Miss Art of Teaching

Being a NSW teacher requires one to pay their Teacher Accreditation fee (aka teaching license). My first teaching gig was given to me because another temporary teacher forgot to pay her accreditation fee. This jeopardise her capacity to teach in any school or service in NSW under the Education Standards Authority. Tonight I decided to pay my $100 (tax deductible) Teacher Accreditation Fee before being penalised for forgetting. I also tick a few things off my To-Do list. This included evaluating all my tasks on the NESA eTAMS dashboard (a website built for teachers to record all professional learning). I decided to look into the final processes of my maintenance of accreditation since it is due on Feb 2019. The process has been simplified and one only needs to have a total of 100 hrs (50 NESA Registered and 50 TIPD), all courses evaluated, confirm employment details and press the submit maintenance button. On the NESA e-TAMS website, it is op...

Today, I gave back all the exams, art essays and practical art making results for my senior class. I went through how I marked each section and I made sure the class knew it was cross checked by my co-worker. Most of the marks were very similar between two teachers. When there were 1-4 marks differences, we averaged the mark so that the student could get a fair grade. I also stapled the marking criteria and teacher sample (made by myself) to each section of the exam. I also gave them verbal tips on how to answer questions and other ways to improve on their responses. I kept reminding them that HARD WORK PAYS OFF. A hard worker can always do better than a naturally talented or 'genius' student. This is because a talented student or a genius student can still be lazy and not produce high quality work. One MUST invest enough time and effort to do well.  Students were reminded to start work earlier and to COMMIT and show passion. They are not to leave things till the la...

I did a bit of marking this morning- Year 11 Senior Visual Arts exam papers. I only marked question 1 and started question 2. Glad to see that my students are doing well minus a few who need to read the question carefully and use the keywords in their response. It will also help if they do more than list what they can see in the plates (unknown artworks) and think of how the artists are challenging the audience or how they address social issues. I have stapled the marking criteria and an example of a teacher response (my attempt) for each question. This way students can compare their responses to the marking criteria and look at how I answered the same questions. I also provide them with an individual feedback. When Term 2 starts, I will need to spend at least half a lesson to go through what was working well and what needs improvement. There will be more revision throughout the year using old test papers to get them ready for Year 12 HSC. Above: Far left is the teacher's ...

My head teacher came into my Year 11 Senior class today to do an observation lesson. I also asked my co-worker who wanted to do a peer observation to come in at the same time. The purpose of the observations is to allow them to give me feedback on my teaching practice and for them to see the level of engagement in the classroom. At my school, every teacher must do an observation and also have someone seated in their class to provide feedback. I spent a quarter of the lesson going through the hamburger analogy. I adapted this from a shared resource on the 'Relief Teaching Ideas Community' Facebook group. I improved on this resource by using words from my own marking criteria and by picking out desirable and non-desirable behaviours exhibited from my students during the first 9 weeks of the term. After the hamburger analogy, I went through the requirements of HSC Visual Arts. I wanted students to understand why the preliminary program and assessment tasks were designed in a...