Interview Questions for EPC 3403

Name: Mariam Yousif

Course Code: EPC3403
Course Name: Practicum 3a
Course Teacher: Antoinette Wiseman
1- Introduction -Warmer
- Describe the setting, the grades you taught and explain the purpose of this
placement.
- I went to Al Hayah kindergarten in Ajman to do my teaching practice journey, I taught
KG2 students, and they were 24 students. Throughout my teaching practice the teachers
followed a stable curriculum and they introduce it to me in order to I apply the same
curriculum that they are applying it without changing anything to students didnt get
confused during the lessons. However, I had two MSTs, teacher Fatima was teaching an
Arabic, Islamic and teacher Eman was teaching English and math subjects.

2- Professionalism

- How did you demonstrate professional behavior as a trainee teacher in the school?
Explain how you maintained your professional status not only in your own
classroom but also across the school.
As a trainee teacher, I tried to maintain my professional behavior in several of aspect in
the classroom and outside the classroom. For example, in the classroom, attending all the
classes on their time, managing the time while teaching a lesson, creating various of
activities that suits students levels and help the teacher in the classroom if she need
anything. However, I evolved professionally across the school by being punctual,
participating in the school events and collaborating with other teachers in the open days
or events.

- Explain how conducting and receiving one formal peer observations helped you to
develop professionally?
During my teaching practice, I received lots of feedbacks from MST which helped me to
present the lessons in a suitable and encouraging way. For instance, MST told me that I
have to maintain my eye contact strategy, so whenever I teach the students a certain
lesson I used my eye contact strategy to attract their attention and encourage them to
learn more. As a result, this comment was helpful and supportive because I tried to
improve my weaknesses and I succeed in it.

- Explain how you collaborated with other staff in activities that involve the
community during this placement.
For clarifying, I collaborated with other teachers in the opens days or events that the
schools created for the students, as an example, in the flag day I helped the teacher in
organizing the event by giving the students a UAE flag and lining them up to sing the
UAE national song.

3- Planning for Learning (including Knowledge and Understanding of Content)

- What difficulties did you face in planning seven differentiated lesson plans to ensure
that they included a range of activity types for the whole class, groups and
individuals.
I confronted a difficulty during preparing my lesson plans is separating the activities in
the areas based on the differentiation which is students levels because when I separated
students to those activities, some of them were at the medium level but they should be in
the low level because of their knowledge. Thus, in this process, I didn't did very well and
it was a challenge for me to know each student and their levels.

- Explain how you assessed the learning objectives/outcomes you set the students.
I placed several learning outcomes which is the lesson goals, to assess these goals I
created many learning activities for students to assess their learning. For instance, giving
the students a small white board with marker to write the letter (p), while they are writing
the letter I assessed them by taking notes to see from where they start to write the letter
and if they are writing it in correct direction or writing it backward.

4- Implementing and Managing Learning (including behaviour management, language

and delivery).

- Explain what you did to make sure that your modeling / demonstration of the tasks
you set your students was clear and effective.
After I explained the lesson and the learning activities for the students, I separated them
into the groups, and gave them the activities to apply it by themselves through following
the self-learning process, so from this method I observed the students to make sure if the
activities that I gave them was clear and effective or not. As an example, in the letter (i)
lesson, I gave the students a corn flashcard with ice cream flashcards that have pictures
that start with several letters and they have to put the ice cream flashcards that start with
the letter (i) on top of the corn flashcard to create an letter (i) ice cream corn.

- What strategies did you apply to maintain student engagement and how effective
were they in ensuring that tasks were completed effectively?
I used several of strategies to maintain students engagement in the classroom and
motivate them to learn more. Ror example, in the letter (i) lesson I start the lesson with
playing a video song for students to they sing with it and do the movements that is in the
video, further, I created an encouragement activity to let the students have fun by
separating on the ground insect pictures that have several letters with giving the students
a stick to strick the insect that have the letter (i). So, from these strategies I tried to
involve the students in the learning cycle.

- Provide examples of how you developed student independence and responsibility in

your classes.
In the development series, I allowed the students to evolve their independence learning
by applying the activities by themselves according what they have learned in the class, on
the other hand, I developed their responsibility in the classroom by giving them work to
apply it and take all the responsibility of it. For example, every day I choose a helper
 hand to do the tasks by taking students attendance and count them, ask them to line up
after the class finish to take them to the playground area, monitor their behavior in the
whole day and tell the teacher if there is any action to do.

5- Monitoring, Assessment and Evaluation.

- What strategies did you use to monitor student progress across a range of connected
teaching sessions including class, group, pair, and individual work.
To monitor students progress, I used one effective strategy which is observing the
students and evaluate their work, for example, in the letter (i) lesson I observed the
students during the learning centers activities and asking them give me words that start
with the letter (i). and through this process I started taking notes based on their answers.
So, according to this strategy I will be able to know students levels and their progresses
throughout the course.

- Provide examples of and describe the formative assessment instruments such as as

anecdotal notes, checklists, Traffic Lights, photos, children self-assessment,
Learning Journey, etc.. you used to evaluate student performance in a variety of
activity types.
During my teaching journey, I used lots of formative assessment methods to evaluate
students performance in the activities such as, taking pictures of the students while they
are applying the activities, taking notes of their progresses and using students self-
assessment by asking them questions that related to the lesson.

6- Reflection on Practice.

- Which teaching strategies did you find were particularly effective and explain why
with reference to educational theory and/or experience?
In my perspective, I found out the key element of the students learning which is
providing them an hands-on activities. As Dr. Maria Montessori stated that The hands
are the instruments of mans intelligence (Hands-on learning, 2014). Thus, form this
strategy of teaching, students will develop their skills, abilities and understanding of a
certain concept whenever they use a hands-on learning because students like to explore
the things by themselves and from that they will earn new experiences that introduce
them to a new concept.

- Identify and critically evaluate the influence of a range of stakeholders at your

school e.g. Ministry of Education, Principal, parents etc.
As a trainee teacher, I have learned lots of skills from the school stuff and they influenced
on me in a positive way, for example, I started to be punctual, using friendly language
and social interacting, so these abilities will support me to be a good example f a trainee
teacher.

- Explain how closely you were able to apply key principles from your own teaching
philosophy as a student teacher in this school?
 I applied my teaching philosophy in the KG classroom by proving them an opportunity to
warm up in every lesson in order to involve them in the learning cycle and encourage
them to learn more.

- What would you say have been your particular strengths during this TP? Which
areas for development have you identified for next semester - justify this?
In this teaching practice, I develop my previous professional development plan by
proving the students lots of hands-on activities, however, in the next semester my focus
will be in the eye contact strategy.
References
Hands-on learning. (2014). Retrieved from the montessori notebook:
http://www.themontessorinotebook.com/hands-on-learning/