Casting an eye over my Twitter feeds this morning, I was mightily pleased to see an old ‘PLN friend’ and mentor back online. Clive Elsmore, or @clivesir as I’ve come to know him, has spent the past few years working in India and Sri Lanka as a volunteer teacher, training local teachers in […]
Continue reading →Today marked an important milestone in my ongoing efforts to build a Personal Learning Network via my blog & Twitter™. At 8AM Perth time, I joined in an international #edchat conversation on the topic of participatory / inquiry learning. Following the conversation via Tweetdeck™ (for Google Chrome™), I started out by retweeting other teachers’ ideas, […]
Continue reading →Well, 2010 has been an incredible year. It was a year in which I passed some significant milestones in my fledgling teaching career, and it was a year of immense, transformational change in my personal and professional life. As my year draws to a close, I am finally starting to realise my aspiration to become […]
Continue reading →As the Australian school year draws to a close, I have had the time to reflect upon and review my experiences teaching upper primary science during 2010. March-May 2010 – Year 6/7 Science & Arts Earlier this year, I replaced a science/arts teacher in a small independent Christian school in Perth’s southern suburbs. I taught […]
Continue reading →My Experiences, Philosophy, & Reflections Thoughts on Classroom Management A Process of Trial & Error – Developing my Management Approach My Jigsaw Approach to Classroom Management The Conscious Competence Ladder (Skill Development) The Four Stages in My Teaching Practice Classroom Management – Summing Up The 3 R’s of Effective Learning Environments Setting the Scene Overview […]
Continue reading →I excelled in my academic studies at university; however, as a result of my youthful inexperience, I always felt vulnerable and unprepared during my practical teaching experiences. While I had some excellent mentor teachers, on several occasions I found myself working with unsupportive, and in one case, overly critical teachers. One almost drove me to […]
Continue reading →As a new teacher, I established a reflective journal; documenting and reflecting on my teaching experiences, observations, and ongoing professional development throughout my first year. I view my journal as a very personal record of my experiences. As I flick through my handwritten entries, recorded in multiple exercise books, I can trace the low […]
Continue reading →Reflecting on my classroom management approach for A Relief Teacher’s Journey, I have gained some surprising personal insights into my relief teaching experience and professional development. I am not an expert classroom manager by any means, but I have become a much more effective and competent relief teacher. I still have a few areas for […]
Continue reading →This is a tongue-in-cheek look at effective instruction and classroom management. It’s well worth watching. (Click to view)
Continue reading →A ‘problem’ behaviour is a particular behaviour, defined by its context, intensity, and frequency, which is expressed in an inappropriate social situation (Conway, 2005, p. 211). While a student’s ‘problem’ behaviours may offend, annoy, or irritate their teachers and peers, they are rarely meant to be spiteful. Such behaviours are associated with poor social skills, […]
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