Thursday August 23^rd 2012

Day Thirty Four

Today I went to my friend Sharon’s primary school. This is a very unique school due to it being a multiage base school. Basically the school believes that there is not such thing as ‘normal’ when it comes to education. Who is to say a year 8 student should be performing this way in year 8? So in their classes they combine different age groups and treat them all individually. This means much more work for the teachers; however it seems to be very worth it in the end. The class I visited was year 5, 6, and 7. To be honest in the beginning I really could not differentiate the ages of the students. They all seemed to look the same age. It was a real fun and relaxing day for me. I liked observing my friend teach her algebra lesson and to also see how primary students behave. The only really bad aspect of this school is that there are no trained physical education teachers. The school believes the students should be active every day, which I agree with, and therefore the teachers also perform as the PE teacher. They are responsible for taking the students out and running the physical education classes. Although this is a great way for the students to be active frequently, these teachers are not trained to teach this, which worries me a bit. Sharon told me it is very common that the students just get out there and play. Yes they are being active, yes play is healthy for kids, but in reality they should still be given the chance to learn physical education. All in all my day was fun. I got in and taught the students a new game they could play. It was fun teaching younger students because they seemed to listen to well. It was so hot out and Sharon and I were sweaty the whole day! It is a beautiful school and I really enjoyed checking out a classroom filled with all different ages.