Interview

Fatima Jumaa
H00250640
Course Code: LSC 2113
Course Teacher: Antoinette Wiseman

Miss Shamsa is a professional teacher in kindergarten, she started teaching since 2008. This
proves that she gained a lot of experience while dealing with children. She lives in Sharjah but
she works in Ajman. She has one boy and two girls. Her favourite hobby is reading novels. She
decided to work as a teacher for two main reasons, firstly she enjoy educating kids and secondly
she feel responsible toward them and she believe that they must be educated in the best way
possible. She graduated in January, 2008 from Zayed University in Dubai and the following
October she got her first job. At the beginning she struggled because of the large number of
students in one class, in addition to the incomprehensive curriculum. Her main goal is to become
an expert and to create new techniques that will promote childrens creativity. Moreover, she
wants to raise a generation full of hope and success.

Questions
Q1: What techniques do use to control the classroom?
She said, I have clear and simple rules, at the beginning of the course she decides with her
students about the consequences of breaking the class rules. And she hangs a behavior chart at
the end of the classroom, for example if a student name is written in green then the student
academic level is perfect and if his/her name is written in a red color then she might need extra
help to follow up with the rest of the class. She also uses Dojo app to evaluate each student by
adding them bonus marks if they were worth it or sometimes the opposite, depending on the
student behaviour.

Q2: How do you manage bad behaviours?

She says I get my students attention through using a simple phrase - 1,2,3 eyes on me! It works.
Sometimes, and she says, I would prefer to have a personal connection with a child and help him
solve the problems. Also, she changes the seating arrangement when children make bad
behaviour.

Q3: How do you encourage the good behaviours?

She says I am using class Dojo program which helps her to manage the children behaviour inside
the classroom. Children will be able to gain a point when they respect each other or help other
and listen to the teacher. When they gain more points they have a gift from the prizes box that
she offers.
Always she praises when she see the good behaviour, and she acknowledge them by name and
try to do it in the presence of the other children to let them feeling proud.

Classroom Strategies
Q4: What the teacher strategies of using technology in the classroom?
She says, I use iPad, laptop and projector to teach the children, and when I have lesson I
let the student to use this technology for example if the children have a match question
she let them to use finger and answer the question.
Q5: How many strategies teacher using during the day?
She says more than 5 strategies, its help her to keep calm inside classroom.

Q6: What the strategies the teacher using when the child make noisy in the classroom?
She say, I use program that name class Dojo that include point for each children like she
take point when they make noisy and if they loss point they will not get a gift. Also, she
say, I use ball and clapping hand when student make noisy to get them attention and talk
with children that make noisy. And she says, I punishes the student and let them to site in
the back of the class.
Q7: What the teacher strategies of following the routine?
Sing a song to let the student to site in the carpet. Ask the student when they forget to put
their name on the cared name. Also, she reminds them the routine by using poster and
show them many time in the week.
..
Q8: How much time the teacher spends in one activity? Actually she spends 15 minute and she
makes sure that each child engages.
Q9: How many activity teacher do in one lesson? She say, more than tree individual group, art,
math, science.
Q10: Would you be able to integrate a special needs child into your classroom? She says, Yes, I
design special activity according to their need.

Lesson Plans:
Q11: Are you used to make lesson plans? Why? She says yes, because that helps me
to organize my idea and know what I will teach step by step. Also, the lesson plans
saving the time.
Q12: What do you include in your lesson plans? She say, Periods, Objectives,
activities and assessment.
Q13: How many lesson plans do you do daily? She say, I have two lesson Plan a
and plan b. And she says, if the projector not work or something broken I use plan
b to solve the problem and to saving the time.

Q14: What are the problems that you encounter about the classroom management?
She says, According to our school rules, children are sitting along time on the circle area (more
than 10 minutes) One important things for KG kids is that never to ask them to sit longer than
they can. Then they will feel boring and will make noisy.
Q15: How you explain for children about the classroom rules?
She says, at the beginning of the first week with a new group of children I try to teach the
children what is expected from them behavior wise. Then let the children participate in making
class rule. When making the rules a child might day "don't hit", you can say "That's right why
shouldn't we hit" Hopefully the child would say "because it hurts" I usually then write on the
poster board.
Rule: Keep Your Hand and feet to yourself
This way the children have helped make the rule, it's written in a positive way.
Q16: What are the important subjects you have to discuss with other teachers?
She says, I discuss with other teachers the activity that I show the student and how
they will apply it. Also, she says I discuss with them about the special need that I
have in the class and how I control their behavior and how to Increase their selfconfidence.

The classroom management strategies that I plan to use in my teaching/classroom:

I will follow Piaget theory which states that at different ages the child should act or think in a
certain way that match his/her age. For example, a 2 years old baby should act intentionally like
playing with a toy, on the other hand a child whos (5-7) years old definitely must be able to
understand more than a baby, for example he/she should be able to recognize several objects and
to differentiate between their sizes. If I notice that one of my student behaviors is not suitable for
his/her age, I will take it seriously and contact the parents because there might be a significant
issue in the development of the child that will harm her/his future life (Piaget, 2013).
In the future I will use Skinner theory most of the time, Skinners theory explained how to
strengthen a good behavior, how to weaken a bad behavior and how to stop a bad behavior
entirely. Firstly, positive reinforcement is to provide a reward to encourage a good behavior, for
example If a student finishes his homework I will give him a gift, the student will do his work
repeatedly to have another gift. Secondly negative reinforcement is the contrary if a student
forgot to finish his homework he would have to write the homework in the break, and avoid him
to play out the class, so the student will be forced to do his homework to get another gift and
play with their friend. The last strategy Skinner used is a punishment which can either suppress
an undesirable behavior, which is the last step I am going to use if I cant control the kid, for
example, I will let him copy the homework twice, or I will not let them take a break (McLeod,
2015).
I will use a poster that includes different management rules and I will paste on the wall and
remind the student in the morning by showing them the poster rules. I will use it to remind the
student because they easily forget the rules.
Provide emotionally and social climate between teacher and student, for example, say a nice
word or encourage the student to do something like it. This help to develop the relationship
inside the class and get a good management because if the student feels comfortable with the
teacher they will listen to the teacher.

According to Piaget who studied Social influences on cognitive development claims that the
culture and environment affects the mental development of a child, therefore I will recommend
families to interact more with their kids even in younger ages. And I will connect with them
daily and let them know about their child and the ability they have (Piaget, 2013).

In conclusion:
I learn from my MST a lot of thing. First thing, I learn how to be organizing when teach a new
lesson, and when I have a new subject about letter I should not teaches them everything in one
day, for example, in the first lesson I show them a litter and I let them to write it in the carpet to
make the lesson more fun. After that, I tell them the sound of the letter by showing video or I
make the sound. Also, I show them picture on anything that include the letter, and I bring a real
material from our real live and show them, and let them to touch it. This way it helps to
entrenches the information in the child's mind. Then In the next day I let them to write the letter
in the paper. The other things I learn from my MST are choose the helper hand in beginning of
the class day. This is a nice system in the class. The role helper hands are count children, help
teacher and change the date of the week. This way is teach the student to be leader in the future
and helper. Also, the real good advice that my MST tell me is dont give the student stake during
the class because they will not be attention when the teacher teach. And the other advice is she
tell me is when I give the student the activity I should give them instruction before I give them
the activity. And I hope to apply everything that I learn from her.

This interview was with teacher Shamsa Ahmed in 21-2-2016, Sunday, inside the classroom, in
the break at 10 am. The class is KG26. Middle level taught that include on student from
special need.

References
Piaget. (2013, February 10). Retrieved from learningandteaching:
http://www.learningandteaching.info/learning/piaget.htm
McLeod, S. (2015). Skinner-Operant Conditioning. Retrieved from simplypsychology:
http://www.simplypsychology.org/operant-conditioning.html