5th years say to me and Colleague this morning “Why are you all dolled up?” We look at each other.
She says, “We’re not”.
I say, “Why?”
Our visitors appear later and a couple of pupils ask, who are those people? and I glance up at them, and reply, “Them? They’re just visitors” and the pupils say, oh, ok, and go back to work. I’m quite touched by their confidence in me actually.
The visitors are here to review Curriculum for Excellence in practice, with a bit of AifL and cooperative learning thrown in. It’s Colleague’s moment. I’m just here for, well, I’m not sure actually. Moral support? I was asked and I’m happy to help out anyway.
We’re asking the class to review all the study skills we’ve covered over the last few weeks. This is their assessment – a group mindmap of everything we’ve covered – and it’s fascinating to see what they’ve remembered.
- brain gym – the evidence may not exist for it’s efficacy, but it works brilliantly as an ice-breaker and to get them moving
- memory techniques – which words out of the 32 can they recall? Why those words? Was it the stories, Was it the actions? Did they laugh?
- the shopping list – used for visualisation, we also got them to make up their own list. Today, they can still recall most of the items in order
- 1-10 in Japanese – more visualisation, with actions
Most of the groups forgot about the original team-building exercises, the brain information graffitti boards and the healthy messages.
Of course, what the class don’t realise is that while they’re working away on their assessments, they’re also marking my performance: what worked, what didn’t? Does everyone remember the same things, are the more recent lessons fresher in their minds, do I need to rotate the order a bit.
One of the Visitors apparently asked a boy, and what is the purpose of brain gym? To which he promptly replied, “It helps you to focus, gets oxygen flowing to your brain”. I guess we’re doing something right.
We finish with the class demonstrating 1-10 in Japanese (complete with genuine mistake in the middle) and some visualisation to end. Visitor apparently commented, “It looks like they’re really taking part.” That’s because they were.
One very minor point: I wasn’t introduced. It was Colleague’s moment, and I knew I’d be looking after the class while she spoke to the Visitors, but an acknowledgement of my presence would have been nice.
On the other hand, the Boss makes a point of returning to say thanks, and says, “How many other classes would you see that sort of thing taking place?” He more than made up for any niggles. Overall – very positive.
Now, can I focus on my uni assignment for a week or two please?
