On my 2nd day of placement, I managed to help out in the higher dance class. I have been dancing since I was 4 and I am part of the university dance team, so I felt like I would be a great help to the pupils here. The pupils were finishing off their choreography for their exam, which allowed me to go around groups and give them ideas. This made me feel like I had done something worthwhile, as the advice I was giving them allowed them to progress further in their routine. The accomplishment I felt when they thanked me was great, and it helped me to become more confident in my abilities.
There were some tough pupils in the classes later on in the day, which meant I had to help them focus and encourage them. I felt as though a few of those tough pupils benefited a lot from having me there, as it allowed them to get the individual help they needed while the teacher gave small amounts of time to all the pupils. There were 3 different classes that all had the same type of pupils in them, meaning that throughout the afternoon I had gained some experience on dealing with them and mean that I was more experienced by the end.
On the 3rd day it was mostly lower school classes I was helping out in. due to them not being as focused as those sitting exams, it meant that the teachers and I had to work extra hard to ensure there was no messing about. One of the first-year classes was taken by a student teacher from Edinburgh University, which gave me an insight as to what it will be like when I do my post grad. Due to him being a student, the pupils didn’t listen to him in the same way as they would their usual class teacher. Although this made me nervous about how classes might react to me, it allowed me to see learn how to deal with these obstacles and gain experience for the future.
This sounds like you have got a great insight to what it may be like after university. Hope you’re enjoying it so far, look forward to seeing how it progresses.
Chelsea
Glad to hear that you became more aware of possible obstacles in the future and that you are already thinking about how to possibly overcome them- Sara
Thats great you got to give the Kids some ideas and feel like you made a difference! As for the tough pupils its good to learn from these experience although it seemed like you being there helped the teacher out. I had similar experiences with tough pupils but as you said its good to see how to deal with these obstacles as it is bound to happen in these environments. – Kim
It is good that you are getting the experience of working with different pupils and learning new things. – Ellis