What Advice Would You Give Someone Undertaking Initial Teacher Training?
Organisation is your biggest friend during this training period. Each person will have their own process, but it is important to know what you have going on, predominantly to allow yourself to plan in time for you. It is important to keep your life balanced by finding time to engage in your hobbies around work. This will also encourage you to think about the week ahead holistically rather than day-to-day which is a skill that will be extremely useful as your timetable builds up.
Something that seems obvious, but if often under appreciated is showing your passion through your lessons. Ideally, everyone wants to enjoy their job and from my experience, teaching is most enjoyable when you can share and express your passion. Not only will it show your class that being passionate about a subject is valid, but it also encourages it. Not every student will necessarily enjoy your subject all of the time, but this passion can open the minds of students to see the excitement.
One of my favourite ways to break up seemingly monotonous maths is to talk about the interesting areas that it can be seen in real life. Simultaneous equations for example, I pose a question about the complexities of launching a rocket – yes it could actually be rocket science. How do you ensure that when you launch a rocket that it will meet say the ISS when the ISS is also moving. Questions like this open the gap of knowledge and creates intrinsic motivation which is important for the mindset of the students in your room.
Sharing your passion will also motivate you as a teacher to make lessons that you are invested in as well as the students. Showing students that you are human, with passions and interest makes you relatable and stops the urge to alter the presentation of yourself in front of a class – which would be exhausting!
Be passionate, have fun and enjoy!
By Harry Acott
You can find Harry on Instagram here.
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