T3W8 - P4 Art

I was feeling anxious about this week's lessons for my P4 classes as I had missed 2 weeks with them due to the National Day festivities and the PSLE oral examinations. I was worried that the P4s might not be able to complete their final art project (create their own cardboard sculpture), filing and reflection before the end of the term. This was amplified by the knowledge that Teacher's Day celebrations would take up week 10's lessons, leaving me with 2 lessons in the term. Against this backdrop of worries, a new task emerged - the P4s were to try their hand at designing their very own camp T-shirt for the upcoming P4 camp! My task was to introduce the details of the competition and collect the designs by the end of the lesson. The deadline set for the Camp T-shirt designs was tight, and there was still the Teacher's day drawing contest and 25th-anniversary feathers to complete.

This was when I decided to seek advice from my mentor, and she reassured me of the order of priority for the tasks (Feathers > T-shirt > Teacher's Day). Speaking to her definitely helped ease my mind, in knowing that filing and reflection can be pushed back to the beginning of term 4 if I didn't have time to complete them by the end of the term. With a clearer idea of what to expect from my class this week, I felt calmer and more focused on each task during the lesson. This allowed me to better facilitate the student's design process and give constructive feedback to them in my lesson.

As with many tasks, some students would finish within the first 10 minutes while others may take up to 40 minutes in 'perfecting' their work. Hence, I decided to brief the class on the Teacher's Day drawing contest and allowed those early-finishers to start on the teacher's day contest first while waiting for their classmates to submit their camp T-shirt designs. To my surprise, the camp T-shirt designs were all submitted in 10 minutes before my lesson was over. I decided to use that time to refresh our memory on sculptures, and to get them ready for next week's lesson where they would begin working on their cardboard sculptures.

This week, I was reminded that I should work on clearing any doubts and maintaining a clear state of mind before my lessons! I feel that as a teacher, my own state of mind can impact my lesson delivery.

Comments

  1. UnknownAugust 25, 2019 at 6:30 AM

    In your opinion, what makes a lesson successful? For me, it would be having met the lesson objectives through a lesson that engaged the students with opportunities for exploration, discovery and a-ha moments. As a teacher, there is a built in barometer that give us a sensing on how well our lessons went. There are days I wanted to kick myself for lacklustre lesson delivery but I have learnt, growing to be an educator is a journey with the misses guiding us to build on our hits. Beyond all the fluff of different strategies and activities under the guise of self-directed or collaborative learning, it is important we clearly communicate the basis of why they are learning what they are learning. I believe that unless students can make sense of why they are learning and how it connects the dots in their lives, only then can engender and sustain the joy of learning. Found this interesting article by Danny Gregory ( https://dannygregorysblog.com/2016/04/15/lets-get-rid-of-art-education-in-schools/), have a read and share with me your thoughts. =))
    Have a great week ahead!

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