret I have is not planning for a field trip during practicum, but fingers crossed there will be an opportunity for that in the future!

This was an interesting past two weeks for me because I have taken on a Biology 11 class and I’ve had a much different strategy in choosing what to prepare for lessons in that class compared to Science 10. Science 10 is all about preparing for the provincial exam. I don’t feel like I have a lot of freedom to explore related and interesting topics because I need to make sure that I hit everything in the textbook. Lest something I didn’t cover make its way onto the exam. Biology 11 is totally different and refreshing. Of course I still have to make sure that I adhere to the IRP, but within that there is so much more room for creativity and exploration. I can choose to cover or not cover specific details depending on how valuable they are academically and how interesting I think they are to learn. Wonderful!

At UBC there has been a lot of talk about the new curriculum being skills, not content focused and I am hoping that is the case. It is certainly more difficult to prepare lessons for Biology 11 because there isn’t a go-to resource like the Science 10 textbook that has everything I need to prepare in it. But it is much more rewarding personally because the lesson content that I choose to prepare is more meaningful to me, and I also therefore think I can teach it more passionately. I was given the chance to cover the microbiology section… my major in university! So I had a lot of experience I could draw upon for lessons, activities, and labs. It’s a great feeling to be able to use my use my passion to help students learn in the classroom, and I need to develop strategies to work that into courses like Science 10 where the content is more restricted. I think it would be difficult, but not impossible, and certainly rewarding.

This week I changed over from my Science and Technology class to my Biology 11 class. I’ll see the Bio 11s through until the end of my practicum… which is only a few weeks away now! Wow, times goes by quickly. I discovered something interesting which is in how I assess my students’ understanding formatively, and I think it has been lacking so far. For my Science 10s I have not been monitoring homework. My philosophy has been that if you choose not to do the homework, you choose to reap the consequences when the summative assessment comes. This philosophy is based on my own experiences as a student in recent memory, but I believe I had forgotten how much nudging I needed in Grade 10 to actually get work done. Students being off-task during work periods has been a constant struggle, and I think I have been at fault for most of that. I need to not stop treating the students as responsible, but realize that they need a bit of help and that I by being a bit more on them about homework I will hopefully actually be doing them a favour.

This relates to UBC because my courses often discussed strategies for formative assessment that don’t involve grades. I plan to collect the homework, but won’t mark it for correctness. I want to just give them a quick read and a checkmark, star, or blank depending on the effort the student put forwards to understand. The issue is not to punish students who get homework wrong, it is to encourage actually thinking about it which will hopefully keep students paying attention more during class and working more during the time after a lesson.