CAREER ENTRY ESSAY
TRANSITION POINT 1

11.12.03

TRANSITION FROM GRADUATE TEACHER (2002/03) TO NEWLY QUALIFIED TEACHER STATUSTUS (2003/04)

INTRODUCTION

‘Throughout your life advance daily, becoming more skilful than yesterday, more skilful than today.  This is never-ending.’ 

- Yamamoto Tsunetomo, Japanese Samurai, C18^th AD.₍₁₎

 The purpose of this essay is to reflect on my professional development so far, to summarise my GTP experience, and inform my future planning.  I will refer to classroom practice (personal and observed), conversations with teaching professionals (particularly my Transition Point 1 Mentoring Session), and quotes from books that I have read during my first Year and One Term at Mayfield.  I have also included some images from my Diary.  In essence, I will discuss the ways in which I have become more skilful and the skills I hope to gain as a Secondary School Teacher.

(The QTS Standards refer to the Horizontal Standards Tracking Document.)

 1. TEACHING DISCIPLINE 

‘If you have come to help me, then you are wasting your time. 
But if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us walk together.’

-         An Australian Aboriginal Leader, C20^th AD. ₍₂₎

Working with Disaffected Teenagers for LEA Special Projects (2000/01) and pupils with IEP’s in City of Portsmouth Boys School (2001/02) gave me valuable first-hand experience of the problems faced by ‘trouble’ pupils in our schools; Those pupils who remain barely within our educational system - SEN Registered/Statemented, at risk of Exclusion, Looked After Children, or simply attention-seeking – live a life opposite to the Teacher.  The primary purpose of our presence at School is Education; theirs is anything but.  This can be due to factors too numerous to discuss here, but it is clear that their personal, relational and social concerns dominate their minds, leaving pupils who rarely consider, let alone sympathise with, their role within a school system.  The less extreme can be taught to value their education (at least while physically at school!), the more extreme will consider only their own interests.

When I began teaching Art and Design at Mayfield, it was this knowledge that most drove my Lesson Planning.  After the first 2 weeks ‘Honey Moon’ period, I realised that my relaxed and naively-positive style was interpreted by some classes as an invitation for them to challenge my authority and blatantly ignore me in lessons.  The benefit of this was that many pupils felt respected (and even liked!) by me and in turn gave me respect.  I soon found that half of my classes were genuine learning environments and half were becoming therapy forums, but in both discipline was enforced from outside by Sally Thomas (HOD) or Duty Managers.  Although my compassion for ‘difficult’ pupils remains, I feel that I can now confidently discipline a class, clearly conveying my expectations for their behaviour and learning, and consistently following-through with consequences and rewards.  I have learned, tested, adopted and adapted various Assertive Discipline techniques; utilising 5 to 1 counting, vocal tone, body stance (gaining significantly from my Department who lead the school in this training).  I have familiarised myself with School and Department Behavioural Policies and Procedures, and have gained the self-confidence to apply them naturally and effectively.  Differentiating the National Curriculum appropriate to class-band and actual ability (educational and behavioural) is key to maintaining pupil interest and managing behaviour and therefore raising achievement.  One example of this is my Phase 3 Assessment Observation where I deliberately began the lesson with a long (6 minute) story in order to gauge the pupils attention-span and respect of my authority (‘Real listening shows respect’ – Mayfield Thought for the Week, December 1-5, 2003). 

I will conclude this section with a quote from Jeff D (Art Department), which underlines the importance that managing the behaviour of a class requires the ability to control your own pose, manner, voice and facial expressions; ‘Discipline in a classroom is all bluff’.  And as self-discipline feeds my own growth and learning and freedom, classroom discipline will allow pupils to grow, safely exploring the freedom found from knowledge and skills learned.

 2. TEACHING LEARNING

‘The difficulty…is to make long distances seem near and make problems into advantages.’

–        Sun Tzu, Chinese General, C 1^st BC. ₍₃₎

I described my initial teaching style as ‘naively positive’.  This has remained, but I now call it enthusiasm for my subject; I am a practising Artist/Designer who delights in the creative process.  Therefore, I am an enthusiastic supporter of positive creative expression in my classroom, and can also praise and advise in a genuine and knowledgeable way, using National Curriculum Levels and practical tips.  While on my second placement, I commented to the Head of Art that she tended to use the St. Edmunds’ technique of threats to gain control of the class, rather than the various Mayfield techniques – praise the pupil next to the offender; short, easy tasks (stepping stones/starters) that can be praised abundantly; varied praise – general acknowledgement of skill to public example of specific learning objectives.  Sally Thomas (HOD) rules this arena by giving counts-to-5 for pupils to complete tasks upon class-entry, such as ‘coats off’, ‘pencils out’, ‘food away’, etc.  She will evolve this into lavish praise of ‘lively brush strokes’ or ‘marvellous composition’ and specific quotes of NC Levels printed in large type on the walls. 

A big problem facing the class teacher is the diversity of pupils - ability, background, gender, race, preferred learning style…  But diversity can become the steps that bring each pupil closer to academic achievement; a range of teaching techniques and tools will allow the teacher to attract each pupil individually.  And so at this point I want to acknowledge elements of VAK/8 Intelligences teaching:   

During my ‘Illustration Project’ introduction, Vicky W (Art Department) commented at the time the way in which the class were mesmerised by a 5 minute Video episode of The Power Puff Girls cartoon;

Pupils moan excessively about Jeff D's long talking – but they will recall nearly all of his writings! – I have observed that this negative reaction comes more from Jeff’s insistence that all pupils sit still, looking at him while he talks.  The Audio learners thrive! – an achievement not to be trifled in Mayfield;

Seeing how many of my ‘trouble’ classes respond in Music lessons to practising Jazz scales on keyboards, I took it upon myself to re-write a popular  rap  at  the  time  into  the

chant, “Art is what?  Art is who? Art is a.. vizza-Visual Language.”  Aiding the teaching of the Art Department motto.  (This became so successful that pupils would initiate it in small groups upon entering the room!)  

Vicky W (Art Department) uses Lavender room-fragrance that I have observed pacifies pupils as they enter her room!    

In conclusion of this section, I will simply leave the following quote, which emphasizes that no matter what teaching style I choose to employ, the result is always to enable greater listening skills;  

‘writings are not heard, so cymbals and drums are made.  Owing to lack of visibility, banners and flags are made. (These) are used to focus and unify people’s ears and eyes.  Once a people are unified, the brave cannot proceed alone, the timid cannot retreat alone – this is the rule for employing a group.’  

 -Sun Tzu, Chinese General, C 1^st BC. ₍₄₎

CONCLUSION

Peter came to Jesus and asked,  "Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me?  Up to seven times?" Jesus answered, 
"I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.

-         Matthew, Pupil of Jesus, C 1^st AD. ₍₅₎

The reason I begin with this quote is that many times I have taught a class whose behaviour was so bad as to leave me feeling utterly shocked and defeated after the lesson.  If I have them the following day, I have tended to treat them unnecessarily harder during that lesson – becoming noticeably inconsistent with punishments and even jeopardising my relationship with them.  Often, their misbehaviour can be traced to factors outside of my control – they had just had PE and were hot and bothered, the class had just been observed – and so their reaction is produced only occasionally.  But even if it is a ‘trouble’ class, a good rule-of-thumb is to forgive them and determine the ‘feel’ of the class each time you teach them so that you can employ learning tactics that respond to how the class actually is and not how they were on a previous occasion.  While forgiveness does not ignore the consequences of misbehaviour, it does allow us to discipline without malice.  And thus remain consistent. 

Consistency is ultimately the main way my pupils can feel they know who I am and whether I am a good teacher.  Due to my need to experiment broadly and learn quickly from mistakes, I have not been as consistent in my first few Terms at Mayfield as I am now.  I know that my consistency in discipline and routine is becoming established with my classes.  Now I wish to become consistently high in my expectations of what my pupils can learn,  undertake  and  achieve.   Since  returning  from  St. Edmunds’ Catholic School, I have begun to transpose my experience there of high discipline/behaviour/learning to Mayfield.  (In much the same way that I had to introduce Mayfield’s promotion of self-expression and recognition/praise/reward there.)  While on the subject of my second placement I also want to raise one more point key to my development; St. Edmunds’ Art Department has only one member, Jill A.  Jill runs the Art lessons using non-specialist cover teachers.  This gave me a unique insight into the importance of my role.  The teachers I worked with were relieved and highly impressed by my presence and skills, as I was able to teach topics that they simply did not have the knowledge for.  Praise and recognition from peers has also greatly increased my confidence as a teacher.   

ACHIEVEMENTS AND DEVELOPMENT

While many of my achievements and development points are implied in this essay, I would like to categorically state a few in summary, using successes from each year group to fuel an action point:

Year 7 – Tonal Drawing of partners eye.  Teaching this required careful listening on my pupils behalf and careful forethought on mine.  I will continue to strive for 100% class attention when addressing, and use quick-fire questions to assess recall. 

Year 8 – Fauvist landscape painting.  This has produced excellent results (Level 5+), allowing confidence to boost in my lower ability classes.  I want to develop my ability to teach ‘painting skills’ more holistically – style, subject, form, accuracy, etc. 

Year 9 – Frida Kahlo biography.  I have used a comic-strip idea to get all classes to interpret written biographical information.  I want to develop my work sheet resources in enabling good Art History research and knowledge. 

Year 10 – Reconstruction.  I have adapted the subject to allow pupils to compare old and new art/design styles, often using ICT.  This has resulted in strictly staged coursework that all can access.  I would like to continue this sense of regimented coursework into Year 11.  I would also like to develop ICT related work for each year group. 

Year 11 – Everyday Life.  This project allows pupils to respond more personally, but has been more fluidly structured.  I would like to solidify it more to allow for those whose Independent Learning Skills are low.  Also, I would like to allow time for lower years to develop ILS, initially through group work.   

BILBIOGRAPHY

1.       Paragraph 25 of Chapter 1, Hagakure, the Book of the Samurai, by Yamamoto Tsunetomo. First published in 1716.  Available from www.geocties.com/Tokyo/Towers/9151/hagakure.htm 

2.       Page 194, Awakening Cry, by Pete Greig.  Published in 1998 by Silver Fish.

3.       Page 50, The Art of War, by Sun Tzu (translated by Thomas Cleary).  Published in 1991 by Shambhala.

4.       Page 56, The Art of War, by Sun Tzu (translated by Thomas Cleary).  Published in 1991 by Shambhala.

5.       Chapter 18, verses 21-22, The Book of Matthew, The Bible (NIV).  Published in 2002 by Hodder & Stoughton.