Know what you teach!

I have recently taken on role as Cover Supervisor at my secondary school, this role involves covering a variety of subjects from maths to textiles etc when qualified teachers are unwell, this is a role many schools are creating as it saves money as they employ someone and pay them lower than bringing in supply... This is a challenging job as I find myself in situations where I  don't know the topic, therefore I am sometimes unable to provide the correct information to the students.  I usually have all necessary information for the class but this can sometimes leave me in deep water, this has lowered my confidence but also ensured me that you must know your teaching subject inside out to be able to provide high quality teaching.

Over the past month I have been placed in P.E as our head of department broke her leg and they asked if I would take on her timetable.  I felt privileged that my line manager had the confidence and faith in me to take on this role.  I have learnt how important it is to have a full lesson plan especially with a subject I am less known to.

I have always thought about lessons before teaching but until being thrown into a lesson unaware, I found out the not so nice outcome of an unprepared p.e lesson.

The particular lesson I am thinking of was a Tag Rugby lesson, I hadn't seen the plan and I found myself on the field with 30 year 9 students.

I started with the warm up I had used previously but this seemed to be over in minutes has I had under estimated how quick they would pick it up so my time management was terrible.

I went onto setting up teams but this turned into chaos and the class went down hill from there.

The students focus had completely gone and there was no sense of control or authority from myself as a teacher.

I learnt from this that my lack of planning and knowledge lead the students to misbehaving, losing focus and not gaining the learning outcome of the lesson.

As a teacher your main priority for each lesson and scheme of work is for the students to come out at the end having enjoyed it and achieved their grading level.  You will not achieve this without detailed planning and confidence in your topic.