Aftert the school exams it was apparent that the L2 Chemistry students are not yet anywhere near ready for their end of year external exams.
In repsonse to this I decided to drop the final internal that was slated, Oxidation and Reduction, in favour of spending the remaining class time on revision of the content of the external standards.
In class time students are allowed to choose their own specific area of the course to concentrate their revision. To aid and focus them at the start of each lesson I circulate in the class and ask them to give me their personal topic or success criteria for the hour they have in the classroom. Making them choose one specific thing to master in the hour seems to improve their focus for their learning and help break down the seemingly impossible task into smaller bits that are possible.
Wednesday, 18 October 2017
Thursday, 21 September 2017
Team Teaching
It is eye dissection time again. This year I suggested to VWJ that we combine classes as we were both going to do the dissection at the same time. This meant we had two teachers circulating the room. Even with the double the number of students, and hence the same ratio, it made for better supervision of what the students were doing. LEM joined us as well as for both of them it was the first time doing eye dissections with a class.
The class format was to watch a video of a dissection, then to do the dissection themselves and complete a worksheet about what they were observing, as a means of making sure they did take the time to observe and not just squee about the dissection.
As I was the more experienced teacher I took the lead in running the class, and setting out the expectations. Eye dissections are a busy activity with a lot of tooing and froing to get started. Having two teachers meant that one maintained order, and gave the students tasks, while the other set up the equipment, or chased down missing items. During the clean up it allowed one teacher to direct the clean up of the room, and the other to supervise the reloading of the trolley and the disposal of the eye remains.
I haven't taught with another teacher in the room as an equal before. Although I was taking the lead, as I was the only teacher with experience of this activity before, we had equal stakes in the class. I have always had another teacher as an observer whether on practicum or for appraisal purposes.
My son has a team teaching class at his school and it works very well for Primary, now I can see how it could work for us in the senior sciences.
The class format was to watch a video of a dissection, then to do the dissection themselves and complete a worksheet about what they were observing, as a means of making sure they did take the time to observe and not just squee about the dissection.
As I was the more experienced teacher I took the lead in running the class, and setting out the expectations. Eye dissections are a busy activity with a lot of tooing and froing to get started. Having two teachers meant that one maintained order, and gave the students tasks, while the other set up the equipment, or chased down missing items. During the clean up it allowed one teacher to direct the clean up of the room, and the other to supervise the reloading of the trolley and the disposal of the eye remains.
I haven't taught with another teacher in the room as an equal before. Although I was taking the lead, as I was the only teacher with experience of this activity before, we had equal stakes in the class. I have always had another teacher as an observer whether on practicum or for appraisal purposes.
My son has a team teaching class at his school and it works very well for Primary, now I can see how it could work for us in the senior sciences.
Friday, 8 September 2017
Planning the Year 10 Curriculum
I have been taking responsibility for managing the update to the Junior curriculum. The content and style have been communally decided by the department but I have been checking that things are not forgotten, and the resources are sufficient to support the beginning teachers.
The year 10 curriculum should be a matter for us to extend on the skills based curriculum we implemented in Year 9. That has had a tendency to fall back into being content based which we have had to consciously watch out for.
The year 10 curriculum should be a matter for us to extend on the skills based curriculum we implemented in Year 9. That has had a tendency to fall back into being content based which we have had to consciously watch out for.
Friday, 1 September 2017
Chemistry in the real world
I have been on the mailing list for Compound Interest for a while now. It is a website that tracks chemical progress in the academic science world I find it useful as a filter for finding real world applications of chemistry that I can illustrate to my students.
It also creates useful infographics of scientific and specialist chemical processes. In the past I have colour printed and laminated some of their infographics into posters for my wall, but I don't have enough space for them all, and the Science Department doesn't have the printing budget for me to continue to do so with every poster. I will continue to do so with the really useful ones, but I have been thinking about ways to showcase the varied and interesting things that Chemists do.
I now have a spot on my wall where I black and white print the weekly mailer titled "This Week In Chemistry". The spot is by the door where it is easy to browse at the end of the lesson, and is passed by each student as they leave.
In addition when an infographic about chemical research comes into my mailbox, rather than colour printing I am setting as the new wallpaper for the projector screen. In this way I can change it regularly without reference to cost.
It also creates useful infographics of scientific and specialist chemical processes. In the past I have colour printed and laminated some of their infographics into posters for my wall, but I don't have enough space for them all, and the Science Department doesn't have the printing budget for me to continue to do so with every poster. I will continue to do so with the really useful ones, but I have been thinking about ways to showcase the varied and interesting things that Chemists do.
I now have a spot on my wall where I black and white print the weekly mailer titled "This Week In Chemistry". The spot is by the door where it is easy to browse at the end of the lesson, and is passed by each student as they leave.
In addition when an infographic about chemical research comes into my mailbox, rather than colour printing I am setting as the new wallpaper for the projector screen. In this way I can change it regularly without reference to cost.
Friday, 25 August 2017
Appraisal - Thinking issues
For this terms observation for my appraisal MTH observed a year 9 lesson where we were looking at thinking skills and applying knowledge they had learnt to real world applications. In this particular instance "real world" was a rather broad concept. The framework for this was from the Issues Presentations that I had seen at the ChemEd Conference and presented to the department.
This particular lesson was within the unit of work dealing with waves and energy and the class had just completed learning about sound and sound waves. The presentation dealt with the movement of waves in a vacuum, particularly in space, using the explosion of the Death Star from Star Wars as the initial image.
The class in question was a lower ability class with many students having literacy at Level 2 or Low Level 3 on the curriculum. Many of them do not display critical thinking skills and show little to no desire to learn them.
The students were engaged by the gif of the Death Star exploding with the Millenium Falcon flying away from the blast zone. Some could very clearly tell the class what had led up to that point and what came after, and could debate the plot points. When challenged some problems or falsities in the presentation of the explosion were identified which led us into the text reading.
Five students participated in reading out loud to the class, a selection of text from MovieTropes.com detailing how movie explosions in space defy laws of physics. Due to their previous learning on sound waves and wave behaviour some of this made sense to the students. I was still having to lead the discussion, positing questions for them to respond to, but most students were engaged, especially the low achieving boys.
The final step was to watch a video on the physics of sound explosions which explained with diagrams, pictures and animation in more detail.
There was very little writing in this lesson which helps get engagement from those students who struggle with literacy. I am trying to develop analytical and critical thinking skills in my students and to get them to see how what they are learning in class can help them to be better at interacting with the world and less likely to be taken advantage of.
This particular lesson was within the unit of work dealing with waves and energy and the class had just completed learning about sound and sound waves. The presentation dealt with the movement of waves in a vacuum, particularly in space, using the explosion of the Death Star from Star Wars as the initial image.
The class in question was a lower ability class with many students having literacy at Level 2 or Low Level 3 on the curriculum. Many of them do not display critical thinking skills and show little to no desire to learn them.
The students were engaged by the gif of the Death Star exploding with the Millenium Falcon flying away from the blast zone. Some could very clearly tell the class what had led up to that point and what came after, and could debate the plot points. When challenged some problems or falsities in the presentation of the explosion were identified which led us into the text reading.
Five students participated in reading out loud to the class, a selection of text from MovieTropes.com detailing how movie explosions in space defy laws of physics. Due to their previous learning on sound waves and wave behaviour some of this made sense to the students. I was still having to lead the discussion, positing questions for them to respond to, but most students were engaged, especially the low achieving boys.
The final step was to watch a video on the physics of sound explosions which explained with diagrams, pictures and animation in more detail.
There was very little writing in this lesson which helps get engagement from those students who struggle with literacy. I am trying to develop analytical and critical thinking skills in my students and to get them to see how what they are learning in class can help them to be better at interacting with the world and less likely to be taken advantage of.
Friday, 28 July 2017
Developing thinking skills by focusing on Issues
Attending the ChemEd conference I participated in a workshop entitled "Who Cares" which was about developing awareness in students of applications of Science, linking issues in the world to the content they are learning in the classroom.
It involved hooking students in with a picture and allowing them to form their own ideas on what the picture was representing. The students would then be given an explanatory text, a short text that one student would read to the class, related to the picture and the issue. After listening to the text students would develop ideas on the opinions and points of view of the people involved, whether directly in the issue or on the periphery. The next step was to watch an explanatory video on the topic, after which they could have further discussion on the topic.
The issues could lead directly or indirectly to the topics being taught.
I prepared and presented an Issue presentation to the Science department and it was very well received. I intend to try and bring it into my classroom as a regular feature. Jenna is also considering using it for the shared classes she has once a week.
To facilitate the departmental use I have set up a folder where presentations of this kind can be filed. In addition I put in a "How to" instruction sheet, and a recording sheet for the various issues that have be put in the file.
It involved hooking students in with a picture and allowing them to form their own ideas on what the picture was representing. The students would then be given an explanatory text, a short text that one student would read to the class, related to the picture and the issue. After listening to the text students would develop ideas on the opinions and points of view of the people involved, whether directly in the issue or on the periphery. The next step was to watch an explanatory video on the topic, after which they could have further discussion on the topic.
The issues could lead directly or indirectly to the topics being taught.
I prepared and presented an Issue presentation to the Science department and it was very well received. I intend to try and bring it into my classroom as a regular feature. Jenna is also considering using it for the shared classes she has once a week.
To facilitate the departmental use I have set up a folder where presentations of this kind can be filed. In addition I put in a "How to" instruction sheet, and a recording sheet for the various issues that have be put in the file.
Monday, 24 July 2017
Class differentiation in Level 2 Chemistry
For Term 3 I have split each Chemistry class into two groups. One group of the academically focussed students, and another of the students who are happy to just get their 14 credits. The academic kids are going to work on both remaining externals, and the others on one external.
Parents have been contacted to ensure that it is clear what their child is doing, and have been asked to respond to me to acknowledge that they are in agreement with the choice that they are making.
<Date>
<Parents>
<Postal Address>
Dear <Salutation>
Re : <First Name> <Last Name> <Class>
From this term in Chemistry, and for the remainder of the year the classes within the course has been split into two working groups. One group comprises the students who are planning to take Level 3 Chemistry in 2018, and may be planning a career or further study in which they may use Chemistry ("The L3/Career" group). The second group are students who have decided that Chemistry does not feature in their future plans, and are aiming to get enough credits at Level 2 to pass the course, but do not plan to take their study of Chemistry any further (dubbed the "I just want my credits" group). So far the students are self-selecting the group they want to be in.
The L3/Career group will be working at a quick pace through two Externally assessed Achievement Standards, 2.6 Chemical Reactivity, and 2.5 Organic Chemistry. It is necessary that this group is diligent about keeping up with the work, and this will require regular homework.
The "I just want my credits" group will be spending their time learning Organic Chemistry and revising the 2.4 Atomic Structure and Bonding standard we covered last term.
All learning for externals should be completed in time for the school exams in Week 9 of Term 3. After the school exams we will tackle the final internally assessed standard 2.7 Oxidation and Reduction.
<First> has yet to choose a group. Please discuss with <First Name> which group <he> will select to be in to ensure that you and <he> are comfortable with his choice. I also ask that you confirm that you are aware of <his> choice in a response to this email.
Yours faithfully,
<Teacher>
<TeacherEmail>
Parents have been contacted to ensure that it is clear what their child is doing, and have been asked to respond to me to acknowledge that they are in agreement with the choice that they are making.
<Date>
<Parents>
<Postal Address>
Dear <Salutation>
Re : <First Name> <Last Name> <Class>
From this term in Chemistry, and for the remainder of the year the classes within the course has been split into two working groups. One group comprises the students who are planning to take Level 3 Chemistry in 2018, and may be planning a career or further study in which they may use Chemistry ("The L3/Career" group). The second group are students who have decided that Chemistry does not feature in their future plans, and are aiming to get enough credits at Level 2 to pass the course, but do not plan to take their study of Chemistry any further (dubbed the "I just want my credits" group). So far the students are self-selecting the group they want to be in.
The L3/Career group will be working at a quick pace through two Externally assessed Achievement Standards, 2.6 Chemical Reactivity, and 2.5 Organic Chemistry. It is necessary that this group is diligent about keeping up with the work, and this will require regular homework.
The "I just want my credits" group will be spending their time learning Organic Chemistry and revising the 2.4 Atomic Structure and Bonding standard we covered last term.
All learning for externals should be completed in time for the school exams in Week 9 of Term 3. After the school exams we will tackle the final internally assessed standard 2.7 Oxidation and Reduction.
<First> has yet to choose a group. Please discuss with <First Name> which group <he> will select to be in to ensure that you and <he> are comfortable with his choice. I also ask that you confirm that you are aware of <his> choice in a response to this email.
Yours faithfully,
<Teacher>
<TeacherEmail>
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