| Date: | 21st March 2016 |
| Group or individual with whom I worked: | Year 7 boys, year 10 girls |
BEFORE my placement …
| What am I aiming to achieve from my placement today? What do I need to be mindful of? What issues/questions need to be addressed to ensure I achieve my aim? Do I need to be aware of particular theories, or have particular skills? Have I thought about all of the ‘what ifs’? |
| Today I was predominantly going to be looking at assessment within PE. The first group I will be involved in is the year 7 footballers. They have been assessed throughout the module but the teacher has planned a game day for the pupils to be formatively assessed.
Keeping the theme of assessment, I am looking to see more assessment in the means of formative assessment with the year 10 girls badminton group also up for a formative assessment today.
|
DURING my placement …
| What did I notice happening around me today? What was I thinking and feeling? How was I involved? Did I do anything to intervene and change the situation that I found myself in e.g. how I conveyed a point or whether I decided not to do something I had planned to do? Did my reflections at the time change the session I had planned or my actions? |
|
During my last lesson with the year 7 footballers the teacher previously explained that this lesson would need to be used for assessment purposes. So the students were told to create their own football drills and then model them to the class. This would therefore demonstrate their football ability and their subject knowledge. I planned to let the students create their own activity, however I did have an idea of what I wanted them to include. However I felt at the time that the students’ activities were good enough and therefore I didn’t need to intervene. Within the last lesson, I worked with year 10 girls badminton group who were being assessed. The students had rankings on a king of the court style activity and returned to the place they were at, at the end of the last lesson.
|
AFTER my placement … (based on the Gibbs Reflective Cycle)
| Describe the activities you undertook whilst on placement today. Set the context, what you did and what happened. |
| During the first lesson I had year 7 boys football. Due to a previously arranged assessment day the students were asked to create their own football drill to mode in front of the rest of the class. During their preparation time the main teacher and I walked around the groups listening to their ideas and offering ideas to improve. However the students’ ideas were of a good enough standard that we did not need to intervene. Finally after the students had presented their ideas to the rest of the group the students, were put into teams by the main teacher with fair ability. The teacher had been assessing the students throughout the module and therefore matched fair teams. The students then rotated around playing different teams whilst the teacher and myself refereed the games, at the end of the game the teacher would confer with me which students he thought were the best out of the group. A criterion assessment grid marked students, when students met the criteria they would move up a level. (See resources on Edublog)
In my final lesson the girls badminton group that I had not been working with often had a king of the court tournament. Students returned to the position they found themselves in the week before. (The teacher had the written order) the students were given a point score for the court the ended up on. Top court was worth 8, then the bottom court 5 (8,7,6,5) the students were then ranked on the number they ended up on.
|
| Document how you felt through-out your placement today. Were you anxious, confident, pleased or disappointed? |
|
Knowing it was the last week of placement, I felt slightly disappointed to be leaving as I really had enjoyed myself on placement. However, I also felt anxious to collect as many resources from the school as I possibly could.
|
| Evaluate today’s placement activity. What went well, what went badly, what would you have done differently? |
|
I think that giving the students in the football lesson the freedom to express themselves by making their own drills up went well. I feel that by putting some trust in that class they stepped up and made good drills within their groups. I think that the performance of the groups when we told them they were being assessed increased, although teachers constantly assess the pupils the students tried extra hard on the last lesson and it showed.
If I could do anything differently then it would have be to be able to visit the girls badminton lesson before hand, and compare the scores from two different weeks. Therefore if someone had a bad day it could be taken into consideration.
|
| Take a deeper, analytical and critical approach to today’s experiences. Can you make connections or apply academic theory or current policy to understand why today’s activities went well or went badly. |
| Capel, (2004) suggests that assessment is an integral part of teaching and learning. When planning for a lesson, it is essential that the teacher plan for opportunities for assessment during the lesson. This was evident in both lessons I took part in as the teachers had a different activity for students to be assessed in. Weeden et al, (2002) agreed with this and have called assessment integral to the educational process and have claimed it should be implemented into every classroom. I think that when they students knew they were being assessed, they were more motivated to perform better, Freeman and Lewis (1998) echo this by claiming assessment has the greatest impact on education.
|
| Draw conclusions. What have you learnt from today’s activities and your reflections? |
|
Today I learnt that different types of assessment could be used within schools. The different types of assessment can be beneficial for different activities and age groups.
|
| Action plan. How will you apply what you have learnt from today’s activities to the rest of your placement and your future professional and personal development? Do you need to undertake further research or reading? Are there courses that you need to undertake to fill a skills gap? |
|
Throughout the rest of my professional and personal development I will continue to use different means of assessment. I believe that
|
| Have any questions arisen today that I need to discuss with my Placement Supervisor or University Placement Tutor (UPT)? |
|
What is the most beneficial type of assessment? Formative or summative?
|
RETURNING to my reflections …
| It is often useful to return to your reflections after a period of time. Revisit the experiences you had; think about how you felt (positive and negative feelings) and re-evaluate your experiences. Do you feel differently about the experience now time has passed have your feelings changed in light of the experience or do you now view the experience in a different light? |
|
Returning to my final day of placement, I feel as if I made the correct choice in leaving assessment onto the last day. This is because I can compare formative and summative assessment.
Throughout teaching football to the year 7’s I have always pencilled in an opportunity for the students to demonstrate the skills they have learnt within the session in a game based situation, I believe that giving them longer game time to demonstrate skills proved positive.
I feel that whilst I placed a lot of responsibility on the students to create their own drills, the students really applied themselves. I would therefore use this approach in future classes.
|