M5 - School Experience - MY PERSONAL REFLECTIONS, „GAINS“

While teaching and the stay at Hertug Hans Skole I got so many reflections, interesting information from teachers (not only Tanja and Morten, but also the others in the teachers´ room), it was really valuable 3-week-stay for me.

Some of the ideas?

• helping pupils - some tips how to help and work with students more sufficiently
  

For example with using red/green brick (instead raising arms pupils turn a brick with the red part on the top - they can continue working, before the teacher come to them - they don´t lose time while raising hand and waiting)

And using white-boards - a laminated peace of paper for each pupil - when I ask a question, all of them write their answer on the white-board and then their raise it at the same time. Therefore I have much better feedback then if I choose only one pupil to answer. It can be used in math for counting, but also for vocabulary in English for example...

• teaching of Music
  

Using of warm-up activities, as I mentioned before, but aslo I brought some concrete inspirations for activities - for example samba rhythms...

• the 3-weeks on Hertug Hans Skole enriched me personally

As I said, it was my first real practice at lower secondary school. And I enjoyed it very much. I really liked the creative way of working with children, differenciated teaching, their critical way of thinking, feedback...And I also liked their individuality. Some people would maybe say - Danish pupils don´t have enought discipline - they wear, what they want, they can have a lollipop, MP3 player in the lesson; they are too individual... But I can´t agree that they don´t have a discipline. I found their WORKING-DISCIPLINE better then of Czech pupils. (We wrote our final seminary paper on this topic with my Czech colleagues from the CR - Míša and Vašek...). The Danish pupils are just unique and if you work with their uniqueness, you can be enriched a lot...

AND THE CONCLUSION?

I will miss it very much. I felt really good at the school, get to know many teachers nad found that there is a lot what to work on, what to improve to become a good teacher - but that it is worth...

Before going to Denmark I was decided to finish my teacher studies in Czech Republicand then quit this field of profession...to find a job in private sector, some office or maximally private language or music school. Because the situation at Czech lower secondary schools is rather complicated...
The Czech system is changing - but slowly...Most of the schools around my home town are unfortunately old-fashioned and not really much young teachers go to teach there, because teachers are underestimated in the CR... Therefore the change in Czech school system will take a quite a long time... There is also not much cooperation amongst teachers, so if a new young modern teacher comes, he/she can be considered a bit as a "black sheep"...And if the pupils are not used to individual work and self-responsibility, then it is more difficult...

To be honest, I started to thing about becoming teacher in Denmark.

There is much bigger possibility to teach the way I like, more space for the social message (I chose teacher´s job not because of Engish and not because of Music - but because of working with young people, the social message behind that. But for sure - both English and Music are quite good subjects for that.;) And in Denmark primary and lower secondary education is more focused on that, than on encyclopaedical knowledge of pupils. )

Schools are also very varied in Denmark – so maybe you can find a good school, with approach which you prefer. But sure, schools are different, there are worse schools, worse classes, more behavioral and discipline problems...And I am sure I got to the better schools, teachers, classes; so I have more optimistic point of view than the average reality is. But one thing is - they are here!

I know that there are a lot of obstacles and difficulties which I have to consider. But still - it is an idea in my mind. No promise, no rash decisions, but the future is open...

M5 - School Experience - English Lessons

As I said, the level of English of Danish young pupils is pretty good. On of the reasons is that they have a lot of TV programs and films in original, with subtitles (films are really rarely dubbed). I found that very interesting and valuable - all the people have contact with native Enlish really often. The media - both TV and the internet - play very important role in people´s lives. And if the TV programs are in English, it is pretty good. And children can also see usefulness of the foreign language. In Czech schools English is something you learn, but you can´t see the immediate utility. It is just something a bit "artificial" for the pupils...

The second thing is that English teaching is much more focused on SPEAKING - rather then grammar, rules and learning vocabulary by heart, as it is in the CR. People in the CR are quite confident in writing;however, when they should speak, they are often very shy. Just not confident enough, because they are too much focused on grammar and "correct language", they are afraid of making mistakes. But it is a part of learning, isn´t it? We need to use the language, to communicate in order to improve throught this process...

I spend quite a lot of time with my teaching and activities in English. The first week we did crosword about London in 6.a and 6.b, connected with my presentation and narrative about London, where I spent 2 months in summer. For the second week I prepared a presentation about the Czech Republic with a true-false statements activity. I really enjoyed the communication with pupils, the questions they had - as I mentioned before (General Notices and Reflections).
The third week I got very good chance from Tanja - she told me that she was having a day-off on Tuesday - and she gave me a choice - to get a substitute teacher/ or to TEACH ALONE ON MY OWN the whole lesson . And I considered that as a big challenge, so I told - OK, I will take it and try :-). Why not?
Finally, Jette Laursen came to the lesson to observe, therefore I was not really alone. ;-) However, it was a good chance and I liked it very much. I prepared various communication games for pupils and I think we all enjoyed it a lot. For me it was a good chance to try games, which I knew only from theoretical lessons, methodology, but I had never had a chance to try them in "real life".:-)
It gave me a lot of reflections, how it was working, what to improve, what else to use...
THANK YOU FOR THAT CHANCE.

M5 - School Experience - Music Lessons

As I mentioned, my tutor for Music lessons was MORTEN KANSTRUP. And if somebody asked me - what was the most interesting and valuable thing I experienced while studying in Denmark - I would say: MORTEN´S MUSIC LESSONS. :)
Why?
I really liked the way how the lessons of Music with Mortenwere built up. He begins lessons with warm-up activities - I found it very useful. It is not only fun for the pupils, it helps them to get into the music, to concentrate, to move body in the rhythm...to co-operate, to feel the "common spirit". And to warm-up :) Lots of the things were really funny too. I think this idea of warm-up activities at the beginning of Music lesson is really good, I had never thought about that before. I know it from English lessons - but why not to use warm-ups in Music too? :)

...Two examples: ;)


...Even ordering of a sausage can be fun :D



I also liked the way how the activities were built up in Mortens lessons. He was searching for quality all the time - his lessons were not only about spending time on Music - it was about developing pupils skills. He started the activity in its simple form and gradually bringing more and more slightly difficult steps. In Czech we call it a "spiral teaching". And it worked well, eventhough it needs a lot of patience, enthusiasm, motivating support and effort from the teacher.
He also connected singing with movements and rthytms a lot, in this process of "spiral teaching", pupils were doing more musical activities at the same time, which I found very good. In Czech Music lessons this activities are often separated - e.g. only singing. But Morten was the example that it is not so difficult to make singing more varied, to connect it with more activities gradually, just add a simple rhythm or movement for the refrain for instance...

And I have to say that Morten has really original activating methods. :) Are the pupils too tired ? - let them stand up. Are there not concentrated enough? Send them to stand up on the desks! :D ...And that really worked - they found out - something is happening, something new. OK, we should concentrate more...And then the quality was found, finally ;-)
...But I am not sure if this could a Czech teacher dare... However, if it works, why couldn´t we do that?

As you can see in the videos, Morten is a very positive person, enthusiastic, dedicated for his job, enjoying the job + moreover, pretty good in playing the piano.

And one more thing at the end - to me very important. I really like is that I could really see a social message in his lessons. He was showing that music is a lot about cooperation The aim in music is not to be faster, lauder then the others, finish earlier etc…Music is just about CO-OPERATION.

I should also write a bit about MY TEACHING of Music. I have to say that I really liked this "job", it was pleasure for me to work with the pupils, eventhough you need a lot of energy and enthusiasm for that. The pupils bring me more energy then and that is what I really like about teaching. And communication throught music, rhythms, body-language, self-expressions via tones and co-operation in music is something special for me. And something in what you have a lot of space as a person, as a teacher. It is a valuable world. First week I tought the pupils a Czech traditional dance called Mazurka (the origin is from Poland , but it is still traditional in Czech;) ) and a mazurka-song "Měla babka".

And second week we worked on listening while body-playing activity according to a grafical part - on Slavonic dance no. 8 by Antonín Dvořák. And later on with simple instrument-playing too. The third week I had also chance to do individual teaching of piano melodies with two single students, while the classes were preparing for a band-plaing for the concert for the end of the school year.

What to say? It was really pleasure for me to teach Music in these classes. I could try some activities with pupils, but also find weak points and what to improve in some activities, just to have a valuable practice oportunity. And teaching is always a process in which you have a lot to learn ;-)

And a special big thank to Morten in the end. TUSIND TAK!

M5 - School Experience - Danish Lessons

When I was told that I will have also 2 lessons of Danish per week in 5.a, I was saying to myself - what will I do in the lessons? I´ll not understand at all and I´ll be pretty bored.
How wrong I was! The Danish lessons were not at all about diktats, filling up grammar excercises, reading and speaking about rules - as in Czech lessons it is usual. They had pretty interesting projects.

On first Monday (30st March) they had a project about IDENTITY. They were making their own collages on the topic - my identity. They got an A4 grey paper, scissors, glues, crayons and magazines with pictures... The teacher also took a photo of each pupil with a digital camera and went to print them. So then they had their photo in the middle of the paper and they were supposed to fill the space around with words, pictures from magazines, drawings, and pieces of authentic texts from magazines which characterize them somehow. They should express their identity through that... They spent more than 45 minutes on that and would continue next time...
Then they had some reading tasks and grammar excercises about direct speech. They were working very independently and with quite a good concentration on that...

All the pupils were working individually, but in cases they needed help, they just raised the arm and the teacher came to help them individually. They were also helping each other. I liked that very much.

The Monday after Easter (20th April) they were working on READING PROJECT - and what was surprizing to me - two classes were connected - 5.a and 6.a. And three teachers were there! The two teachers of Danish + Annette, who helped and supported the weaker pupils. Pupils were working in groups of 4, according to their reading level, both classes mixed. And each group had the same book with which they worked.
I really liked the tasks which they had, I found the project very interesting and valuable. Not only did they co-operate in cross-classes groups, and worked without a permanent control of the teacher (even in different rooms), but the tasks were really good aimed to depelop reading skills and were showing them how to focus on the most important things in the book. In my opinion this is really important nowadays, because children are losing contact with literature.

Therefore I have to say that I was really glad to see these Danish lessons.
I know that my main subjects: English and Music are mainly focused on activity of pupils (it is one of the reasons why I chose right these ones). However, I was surprised, how interesting and active lessons of Danish language could be.

M5 - School Experience - General Notices and Reflections

I spent 3 very interesting, valuable and enjoyable weeks at Hertug Hans Skole. I didn´t want to write about the practice before it is finished, just to have some overview on all that. Since the beginning of my practice I was trying not only to observe, but also do various activities with pupils. Both Tanja and Morten were very good tutors, thank you very much, really.
I will write more about the lessons of Danish, English and Music later. First of all I would like to mention some things that surpized me and which I liked about the practice, the school and the teachers at Hertug Hans Skole.:

- 90 minute lessons (+30 min. breaks)
(on HH Skole they have "double-lessons" from 8:15 to 9:45, than a 30-minute break; and from 10:15 to 11:45. And then a second 30-minute break - for lunch. And after 12:15 they have single lessons then.)
I found that "double-lessons" have various advantages and disadvantages - you can make a longer project with pupils, you can manage more activities, do more warm-ups at the beginning. On the other hand pupil could be tired; especially Music-lessons, which are full of action, could be too long for concentration. And then you also don´t see the pupils twice week, but only once - in a double-lesson.

-very good equipment of the school
In the music classroom they had 4 keyboards and 2 digital-pianos; a couple of electric quitars, a base guitar, rock drums, kongas, base-drums, big metalophonss and xylophones, cow-bells, plenty of claves, triangles, timbrels, guiros... Then you can make a lot of various activities with playing musical instruments, you can have a school band - the teacher has much more possibilities for activities with pupils, the ways how to involve them in diferenciated teaching with musical instruments
And in the school they also have available 20 notebooks for teaching and 2 or 3 projectors. When you need them, you just book them in advance and you can use it in the classroom - it is portable. They have also a movable television set with a DVD-player. (There is not a smart board in every classroom as on 10th grade school, but the technology is portable and movable which I found very flexible)






- the atmosphere at the school was very good - friendly and co-operative - also amongst teachers (teachers have a common room where they spend 30-minute breaks together. I felt there very well, I was aslo warmly welcomed by other teachers. Usually I stayed there also after my last lesson-for a lunch break - just to speak with the teachers and spend more time there. After the last day I was pretty sad that I have to leave. I get to know about half of all the teachers and I really liked speaking with them. And every Friday they have a lunch together, which keeps the atmosphere friendly and helps to build a good team. In my opinion it is important to have such a common room for teachers in the school and Friday lunches are a very good idea. :)





-various project during the school year - they have some exceptions from the schedule during some weeks and they do various projects with the pupils - for example a musical for 1 week, I experienced a project in Danish focused on reading where 2 classes were connected, in Anjas lessons at primary school they had some one-week project in Math...
It is good that they do some exceptions from the schedule - they have a space for projects and also cross-classes co-operation, it is also variegation of the school year both for pupils and teachers. In my opinion it helps also the atmosphere of the school and flexibility and openness of the pupils, the school is more varied then.

- computer system
I was surprised how developed a school communication and administration system on computer they have. First of all Morten made me my own schedule easily and print it for me. But then he also printed me a list of photographs of pupils from 6.b - just to learn them easier. Wow!
They have also a documentation about every single pupil on computer - with all individual goal for each subject for each pupil. Teachers can write there the individual goals (-differentiated teaching-) and how to work on them. Pupils can easily connect to their page too and also communicate via email. And there is also a special section for parents of each pupil. The teachers can easily communicate with both pupils and parents then. In this system there is also a sector for materials, something like black-board. They can put materials easily there and share papers, projects, presentations...

I would like also to mention, that I was surprised about the discipline and motivation of the pupils. I will not write too much here about that, because it was a topic for our final seminary-paper.
I am sure that this depends a lot on teacher everytime and I had a very good tutor-teachers. But also in general it worked. The teachers could leave the classroom and the pupils continued working - in various lessons and a Danish project. To my surprise the class didn´t turn into a ZOO without a supervision of the teacher, as it would have happened in a typical Czech class. :D And when I visited the school-concert, I was surprised that pupils (even those ones from 8th and 9th grade) didn´t disturb so much. Some of them didn´t enjoy the music, simply it was not their cup of tea, sometimes they were wirthing about or whisper to each other, but they didn´t disturb seriously. They managed to respect the band for 45 minutes.

And I really enjoyed critical thinking of the pupils. In some lessons I had really good feedback - the best was a lesson about the Czech Republic in English when the pupils of 6.a asked such a good questions. We spoke not only about weather differences, landscape, sportsmen, Easter and Chrismas traditions, but we got also to religion and atheism, immigration problems, a topic whether is good to have a queen or president... - Just because the pupils asked! I was surprised with their somehow mature way of thinking and interest. It was a really good lesson and we spend on speaking about Denmark and the Czech Republic full 90 minutes.
And sometimes the pupils were also thinking how to make the lesson better, they have some notices...Once we were playing a "bomb-game" and we were throwing a ball criss-cross to each other. But then some pupils didn´t get it so often. And a boy standing next to me said - wouldn´t it be better to just pass the ball as a bomb around the circle? Why not, thank you very much, good idea!
So I really liked the feedback from the pupils, I felt I can learn something from them. I am not just a teacher, authority, an "ideas-and-information-giver". The education process is more about co-operation... :)
Thank you very much, all my pupils ;) You enrich me a lot in some way...

And one more very good thing:
I was surprised with a very good level of English of the pupils. Before my practice I was a bit afraid how could I teach at DANISH school, DANISH pupils...English lessons are quite OK, but what about Music? I was not sure whether I could manage. ...And?
Finally, I have to say, there was no problem to teach them, we managed to understand each other. I tried to use at least a little bit of Danish in Music lessons and for introducing myself. At the beginning I felt that some pupils are little bit shy to speak English (in 5th grade mostly). So they asked for translation sometimes from the teachers. But eventhough there was no other teacher than me (Morten sometimes left the classroom for couple of minutes), we managed to understand each other. Moreover - music is more about melodies and movements, so you can use much more body language and voice... :-)
So in the end my "hesitating" whether I can manage to teach foreigh pupils in foreign language (English and a bit of Danish :)) was useless. I think we managed to establish a very good contact with the pupils.
And I liked that very much!

M5 - School Experience - Introduction

Between Monday 30th March and Friday 24th April I had SCHOOL PRACTICE at HERTUG HANS SKOLE(http://www.hertughans-skole.dk).It is a public school (folkeskole)in Haderslev and I spent there full three weeks on practice - both on observing and teaching.
On Thursday 26th March, before the practice, I was there at the meeting with my tutor-teachers. I have to say that I was very nice welcomed and introduced to the school. I had never had a practice at lower secondary school before (! eventhough I am in the 3rd year of my teacher studies in the Czech Republic - we had had just few observations in a couple of lessons - however, no teaching!!!) Therefore one of my first questions was - what is expected from me? And to my surprise the answer was - nothing. I asked how much should I teach, what should I do in the lessons, when to start teaching etc... And Morten, my Music-teaching tutor told me that - there is nothing I have to do, but I will be very welcome to bring my ideas, to prepare some activities with pupils, to be creative and open. If I have some ideas, just bring them - we can speak about that and I can realize it in the lesson.
Wow, this attitude I hadn´t expected, it was very surprizing for me. And that brought me so much motivation! Really! :-)

So I was looking forward to my practice very much. The practice was also one of the reasons why I had chosen Denmark and UCSyd to study - to have a practice which I really lack in my teacher-study in the Czech Republic.

I got my schedule:
Monday 8:15-9:45 Music in 6.b (with Morten Kanstrup)
10:15-11:45 Danish in 5.a (with Tanja Grau)

Tuesday 8:15-9:45 English in 6.b (TG)
10:15-11:45 Music in 5.a (MK)

Wednesday 10:15-11:45 Music in 5.b (MK)

Friday 10:15-11:45 English in 6.a (TG)

So from Monday 30th March - go for it! :)

M3 - Globalisation and Citizenship – Henrik’s lessons

On Friday 20th we had a Globalisation and Citizenship lesson with a new teacher – Henrik.
He started the lesson with giving everybody a very cold stone to hold as tough as possible during next couple of minutes…Oh! It was freezing so much (he had cooled it in a box of ice before). And the explanation which was coming later?
The stone was as a person in troubles (cold) – and it should show us that sometimes it HURTS to help, to keep somebody warm.
The question from Henrik was: Are you ready to give, to help, to pay costs – not only receive? --- It was a pretty good, touching and therefore unforgettable example of the basis of citizenship – not only to GET, but also to GIVE. I liked that “practical” example very much!

Then we started to work in groups with Obama´s inauguration speech – finding key words of citizenship. We were going to work with them more in a following lesson too. Unfortunately I had to leave this lesson earlier, because I was having an appointment at a chiropractor with my back…

For Monday 23rd we should prepare presentations about “How is citizenship taught in our country”. Then we were watching and discussing some stories and songs connected to citizenship – for example: Earthsong by Michael Jackson, Where is the Love by Black Eyed Peas and Shawshank. Some interesting ideas from this lesson:
“Sitting in front of TV is better than playing computer games”. (Computer games are often based on killing, hurting other people... On the other hand, you can find quite a lot of social messages in TV series and films such as Baywatch, Superman and Armageddon…)
We also spoke about balance between
-globalization vs. nationalism
-rights and duties
“You have no rights without duties, and no duties without rights”.

And a notice from Shawshank film: “Freedom can be also between walls, freedom is in your mind”.
I think it can be good idea to speak during a language lesson with pupils more about the meaning, deeds and consequences of behaviour in some TV and music scenes; to discuss the social message in them. In my opinion the topic of citizenship and democracy can be used in language lessons quite a lot…
To speak more about freedom hand in hand with responsibility;, about duties and rights; about giving, not only greed to get… to help the pupils to grow up into good citizens and help them to understand the world…

We also get homework – to make a POCKET VIDEO about democracy and citizenship.
Why a “pocket” video? It should be made with a mobile-phone (or a digital camera) – the thing you usually have in your pocket with you…
I found the idea of pocket videos quite interesting – because it is the way how to USE A MOBILE-PHONE in the lesson. Pupils usually love their phones and can be creative, using the newest technology at school. So – why not? :)

In the last lesson with Henrik – on Friday 27rd (in fact it was our last lesson of the whole programme, unfortunately) we watched a scene from The Lord of the Rings (a part with a quarrel and then making a fellowship). Then we were discussing it and working in groups – finding the key-words from Obama’s speech which can be connected with this scene. I liked it very much. A few ideas got from that:
“Everybody can be tempted by power.”
“Arguing is good, but not fighting.” (arguing is a part of democracy – that’s right)

Then we were working in groups on the second task – to find the biggest challenges about citizenship nowadays – on personal, national and global level and how can they be solved and taught.

I confess that I liked these lessons so much. I liked the Henrik´s way of thinking, the way of working with us, the way he gave us ideas and made us thinking…


AND I WAS VERY SAD THAT ALL THE LESSONS AT UCSyd HAD FINISHED THAT FRIDAY. Since then we have been having practice at Danish schools.

I liked the whole programme very much, it really fulfilled my expectations. Moreover – it was even better then I expected. I think it helped me to "extend my horizons", to discover not only Danish school system and Danish culture, but also the wideness and beauty of European cultures, helping me to understand more to each other, to see my own country, culture and school-system from outside …And what is more it supported me to learn more about myself, helping me to be more open-minded, tolerant and respectful, self-sufficient, responsible, co-operative, understandable… I hope this will help me – and I will be really trying – to be a good European citizen. I think this was the most important thing which is this programme about and I am really happy about that. I think it helped me to thing more about my values and about things what I would like to do and not to do in my life… And it learnt me to ASK QUESTIONS, AND BE CRITICAL AND TOLERANT AT THE SAME TIME. I know it is only the BEGINNING and there is much more to learn, but I am very glad for that.

And of course – I am really looking forward to my practice at a Danish school!
I consider it a next step in the study programme.

I would love to say something right now:
Thank you to everyone – the teachers, my schoolmates and house-mates and all the people who contribute to this programme. “Living and Learning Together”. TUSIND TAK!