Taking a look back

When it comes to reflect upon this year, I have to say it was a truly positive one. Kids were all enthusiastic and showed a great interest on every activity we proposed. They were truly engaged, and that is the key to success.

One of my strengths was that we could build a nice bound with the kids. This year there were some days that I had to be absent because my little boy was ill and the first thing my students asked me when they saw me on the following day was: Why were you absent Miss? Is your baby ok? They are so thoughtful with the others... A real pleasure to share days with them...
Another strong point was that we created a blog for Third form and go into it very enthusiastically. The objective was to have stuff organized and have a site that parents and kids could visit everywhere and anywhere. Some kids told me they entered the blog very often and parents could see their work there, that was more or less the idea of it all. But one weak point was that as the days passed by and with the loads of work I had to deal with, it was hard to find time to upload things as often as I did at the beginning of the year. This is something I will definitely consider and be consistent on for next year.
I loved that we included one new project and reflected upon the other projects and gave them a twist. I am very proud of our team work and the final product: extensive writings, more use of English in the classroom and new knowledge on different subjects (rainforest, circus, plants...). But there are always things to improve (and this is the part I like about the end of the year: reflecting upon what needs to be improved). I have to be more consistent on home reading and the reading sessions. You know that moment in the year that you feel that everything is about to fall into pieces... (there's ALWAYS a moment we think we are about to collapse... -Or MANY moments, to be honest.. haha-), well, I know I have to find the way to manage time when we are coming to the end of the year. At the beginning everything is so nice and organised... I have to make it next year.
Intensive, positive, comforting, reflexive, encouraging... Adjectives that describe my 2015, and I expect my 2016 will be like this one and better! (There's ALWAYS room for improvement!)

Tutti Frutti - A bit of everything

Well, when I have to come to choose a topic about this getting-to-know-each-other period, it's difficult... Simply because there are many things I thought of, and felt proud of, and maybe some others I could have done better...

I loved the way we could deal with the project and give it a twist to help them use some specific vocabulary so naturally, and creative tasks we could do with them.
I feel really proud of our new blog... I have to say, some years ago I was a bit scared of technology at school. I thought that maybe kids would be noisy and too excited and their work would turn up to be messy and not right... But I have to say I was SOOO WRONG! It is too engaging for them and makes our lives easier! And actually when they are working with the nets or with a technological device they are so concentrated and they get great results. Kari and I are so engaged with it too, so it's highly motivating for both sts and teachers.

I am still finding the way and trying out different strategies to make them listen to each other... What an issue... Nowadays the main problem we as a society have is that we have trouble in listening to the others, looking at each others' eyes, being present in a situation in body and mind. I have that feeling. And of course school is a picture of the world, a tiny picture of the world...
Look what I found on the net, I'm sure it can be useful and will be helpful for listening to each other and turn taking
https://www.educaixa.com/-/aprende-a-escuchar

I think last year I didn't mention this, but I am really happy to get to know all the people I'm working with. I have the feeling you are all the time pushing each other to learn, to make things better, always willing to give a hand. This feeling of not being alone... All my colleagues have been always eager to help me when I first started, and they still are.

Now, that I came to the end of this reflection I could notice the topic I wanted to write about (now I'm thinking of it), and it's the topic of CHANGE. As teachers, we should always be flexible, and change for a good cause. And if something doesn't work out, try a new one: I was scared of using technology and now I'm thankful of it. I have tried many strategies to help kids listen to each other and keep finding the right one that works for them. We have made some changes to our projects and came up with interesting ideas. Change is the paradigm, the structure that underlies our work as teachers... God, what a never ending career we have chosen. IT'S GREAT IT'S NEVER ENDING AND IT'S ALL THE TIME CHANGING AND THAT WE ARE ALL THE TIME LEARNING, not only teaching!!!

Reflecting upon this year

Reflecting upon this year

Summarizing skills: Students have worked on fairy tales. They chose a fairy tale and designed a concept map on the story (using popplet). It included characters  (heroes and villains), setting, problem, resolution and the three parts of the story. 

Logical and creative thinking: Students worked on analysing and sequencing in the guided reading sessions. Althroughout the projects they compared different versions of the same stories, and they stated hypothesis in the project about plants.

Communicative skills: 3rd blue worked on the mystery hangout and the two forms worked on a mini science fair in which they exposed their knowledge about plants.

Reflective thinking: at the end of each lesson we made students reflect upon their behaviour and attitude of that day. and we sometimes at the end of the class went over the objective and the content or tasks that we worked on and students made comments or reflect upon the day.

Bringing the world into the classroom: Students worked on the Brazil World Cup 2014 and they used netbooks to search for info about the countries involved.

Collaborating with other teachers: we worked on a bilingual project: Helping plants grow well. together with Spanish teachers we covered all the 3rd form curricular contents on this issue. Students did different experiments in both shifts and they brought the knowledge they acquired in the Spanish lessons.