Practicum Period

TALLER DE PRÁCTICA DOCENTE
KINDERGARTEN’S REFLECTION ABOUT PRACTICUM PERIOD
When I met this great an unknown group of five-year old children I was acquainted
with the fact that the class did not have a starting and an ending. So the students
did not realize when the class started and when it was over. After asking the
teacher, she told me that they did not like to sing a ‘Hello song’ much. The situation
that I could see was that some students kept on playing with their things when the
class had already started.
I considered that including a ‘Hello and Goodbye song’ to help students know when
the class started and ended, would be a relevant aim to achieve during my
practicum.
The topic to develop was TOYS. During the three classes, I had to present
different toys ( about three per class). I did so with different situations. Every
class started by making a circle to create a comfortable atmosphere and easily
make eye contact with all of them. The first class a friend of mine called Tino ( a
puppet) was presented to the children. It was nice to see how enthusiastic the
children seemed to be as they wanted to touch it! Tino said ‘hello’ to all of them. A
colourful envelope with photos of the target toys were presented and later, on
their books, they had to stick them following a listening activity with the
characters from the book.
The second class, real toys were presented, and the children got highly motivated
when during the warm up, somebody knocked at the door and I asked some of them
to see who was there. They found two boxes with toys. Everyone wanted to touch
and hold them. I persuaded them to leave the toys in the boxes and that later they
could hold them. In this class a story from their book was presented.
In the last class envelopes with a puzzle to be solved were hidden all over the
classroom. The students had to look for them and then they had to solve it. The
puzzles were about the key words related to toys. Later, the children cut and paste
some images related to the story read the previous class.

I consider that the objectives, the activities and the use of resources were
coherent with the pedagogical perspective. After the practicum period the student
could start and end the class by singing and making a circle ( this aim was kept
throughout all the classes), Then the target vocabulary related to toys could be
presented and practiced.
The topic itself was significant to the students, they love toys so, as a consequence
they showed interest in the activities presented, even for the naughtiest ones.
Students at this age are characterized by having a short attention span, so I
believe that this is the first thing I should have in mind at the moment of planning.
Creativity in the selection of activities ( making them move from being sat on the
floor to sit on their chairs) , patience and having them doing something all the time
are the key to a successful class.
From this experience I learnt to be less anxious. When the students are not making
eye contact with you, it does not necessarily mean that they are not paying
attention. I could verify it when asking students for vocabulary recognition.
In the future I would be more aware about timing. Some activities took longer time
than expected. However, each class is a mystery as regards unpredictable
situations of any type from starting the class later due to external factors to
interruptions because children need to go to the toilet.
Working with pre school students has been one of the most memorable experiences
to me. Children at this age are full of energy and they are so plain and transparent
that they directly can tell you that they don’t like the activities you present to
them or just the opposite! I love their honesty.
I feel a deep respect to them because I have always been a bit afraid of them. I
am used to working with older students so making them feel at ease and motivated
were my highest concerns.
The teacher recognized and concluded that it was necessary to include and
opening and closing activity to guide the students in which stage of the class they
were.
All in all, I could say that this practicum period was a moment of permanent
learning to me, from the use of technology ( a completely new world to discover!),
from my little students mainly and the warm bond that I could establish with the
teacher.

PRIMARY LEVEL REFLECTION ABOUT PRACTICUM PERIOD
The first time I saw this seventh form group I thought it would be easy to work
with them because they were just eight students. But I was wrong. From my
observation classes I could see that it was a bit hard for them to sit and work
straightaway. They talk among themselves and it generally took them time to open
their folders or books and just do what the teacher asked them to do.
Then I realized that it would be quite a job to attract their attention and make
them focus on the task to do. From that moment, I devoted time to work on
appealing warm up activities and meaningful contexts for each of the classes, taking
into account their interests according to their ages and behaviours in class. I knew
that the key would be to use variety of learning strategies and make them move
from one task to another one to make them do different things.
The aims for the three classes were the modal verbs ‘should/ shouldn’t- must /
mustn’t and their differences. During the first class the modal verb
‘should/shouldn’t was presented. The trigger was to ask them to classify things
presented into healthy and unhealthy things. Later, the students had to complete a
quiz related to the topic, which was accompanied by a listening task. Here, an
expert on the subject talked on a radio programme about healthy habits. All these
activities pave the way to the presentation of the teaching point. After being
divided into groups to give advice to a situation presented, the song ‘ Should I stay
or should I go’ by The Clash was presented. They loved it! They still sang it the
following day.
For the second class the context provided to present the teaching point was
sports. A competition in groups let them form as many words related to sports and
equipment as they could. Some images were presented later to show different
sports ranging from the most popular sports to extreme ones. After presenting the
modal verb ‘must’ to explain rules, the students wrote a text about different
extreme sports: Base jumping- Parkour- Zorbing – Ice climbing.
The context for the last class was illnesses and symptoms. Here, the students had
to identify the differences between both modal verbs presented in the previous
classes. A listening activity to choose the correct answer and the completion of
sentences according to what the students listened helped them infer and spot the
differences between the modal verbs. The class ended with a role play in which a

patient visited the doctor. They had to use all the expressions seen during the
class. What attract their attention the most was the doctor’s stethoscope they
use. They had fun!
I consider that the contexts that I’ve chosen for the different classes were
appealing to the students. That was great because I could achieve my first goal
that was to attract their attention. On the other hand, I had to deal better with
timing. I could see that there were external factors such as coming late from the
break that influenced on the classes. I also should have planned less activities for
the lesson considering that they took longer time than I expected.
Children at this age are characterized by egocentrism and there are two aspects
to take into account: the imaginary audience ( they feel that everybody notices
about them) and the personal fable ( children believe that their experiences are
unique and felt just by them). Considering this, I tried to plan tasks in which
nobody could feel exposed unless they want to. In this way, the shiest students had
the chance to participate more and not felt threatened. As students at this age are
into collaborative work, many of the activities presented were performed in pairs
or in groups. As the strongest students were asked to work with the weakest ones,
the tasks were fruitful for everybody.
I have always felt more confident working with early teens rather than younger
children. So this second period was less stressing but as challenging as the previous
practicum period. Every student is a completely new world to discover and I believe
that as a teacher we should help them develop their strengths and overcome the
obstacles that may come up.
All in all, after finishing this second practicum period, I could say that I feel
pleased with the job done. Of course that the classes are perfectible, there are
always possibilities of improvement and that is what I love about this job. It is an
act of optimism. Children need support, motivation and a true purpose to learn and
that is the challenge to face.

REFLECTION ABOUT PRACTICUM PERIOD -SECONDARY LEVEL
The first time I met these first year students I found that they were a small
group, just nine, five girls and four boys. Along my observation classes I could see
that they were quite talkative and many times it was hard for the teacher to make
them focus back on what they were doing. One of the boys was always interrupting
the class unnecessarily. This repetitive situation made the other students get
distracted.
I knew that the way to go was to highlight the use of varied activities and
strategies with a meaningful context according to their age and interest so as to
catch their attention and avoid distractions.
The teaching points to achieve in the practicum period were Present Perfect and
‘Used to’. The contexts presented ranged from sports and comedies to childhood
memories.
As adolescents possess a strong sense of fairness, the games and competitions in
the classes were introduced with clear rules. This group was quite competitive and
loved games so they seemed motivated with them.
The first four classes were devoted to the presentation of Present perfect with
its contrast with Past Simple. The first class’ context was sports. Throughout the
class the students talked about the sports they played and liked, completed a quiz
and a word search to find verbs in past participle. During the second class, adverbs
to indicate frequency and time were introduced with a poem to complete. This class
ended with a song by the Irish band U 2. The third class dealt with the contrast
between Present Perfect and Past Simple. Here, the context was love with the
presentation of romantic comedies film covers. The students seemed interested in
the topic. This class gave them the opportunity to predict the topic of a text to be
read and role play situations to put into practice the teaching point.
The other content to be presented was ‘USED TO’. The context was appealing to
them because it was about childhood memories. I showed them pictures about my
own memories so they felt at ease to talk about themselves later. The class ended
with a song by Daughthry, called ‘Used to’. They enjoyed it.
The last class was devoted to written production. The students watched a Coke
advertisement about how things used to be and how they are at present. It

triggered different topics to discuss such as transport, food, clothes, among
others. Most of the class was devoted to make a padlet in pairs or individually in
which they showed their productions.
From the very beginning, I found out that this would be a challenging group to work
with. It would be hard work to motivate them and keep it throughout the classes so
I should be creative.
Adolescence is a period in life characterized by physical, emotional and
psychological changes. As Scales (2010) states, early adolescence is intense and
unpredictable. They evaluate the limits of acceptable behaviours and defy adults’
authority.
In early adolescence, children have the need to belong to a group. They may
experience feelings of romance. Within this scenario, I thought about planning
activities in which they could interact in pairs or small groups, providing them the
opportunity to express themselves and enjoy the class by playing games. I tried to
present many activities as competitions and I found out that they enjoyed them
quite a lot.
What did I do with the student that interrupted the class? Well… I chose him as a
helper in many activities. In this way, he felt important and was busy. It worked!!.
On the other hand, I should improve timing. I consider that the problem is that I
become anxious at the moment of planning and then external factors do not let
devote the necessary time to each activity.
To sum up, I have to say that teens have always been my cup of tea. They are
moody, one day they behave as children and out of the sudden they consider they
are grown up. These fluctuations due to the fact that they are building their
personality to become adults are really hard work. I have empathy with them and I
try to negotiate with them all the time. They need to be listened and I love to be
near them to help.
This is my last practicum period and I have to admit that it was absolutely
demanding and exhausting but I wouldn’t change it by anything else in the world!
Dealing with students is dealing with the future and being part, at least for a short
period of time in their life is invaluable.

Practicum Period

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