On Wednesday  and then again on Friday I took a smalls group of students for english. Six students at a time. I was told to create a lesson around figurative language. Some ideas given to me where a worksheet or a poster, I wanted to do something creative though. I wanted to show that I could develop my own ideas and I think that I did that really well.

My idea was to play who wants to be a millionare with questions on figurative language. I had no acess to the internet so I could not use a pre made template and so I just made my own slightly less impressive one than some I have since found on the net. Mine is still perfectly serviceable though and it worked well.

To make it easier to play in the class setting I seperated the students into two teams and they raced to get to 1,000,000.

First I explained the rules of the game such as the point system.
The point system was the same as in the game show:

_When I was a student there was very little use of ICT as a learning tool. The only use of ICT that I saw when I was in primary school was when we had to use the computers to type up a project, or to research something on encarta, I can't remember much use of the internet. We also used it to play games during wet day timetables and free time. In high school we used the computers to research, to type, and when we were taught IT in year 7 and eight we spent alot of time on Mavis Beacon learning how to type and making spreadsheets on excel. The only other use of technology that I regulary saw was the use of the projector and many of the older teachers had no idea how the technology worked at all and had to get the students to help them, simple things like turning up the volume could be baffling. Actually I lie there was also a system that allowed teachers to make a quiz, all the students would be handed a remote and then they could answer the questions like in a game show.

_I have to admit that the  thought of going to a school even if it was just for observation was a little nerve wracking but after the end of the day I was over that feeling, in the end I felt that it was really no different to when I help out at the local primary school. My first observation placement was in a primary school. It was a bit confusing though being thrown out into schools during week three when we had hardly even started the semester, I had no idea what I was supposed to be looking out for or doing so I wrote allot down, anything that could be important, or what sorts of questions I was supposed to be asking.

_The following is a copy of another blog post that wrote a while ago for uni, I thought that it would be suitable to post here:

I’ve been thinking about ICTs and how they are used in the classroom. Penpals was what came to mind, in high school we had a sister school in Japan and in primary school we had penpals from other schools. When I was at a local Primary School  Upper Plenty Primary helping out at the end of last year I noticed that they also have something similar, the program that they had in place allowed the students to talk via videochat to a school somewhere in another country. These sorts of programs allow the children to connect with others there age in another country and so learn about another culture. When I am a teacher I am hoping that they have a similar program in place that my class can take part in as I think that it would be a really fantastic chance for the students to be able to learn about another country not just through reading and watching videos but to actually have the chance to hear from someone of a similar age to them and ask questions.

I have never known a classroom where ICT has not been used, granted in my early years of schooling it