Wrapping up the programme

Wrapping up the programme

To wrap  up this programme at Haaga Helia University which started in April, 2012 and continued for 12 weeks I want to say that the programme in general was good. In addition, I can say that we benefited from it and we learned some important educational and vocational information regarding teaching and learning methods and tasks. We also found the arranged visits to some schools ,institutes and places were very beneficial. In fact, I can say that the goals of the programme had been successfully match.

The programme started with orientation that included the following:  welcoming the participants, some practical information, programme connections to TVTC strategy, the pedagogical principles and working methods and introduction to vocational pedagogy. We learnt some important facts and practical information about: social media, teaching and learning, students with special needs, collaborative methods, on the job learning practice, assessment of learning and making shadowing. In addition we learnt some principles of teaching practice and practically we had preformed lessons in teams. Also during the 12 weeks we made some important and useful visits and excursions such as city tour in the 2^nd week, excursion to Porvoo in the 4^th week, trip to Vierumaki and Jyvaskyla, trip to luukki National Park and visit to a company.

To conclude, I can say that during this programme I have learnt many important things and in my opinion, I think the programme instructors did well. I liked very much the way of teaching as a team, methods of collaborative learning they implemented in their classes, ice breaking and wrapping up the lesson that some instructors used. Finally, I would like to say thank you to instructors, to colleagues and to anyone who facilitated our affairs in this programme    

       

My teaching practice special reflection

 My teaching practice session with my colleagues, in the ocean team, was a first successful trial and I appreciated its valuable outcomes. In fact, teaching for the first time as in a team is not so easy for all of us, and we actually faced some difficulties at the beginning but we could overcome them with the help of David and Irmeli. They both contributed some important instructions and advice and they facilitated our job by arranging for some materials and offering some teaching aids such as flash card and coping papers that we actually needed.

First step of our teaching practice started with the counselling session by David. We discussed with him what our lesson would be about, what skills that we might cover, teaching activities that could help for performing the lesson in a good way. Then, the members of the them gathered and selected the lesson topic which was ''The Most dangerous animal in the world'' about 'mosquito'. The 4 members of the ocean team shared the roles of the teaching practice lesson and each one knew his role. We started our lesson with exploring the lesson goals and some important instructins  by our colleague Mr. Alturki, then Mr. Abdulrahman presented a video about the 10 most dangerous animals in the world having participants do some tasks. Then, I presented the reading part which was a passage about the most dangerous animal. Before reading the passage silently, I discussed with the participants the types of reading and some pre-reading techniques. Then, I tried to have them practice the pre-reading technique but there had been an organizing mistake happened during disrupting papers to participants. Unfortunately, I think one of our teaching goals had not been matched. In other words, it is supposed that participants completely practice those important reading techniques in the reading context but that partially happened. After that, Mr. Saeed performed the last teaching step which was the assessment and wrapping up the lesson. Honestly, I feel that the lesson in general was performed  well especially the parts with my colleagues and I also think that there had been many different skills covered such as listening, speaking, reading and writing and they are the most important skills, especially in teaching a language. To be more honestly, I think I should pay attention to my above mentioned mistake and try to avoid its occurring again in my classes. I think the best way for preventing its occurrence, in the future, is by implementing the easiest activity or task.  That means to give each group of students a sheet of paper containing all the paragraph of the passage and discussing them all with students.

During the teaching practice I learnt plenty of significant things such as being patient when dealing with colleagues who will share me teaching, to prepare my lesson well, I learnt many new teaching activities and techniques, adjusting time.

In addition, I think the other groups in the teaching practice were very good and they all did well. I observed a lot of different teaching methods which could contribute to my teaching career and experience. They used many different teaching aids in their teaching times, they motivated participants to have them participate, and they used cooperative teaching methods in their teaching. I think all the groups matched most of their teaching goals in their teaching sessions. I can say that observing peers gives a person a very good opportunity to learn some different teaching techniques and helps him to build his critical thoughts.

WEEK 11REFLECTION

We started week 11 with Irmeli and her important topic which was about students with special needs. In fact it was very important topic and each one needs to know more information about it. I have learned many basic things and I planned to read more about it. In my opinion, this is a very broad topic and it needs more time in the future.

In addition, we spent a very good time with David about his topic organizations and networks. I have learned some important facts. However, also, this topic needs more time and it needs more reading by participants because each one needs it in his job.

On Wednesday,   we spent very nice moments in the national park with Irmeli and her son who has prepared the place and the coffee. After we left our belongs in the tent we hiked the forest looking for  trees, flowers and different sightseeing. Irmeli explained many important facts about the forests in Finland and a historical custom of collecting flowers putting them under the pillow to dream and see your future wife/husband. In fact, I enjoyed that trip but the hiking took most of the time and the time for rest and for making our barbecue was short and I think there is no need for assignment in this moment. Honestly, I appreciate what she did according to her nice personality and her enthusiasm in this programme.

Furthermore, I want to thank the staff of our embassy (the Saudi Arabian embassy in Finland) for their generous invitation on Tuesday. They picked up from the university at 2:00 and took us to the embassy. We spent a very nice time and enjoyed moments we stayed there. We had a very delicious lunch there. Also, we discussed very important things with them. Then, left the place at 5 pm.      

WEEK 10 REFLECTION

WEEK 10 REFLECTION

Here is the reflection of week 10 which was about teaching practice and simulation Pedagogy. Participants had taught as group teams bearing their responsibility for students. This way of teaching was new for all the participants, so they faced many obstacles, such as teaching topic disagreement, lesson preparation for team work and time management during the performance of each participant in his group. However they successfully overcome most of them. That type of activity was very helpful and in my opinion, teaching practice should be regarded as the main outcome of our programme, so I think it would be more beneficial if the teaching practice sessions had taken place many times during the 3 months programme. I enjoyed and benefited observing and participating in teaching practice activity and I learned many important teaching and learning skills and methods. I appreciated all the successful comments and recommendations from my colleagues and observers.

WEEK 9 REFLECTION

During that week there had been various learning activities. Acually, we spent two days with Jari Rantamäki, a presentation about Performance evaluation in educational institutions. Then we spent a very fantastic time in Workshop on mobile learning at Omnia. In fact, I liked this visit very much and I think it was one of the most useful activities in our program, because Omnia was a very organized school and we learned from their presentation many important technological uses and programs of mobile devices that could be very smart and active teaching and learning tools. However, the time was not so enough I wish if the visit was longer than it had been, but I think it would be better if it is taken into concentration to be 3 days or more if it's possible in the future.

Also, during this week we had spent very important moments with Merja and Katri and their teaching sessions were about Developing Vocational Education and Teaching. During that time they divided participants into small groups having each group discuss one teaching methodology, letting one of each group make a presentation about the discussed methodology. In my estimation, I think that way they used was brilliant and very beneficial for students, because this activity covered the most important pionts of our program and it had been targeted as a type of review to the material and information we had learnt many weeks ago. In addition, We had spent a very useful time with David during his guidance and counseling session. That session was about our teaching practice next week, in the group of the ocean team.  That meeting was very useful because he gave us many important advices, answered our enquiries and discussed some important ideas about our team work. In general, it was a good week.