Planning the way

Another relatively full day today. We were split into our STG groups for the first time so people from all three science groups were mixed together. After a brief getting to know each other, we started looking at the differences between primary and secondary science education, focussing on our primary school placements. We then moved on to the National Curriculum levelling system and were given our first oppoortunity to assess a late KS2 question paper, assigning levels to each question based on the knowledge needed to answer it. Seemed fairly easy for the most part, but sometimes it could be difficult to tell whether a certain concept needed more knowledge than was initially apparent. This will probably come with practice and familiarity with the NC. The last exercise before lunch was to look at six different answers to a Year 5 Biology question, and discuss how we would deal with misconceptions of the subject.

Coming back, we spent the remainder of the session loking at lesson aims and objectives, and most importablty the difference between the two. Using this knowledge we had a go at developing our own lesson objectives given a lesson aim. We were then shown how to effectively observe a lesson, and the sort of things to look out for. Things such as teacher movements, time spent on activities, which students were asked questions, etc. Again, a lot to take in, but will probably become more apparent with practice.

We also found out our placements today, and I'll be starting at Loxford School. Looking at their website it seems that Ofsted really like the place, and it's within easy reach of me as well. No problems there then :)