Lech Lech Kolejorz! Lech Lech Kolejorz! Lech Lech Kolejorz!

Week 11 – Personal Development – 18th May 2011

Last weekend I made plans, with four Italians, to go to Oslo. We booked flights a few months ago because they were very cheap (Less than £10 return) but when we started to look at hostels and prices for transport, museums etc. we decided that a trip to Oslo would really hurt our wallets and instead we enjoyed another weekend here in Poznań, making the most of the time we have left on Erasmus. One of the many reason I have loved Erasmus is the fact that it provides me with the opportunity to be more independent and the opportunity to budget for everything I want or need, unlike at home where I receive financial support from my parent, or as pay from my part-time job.

Roasting Sausages

As I stayed in Poznań, I had quite a relaxing weekend. I spent the weekend hanging with friends, playing football and volleyball and attending a big student concert organised by the university. There were definitely over 1,500 people just enjoying the nice weather, the good music and everyone else’s company. It lasted into the night with bonfires starting where anyone could come and cook their polish sausages. It was organised by the university and it was a great event, and a great opportunity to meet new people.

Vegan Cake

I was informed this week that in Poland a lot of the older people do not eat meat on a Friday due to religious reason, a fact that I was quite surprised with and I still don’t quite understand the reason behind it. Anyway, last week I was invited to a Vegan dinner by some people from my church. I have never intentionally eaten a Vegan meal before but this one was excellent. It was great evening, with great food and great company. Needless to say I will never be a Vegan. I love my meat too much, although I found it fascinating how much you can still make by using meat or egg alternatives and I really appreciated the opportunity to try something new.

Today I also had the opportunity to go on a school trip with my class. The father of one of the girls from my class plays for the Lech Poznań football team and so he managed to get the class into the stadium for a tour. As he was a player we were able to see absolutely everything. The changing rooms, media areas, Very Very Important Person (VVIP) area and we were even allowed on the pitch and to meet some players and the head coach. Like at home there is such a big ‘football culture’ here so the children absolutely loved the trip. And I loved it too!

My Class at Lech Poznan Stadium

This weekend Kathryn is coming to visit and we plan on visiting Krakow and finally seeing the sites of the city and also plan to visit Auschwitz (an infamous concentration camp in Poland).

Until next time,

Jeff

More about the Polish school system!

Week 11 – Professional Developments – 10th May 2011

After enjoying a great Easter holiday and long weekend I have been immediately plunged back into work. I am really enjoying and benefiting from my experience in my school here in Poznań. Due to this I have decided from this week to go into the school for three days a week. I have been developing a great relationship with the class and am really enjoying being challenged by teaching both within a private school and within the IB curriculum. I believe that my teaching experience in this class has not just provided me with confidence but has also increased my ability to both plan and carry out effective interactive activities. As I spend a lot of time planning, teaching or learning polish myself I have become very busy during the week but I may not get such a great opportunity again and I want to ensure I make the most of it.

A big similarity between Northern Irish primary schools and Polish primary schools is the lack of male teachers. During my teaching practice at home, I found that there were no male teachers in both schools I taught in. This is no different in ISOP. There is only one male teacher in the PYP (primary years programme) and he is a specialist PE teacher. I find this very interesting. I think it is important to have both male and female teachers in primary schools. My teacher mentioned to me today that she has noticed that some of the more ‘lively’ boys of the class are responding very positively to having me, a male influence, in the classroom.



Our Classroom



Today I had the opportunity to informally ‘interview’ the main class teacher about assessment and recording of pupils’ progress within the school. My teacher is currently writing reports for the pupils and she was able to show me some of her methods used throughout the year to record pupils’ progress. PYP defines assessment as ‘the means by which we analyse student learning and the effectiveness of our teaching and acts as a foundation on which to base our future panning and practice. It is central to our goal of guiding the child, from novice to expert, through the learning process.’ My teacher told me that assessment with IB schools had to be a continuous process using both formative and summative assessment. (IBO 2000) The class teacher also informed me that IB schools believe that students should not be given grades, only comments about good work, or areas of improvement. However within the Polish system teachers are required to provide pupils with grades. The school is currently trying to think of a suggestion that will keep the teachers right in both systems.

One of the guys on my volleyball team recently asked me if I could go into his girlfriends school, she is an English teacher in a Polish Secondary school, and give a short presentation on life and culture in Northern Ireland. Of course I agreed, it would be fun to make a short presentation and also will give me the opportunity to see a polish school. After speaking to her on the phone she informed me that the presentation should be about 2.5hours but not to worry because that includes time for the students to ask me questions. I am not too sure what I have gotten myself into, although I am looking forward to learning a bit more about NI culture myself.

This weekend I am heading to Oslo with four of my Italian friends, including my roommate Matteo. I am really looking forward to practicing some Italian and seeing a new city in a new country. I am not looking forward though to the effect that a weekend in one of the most expensive cities in Europe will have on my bank balance.

Anyway, thanks for reading,

Jeff

References:

Primary Years Program Assessment Handbook, January 2000. International Baccalaureate Organization

Union Jacks, Cups of Tea and Cucumber Sandwiches!

Week 10 – Professional Developments – 3rd May 2011

Over the past few weeks I have really enjoyed getting to know my class better. I have had the opportunity to teach a number of different Numeracy and Literacy lessons and I have been very impressed with how the children have both listened and worked. As the International School of Poznań (ISOP) is a private school the children are expected to work hard, not just in school but also in the evening. The children receive a lot more homework than children of the same age back in Northern Ireland. As the school is a private school most parent are very involved in their child’s education. Fortunately for the teachers this means that children are really encouraged to work hard at home, although unfortunately some parents have very strong opinions about how their child should be run and may be regularly questioning the teaching methods used in the classroom.

Another observation I have made of the private school system for teachers is that they do not have to teach all subjects. Class teachers only teach Unit of Inquiry (which is equivalent to World Around Us in the Northern Ireland Curriculum), Numeracy and Literacy. Specialist teachers come into the class to teach the other subjects like Art, Music, Spanish, German and Physical Education. This allows the class teachers some free time so that they can mark student work, or complete paperwork, which like in all schools there is a lot of.

I am working with a class with twenty-one students of ages seven and eight, each child with very different abilities and needs. The class has eleven polish students and the rest are from many different countries and all have very different English speaking abilities. This school is obviously very diverse and is proud of this fact. It copes with diversity through encouraging children to embrace differences and celebrating special occasions from all around the world. On Friday we had the opportunity to celebrate the wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton. In school we made Union Jack, drank tea with milk, ate cucumber sandwiches and watched the ceremony using the projector. The children really enjoyed this historical day and I was very happy to have the opportunity to see the ceremony myself as I assumed, with the lack of TV, that I wouldn’t get to see it.

Our Royal Invitation!

Within the school the children also have a wide range of extra-curricular activities. The school has just built a new multi-purpose sports court that they are making very good use of during after school clubs. They also have non sporting clubs, for example Spanish club, maths club, music club and English club. These are well organised as they are fun and interactive for the children. Last week in maths club we took the children to the computer room and played maths games over the network against the rest of the class. It was a lot of fun, a little competitive and I could really see the benefits of the activities that we were doing.

This weekend I also had the opportunity to visit Prague. We set off late Friday night and took the train through the night. It took us around eleven hours to get there and for most of it we didn’t have a seat, and had to sit on the floor. I can safely say that was not one of the best night sleep I have ever had. Also when we arrived there was some confusion with the hostel that we thought we had booked. They actually did not have room for us but we didn’t realise until we were there. So we took off to find another one. Unfortunately as this weekend is a national holiday is quite a lot of European countries, Prague was very busy, and we had to look in about seven different hostels until we found somewhere to stay.

Prague is a very beautiful city. Most of the buildings in Prague survived through the war, meaning that everywhere you go in Prague you will see an outstanding piece of old architecture. We had a great weekend exploring the city, visiting the markets, enjoying the tours and taking a lot of pictures. Although there is not much to do in Prague there is so much to see, and as long as you get good weather you could easily just spend days walking through the city.

We also noticed in Prague that the Czech language is quite similar to Polish. We found that we just used polish to ask for directions of order things in shops we were generally understood. I am very glad that I visited Prague, it is a very beautiful city but I am not sure that it is the sort of city that you would enjoy as much if you visited again a second time round.

After a nice long weekend I am refreshed and ready to start back to university and school and I am looking forward to a few more adventures planned in Oslo and Krakow at the end of the month.

Until next time,

Jeff

Celebrations!!

Week 9 – Cultural Observations – 24^th April 2011

This week has been an absolutely fantastic week for me. There has been a great focus within my week on celebrations. Not just because we have reached the Easter Holidays Easter but also because I turned twenty-one years old this week in Poland. I was able to spend my birthday with some of my great friends in Poznan. We had a BBQ in the afternoon in some beautiful summer weather and in the evening I went out for dinner with a few friends. I was even given some icecream with 21 candles on it and was sung happy birthday in multiple languages at the same time. I had an absolutely fantastic birthday.

In Poland people do not only celebrate birthdays. If you look at a polish calendar you will see that there is at least one name on every day. These indicate what is called imieniny or ‘name day’. Poles over the age of thirteen usually put more emphasis on their ‘name day’ rather than their birthday. Name day celebrations are very similar to birthday celebrations. Gifts are given and a name day party is very common. Unfortunately Jeff is not a polish name, and it doesn’t have a polish translation so I do not have a name day, but I was able to enjoy my birthday.

In Poland Easter is a very important festival. In such a catholic country this time of year is very important for most polish people, of all ages. The festivities are not just limited to Easter Sunday but occur throughout holy week. Holy week begins with Palm Sunday where people come to church with willow branches or bouquets of dried flowers to represent the iconic palm leaves that are a symbol of this important day. Traditions and celebrations continue all week with many church and mass services. On Easter Sunday baskets of food are taken to the church to be blessed. Easter Sunday is also a great day for families to get together and share a wide variety of tradition polish church. Traditions don’t just end on Easter Sunday but continue on to what is known as Wet Monday. This day got its name as tradition dictates that on this day it is acceptable for people to throw water over each other. I am looking forward to hearing a lot of funny stories and hope to see a lot of wet people tomorrow, let’s hope though that the weather holds up.

The past week has been very relaxing for me as I have had time off school and university and I have been able to enjoy birthday and Easter celebrations but I am looking forward to getting back into a routine and back into my school by the end of the week.

Happy Easter!!

Jeff

Bić albo nie bić

Week 8 – Personal Development – 17^th April 2011

Now that I am in school and teaching a few lessons each week I feel that I am going to be very busy, I don’t mind though, I really enjoy having something to do. This week the sun has come out and some great weather has arrived. I have been playing volleyball outside many times this week and hope to enter a few polish beach volleyball tournaments before I leave. Only a few weeks ago I spoke about how spring had finally arrived but I feel we have hit summer already. As I write this I am relaxing in the local park soaking up some rays and enjoying some mouth watering strawberries with some outdoor volleyball planned for this afternoon! This is the life!



This week has been quite a dramatic week for me. When I say this I am talking about the fact that I had a number of drama classes. In my multicultural class we had a special guest taking us for a lesson entitled drama as a means of multiculturalism. It was very interesting as I got to find out a lot about the Polish, Spanish and Turkish cultures by working with people from those countries. It was also very fun and interactive and was a great environment to address, through drama, some of the problems or benefits of multiculturalism that we have come across since being here.

Hamlet

This week I also joined a drama group for beginners in the Polish language. Our plan is that we will write a script for a modern day ‘Little Red Riding Hood’, translate it into polish and then perform it for our friends here in Poland. We only have 4 weeks so it will definitely be a challenge but it is something I am really looking forward to in the hope that it will really advance my ability to speak the polish language. I have been cast as one of two narrators, the other is a puppet. I call him Hamlet.

This week I also had the opportunity to go to the cinema. It was the first time that I have been since arriving in Poland. We had heard that in Poland international movies were shown in English with Polish subtitles so we thought we would be fine. We went to see the new film ‘The Way Back.’ It is about prisoners escaping from a prison in Syberia and walking to India. Unfortunately a little of the movie was in Polish or in Russian and obviously they did not have English subtitles for this bit. Fortunately it was not enough to ruin the movie for us. And I did learn some new polish words by following along with the subtitles.

This week I am going on a school trip to the dentist with my school which I am extremely excited about and I hope to find out a little more about the polish culture in terms of the Easter celebration.

Ciao,

Jeff

A Busy Week for Mr Jeff

Week 7 – Professional Development – 10^th April 2011

This week for me has been overall, quite hectic. Fortunately after being here over a month a have finally made it into a school. Here in Poland I have been placed in the International School of Poznań and like I said last week it is an IB school, and therefore does not follow the usual polish curriculum. Also all classes are taught in English. I am going into the school all day Mondays and Tuesdays, and then on Wednesday afternoons. As their school begins at eight in the morning I have had to get up at half past six, which I am really not used to. I have really enjoyed working in the school and have already been given responsibility of reading lessons and teaching English as a foreign language as I am a native speaker and plan to take more lessons this week.

Throughout my first week in the school I have made some interesting observations. In the class that I am working, which would be the equivalent of Primary 3 back at home, the children are extremely intelligent. The first lesson that I observed with the class was about which blood vessels and veins carry oxygenated blood, and which carry deoxygenated blood. Obviously this was being taught to their level, but I was really impressed with the complexity of the words that the children were aware of, especially as this was not the childrens’ first language. On top of this some of the children have been given complicated spellings including ‘embarrassment’ or ‘ashamed’ which the children seemed to have little difficulty with. Even the childrens’ ability to cut and stick seems to be more advanced than children of an equivalent age at home in Northern Ireland.

I am not sure if these observations are due to the fact that the school is private and therefore parents have very high expectations from the teachers or if this has something to do with the curriculum taught in IB school. I feel that it is a combination of both. I have been looking into the IB curriculum and I feel it has very interesting values.  There is such a strong emphasis on quality education (valuing their reputation for high standards), participation and international mindedness and you can see these values in action within both the primary school and within the curriculum. (Strategic plan of the IBO). Within the school and curriculum there is also a big focus on children striving to achieve ‘the learner profile’. This profile encourages children to become inquirers, knowledgeable, thinkers, communicators, principled, open-minded, caring, risk takers, balanced and reflective. These attributes are on show in every classroom within the school, and are referred to in many class activities which emphasises to me the importance of ‘the learner profile’ in this IBO school. (IB learner profile booklet)

 Also at the school teachers are called by their first name, so I am being referred to as Mr Jeff, a name that I quite like as I feel it is a lot more personal than Mr Scott, which in a primary school I feel is no bad thing!

Until next time,

Mr Jeff!

Strategic plan of the International Baccalaureate Organization (IBO) – 2004
http://www.ibo.org/mission/strategy/documents/sp2004.pdf

IB learner Profile Booklet
http://www.ibo.org/programmes/profile/documents/Learnerprofileguide.pdf

Spring has Arrived!!

Week 6 – Cultural Visits – 2^nd April 2011



Relaxing in the sun



Volleyball in the Park



This week, Poznań has really seen a massive change in the weather, for the better. I feel it is safe to say that spring has finally arrived in Poland and I am loving it. The temperate has risen, the sun is out and the whole city is starting to look that little bit greener. Of course we have jumped at the opportunity to really enjoy the weather. This week we have enjoyed BBQ lunches, visits to the park and a lot of messing around with a volleyball on the grass outside (and it is also becoming less common for me to get funny looks when I am outside in shorts.)

This week I had the opportunity to visit the International School of Poznań. I was given a tour and told a little about the school, the classes and the curriculum. I have been informed that the curriculum used in this school is the IBO (International Baccalaureate Organization) curriculum. This is a curriculum that has been designed in recent years to meet the needs of globally mobile students. I think that being able to observe and teach within this curriculum will be an invaluable experience as today’s society is becoming increasing multicultural every day. I will start in the school on Monday and I am really looking forward to gaining some experiences working with children from an entirely different culture and background.

The Last Supper - Made of salt!

Last weekend a few people from my Polish course set out to Krakow. It took us eight hours to get there but cost the equivalent of about five pounds. I feel this is very good value for public transport, and completely different than what you would expect at home in the UK. When we were in Krakow we had the opportunity to visit the nearby salt mine. It was a fascinating to see some of the sculptures that the miners were able to craft out of just salt. We also visited the Castle and a number of different churches. Some of the architecture in Krakow is incredible. This week I have also had the opportunity of a formal tour of Poznań. It was really good to discover some of the history of the sites that I have already seen around Poznań. We finished the tour by visiting the Church of the Holy Saviour in Poznań. Again it is a wonderful piece of architecture. During my Erasmus I have been really struck by the architecture here in Poland. No matter what city you visit you will see many beautiful buildings which I feel really contributes to the culture in each city but also here in Poland as a whole.

Until next time,

Jeff