3rd Week - partnership school

Today in my partnership school the 7 other pre-service teachers and I were involved in athletics day on a sporting arena near by. Yet, I found the most valuable and informative event, for me, occurred at the start of the day before we even left for the sporting events.

Two other pre-service teachers (Katie and Lauren) and I were in my mentor teacher’s art classroom with year 10 students. After she introduced us to the class she then went and marked the online role. Fascinated at this up to date way of marking the role I went over to observe how it was done. I believe it was really efficient as when you scrolled over the students names their picture comes up even. Yet, there are always down sides to the system my mentor told me. She then explained how this new role involved teachers having to mark it before the first half hour of the class. If it is not done in time the head teachers look down upon the teachers who mark the role late. However, as my mentor teacher made me aware, some issues arise that have to be addressed early in class for student’s welfare and safety that can’t just be ignored. Hence, they cant always have the role marked by that time.

This made me think about how flawed the system can be at times. It seems like the people in higher positions in the school lose touch with the actual teaching factor and focus on the rules and legislation instead. I personally believe my mentor teacher made a valid point that marking the role first thing in the morning isn’t a great teaching strategy in a high school setting. I remember in high school finding the role marking procedure boring and a waste of valuable learning and teaching time. Many also lost interest at the start of the day and would muck around. I would much prefer walking into a classroom and being motivated to get started on an activity straight away then the teacher coming around to mark off our names. That way we are already quiet and settled and any issues that had to be dealt with early could be.

This started to make me think about this particular issue in a wider context concerning education as a whole. It made me question, although in most primary schools and secondary schools marking roles is done first thing in the morning, is it really a great teaching method? I have marked names on the role first thing in the morning in primary school with the upper years. Even with them, unless you make it creative and fun they even tune out and get bored. Hence, I believe in a secondary school this process may be out dated and not the most effective teaching method.