Critical Learning Incident
Over the course of the two weeks that I spent on practical experience in a year 1 classroom I took a number or Mathematics and English lessons. The learning incident that I will be discussing in this CLI was experienced during my second mathematics lesson, which took place on the 1st week of my placement.
Situation:
The particular math lesson that is being discussed was a lesson that was taught as a continuation from the first math lesson, which I took earlier in the week. The topic for this math lesson was time and I was teaching the students how to tell the time to the half hour on both a digital and analogue clock. After re-introducing the clock, how to tell time to the half hour and quizzing students on a range of different times using a demonstration analogue clock, I introduced the lessons activity. The game we were playing was a memory and matching card game in which students were required to, in pairs, spread all cards out on their desks face down. Taking turns, students were then allowed to turn over two cards at a time in attempt to match an analogue half hour time with the corresponding digital half hour time. As students found a matching pair they were allowed to keep a hold of their pairs, and the student with the most cards at the end of the game won.
Although the students thoroughly enjoyed playing the game and didn’t want to stop playing, I did discover a number of issues with the game, as well as the cards themselves. Some of these issues were:
Action:
As I was taking another mathematics lesson a couple of days later covering the same topic of telling the time to the half hour on a digital and analogue clock, I took the opportunity to discuss the success of the lesson and game with my mentor teacher, as well as some of the issues that the game presented. My mentor teacher suggested I make some changes that I felt would amend the issues in the game and try to play the amended game again with the students in my next lesson.
For what felt like the 10th time that week I rushed to office works after school in an attempt to find some stickers that would cover the backs of each of the cards. I found that the stickers were going to be very expensive and I needed a lot of them so instead, I bought two rolls of masking tape, one in bright orange and one in bright green. I would use these to cover the backs of the cards so that the students could no longer ‘cheat’ and look through the cards to find the pairs. To fix the cards I simply placed a strip of coloured tape on the back of each of the cards. I placed green tape on all the cards with an analogue time displayed and I placed orange tape on the back of all the cards with the digital times displayed.
To solve the problem of students having too many cards for both the space that they had available, as well as their memory and concentration abilities I decided to split the amount cards in half. This then meant that instead of students receiving a set of 24 matching cards (12 analogue times and the corresponding 12 digital times), the students would receive 12 matching cards (6 analogue times and the corresponding 6 digital times). I did however have on hand the other half of each pair of students set of cards, so that the students who found the new game too easy, finished early and required a challenge could add the other 12 cards to their set.
Outcome:
The outcome produced by the simple changes that I made to the cards within my memory matching time game was overall a very positive one.
By covering the back of each of the cards with either a strip of green masking tape or a strip of orange masking tape I was able to make the cards so they were not see through and therefore the task once again became a challenge for the students. It took away the opportunity for students to ‘cheat’, while still offering an extra level of support in terms of colour matching that was not provided within the first round of the game.
I believe that there was a significant change in both student learning and student attitude, simply by decreasing the amount of cards that each pair of students received to begin their game by half. I feel that it made the game seem less daunting and allowed the students to feel as if it was not an impossible task. It also allowed my mentor teacher and myself to monitor student learning more closely and recognize the students who could understand and cope with the extension of adding more cards. By halving the amount of cards students received I also solved the issue of space on the students desks and the mixing up of cards with other pairs.
Overall, both myself and my mentor teacher felt that the revised version of the memory matching game based on telling time to the half hour worked very well. The students enjoyed the game a lot more the second time because it became a fun and smaller, yet still challenging task. Allowing the students to play the game in pairs created a sense of friendly competition and engaged students in a fun, interactive and collaborative way. I feel that this game was successful and I will definitely be using it again in the future when teaching students how to tell the time.
Link to Australian Professional Standards:
The learning and understandings that I gained from my experience in teaching this concept and game to the students of my grade 1 class is aligned with a number of the Australian Professional Teaching Standards (APST).
Through this practical experience I was able to gain a greater understanding of how students learn (standard 1), the content that we as the teachers are meant to be teaching and how we are meant to got about teaching the content (standard 2).
I completed all standards within the professional practice domain of teaching when re-planning and implementing my lesson/activity to ensure the most effective possible learning was occurring (standard 3). By adding the different colours on the back of the cards I was creating a supportive learning environment (standard 4) and by reducing the amount of cards the students received I was able to provide more relevant feedback to all students and assess student learning on those who were capable of receiving the extension (standard 5).
I undertook the professional engagement domain of teaching by taking part in both professional learning (the practical experience – standard 6), as well as when engaging professionally with, discussing my lesson with, and receiving feedback from my mentor teacher (standard 7).
Situation:
The particular math lesson that is being discussed was a lesson that was taught as a continuation from the first math lesson, which I took earlier in the week. The topic for this math lesson was time and I was teaching the students how to tell the time to the half hour on both a digital and analogue clock. After re-introducing the clock, how to tell time to the half hour and quizzing students on a range of different times using a demonstration analogue clock, I introduced the lessons activity. The game we were playing was a memory and matching card game in which students were required to, in pairs, spread all cards out on their desks face down. Taking turns, students were then allowed to turn over two cards at a time in attempt to match an analogue half hour time with the corresponding digital half hour time. As students found a matching pair they were allowed to keep a hold of their pairs, and the student with the most cards at the end of the game won.
Although the students thoroughly enjoyed playing the game and didn’t want to stop playing, I did discover a number of issues with the game, as well as the cards themselves. Some of these issues were:
- As the cards were homemade there were some issues in their construction, in particular, both the digital and analogue clocks were visible through the back of the card when they were placed face down. This allowed some students to ‘cheat’ and look through the cards before attempting to match them using memory.
- There were too many cards for the student’s memory and concentration abilities.
- There were also too many cards for the limited space that each pair of students had on their desks, this meant that some pairs of students were getting their cards mixed up with the pair next to them.
Action:
As I was taking another mathematics lesson a couple of days later covering the same topic of telling the time to the half hour on a digital and analogue clock, I took the opportunity to discuss the success of the lesson and game with my mentor teacher, as well as some of the issues that the game presented. My mentor teacher suggested I make some changes that I felt would amend the issues in the game and try to play the amended game again with the students in my next lesson.
For what felt like the 10th time that week I rushed to office works after school in an attempt to find some stickers that would cover the backs of each of the cards. I found that the stickers were going to be very expensive and I needed a lot of them so instead, I bought two rolls of masking tape, one in bright orange and one in bright green. I would use these to cover the backs of the cards so that the students could no longer ‘cheat’ and look through the cards to find the pairs. To fix the cards I simply placed a strip of coloured tape on the back of each of the cards. I placed green tape on all the cards with an analogue time displayed and I placed orange tape on the back of all the cards with the digital times displayed.
To solve the problem of students having too many cards for both the space that they had available, as well as their memory and concentration abilities I decided to split the amount cards in half. This then meant that instead of students receiving a set of 24 matching cards (12 analogue times and the corresponding 12 digital times), the students would receive 12 matching cards (6 analogue times and the corresponding 6 digital times). I did however have on hand the other half of each pair of students set of cards, so that the students who found the new game too easy, finished early and required a challenge could add the other 12 cards to their set.
Outcome:
The outcome produced by the simple changes that I made to the cards within my memory matching time game was overall a very positive one.
By covering the back of each of the cards with either a strip of green masking tape or a strip of orange masking tape I was able to make the cards so they were not see through and therefore the task once again became a challenge for the students. It took away the opportunity for students to ‘cheat’, while still offering an extra level of support in terms of colour matching that was not provided within the first round of the game.
I believe that there was a significant change in both student learning and student attitude, simply by decreasing the amount of cards that each pair of students received to begin their game by half. I feel that it made the game seem less daunting and allowed the students to feel as if it was not an impossible task. It also allowed my mentor teacher and myself to monitor student learning more closely and recognize the students who could understand and cope with the extension of adding more cards. By halving the amount of cards students received I also solved the issue of space on the students desks and the mixing up of cards with other pairs.
Overall, both myself and my mentor teacher felt that the revised version of the memory matching game based on telling time to the half hour worked very well. The students enjoyed the game a lot more the second time because it became a fun and smaller, yet still challenging task. Allowing the students to play the game in pairs created a sense of friendly competition and engaged students in a fun, interactive and collaborative way. I feel that this game was successful and I will definitely be using it again in the future when teaching students how to tell the time.
Link to Australian Professional Standards:
The learning and understandings that I gained from my experience in teaching this concept and game to the students of my grade 1 class is aligned with a number of the Australian Professional Teaching Standards (APST).
Through this practical experience I was able to gain a greater understanding of how students learn (standard 1), the content that we as the teachers are meant to be teaching and how we are meant to got about teaching the content (standard 2).
I completed all standards within the professional practice domain of teaching when re-planning and implementing my lesson/activity to ensure the most effective possible learning was occurring (standard 3). By adding the different colours on the back of the cards I was creating a supportive learning environment (standard 4) and by reducing the amount of cards the students received I was able to provide more relevant feedback to all students and assess student learning on those who were capable of receiving the extension (standard 5).
I undertook the professional engagement domain of teaching by taking part in both professional learning (the practical experience – standard 6), as well as when engaging professionally with, discussing my lesson with, and receiving feedback from my mentor teacher (standard 7).
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