Description; I have limited this example to one class out of a full days dance teaching at an Associate School of Italia Conti the class is a Grade 2 ISTD exam tap class and is comprised of eight to ten year old boys and girls. The session takes place the Clapham site and involves me travelling from Droitwich on a Saturday morning to reach the school by 8.30. The session took place on Saturday the 5th march 2011 from 8.30-10 am.
Plan; The previous week I had asked all exam candidates to come as if it was the actual exam. This involved them having immaculate hair, clean tights and leotards. In one particular case the child is autistic and needed special attention to avoid surprises. Ahead of the session I had to burn disks for the children to make sure they had a copy of the syllabus music to practice with during the week to enable them to be as prepared as possible for the exam date. This is vital as they only come to class for an hour a week so a lot of their progress is developed at home. I also had the task of lesson planning to ensure that all exercises that need to be covered were and any mistakes that needed to be ironed out were dealt with.
Initial Reflection; I was apprehensive because there was a lot of work to do and the exam date is fixed for the 12th March. I was trying to schedule the available time to make sure that all the details were correct. One girl came in with an injury which prevented her from working at 100% effort. I had to see one parent to inform him that is daughter was not going to be able to take the exam since she was not at an acceptable level of preparation. I found that quite a difficult thing to do and felt like it should have been dealt with at a higher level at the school.
List; I was tired as a result from leaving home at 6am, some children were take out of my class for an acting rehearsal for a show that was taking place at the end of the day, some children were late which disrupted the class and meant that we had to back track which wasted valuable time. I was pleased that everyone turned up dressed as requested the pervious week, the floor of the particular studio used for the exam was slippery which resulted in the children been more cautious then normal.
Evaluation; Everyone attended, the lesson plan worked well although a few minor changes were made on the day to accommodate a few problems I had not anticipated, I learnt that I must isolate my own stress from the children as it can affect their performance if the see me expressing concern. I discovered that it was worth while treating the lesson as a dress rehearsal so that they had the feel of what the exam will be like next week.
What If; I could have had injuries in the class, lack of attendance, parents who had not bothered to take the dress rehearsal seriously, I could have had children not in the the correct shoes, I could have missed my train or been delayed, tubes may not have been running due to engineering works or strikes!!!
Another view; from the perspective of the parent of the autistic child I teach, this particular parent has a lot of concerns when taking her child anywhere, with her son being autistic the day can be very unpredictable and unexpected problems can arise and are almost inevitable. The simplest thing like how his breakfast goes in the the morning can determine how the rest of the day will go. I encourage this particular parent to regularly pop in to view the class and her sons progress. As this week I had asked them to arrive dressed for the exam the autistic boy had to wear a leotard which he wasn't used to and felt quite alien to him, this created a few problems to begin with. His mother had to line the inside of the leotard in satin as he has a complex with seams on clothing, this meant extra preparation and time had to be spent on the mothers part to ensure it all ran as smoothly as possible for her son. I updated his mother throughout the day as she kept asking how he was in his leotard and if he had caused me any problems, I put her at ease when I stated he was a little apprehensive at first but seems confident and happy now and she needed not to be concerned. This was a success in the parents eyes as so much potentially could have gone wrong due to the disruption of the class and the extra 30 minutes I had added on to his morning.
Themes; I valued all the children's commitment and attitude to the class. They all worked extremely hard and their focus was impeccable. They all took on board notes and corrections and applied these to their work. I was enthusiastic watching them progress and develop new skills in the class. I am also enthusiastic about their tap exam next weekend and showing the examiner what they are capable of, I just hope that they all do as well as they can and that all the hard work on mine and their part pays off. If I was to do anything differently in the class I would have tried to spend more time individually and written each child out notes to take away with them with key points to work on in the week running up to their exam. I would have also liked to have used the studio they will be taking the exam in more regularly leading up to the exam to ensure they are more comfortable with the space and floor. This particular day fits into my week as I know that every Saturday I need to go to London and that I need to book a specific train to enable me to be on time for my 8.30 start. I have taken this example of a regular even which became more special due to the implications of the exam. Each week is different but I will use this frame work as a general reference for the future to try and help my own learning and my performance as a teacher.
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