Ta Level 3 Ncfe Assignment One

Assignment one
Supporting the Teacher

1. Describe how you might contribute to a lesson given to a group of seven year old children learning to play percussion instruments?

My role as a TA in contributing to this lesson would begin with setting up and organizing the learning environment before the lesson takes place and ensuring the learning area is clean, tidy and safe for the lesson, during the lesson my role would mainly consist of promoting good behaviour within the groups and encouraging the pupils to complement each other’s learning and efforts. I can ask the children questions about the instruments and get them to really think about their task, I would also take part myself and try to play an instrument whilst giving positive support to any pupils who need it. My role during this lesson would be very hands on ensuring I circulate the classroom spending time with all the pupils so I can effectively evaluate their needs individually on their capability and willingness to learn. The information I can collect from this will be useful to the teacher to reduce health and safety risks, reduce possible behavioural problems and pinpoint any pupils who need a little extra attention or encouragement. All of these things the TA can do are important to the teacher, the pupils and the school because they free up more time for the teaching staff to focus on teaching.

2. What might your role be in organizing, using and maintaining the learning resources, materials and equipment for this percussion lesson?

The TA’s role is very focused around organization, but it would generally depend on the type of classroom you’re working in adjusting your organization and maintenance of the learning resources to suit the needs of the teacher and the lesson planned. This requires the TA to be dynamic and be able to contribute to any type of lesson, Some of the more general roles may include:- * Checking the availability of required resources for the planned lesson. * Ensuring that any equipment the students will be coming into contact with has had the appropriate safety checks and certificates. * Ensuring that all the equipment works properly. * Clearing desks and preparing the learning areas ready for the music lesson. * Maintaining and replenishing any consumables required for this lesson such as pens, pencils, paper, music sheets, writing books etc. * Disposing of and recycling old or used resources and waste from the lesson effectively.

3. Describe how you act in class in order to be an effective role model for the standards of behaviour expected in pupils?

The teaching staff’s behaviour towards the pupils and each other is paramount to demonstrating to the pupils how to behave appropriately. The pupils will need to learn how to behave appropriately and the best way to achieve this is by making rules that clearly show the rewards and consequences of positive and negative behaviour. The children need clear boundaries of what is acceptable and unacceptable behaviour, My behaviour in class and the whole school is consistent so the children have a clear sense of positive and negative behaviour, I praise and encourage pupils who are doing well in their given tasks but I also build self-esteem for the pupils who are finding their given task slightly harder than other children. I encourage all pupils to be courteous of each other. I treat all staff and pupils with respect at all times, I find this preserves the pupil’s dignity and helps me to build a respectful working relationship with them. I respond quickly and effectively to any kind of incidents around the school including bullying, accidents and violence by following school procedures and reporting the incidents to the appropriate staff. All of these things contribute to how positive reinforced behaviour is viewed by the pupils and improves their behaviour by knowing exactly what the school expects of them during school hours.

4. What strategies might you employ to encourage pupils to behave appropriately? Describe how you might react to incidents of bullying and violence.

The first step would be to promote good behaviour by example, positive strategies for managing pupil behaviour that will help the pupils understand what’s expected of them and consistent good teaching and support. Strategies we can use as teaching staff would be to balance correction with praise and encouragement, to use rewards and consequences consistently so the pupils get used to them and to any suitable alternatives to confrontation. The TA can help by: * Encouraging pupils to pay attention and stay on task. * Praising pupils good behaviour. * Implementing the schools policy by enforcing school guidelines. * Encouraging a good standard of pupil behaviour at all times. * Promoting the benefits of appropriate behaviour. * Making examples of inappropriate behaviour and reassuring pupils this kind of behaviour is neither acceptable nor will it be tolerated.
A TA’s response to bullying should be appropriate, according to the age and level of the pupils and your understanding of them. Responding calmly and consistently but also dealing with each incident individually and assess the need of each pupil separately so the needs of each pupil is never overlooked. To Show pupils that all accounts of bullying are always taken seriously, are dealt with accordingly and are never acceptable.

Question 5
Describe how you might appropriately observe the physical abilities and skills of a nine year old boy.

Pupil observation is one of the many useful things a TA can do to contribute to a child’s development, by assessing the above pupil I can identify the child’s physical strengths and weaknesses, I can monitor the pupils progression on the curriculum, I can ask any questions the teacher has previously informed me of to aid an accurate observation and I can check any basic/key skills that the teacher would like recording. Before the observation I would plan a short meeting with the teacher to determine exactly what information he would like me to collect from this study, I would plan a small physical activity around the goals the teacher would like to achieve from the observation, and I would chose a suitable method of observation as to not be obvious of my monitoring of the pupil. For this task I would use participative observation so that I could interact with the pupil giving praise and encouragement without him becoming inhibited or embarrassed, after the observation I would thank the pupil for his time, ask him to carry on with any tasks he has been given for the day and write up my evaluation of the observation before arranging a time with the teacher to discuss the activity.