TDA 3 1

TDA 3.3 Support learning activities

1.1 Explain how a learning support practitioner may contribute to the planning, delivery and review of learning activities.
A Teaching Assistance may contribute to the planning, delivery and review of learning activities by supporting the teachers to teach, explain, encourage working as a team, a good role model, promoting positivity and giving one to one support to children.
Learning is gaining knowledge. Understanding an on-going process and building on existing knowledge through studies.
It is easy to assume a child arrives to school and is ready and able to learn. There are so many factors which might arise that might influence the child to be distracted before school has not even started. This will cause lack of concentration and the child will fall behind on their work.
Abraham Maslow, a psychologist, theory of ‘Hierarchy of Needs’ states that there are certain needs that need to be met in order to motivate ourselves. We must satisfy each need for all the others needs to be met. If psychological needs are not met the human body cannot function properly and will not survive. Once these needs are met people can move on to the next level of safety and security. Satisfying these needs is important in order to avoid unpleasant feelings or consequences. When children felt loved and secure and had friends they could progress and gain confidence in themselves and reach goals. This will make them feel inspired to do more.
Schools follow Maslow’s and aim to provide children with the needs stated in his ‘Hierarchy of Need’. The school where I am working Manor Longbridge Primary School establishes very strict rules. There is supervision of what is in the lunch boxes and children are expected to have a fruit provided by the school at 10:30am every morning. They also provide milk for the younger years, there are sinks in the classroom for drinking water and there are water fountains in the playground. Parents are always reminded of children having strict bedtimes and daily routines. Toilets are kept clean and children are encouraged to wash their hands after they have used the toilets. The safety needs are met by having an Anti-Bullying, Child Protection and safeguarding policy in place and staffs abide by them. There are staff out at break and lunch time. All major incidents are recorded for safety reason and sanctions for behaviour are applied where appropriate.

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Most staff is First Aid trained to deal with any medical reasons. The love and affection is provided by the school Ethos of working hard and caring for each other. It is encouraging children to achieve well and to look after everyone else and caring for them. The children are treated equally as there are special weeks for religious occasions e.g. Eid, Christmas and Diwali. There are a variety of clubs held after school e.g. homework club, gymnastics and reading club. Homework club is there to support the ones that need support with their homework. Self-esteem is encouraged by holding achievement assemblies every week where the children achieve star of the week and house/table points. Pupils work is displayed on the walls of the class and halls. Children’s photos are displayed if they achieve star of the week award. The children take assessment tests; they are given responsibility to mark their own and each other’s work. The school council is making decisions for the benefit of the school and the children.
A teaching assistant may contribute to planning of learning activities by having a discussion with the teacher about the learning activities that will be taking place in the lesson. A teaching assistant should have a clear understanding of the learning objectives of each activity and know what they should be doing to help the child to achieve this. There should be joint planning considered to make the children achieve their outcomes. Teaching strategies will be grouped, what teaching approach will be used, what resources are needed for the lesson and the type of evidence the teacher will gather to check learning objectives have been met.
There is a planning, teaching and evaluation cycle which teachers use to help with planning. Long term plan is completed by the teacher covering the curriculum throughout the year. Medium term plan is termly or half-termly and shows the order of the learning objectives to be taken and details of any requirements of resources can be arranged. This can also look at the methods of pupil assessment that will be used. Short term plans are for the week. Teaching assistants may assist in the medium term planning as they will be able to see what topics or themes are going to take place. This will also enable them to discover if they have any knowledge in this particular subject or of any difficulties you might anticipate or give any suggestions to the planning. This planning should include the areas of responsibility given to the teacher assistants in each lesson. It might be one to one or in small groups. There might be activities that are outside the classrooms.
Objectives will be set before each learning activity as you need to know what the children are going to achieve and what is expected by the end of the lesson. A teaching assistant will need to know the learners. All children learn in different ways. There are children that have special needs which need to be met maybe by one to one support. Others have individual education plans. There are also children who are shy and use English as an additional language. All this information needs to be aware of by the teaching assistant to help them learn.
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if resources are needed then this should be prepared beforehand so you do not waste time at the beginning of the lesson. General and specific items i.e. pens, pencils, rubbers. Board pens, rulers are usually kept in the classroom. There might be musical instruments needed for the music, maths apparatus or any other subject resources such as computers for ICT. You will need to make sure everything is in safe and working order. Outdoor equipment is usually kept in the hall in the apparatus cupboard for PE, football and any other sports activities. You need to make sure worksheets are photocopied beforehand. Time will have to be organised for making time slots for different purposes. The teacher will want the children to benefit from sitting with their friends as well as expecting them to do well in the class. They may decide to have a seating plan. Having class of mixed ability, you need to make sure that all the needs are met. Decisions about all this should be made before the lesson begins that way children will see it as normal and not something the teacher has just constructed. Differentiation is the way teachers will mostly use to aid them with their teaching. Differentiation is about teaching and learning styles and teachers should be using it in order to have a variety of teaching approaches to accommodate the different learning styles in the classroom. Teachers who only organise in the ‘ability group’ way are limiting the learning of many children in their classes particularly those with special education needs. When planning group work the more able children should be sat with the less able as they can help them if they are struggling and can boost their confidence. Different children can make use of different skills group work also help the teachers to move around the classroom and identify who is most in need of support.
The best way to meet the children’s different learning is to deliver the curriculum in different ways. You need to know what you want the children to learn or be able to accomplish. Be aware of who knows the information or can perform the task and what you can do to help students progress and continue learning. You can assess children’s abilities with the class discussions and written quizzes. To help children effectively involves determining what they already know and how do they apply it teachers can ask a mixture of complex questions aimed at children who can handle them and simple questions to the ones who can handle them. You can differentiate literacy and numeracy tasks. You can make difficult tasks for the more able children and always make sure that they can follow this task. In our class there are three different types of strategies the teacher will give out to the class. The more able children get the more challenging tasks. The middle tasks are done by the most of the class and the less able get simple tasks. The layout of the questions will be in ability order. If a child who does not know how to read will not be able to answer any questions, sp the less able will have to have simple language to meet their needs. Certain resources will be needed for those that need additional support such as maths apparatus or computers if they cannot mentally do it. Homework is always set so it is met by everyone’s needs.

Often the input out of an attentive adult will prevent children’s mind wandering odd their work. This attention supports the pupils in helping them become better learners. Teaching assistants seek to enable children to become more independent. They need to know when to stand back and let the child get on with it. TAs contributes to children’s learning when they are working with groups of children. This can be helpful to children with special needs or EAL children, this will make them feel included when implementing behaviour management policies by the teacher a TA can provide valuable backup in dealing with disruptive behaviour from pupils. They can help children who find it hard to form friendships and good relationships with others by giving them support individually. At the same time they will be able to identify if there are any problems or concerns on the children. TAs helps in raising self- esteem of children by showing interest in their work. You need to be good role model as children will learn the way you talk to them, the way you behave around them. Always use positive language and positive language and behaviour. TAs will observe pupils performance and provide the teacher with what works for pupils.
TAs encourages good behaviour and praise whenever appropriate. They will repeat instructions whenever necessary especially with special need and EAL children who need time and extra support. Individual attention should always be given. Classrooms should always be kept clean and safe. Children will not be able to learn of it is too hot or too cold so windows should always be controlled.
At the end of the lessons the teacher and the TA can discuss and evaluate if the learning objectives were achieved. From the results they can assess if the activity went well and is there any need to change or adapt the activities way to meet the needs of those who did not achieve their objectives. By assessing you are award of pupil’s targets and what targets they can get if activities are repeated.

Evaluate own strengths and weaknesses in relation to supporting learning activities and how these may impact on the support that can be provided.

I am currently working in year 1. I offer my support to whoever is in need of help. I also do guided reading. There will be certain topics which i will be involved in where i will support a small group of children. Most of the children are quiet bright and can just get on with their learning. The children who need extra support i will work with them. Getting them to concentrate and focus is a challenge as they do not understand and give up too quickly. This can cause a disruptive atmosphere for the rest of the class. Disciplining the children is also a challenge as there are quite a few disruptive children in the class. I need to realise when to apply behaviour sanctions and how to deal with the sulking children after they have been disciplined.

My strengths are that i am good at communicating with anyone. I can relate well to any age range and I’m easy to approach. The teacher finds it easy to set me tasks and the children relate to me as well. I can multi task which is very essential to the class as time is a very big issue. My second language is Bengali it comes very useful as there is a lot of Bengali children in my school, who can’t communicate well in English. I can work well as part as a team as i am a easy natured person.

My weakness is that i lack confidence in speaking out my opinions i am afraid to give any feedback to the teacher in case they feel that i have criticised their teaching. I can deal with this as i become more involved in my role. I need to involve myself in the planning of lessons so i know what the learning outcomes are and do i need to gain knowledge beforehand about any activities that i will have to support. I need to question about the children’s books when i am doing guided reading and i have been observing a teacher who specialises in this area. Our main aim is to do guided reading with each child at least four times a week. We are covering a project called ‘introducing a book’ which will enable me to train in how to introduce books to children that cannot read and question them about the book and predict what will happen at the end. This is helping me to build up confidence in guided reading.

3.2 explain how social organisation and relationships may affect the learning process

Social organisations and relationship may affect the learning process by many ways. If a child has fallen out with a friend or been hurt by someone in class this may cause them to become withdrawn and distracted from activities they wanted to participate in. Children are put into groups in order to give them the best learning potential. Some children are easily distracted so would work better in small group with extra adult attention to keep them focused on the tasks. Children who are more able can help them and encourage them. This will help them gain self-confidence. Children are grouped in several ways i.e. ability groups, SEN and EAL groups. This can also be seen as a risk as some children will just sit back and let the peers do the work for them. The children are also encouraged to join after school clubs which can help them to form friendships across the year groups.

Some teachers have an easy way to approach manner which will enable the children to confidently answer questions in the class or view their opinions. Teachers who are too strict will not be able to have this kind of relationship with the children as children will be scared of them and not open up. If the adults interact appropriately with each other, children will become aware of this pick up this behaviour and apply it with their peers. So adults need to act in a positive way.

TAs needs to respond to children’s questions in a way that is understandable to them. Getting to know that child will help to support them to the best of your ability and you need to treat every child equally.

5.1 explain the importance of evaluating learning activities
The importance of evaluating learning activities is that children must understand what they are learning and why? Learning objectives are introduced at the beginning of the lesson and can be looked at again at the end of a lesson to see how successful they have met.
Evaluating will let teachers see how well children are doing. This will enable them to see what is working and what needs removing or changing. You can assess how well the activities are being delivered and how they could be improved.
Evaluating is a great way to for gathering facts weather something is successful or may need changing, so if you spend some time going through the learning activities and seeing how children have responded to a certain task or questions can help. When planning lessons evaluation helps you to think about the learning that has been taken place, learning objectives need to be clear so children understand what the outcome means. Objectives must also be achievable.
Some children cope with the learning more than others. If children are finding work hard then they will need some extra help and attention. Some children could be doing really well and might need harder work to boost their confidence. All of these will be assessed if teachers evaluate tasks. Some children can just undergo or rush through any activity without any help so they might just sit around doing nothing which might mean that this activity was too easy for them or was not suitable for them. You might have to make this activity more interesting, difficult or time consuming so the students really have to work to complete it. Some activities take longer than expected maybe children are struggling then there will have to be changes made.
It is important to ask questions and observe any areas in which has been successful or need to be changed. All of these will provide some kind of evidence of which evaluation is assessed. If you collect the same information each time you evaluate any activity you might be able to compare it with anything else in the future or past. The more you know about what and how children are learning the more you can plan learning activities or your teaching. Evaluation is very essential for child’s confidence. Most test and assessment are made to meet children’s targets. If some children do not meet their targets every time then this will put them off trying harder so the evaluation has to be fair and proper and you must always be able to praise for good effort or offer encouragement or support if results are negative.
Evaluating will also make a teacher aware of any possible learning difficulties a child might be experiencing i.e. Dyslexia; SEN. Teachers can see how children learn best. Some children are better with notes, some with projects. Observations and reports on progress must always be accurate, objective and constructive. There are different types of formats use to evaluate. You can do this verbally/non-verbally. It could be a very detailed report or just a few points. There are various assessment sheets that might need to be filled in for observations of a child. You can ask the teacher how you need to evaluate. All information needs to be correct as OFSTED may read evaluation. OFSTED will want to know the results of teaching, the outcome of learning, how successful the activities are? What children’s behaviour is within the school environment? They will also see if there are any areas of improvement. Evaluations will give them the evidence to all the concerns.

6.1 evaluate how own knowledge, understanding and skills in literacy, numeracy and ICT impact on practice.
I am currently working in year 1 and i have basic knowledge of literacy, numeracy and ICT skills. I am able to assist to most of the questions. I need to be aware of maths solving methods. There is so much help nowadays solving maths. In my placement i had to take two less able children to demonstrate to them how to do base 10. Trying to teach them how many cubic square need to be in the units and the tens column was very challenging. They found that they understood that units are single numbers but when putting ten cubic’s instead of one cubic to show that we are counting in tens was very confusing for them. One of the children is dyslexic and it took me nearly one hour to finally get some positive results. Methods are different to the way i would have done it. If i do it a different way to the teacher, this will confuse the child. The ways of how children are taught nowadays are different and things are still changing.
When i am doing reading with the children i need to be aware of the books and what they are about as i will be asking them questions about the story they are reading, to see their understanding. I will make comments on their reading record books and point out on what needs improving e.g. read clearly, try to use expressions and go over and correct their own mistakes.

6.2 develop a plan for improving own knowledge, understanding and skills in literacy, numeracy and ICT.
I’m currently doing guided reading twice a week with the children. It has taught me a step to step guide of how to introduce books to children and how to questions them. This is mainly targeted to children in early years but there are older children with special needs who will benefit from this. It is focused on making children become independent readers.

I am undergoing courses online for refreshing numeracy, literacy and ICT. There are activities that BBC Key Stage 2 bite size is offering online where it refreshes your mental maths, literacy and ICT. I found this very useful as i had forgotten how to do fractions, decimals, spelling, grammar and the basic uses of Microsoft. This will help me assist the children if i have knowledge in these subjects. I am also going to do the science activity on this website. I am currently undergoing the supporting teaching and learning in schools level 3 and i have done level 1 and 2 business and customer service skill.