‘You don’t know what you don’t know’ pretty much sums up my first five weeks of Term Two at St Luke’s Catholic College. Having spent my entire career teaching only Literacy and Mathematics to the twenty per cent of students who find learning a challenge, I suddenly found myself teaching Dance to Stage Two and Visual Arts to Early Stage One – Two areas of the curriculum that I am very unfamiliar with and quite frankly never saw myself ever in need to become accustomed to. Needless to say my experiences have been both challenging and enlightening.
I decided to complete the Dance Program during the two-week break, which allowed me to undertake a ‘crash course’ on all things dance, thus providing me with a better understanding of what the outcomes of this curriculum would look like. A former colleague of mine provided me with a lot of guidance and advice, which assisted me in deciphering the curriculum support document, after which I had created a program that I was proud of and ready to implement.
Learning ways to analyse and interpret dance sequences and understanding the story behind it was inspiring. I will never watch dance performances the same again! By utilising tools and resources such as YouTube and film, I am able to better demonstrate to the students the common sequences of folk and creative dance, thereby providing them with a strong visual aid to develop technique.
Visual Arts in Early Stage One is proving to be another big learning curb for me this term. I now know that art in Kindergarten is a lot more than drawing and colouring in pictures and making Mother’s Day cards and Christmas decorations. Children in Early Stage One are introduced to artists such as Salvador Dali and asked to discuss what aspects of their art resonates with them, and what techniques they dislike. I am also learning how to navigate around water paints and the mess that follows, the mixing of colours, the water spills and the scrubbing of paint from little hands. I think the most important learning so far is the preparation needed prior to the lesson.
These two teaching experiences have given me the opportunity to interact with students in a very different setting, thus allowing me to get to know different aspects of their personalities, which Mathematics and Literacy might not necessarily uncover. Although I find it more rewarding to teach Literacy and Mathematics to students who require extra support, it is refreshing to see the students I teach enjoy and excel in other areas. I am grateful for the experiences and look forward to using what I have learnt about our students in a beneficial way, in particular tailoring their learning to their interests.