Teaching at KGSC:
These two weeks teaching kicked into high gear as the first week was full of assemblies, class rules, and preparation for Term 1 (it’s the beginning of the school year over here)—which lasts 12 total weeks. While there was little classroom experience I gained from observation, it was an important time to get a feel for the school, the students, and the staff—especially my coordinating teacher, who has six degrees and is the only one at KGSC with her doctorate. Not to mention finding my way around the school, which has beautiful landscaping and tree-cover from the scorching sun (which the students eat under for morning tea and lunch), but is an absolute maze to get around. The few lessons I was able to observe I was a bit taken aback as she was much more authoritative than what I was used to during my secondary level experiences. Middle-level students as I found out are an entire different breed which requires an entirely different teaching demeanor than what I was used to. While I would say I am relatively laid-back when I teach, I’ve found that discipline must be at the forefront at this level—a management skillset I learned to quickly acquire, adapt, and enforce in my classroom. One must walk that fine line gaining rapport in the classroom while also maintaining the respect needed to create a lively, yet controlled atmosphere conducive to engagement and learning.
The second week of teaching I was thrown into the fire 1st period Monday morning. Sometimes, it’s the best way to learn and just start rolling with things from that point—which is what I did. I ended up teaching over half the classes for that week, which is quite unusual for student teaching but it really helped me get into the flow of the school system and my teaching schedule. After just two weeks, I truly felt I gelled right in with the school, the students, the staff, and my coordinating teacher. There is a definite presence of that “no worries” attitude and philosophy which hits home for me personally. Overall, the staff has been extremely helpful and my coordinator has given me free reign (with broad curriculum guidelines to follow) to go about my business in any way I feel necessary.
I should probably quickly mention what I am teaching since I am not teaching purely English, what has been an exciting challenge in and of itself. While I am teaching a a few classes of English, I am also leading literacy in numeracy investigations for Math and lab experiments for Science. While it goes a bit against the grain of what UNI wants me doing, there’s a reason for everything and it is an opportunity that I have willingly accepted. After all, what is a liberal arts core education good for if I can’t broaden my horizons internationally and use it in the real-world. It’s strange to think about now, but my first major before switching to Psychology and English in college was actually actuarial science—the two fields I am prominently teaching here. For those interested in literacy in numeracy, here is a bit more of an explanation for what I’m doing—those not interested scroll down further!
“Literacy and numeracy are arguably the two most prominent areas across Australia's educational system and workforce which are holding the country back. During staff meetings at the beginning of the year, Kelvin Grove State College identified these two areas in which curriculum wide needed to be focused on (50% of Australian's couldn't meet the minimum literacy or numeracy score to fully function in society one major educational survey showed). Teaching literacy across the entire core curriculum (becoming more and more popular), not just in English classes, imagine that! Essentially, what I will be doing is using literacy in real-world numerical contexts to help deconstruct questions from a "maths investigation" workbook as well as from past NAPLAN tests (National Assessment Program: Literacy and Numeracy http://www.naplan.edu.au/). While it still has a mathematical focus, I will definitely be using my English skills I have gained at UNI to sort through the contextual and linguistic issues. I think this an excellent opportunity to help participate and contribute to an important drive within the school and the country as a whole. I came to Australia to experience something different within their educational system and I think this will be a great experience to add to my resume, especially if I end up in an international school system such as Kelvin Grove where I will be teaching other core subject areas besides English. It's a very unique and diverse opportunity and one I am enjoying already.”
Cyclone Yasi:
Since we have been here, Queensland, Australia, has now endured two of their worst natural disasters in their history. What are the chances, right? My first post detailed one of the worst floods in Queensland’s history which devastated areas to our north and Brisbane as well; following three weeks later came Cyclone Yasi, which made international news as Australia’s most powerful cyclone to ever hit the coast.
While this was being billed as a catastrophic hurricane like Katrina, their was only one person who lost their life as towns were evacuated due to the advanced warning as well as a strange twist of fate as the category 5 cyclone unexpectedly veered slightly south at the last minute, avoiding Cairns (an intensely populated city) and instead directly hitting and decimating the smaller coastal towns of Mission Beach and Tully, which are in the state of Queensland, but much further to Brisbane’s north leaving us virtually unaffected.
That is all for this post! More to come on some of the more exciting things I’ve learned in Australia (aside from the boring teaching stuff)!
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