Thursday, 4 May 2017

Stage de Nouméa 2017 - Observations - College Portes de Fer

Class Observations – Nouméa 2017

Collège Portes de fer – Day 1 – Friday 21st April
-       Teachers meet students in the playground and walk to class at the beginning of the day and after breaks.
-       All students stand to begin class and sit when asked to.
-       Teacher does not call out the roll – Asks the students “Who is absent?”
-       The class has desks organisied in rows.
-       Uniform t-shirt (grey) and Sports t-shirt (green) – only to be worn for the correct sessions.
-       Classes have approximately 25 students.
-       Presentations using Interactive board – Disney characters and other moving cartoons used to engage the students.
-       Use of Learning Apps (Homework Task) – Subscribe to the App, make group, set tasks and monitor progress.

Year 9 – English – 7:10-8:10am
-       Class are working on writing biographies.
-       Begin the lesson by revisiting the last session.
-       Questions are revisitied e.g. Where was he born?
-       Students respond to the teacher.
-       Big emphasis on hands up.
-       Students are required to memorise the biography questions and information.
-       Use of powerpoint to display learning material.
-       Students are working on sequencing their ideas.
-       Teacher guides the students to write a shared class biography about Queen Victoria using the information provided and the questions that they learnt in the previous session.
-       The expectation for the next session is that they will write their own biography on a chosen person (no longer alive) and present to the class. They are able to make notes but not to read sentences that they have written.
-       Most instructions are given in English – full immersion but due to different levels the teacher will sometimes ask the students to translate her instructions into French and say aloud.
-       Group work – Half class – They are required to ask questions and respond. They stay in their seats for this task and the teacher facilitates the discussion. The teacher selects a student to share a question and then to give a response.
-       Half the class have information about William Shakespeare and the other half a table to fill out.
-       Students then use this information to write a biography about Shakespeare (Homework also). Write notes and begin the task as a whole class.

Year 7 – English – Group 1 – 8:15-9:15am
-       Students learning: Have you got? Yes I have got/No I have not got. Singular and Plural.
-       Recall the previous session to begin. No books/notes – students are not allowed to look back on their work from the previous class.
-       Students complete a workbook task on plurals – Has she got? Have you got? How many has she got?
-       Picture of pet shop shown on Interactive board – Recall questions – Teacher to student, teacher to student.
-       Make a list of the different pets as a whole class – She has got…
-       Copy the lesson into books – these are all very well presented.
-       There is an expectation of silence when copying down the lesson.
-       Teacher spends the lesson at desk or at the front of the class.
-       Listen and repeat for pronunciation of vocabulary.

Year 7 – English - Group 2 – 9:30-10:30am
-       The same lesson as taught to the previous Year 7 Group
-       Interesting to see the contrast in levels.

Collège Portes de fer – Day 2 – Tuesday 2nd May
-       Discussion about tablets/shared information about Language Apps we use in NZ.
-       Detentions are given to students who teachers feel are not working hard enough in class – they return and complete their work.

Year 10 – English - Advanced – 8:15-9:15am
-       I gave a presentation about NZ and Berkley.
-       Students were hesitant to ask questions in English.
-       Played Order of Importance, Chain Fairytales and Categories.
-       Next session look at questions to do with school – Who, What, When, Where, Why and How.

Year 9 – English – 9:30-10:30am
-       Students learning: Life in the past.
-       Revise What people could/couldn’t do in the 1800’s – Emphasis on full sentences.
-       Life was harder at that time Activity – Comparing Nowadays and the past. Vocabulary given to the students using words and pictures.
-       Teacher reads and the students repeat – Not used in sentences.
-       Students work independently – teacher sits at desk – Many students unsure of task.
-       Teacher goes through the task. Chooses students to share sentences e.g. People couldn’t use ______ in those times but they could use _______.
-       Vocabulary test scheduled for the next week.
-       Make sentences as a class e.g.  Since there was no electricity, people had to use candles or oil lamps.
-       Asks students to translate the sentence to French.
-       Pour - For + name, to + verb
-       He had to (il était obligé)
-       They didn’t have to (ils n’etaient pas obligé)

Tahitian Dancing – 12-1pm

Year 7 – English – Group 1 – 1-2pm
-       Students completing a test on what they learnt over the last week – 20 minutes at the start of the lesson.
-       Being tested on - Have/have not got, has/has not got, how many. Use of singular and plural.
-       Expectation of silence during the test.
-       Instructions are given in French.
-       Once finished students hand in their tests and take a vocabulary task to complete – This is about food (matching pictures to the english words) – 5 minutes to complete this task.
-       Mark the vocabulary sheet as a whole class then repeat the vocabulary after the teacher.
-       Extension – What do you love/like/don’t like/hate/prefer?
-       Make sentences e.g. I like pasta/I don’t like bacon and eggs – teacher writes individuals sentences on the board.
-       Gives sentence structure – I like… and I love… but I don’t like…/I hate… but I prefer… - Teacher picks students to share their sentences so not all students get to come up with a sentence and say it aloud.
-       Students copy the lesson into their copy books.

Year 10 – English – 2-3pm
-       Revise work from previous session – Crime scene – Using subjects and verbs.
-       Second task – change senences into the passive voice e.g. The burglar broke into the house becomes The house was broken into by the burglar.
-       Teacher chooses students to feed back to the class – same individuals share – others chat or quietly copy into their books.
-       New task – What did Sherlock Holmes use to do in the past?
-       As a class students come up with a paragraph to answer this question – using they used to/they didn’t used to.
-       Teacher has the paragraph written and the students are trying to rewrite from memory.
-       Students copy the paragraph into their books.
-       Students complete a grammer sheet about used to/not anymore/no longer/not any longer. Teacher reads the instructions and then the students complete in silence.
-       Students translate the sentences into French.
-       This class has a variety of levels as they have all come from different teachers – Corinne mentioned that there is a lot of gaps in grammar and that she is finding it difficult to catch up some students and to extend others.

Year 7 – English – Group 2 – 3:15-4:15pm
-       The same lesson as taught to the previous Year 7 group.
-       These groups will move on to write questions about likes/dislikes in the next session.

Year 9 – English - Advanced – 4:15-5:15pm
-       Showed short presentation about NZ and answered questions.
-       Played the Memory Game, Categories, Chain Fairytales and Order of Importance.
Collège Portes de fer – Day 3 – Thursday 4th May
-       Students who have misbehaved in a class get put on daily report. Teachers rank the lessons behaviour/work by coulour – insufficient to good.
-       Possibility of Year 7 classes writing letters to my class in English – Name, Country, Family, Pets, Sports, Likes/Dislikes. My class could then reply in French.
-       Possibility of Year 10 - Advanced (European Section) – coming to visit Berkley depending on fundraising.
-       Possibility of Berkley visiting Portes de Fer during their upcoming trip in October.

Year 10 – English - Advanced – 7:10-8:10am
-       I took a lesson on questions with this class (who, what, when, where, why and how).
-       Students answered the questions in English and then wrote a paragraph about their school to include as part of their presentation.
-       Students then came up with quiz questions about New Caledonia and their school to ask the students in New Zealand.
-       Their teacher motivated them to raise money for their trip by saying that if they sell enough cakes they may be able to come to Hamilton to visit Berkley.


Year 7 – English – Group 1 – 8:15-9:15am
-       Students complete a test on the food vocabulary from last session (10 minutes).
-       Students then move on to correct the test on have/have not that they did in the last session. They go through each question. Teacher chooses student to share the answer. The teacher was very disappointed by the results of this test.
-       Students revise I like, I don’t like, I love, I hate and I prefer.
-       Teacher shows pictures (cakes, ice cream, bread etc.) on the board and chooses students to form sentences.
-       If students take more than 5 seconds to reply the teacher quickly selects another student and asks the others to repeat.
-       Teacher often shouts at the students in French to remind them not to speak in French or to tell them to be silent.
-       Students move on to questions e.g. Do you like coke? Yes, I do/No I don’t.
-       Students copy the questions into their copy books.
-       Shows pictures on the board and then chooses students to ask their neighbour a question. The students repeat many of these.
-       Teacher tells me that a student is difficult and has problems understanding very loudly in front of the whole class. She says “This is why he never learns anything!”
-       Next the teacher shows the picture and the like/dislike picture and students must make a sentence. Teacher chooses the students to make each sentence.

Year 7 – English – Group 2 – 9:30-10:30am
-       The same lesson as taught to the previous Year 7 group.
-       Teacher compares the classes – attitude, attention, ability and individual students.
-       Students in this class begin correcting their tests independently using their copy books.
-       Students are asked to write/copy vocabulary at home in preparation for the vocabulary tests that they have.

-       Use of pictures and repetition is excellent.

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