TPA

ACTIVITY 4 – DYLAN SMITH - 2165258

Activity 4 (during block) LINKS to STANDARDS 2.1 2.6 3.3 3.2. 3.4 3.5 3.6 3.7 4.1 4.2 4.3 6.3 7.3 
Record at least
one 10-minute unedited video segment of your teaching for self and peer review. Use a school device to do this
and make sure that the video is deleted after it has been used as the basis for a professional discussion with
your mentor or University Liaison. In your journal, record your reflections after teaching the lesson. 


Prompts and responses based on discussion with your Mentor Teacher and/or University Liaison

• Lesson Overview


Today’s lesson and associated reflective entries were taken from lesson 3, Tuesday the 4th of June, week 6 of
term two. This lesson is the first lesson of a three-week unit of SHINE (Sexual Health and Relationships). The all-
male cohort of 24 students consists of mixed levels of physical and academic readiness. The nature of this SHINE
unit permits students to be involved in a variety of learning experiences based on a number of different sexual
health and relationship issues. The associated video was used to initiate discussion with the mentor and
promptly destroyed as per school protocol.

• What surprised you about your teaching?

Initially, I had my reservations about how the lesson would go with this particular cohort of students. Given the
ongoing instances of disengagement and poor behaviour throughout both theoretical and practical lessons, I
was faced with certain decisions around how I was to structure the lesson and manage students to facilitate
learning for all. Putting myself in the best possible position to overcome these challenges, I ensured that going
into the SHINE unit my lessons were planned well, relevant and engaging. The most surprising thing for me
during this initial lesson was that even though it was the first time I had delivered the content, my delivery of
content, facilitation of activities and conciseness of the importance of the topic carried me through the throws
of the lesson, allowing me to manage problematic behaviour and ensure that all students were engaged
throughout the lesson. 


• Does the video segment show that you engaged students? How did you manage challenging student
behaviour?

The video has demonstrated various qualities of my practice that I will continue to build on as my career
progresses. As discussed earlier, this cohort of students contained a large number of students who displayed a
variety of behavioural discrepancies in need of careful monitoring. Students were made privy to the importance
of the unit’s content, and it was highlighted that due to this, noncompliant attitudes and poor behaviour would
not be tolerated. In accordance with the school behaviour management policy, students were given the
opportunity to do the right thing and engage with the lesson each time they entered the classroom. Before each
lesson I highlighted the steps that I would follow in the event of undesirable behaviour and generally this
resulted in a positive and respectful classroom environment. Due to the highly relevant nature of the content
and my passion and persistence to make lessons informative and fun, the footage reflects a high level of student
engagement with minimal issues. 


• What strategies did you use to address the needs of the whole class and the specific needs of individual
students? 


The SHINE unit required a number of different strategies to address differing levels of student’s readiness and
differences in learner profiles. A number of the activities required students to work in small groups, involving
themselves in inquiry and problem solving activities which allowed me to spend time working with each group
discovering what strengths students had, how they interacted with the group, and how they could use their
interests and abilities to help their peer group achieve the desired outcome. These activities provided vital time
 TPA ACTIVITY 4 – DYLAN SMITH - 2165258

to check in with students and see if content was being understood and any uncertainty could be cleared up and
revisited as a class if multiple students displayed similar concerns. Multi-modal presentations and activities
allowed students of differing academic readiness levels to be engaged with, and display their knowledge in ways
that they felt most comfortable.

• How did you monitor student understanding and learning during the lesson?

As discussed before, the discussion and activity based nature of the lessons enabled me to integrate with the
class and even participate with groups during activities and discussions to work through content. These
opportunities presented themselves in much of SHINE unit, allowing me to work with each and every student
and clear up any uncertainty, whilst providing ideas and options for students when starting and completing the
various inquiry based learning opportunities. 


• What did you learn about your planning and teaching from viewing the video? 


From direct feedback received from my mentor teacher my ability to provide good clear instructions and
information during the lesson and direct the activities displayed that I had had allocated significant time into
your preparation and understanding your content. As hard as it was watching myself teach, I found my classroom
manor to be inviting and encouraging, highlighting my commitment to the students as their educator to provide
them with high quality curriculum and authentic learning experiences they will take with them throughout their
lives.

• What worked well and what might you work on future? 


There were a few points to work on as a result of this lesson. Being mindful of video noise when showing videos,
continuing my consistency with expectations around phone use, hats inside, and following through with
behaviour management protocols will ensure that my role as teacher is valued and respected by students.
Moving forward, one of things that I will strive to work on is working to the time constraints of the lesson. I have
found that on more than one occasion my lessons have been pushed for time, sometimes missing out valuable
knowledge consolidating activities. I am planning to amend this by being more conservative with the volume of
content contained within each lesson, enabling more time during lessons to spend engaging in conversation,
debate and authentic learning experiences.


Signed……Signature in Placement Handbook……………………