PRIMARY

Observation Sheet Questioning

(Please complete this form for both primary and secondary professional experiences and
place in your ePortfolio)
Graduate Standards - AITSL
Professional Knowledge:
Professional Practice:
learning

1. Know students and how they learn

2. Plan and implement effective teaching and

Question Type

Do you feel your questions

were clearly structured and
readily understood by the
students?

I feel that I most of my questions were well constructed and

understandable. There were a few, however that I could have
worded better.

Did you use a variety of

question types?

I used as many as I could think of in the moment.

I.E: How, what, why, where, with who? Etc
Thinking back I could have used a bigger range of question types,
but I used a good variety!

What balances was there

between the various
questions types?

I tried to balance the question types evenly, but that didnt work
very well.
There were more what and why question that I asked as opposed
to the rest.
I could have used more of the other form instead of constantly
relying on those main two.
I used the different question types to add diversity in the lessons,

Consider both why and

when you made use of the
different question types?

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as well as to keep the student interested in what I was saying.

When I used the different types of questions depended on what
was being said, and what information I was trying to draw out of
the students.

Distributing and Directing Questions

Did you recognise any

pattern in the distribution of
your questions amongst the
students? Consider
reasons for this pattern?

I did recognise a pattern with the whole class. Usually the

questions would be directed to the same handful of student, as
they were the only ones who put their hands up. When I started to
notice this I did however start to ask those who didnt have their
hands up.
With the smaller group there wasnt really any pattern that I could
pick up, as it was a small group and they were all eager and
participating. This meant that the questions were fairly evenly
spread between the students.

How have you directed

questions to the group?

As asked the students to raise their hands and I would then choose
one to give the answer.
Eg: Who knows what climate change is?

Have you used wait time?

I did try to use it on the whole class lesson, but it wasnt so

effective, as the students were quite fidgety and restless at the end
of the day.
It was quite effective on the smaller group though! I found that by
using this they retained more knowledge!

Did you make eye contact

with the group as you
directed your questions?

I did my very best to make eye contact, and I believe that I did
make as much eye contact as I possibly could!

Reactions to Students Responses

How do you deal with
correct responses? Do you
qualify any praise given?

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When a student gave the right answer I would encourage

them by saying something like: well done or Good job!.

How do you deal with

incorrect responses? How
do you deal with students
who stumble and grope for
an answer?

I still tried to give the wrong answers as much

encouragement as the right.
Eg: Nice try, but not quite or good thinking, but not
quite.
When I came across a student stumling for an answer I
would wait for a few seconds to see if they could get the
answer out on their own, then I would help them out a little.

What use do you make of

the students responses to
develop the teaching point?
Have you redirected any
questions in order to add to
an initial response?

In the whole class lesson I made use of the students responses to

add to the teaching point, by drawing a mind map on the board
and then adding information to that answer.

Are you the only evaluator

of the students answers?

No, the rest of the class is as well, because they are all
participating in the discussion.

In the smaller group I used the responses the students gave and
built on them to the next point. I had planned the lesson in such a
way that I would be able to do so.

Overall Comments

I think my questioning skills some work, but for my first go at it I thought that I did quite
well!

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Observation Sheet Management

(Please complete this form for both primary and secondary professional experiences and
place in your e portfolio)
Graduate Standards AITSL
Professional Practice:
1. Create and maintain supportive and safe learning environments
2. Planning for Effective Management

Was your lesson plan

effective for managing the
class?
e.g. How did the students
react to your lesson overall
and to your planned
activities?
Did anything unexpected
happen?

I felt that for both lessons my lesson plan was effective for
managing the class.
The student responded very well to the lessons and activities that I
had planned and they enjoyed them! They especially enjoyed the
craft in the whole lesson!!
The only unexpected thing that happened was a good kind of
unexpected! The students used their imaginations with the craft to
create 3D collages!

Did you provide a variety of

activities?
For the whole class activity, there was only one activity, but it was
craft and that is time consuming so that was the only activity
Were you satisfied with
required.
your timing, particularly for
But for the small group lesson, I had a number of activities for the
the end of the lesson?
student to complete. I even had extras for them to do if they
managed to complete the activities they had before the time was
Did you feel you were able up.
to change things if needed?

I did change a few things as the time went passed, just so that we
had enough time to get everything do.

Were you aware of

classroom procedures and
school disciplinary policy?
How much did you know
about your students?

I was aware of the disciplinary policy and actions that I would

need to take if anything were to happen, as I had been informed
before starting. The supervising teacher let me know beforehand
what to expect and how to deal with it.

How did your mentor

teacher maintain a safe
learning environment?
What strategies did your

She maintained a safe environment buy maintaining control of the

class. She use strategies like rhythmed clapping to get the students
attentions, she used a points system (called Dojo) to reward good

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observe your mentor

teacher using to maintain
this?

behaviour as well as take point away if they were not behaving

properly, she also used a warning system.

Maintaining a Positive Attitude in the Classroom

How did you demonstrate to
the students that you valued
them, and enjoyed
learning?
e.g. Tone of voice, facial
expression, sense of
humour, introduction to
students and topic.

Which aspects of your

teaching style do you feel
helped you maintain class
attention?
e.g. Variety of activities,
class or group discussion,
pace of lesson, interest at
class level.

I always made sure that I had a smile on my face and that I was
happy. I used a calm tone of voice, as well as an authoritative
when I needed. I engaged in conversations with the students using
sense of humour and encouragement. I made sure that when I
needed to be firm that my body language and expression
supported my tone of voice and what I was saying.

I feel that the variety of activities was what helped me maintain

the attention of the class. When they were doing their activities
they were focused and working, as opposed to when we were
having discussions. Only some would participate when we were
having discussions others would be talking to one another of
playing with their stationary.

Did the students know what

was expected of them?

They did know what was expected of them as I made sure to tell
them what they were doing and how to do it.

Were you able to redirect

energies of attention
seeking students? Did the
students have enough
to do?

There were a few student in the class who were attention seekers,
so I made sure that they were on task and every now and then I
would check on them to see if they were working and how they
were going. I also tried not to pay attention to them if they called
out or something like that.
I made sure that the students had enough activities to complete in
the time that I had.

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Dealing with Minor Misbehaviour

Were you aware of what
was happening in all parts
of the classroom? Did you
know what each student
was doing?

I could see what was going on in most of that class most of the
time. There were a few occasions when I saw something happen,
but couldnt see who did it or how. Other time I someone do
something, but I didnt see what it was that they did. I tried to be
as vigilant as possible, when I wasnt teaching a lesson I could see
a lot of what was going on, but as soon as I was up the front of the
class I realised how much more difficult it is!

Did you take any action

when you observed poor
behaviour? Why? Why
not?

Yes I did. I would tell them to stop, what they were doing and pay
attention. I did this because if I let them continue it would not only
be a distraction to myself, but to the rest of the class as well.

Did you use non-verbal

cues? e.g. Contact, pause,
gesture, movement toward
student/s concerned.

I use bot verbal and non-verbal cues. I tended to use non-verbal

cues when I was talking to another student and verbal cues when
the class was getting noisy or someone was continuously being
disruptive.

Overall Comments

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I think that my classroom management skills are good, but I will need to work on my
lesson planning and execution, but overall I think I did well.

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Schools as text looking at the whole school

Describe the school in terms of
its demographics, appearance
and resources (be general here
and do not name the school).

Overall the school is a good school! They have a range of

student, from kindy to year 10. The school is quite a
multicultural school. The appearance of the school is very
good! Its kept very tidy and a safe and fun environment is
constantly being maintained. The school has a library that
contains many resources as well as a support centre that is
very well run and stocked with resources!!

What were the roles and

responsibilities of the teaching
staff you observed?

The roles of the staff, apart from teaching, were to be

mentors and friends to the students, to have lunch and
recess duty patrolling the school, being on devotions once
in a term. Teacher had to take care of injuries, they had to
see to it that the need of students were met, they had to
see to the needs of students who need more help than
others, they had to provide support for one another.

After discussion with your

mentor teacher describe how
policies and processes of
government, administration and
schools have an affect on the
work of the teacher?

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What did you observe non-teaching

staff doing to support teaching and
learning in the school?

The non-teaching staff provided support for the teaching

staff. They offered to run errands for the teachers, make
photocopies, they took care of student who werent
feeling well of were injured when the teacher wasnt able
to, they did the tidying up that the teachers didnt have
time to do.

Students
You will have observed the
diverse nature of your classes.
How was this diversity
supported?

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There were student of different learning levels in the year

5 class that I was in. there were 3 in particular that were
below all the others. They would be taken out of class for
maths and sometimes for English to receive further
support and one-on-one time that they need to be able to
understand the concepts and topic as well as to try and
catch up to the level the rest of the class was on. Other
student had issues at home, so they were provided with
counselling sessions and allowed time to relax and
recuperate after returning.

Function of Schools
Did you observe the connection
of your schools with the broader
community? How did this
happen?

What do you think the function

of school is?

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Yes, there was a connection to the broader community

through the various sports that were being represented by
the school ( netball, soccer, hockey, afl etc.)

The function of school is to give children an education to lay

a foundation for their future, as well as for the student to be
able to gain the life skills they need to get through life, like
making friends, public speaking, social skills and so forth.
Another function of school is to build a
community/environment, in which students feel safe and
protected.

Professional ePortfolio
Professional Experience Portfolio (50%) Site address (link) and your name.
__nicoleshehard.weebly.com___________________________________
CRITERIA FOR EVALUATION

COMMENTS

PART A (20%)
Required components for both the Primary
and Secondary Professional experiences:
Lesson Plans (4)
Observation Sheets (one set for primary and
one set for seconday):
Questioning
Management and
Schools as text
Evaluation Form/Final report (2)
Lesson Critiques (At least 2)

PART B (30%)
Essay Tell the story of your Professional
experience and reflect on your choice of
Primary or Secondary Teaching.
Frame your story using the unit outcomes
(Unit Information).
Correct essay conventions are required as are
in text referencing and standard writing
conventions. (500 words)
Tutor

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TOTAL MARK for

Observations
and Essay
/50

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