ENGLISH
English is a subject that I believe is essential to the development and progression of any individual's education. For this reason I strive to ensure that English is fun and engaging, even to students who do not possess a natural love for the subject.
READING
While on placement at St Johns Lutheran school I was fortunate enough to take part in the approach of 'Great Books'. This is where students take a variety of different steps in order to read and comprehend a particular text. First the text is read as a class, then students are to read the text several times themselves. Students are to take notes as they are reading, writing down any questions, thoughts or ideas. The 'Great Books' approach also spends time discussing the text and students thoughts about it. The 'Great Books' approach helped me to recognise that even younger students can be analysing texts and looking beyond the initial meaning of a text.
|
I have tried a number of different approaches over my placements to get students engaged during English. I have found that hands on activities are very effective at getting students interested into a particular topic. If written activities are accompanied by hands on activities, students are more likely to actively participate in all aspects of the task.
During the last two weeks of my final placement I implemented an English Unit on reading and comprehension. After observation on previous lessons I found that there were certain students who were not engaged during English. It was often a battle to get these students to put pen to paper and write. I knew that I had to do something to get these students engaged and enjoying English. I decided to put together a rubric with different tasks that students could complete. They were able to choose which tasks they completed as long as they included one task from each column. This empowered students providing them with an input into their own learning. Students were all engaged while completing the different rubric activities. I would definitely use a similar sort of activity again in the future.
|