Due to the online nature of my practicum, I had very limited opportunities to full teach a classroom. The Primary Head had expressed concerns regarding my role in teaching a class by myself, so my mentor gave me the opportunity to teach a lesson asynchronously, rather than syncrhonously on Zoom, every Monday and Wednesday. One of the lessons I taugh asynchronously is a SPAG lesson about nouns and adjectives. The lesson objective for this lesson is as follows.

LO: I am able to recognise nouns and adjectives

In the beginning of the school year, my mentor had already gone through with them what nouns and adjectives are. With this in mind, I tried to make a SPAG lesson that was more targeted towards application of nouns and adjectives, rather than a long lecture. On Monday, I researched the different resources available on Twinkl, a British online website that provides teaching resources on a monthly subscription. After browsing a variety of teaching materials, I was able to decide what kind of format I would like to adopt in my SPAG lesson. First, I found an external website to better explain what nouns and adjectives are as a readiness activity to make sure students are able to recall what nouns and adjectives are. Then, I moved on to an engagement activity that would allow them to apply what they learned about nouns and adjectives. The engagement activity for this lesson was to have students apply what they learned about nouns and adjectives to the first activity which circle the nouns they see on the slide, as well as modify sentences to include powerful adjectives. These activites are mandatory for the students to learn, and I even included an optional mastery activity for those students who would like more practice. On Thursday, I had my weekly meeting with my mentor and showed her my SPAG lesson so she can review it. After giving me feedback, I went back to make the changes to better the lesson as my mentor had pointed out, and then submitted it into the lesson plan folder a week before.

Before I created the SPAG lesson I was quite content, because my previous SPAG lessons have been quite successful. For those few kids who have actively turned in their work, they were able to understand the lesson and achieve the lesson objective. I wasn't as worried about the students not understanding this lesson, as they have prior knowledge regarding what a noun and an adjective is. They have constantly been practicing how to use adjectives, and have a clear sense of what nouns are. My only concern during the creating on the SPAG is lesson was whether or not the activities were repetitive. I realized that most of my activites were "fill in the blanks", "underline the. . ." and even "complete the. . . " statements. So, this time around I felt motivated to try a different engagement activity.What was good about this experience is that I was able to practice creating a lesson. It tested out my creativity and made me explore the topics more in depth, because in order to teach the lesson I would need to ensure that I fully understand the topic at hand. It's important that we try to branch out when it comes to lesson planning and be more creative in including different activities because when the activities are more engaging, students are more motivated to learn. What's even better is that it doesn't drive extrinsic motivation to learn, but instead intrinsic motivation (Kreuger, 2021). What was bad about this experience is that I understood that I had limitations when adopting different engagement activites.

Based on my experience, the students in Year 3 do not display a broad knowledge on how to navigate the internet. Whenever we have Zoom meetings, and the teachers try to implement an online learning tool, there would always be a delay in learning as the students try and figure out how to do so. This lack of digital nativity really impedes the many different possibilities students can embark to try out different engagement activities. What went well about this experience is that I was able to create the lesson plan a week (4-5 days) before the lesson would go live. Sometimes, it takes a while for me to create a lesson plan partly because of other commitments, as well the time it takes to move the lesson on different platforms. First, I create the lesson on Canva, then I shift it to Powerpoint, and then I also need time to record that audio. In hindsight, having multiple platforms to create the lesson plan definitely delayed, making the time I spent not as effective. When it comes to creating a lesson, it is important to be disciplined in preparing it early because having consistency in the classroom can contribute to having excellent management (Sudhakar, 2017).

What I learned from this situation is that there are so many resources online to help you create an excellent lesson plan. As I was looking up what nouns and adjectives are to further understand the topic, I stumbled on so many different website that provides in depth explanation about the topic; it also takes into consideration the age group of the students learning, and ensures the explanation is as simple as can be. I was also able to take a look at the different worksheets that come with the topic at hand and get more ideas about how to create a learning activity. I also learned how important it is to manage your time when planning/creating a lesson. In a day, a classroom teacher is responsible for at least five different lessons, excluding specialist subjects, It took me at least four days to create a lesson for only one subject, I can't imagine how long it would take if I create a lesson for all five subjects. Therefore, time management is crucial skill for teachers to have. It also helps to prioritize work, making the teacher be able to get things done, in less time (Voki, 2015). In my future teaching profession, time management is a skill I definitely need, but it is a skill that I realize I am still developing. Throughout this practicum, I realize that I have good time management, but then it begins to dip in the middle only to pick up at the end. So, I have to work on having a consistent time management skill. I think what can help with saving time is definitely gathering teaching resources for the students. As I discovered, there are so many resources online from other teachers from different schools. These resources have been verified and used by other teachers, so they are very reliable. Therefore, I do not need to spend unnecessary time on creating my own materials, unless I need to do so to cater towards my students' needs.