Philosophy

As a teacher I look forward sharing information and guiding students to discovering the
world around them.
Constructivism is how people learn through their constructing their own understanding
and knowledge of the world, through experiencing things and reflecting on those
experiences.
Behaviourism/behaviourist environmental factors influence behaviours.

Point out main points

o Guide and facilitate learning
o Supportive environment
o Behaviourist theory influenced me strongly during this placement through my
research and engagement with the transition/1 classes and their use of
positive language and positive reinforcement.
These theories have influenced my ideas of teaching.
Ethical issues
Religious/cultural views Religion is a major area of morality and ethical debate. As a
teacher we can be torn between what our job says we teach and what we believe. Our job is
to provide demonstrably true information which students can take on board as they wish.
Although the influence of parents or guardians can affect how this curious nature presents
itself and also how they process the information provided.
Part of our jobs as teachers is to promote confidence in the profession. Teaching has moved
on from the traditional textbook and notes to more engaging hands on activities. Through
meaningful maths and programs such as primary connections science.
My philosophy and thoughts on teaching have developed over the last 4 years and even the
last 10 weeks. I have found that there is no one theory or practice tht influences me as a
teacher but several. The Code of Ethics continues to influence me and my teaching. Whie
constructivism and behaviourist theories have influenced me these are areas in which I still
have a lot to learn. I look forward to learning more about them and implementing these
practices into a classroom in the future.

Types of assessment and data collected at Millner

o PM, Naplan, Pat, IKAN

o Observational, work samples, conferencing with students

 o Teaching and planning at Millner Primary is influenced by these informal,
formal, summative and formative types of assessments. In 3/4 assessments
have helped guide ability groups for literacy and numeracy.

o Assessment may and can provide more detail into students work, skills and
knowledge of a topic.

For following sections there are references made to three focus students. these students
represent below, at and above levels. While these students represent these levels, they are
a sample not, necessarily showing the broad range these levels can represent. Class levels
are broad and students may be low or working towards a level.

Initially in my placement I collected literacy based data to guide my planning in a humanities

subject. I collected literacy based data due to the skills required in a humanities subject.
These skills include reading and comprehending through research and writing. Using this
data help me see where the students were at with their literacy skills.

I collected work samples in the form of students narratives. I also used their literacy groups
as a guide. These literacy groups are based on PM testing and are ability levels. Another
piece of data that can guide literacy planning is the writing level visible learning wall. The
students also participated in an initial geography lesson where they brainstormed their
ideas about climate. This lesson was completed prior to my starting my placement. As such
information from this lesson was gained from a discussion with John.

In beginning to analyse and plan I looked at three focus students. One who fit into below,
one at and one above. I chose to collect data with a literacy focus because students will
be researching and writing about climates. Literacy skills such as comprehension and
sentence structure are important for this unit and the summative assessment. Throughout
the unit students will be collecting information about climates and the environment, plants,
animals and humans within these climates. As such reading, comprehending and then
writing the information down are part of this. The literacy skills observed through these
pieces of evidence and the students overall literacy level will guide the planning and
implementation of the unit.

For below the student required support from a teacher or SESO (Special Education Support
Officer) to write, type or get their ideas into a coherent form and/or onto paper.
This student is someone who has lots of ideas and thoughts, though struggles to focus and
get them down on to the page. This is a contributing factor to his low literacy and his low
literacy is a contributing factor to this struggle. During the lesson where students were
writing their dreamtime stories I worked with this student and helped him worked through
his ideas. I also scribed his story for him. As we worked on each part, Nathan would
write/copy the part into his book from the paper I had scribed his story onto.
Part of writing a dreamtime story was to have a message or moral for your story. For this
student, this part was done verbally. Through this conversation, with some prompting this
student could identify a basic message.

For at the student had a clear ideas and structure, with editing required. When I read
through his story it showed clear ideas and structure though require some redirection with
editing and as mentioned the tense of the language used. This student is at PM level 24 and
he is at average for this cohort.
Part of writing a dreamtime story was to have a message or moral for your story. Thomas
had, through a conversation shown that he had a message but was struggling to writing it
done coherently. We talked through it together and found a simply way to write what he
wants for his message.

The student that exhibits above level characteristics shows a good grasp of the English
language and is at PM level 27. There were minor fixes made in his writing, mainly spelling
and adding some words to help his sentences become readable.

This data assisted with identifying strategies and providing differentiation for working with a
range of learning and cultural needs.
Through observing students written work and checking their writing I could address ways in
which to adjust activities for them in future written tasks. An example of this was when we
had a paragraph written on the board for the students to punctuation the lower students,
Nathan included was asked to write the first three lines, while the others were asked to
write the whole paragraph.
In geography, a way I have differentiated the activities was to ask lower students to draw a
picture with some words to represent information, and at and above students to write their
information in sentences, providing more detail or justifications where appropriate.

As part of my planning for my final week I included sessions for testing such as PAT, IKAN
and the South Australian spelling test. While I have engaged with implementing these in the
classroom setting I have had limited experience with interpreting these types of data for
future planning. In engaging with these types of data I would ask for support in learning
about, using and interpreting these data sets.

During my teaching of the geography unit plan there was a lesson that didnt go to plan. This
lesson was about comparing. Using observations and reflections of this lesson I adapted this
lesson and others so that students were engaging with the content in a more suitable way.
Data doesnt stop at pre-assessment or pre-knowledge of student ability to inform planning;
data collection is continuous and this data continuously informs planning and teaching
sometimes to the point of changing and adapting lessons.

o Using the data I collected I planned a geography unit. Humanities based

subjects often call on skills learnt through literacy. These skills include
reading, writing, researching and using inferring and comprehension skills.

o Initial plan and sequence of lessons

Each lesson was on a different aspect of Australian climates leading

up to a final task where students used this information to complete a
fact sheet on an Australian climate.

As part of introducing this unit, students looked at indigenous seasons

of the top end and how it related to climate.

Students created mind maps relating to the topic in an initial

lesson before commencing my placement

Use of ICT and the researching skills used

Each lesson had an aspect of ICT.

Students were introduce to the topic of the lesson through a

class discussion and/or a think, pair, share.

When students moved to their activities, they worked in mixed

ability groups to find out about the topic. Students could use
siri or typing to search for information.
 There were pre-prepared websites students could look at.
Such as the Alice Springs Desert Park website. Through this
website students chose an animal to describe.

Adaptions made to the sequence of lessons - compare lessons.

When I got to Lesson 6 in the teaching sequence of the unit,

the students struggled with the concept of comparing two
animals from two different climate zones.

Due to this reflection I adapted both the animal and human

comparison lessons and changed them.

The changes that I made were to drop the comparisons and to

choose an animal from the Australian desert, specifically from
the Alice Springs Desert Park website. Students had to find
size, habitat, diet and animal adaptions. For the lesson on
human adaptions, we had a class discussion on what we
needed to live in Darwin. I then asked students to think about
what their climates zones were like and what humans might
need to live there.

Student activities

Students were placed into mixed ability groups, where they

could help each other during their researching phase.

During these lessons I learnt to adapt initial introduction and

instructions to provide clear instructions to activities. This
further helped avoid confusion.

As mentioned previously, there were some lesson adaptions.

These adaptions were prompted through observing student
engagement and student understanding of the task. These
obseravtions and reflections on the student engagement,
learning and the teaching of these lessons are an example of
formative assessment.

Due to the changes in lessons, there were also some changes

in the final assessment and rubric. The changes were made so
that student learning could be shown accurately in the
assessment. These changes were to show that students had
 been able to identify size, diet, habitat and animal adaptions
as well as human adaptions.

Assessment, feedback and judgement.

o Due to the below student leaving the school, the student chosen her for this
level is different. There are similarities between the two. Both requiring
support to place their thoughts onto paper.

o The final assessment provides a summative assessment to gauge what

students have learnt throughout.

o Implementation of the assessment

Some individual and some collaborative student work.

Due to the nature of mixed ability grouping and students

working together to research the information throughout the
unit the assessment had elements of collaboration. This took
the form of the students asking other members of their group
if they had information for certain elements of the fact sheet.
If others did this information was shared. As individuals
students went back through their own work and used the
ipads to gather information.

Student support

For some students they required support in the for of scribing

or information being read out. An example of this is a group of
three students (one of them the below focus student)
requiring support to identify the animal adaption and putting
this into their fact sheet.

ICT Support include assistance using siri or typing the search

criteria into google or equivalent search engine.

o Students achievement

Students results were spread across the three strands (Below, At and
Above) with some showing skills in higher areas due to the
collaborative nature of the assessment. An example of this is Taryn
 (Melissa), who worked with others from her geography group to
complete her factsheet.

o Feedback provided for lesson work is something I tried to be conscience of

while at Millner Primary School, using constructive feedback in the form of
positive, needs work, positive. While most students were accepting of this,
occasionally a student found this difficult and would get frustrated and/or
storm off (though not leaving the class). This student would then (most of the
time) return and work on the task still required of them.

o Providing students with feedback for an assessment through formal or

informal conversations or comments on work samples is an area I will
continue to develop.

o Aside from assessing students knowledge at the end of a unit, teachers are
required to follow an assessment schedule. These assessments include IKAN,
PM, Pat and SA spelling test. As part of my teaching while at Millner I planned
sessions for these tests and learnt how to implement them.

Moderation

o Moderation for the geography assessment was an informal conversation

between myself and my mentor teacher.

o Beginning this conversation, I showed John/my mentor teacher a sample of a

below, 2 ats and an above assessment that I had marked. After looking
through them there was a discrepancy between the 2 ats. One of the at
level students had a similar level answer to the above student, though I had
given this student an at level mark for that section. As such I made an
amendment to this at students mark and moved him to above.

o I have learnt from this marking and informal moderation process that
consistency is important. Consistency can be achieved through rereading
through your own marking once completed and through having others check
it. With consistency comes reliability.

o The next step in moderation is to continue to engage with colleagues to learn

more about moderation and engage with colleagues to keep a consistent
level of professional judgement.

o Marking assessments with the assistance of a rubric contributes to student

feedback and reporting to students, parents and carers.
 o Feedback and reflections and how professional learning can improve student
learning.

o Moderation at Nakara - Second Placement

During my second-year placement I was sat in on a formal moderation

discussion for an English assessment for year 5. During this discussion
the two teachers went through the others below, at and above and
provided feedback on the marking and asked clarifying questions. As
they were going through the assessments, feedback and clarifying
they briefly described what they were doing and why. My mentor
teacher at the time selected three pieces of work, one at each level
and gave me the chance to go through these, allowing me the
opportunity to provide feedback and/or ask questions.

This moderation session provided an introduction to assessing

student learning, what feedback to students looks like and the
process that people of differing views go through to make consistent
and comparable judgements

Clarifying and Confirming for Maths

Clarifying session at Karama - I attended a clarifying session for financial maths and
presented the shoebox of love assessment. I received feedback about the task itself and
about the implementation of the learning and task itself. The feedback and questioning that
I received about the implementation included

Delivery the assessment over several lessons due to the size of the task,
What parts of financial literacy did I need to teach prior to completing the task,
What did support look like for the students who required it?

Confirming Session at Malak - I attended a confirming session for financial maths

and observed the feedback process for grading and grading/ability levels. Internal and
external moderations sessions help maintain consistency in professional judgement of
assessment. These sessions and other moderation sessions adhere to administrative and
organisational policies and processes.

Staff meetings and PLT's

During my placement at Millner primary I attended and engaged with morning briefings,
staff meetings and Professional Learning Team meetings. These meetings addressed aspects
of school life on a weekly basis as well as addressing reading programs and
resources and priority area groups. The meetings addressing the reading program provided
insight into how a school looks at and approaches reading at a school and stage level.

Research Project
Alongside my placement I completed a research unit. My topic for this unit was
'what benefits does positive reinforcement (in the form of positive language, supported by
other reinforcement strategies) have on positive behaviour in a transition/Year 1 class?'
During term three I observed Katinka and Chandell in their classrooms and these teachers
completed a questionnaire.
As part of engaging with colleagues I explained the task I was to undertake, what was
involved and the topic I was researching. Observing other teachers in a classroom
environment also helped me see different teaching styles in practice. Through observing
others teaching styles I am able to see strategies being used and identify whether there are
aspects that I may use in the future.

Primary Connections Professional Development

This Certificate is for a Primary Connections Workshop called Primary Connections Ready:
Pre-service Teacher Program. This workshop ran for two days and covered various aspects
of the science curriculum. These aspects included experiments, investigations and content
knowledge as well as examples of units of work aligned with the curriculum. In attending
this professional development workshop I feel I can more effectively teach science.

Throughout the two days I completed various hands on activities and experiments that
engaged me in the content that students would be learning in schools. These activities and
experiments all linked back to the curriculum, the primary connections units and to the 5e's
which is a core theme of primary connections. Science is an area of study that I have always
found challenging, the main challenge was in understanding the concepts of science. As a
result of this challenge it is a subject area that I find I lack confidence in when teaching.
Through this workshop I gained an understanding of the science concepts and how to teach
them to primary students. A suggested strategy put forward by those running this workshop
was to teach the concept area that you are least confident with first. This is due to this
concept area taking sometimes more time to teach and learn.
Professional learning provides a learning environment for teachers to further their skills or
learn new skills to further help their students in the classroom. This help may be learning
new skills or developing current ones further to improve student learning.

During my time at Millner Primary School there have been times where I have
encountered challenging behaviours.

o Students running around the classroom,

o Students refusing to do their work,

o Students becoming frustrated with either the work or instructions,

o Incidents happening at recess or lunch and emotions and behaviours

following them to the classroom,

o Students not listening.

As a response to a students challenging behaviours, a meeting with their carer was
organised which I sat in on. The meeting was similar in form to a student led conference. A
strategy that came out of this meeting and that has been implemented with this student
within the class is a communication book between the teacher and the carer. As one of my
roles as a teacher has been to communicate with the carer of this student, with this comes
confidentiality. Specifically in not mentioning others names if there has been an incident
between students.
Another strategy that I have learnt and am still learning to use with the primary age group is
remind, warn, act.
In term three student lead conferences took place. Students came in with their parents and
shared their learning with their parents. During this session parents also had the
opportunity to see students assessment data.
Reporting to parents/carers and keeping accurate and reliable records can take the form of
the use of Grade Expert and assessment marking and rubrics as well as students reports.

Bridge of Respect
At Millner Primary School there is a whole school approach to behaviours. This takes
the form of the selected learning behaviours and the bridge of respect. In 3/4 Knight
a rewards chart is used as well, this is linked to the learning behaviours and bridge of
respect.
Health lessons
During health lessons in 3/4Knight we discussed inclusion of people of different language
groups, cultural groups and ability groups, positive language, equality and equity using a
bandaid solution activity. This bandaid solution activity everyone with a differing injury
ranging from a paper cut to broken bones and each injury was given a bandaid. The
question then was that equal? Was it fair (equality)?

As an educator and person residing in the Northern Territory I am a mandatory reporter

under the Child Protection Act 2016 and the Care and Protection Act 2007 and have a
responsibility for the wellbeing and safety of children living in the NT.

What have I found challenging?

During my final placement at Millner Primary School, there were several things that
were challenging. In the classroom there were several students who exhibit
challenging behaviours.
Differentiated planning for both rotations and adaptions during lesson time.
Adapting to weekly plan changes ahead of time, on the day and in the middle of
lessons.

What have I learnt?

When faced with challenging behaviours there have several interrelated things that I
have learnt. I have learnt how to put suggested strategies into place and how and
why it is important to stay calm in these challenging situations. A strategy implement
during my time in 3/4 knight was a communication book for a particular student.

I have adapted my lesson planning technique to provide more coherent lesson

sequences. Initially I was planning using day sheets, upon discussion with John/my
mentor teacher I change to a weekly plan. This type of planning was much easier and
more efficient as well as providing a way of seeing my lessons for the week all in one
document.

Differentiated groups for maths and literacy has been a beneficial as it allows the
students to receive content more relevant to the level that theyre at.

Areas to continue to work on?

Some areas to continue work on in the future included:

o building rapport with students, which will help with challenging behaviours

o learning to think on my feet and adapt lessons as needed

o when reflecting identify the positives

 using the constructive criticism style on myself

o adapting to students needs and adapting lessons in the middle of lessons.

o These will come with experience and possibly some professional

development and I look forward to these experiences.