Preparing for professional experience:

Oh my goodness! I go on my first professional experience placement in a primary school in under 2 weeks, and I am feeling rather excited and extremely nervous at the same time!

I am probably more nervous than excited as I have lots of experience working as a kindergarten teacher however no experience in a primary school! Coming from an early childhood background and working with children only up to kindergarten, I am feeling very nervous about my abilities in a school classroom. I have to learn the routines, behaviour guidance strategies for the classroom, assessment requirements, documentation requirements and the list goes on and on! Oh and I am still playing catch up with my UNI work due to work and family commitments.

Ok, so to stop thinking about all these things I decided to make a list of everything I need to organise for professional experience. Please see list below:

• Organise meeting with prac mentor
• Meet with mentor
• Find out what subject I will be completing my lesson plans for, what is the prior learning students will have?
• Find out what ICT the class has available
• How many students are in the class?
• Discuss how I will observe, document and then teach in class.
• Discuss students in class e.g. any challenging behaviours, additional needs, gifted students etc
• What is the class routine?
• Develop 5 lesson plans from USQ study desk and send to my mentors for feedback to ensure they work in with her teaching plan for students
• Take a certified copy of my blue card for school to keep
• Organise my 3 children and have groceries and meals organised.

I really loved reading Sara’s and Jacinta’s blog where they have a checklist of things to do to prepare for professional experience too.