I had the opportunity to observe Briana and her Year 1 English/Maths student. Briana was able to keep the lesson fun and engaging throughout, setting up rewards and incentives to encourage the student to do her work. She also made the work engaging and interactive, listening to the students stories about herself and her family.
Briana was also able to establish the importance of the student completing her homework, after some lessons of incompletion. Briana was able to express why her student needed to do her homework, and was able to make the work more engaging and fun so the student was more willing to complete the given work. This resulted in her student bringing in homework that was successfully completed, showcasing improvement in the students engagement in her work.
Briana went through spelling throughout the lesson, actively helping her student with such spelling, sounding out words and syllables to help her student. Briana was able to help her when she made mistakes in a positive manner, adding suggestions to help her solve the spelling for herself.
After, they went through writing stories. Briana made sure to further engage her student through writing festive Christmas stories, with the story mainly being about Christmas trees and decorations. Throughout, Briana was able to help with her story, helping with spelling and grammatical mistakes. Her student consistently improved, understating and learning from her prior errors.
Briana was able to make such work more fun and engaging for her student in a number of ways, tuning into the students attachment to colouring and creativity. She allowed her student to use coloured pencils instead of regular led pencils, further engaging her student in her work.
Overall, Briana was able to construct a fun and engaging lesson through actively engaging with her student, and making the lesson relate to Christmas through festive stories. I will look to implement these strategies with my primary students for the remainder of the term.
Daniel Rulli
