Week 11 - Day 87 - 3rd Grade

Much like our 1st Grade, the 3rd Grade is also veeeeeeery cute, although they can be quite arrogant sometimes! But nothing beats approximately 15 little kids trying to feshpile themselves on a ~2metre tall Bruno!

We have Physical Education & Music with this third grade, and we've been having a GREAT time!

In Physical Education, we have played some teambuilding game where you have to use hoolahoops to get your whole team across the gym, which was a fun warm-up, but then it was our turn to teach them some games from our home countries!

We taught them Tikkertje, Dikke Bertha, Zakdoek Leggen, 1,2,3 Piano, and many many more!

We also played Dodgeball & Cricket with them in the park near the school, and they taught us a weird dodgeball variation called "demon" (or something!)



In Music class, Eva, our Spanish colleague, taught them (and us!) how to dance to the (popular?) Spanish song "Yo tengo un tallarin" - Which we then promptly introduced to the rest of the Erasmus students, and we have sung and danced it many times since!



Nicole also gave them an introduction to Linedancing, as well as everyone practicing a certain Hannah Montana song together! (Hawk in the sky!)



We also taught the pupils how to sing Frère Jacques in Danish, English, Spanish, Flemish & French! Of course we also sang some Danish classics with our class...





We also played some rhythm clapping games, and everyone played around with an instrument of their choice!

Every week, one pupil could bring a CD with their favourite music, and play one song from it. They'd have to explain why they chose it, what kind of music it was, what style it was best compared to etc. Then the pupils would get to do a "freestyle dance" to it - Pretty cool!

Week 12 - Day 82 - First Grade

Woei woei, how busy have we been!

Time is really flying now, as the end of our Erasmus trip is drawing near, and it fills our hearts with sorrow, we will miss everyone soooo much! It was a pleasure celebrating my 23rd birthday in Copenhagen, and now that I'm fully recovered from that little exploit, I'm ready to blog about my teaching practice!

This will be the first blog post in a series of three, each will talk about a different class we've come across in our teaching practice. The first post (this one) will be about the first grade, with whom we have Mathematics. (The pupils are aged 6-7)



Let me start off by saying that these kids are soooooo cute! Most of them don't speak a word of English yet, except some of them who have lived abroad, or whose parents are not Danish.

Eva was put in the group with a girl who spoke Spanish, Claire had a little translator who's father is English, and Nicole was grouped with a cute little guy who used to live in South Africa. Bruno & Myself were not as lucky. We had to rely solely on our knowledge of Danish and body language, but we pulled through!

As I mentioned before, we were basically in charge of our own little groups, and we had to guide them through the different workshops, which was fun, but mindboggling at the same time!

The teacher had prepared various different "Real" situations in which the pupils would learn about subtractions, and practice their sums some more.

Workshop 1: Rolling & buying

In this workshop, the pupils rolled two dice, and got some plastic money depending on the amount they rolled. They then picked a card (face-down) with items from the shop on them.

If they rolled a total of 6, they would get 6 Kroner, and if they then picked the "Banana card" (which represents a banana, costing 4 Kroner) - They would have to figure out a few things:
- Can I buy this item? (Yes/No)
- How much money will I get back? Or how much money am I short?

Hvor mange penge har du tilbage? (Or something similar! :P)

And they would repeat this over and over until they filled out their paper. Very fun!

Workshop 2: Recognising number systems

The pupils were given 4 grids listing all numbers from 1 to 100, and they saw some numbers were grayed out, in a specific, mathematical structure. It was our task to guide them to the correct conclusion.

When it was just even/uneven it wasn't really a problem, but I'm not exactly good at mathematics, so when I saw the grid which had 1 coloured, 2 not coloured, 2 coloured, 1 not coloured, 1 coloured, 2 not coloured, etc etc - I panicked a little, since I thought I should recognise some crazy mathematical scheme, like the "fibonacchi string" or something. But I didn't. It was just 1,2,2,1,1,2,....

This was actually quite hard for the pupils, but they pulled through, probably due to my expert guidance! *ahem* *cough* *cough*

As soon as they were finished with those two, they could make their own structure, and then have their neighbour guess what the structure was. It then became apparent to me that "No you're not meant to draw a bear!" is not in my Danish vocabulary.

Workshop 3: Plus/Minus race
Each group was given two Envelopes of numbers, and they were all placed face-down on the table. The pupils could then draw three numbers, and they'd have to do as many actions with these three numbers as they could.

For example, if they drew a 2, a 3 and a 4, they could make the following sums & subtractions:

2+3=5
2+4=6
2+3+4=9
3+4=7
3-2=1
4-2=2
4-3=1
4+3-2=5
etc etc

Most of them managed to find about 4 every time, which is impressive!

Workshop 4: Get from A to C

For this workshop, every pupil was given a calculator, they would then draw two numbers. The first number was their starting point, the second was the solution.

For example, if they drew 21 and 8, they'd have to think how to get from 21 to 8.

First they'd have to determine which was bigger, 21 or 8. Since 21 is bigger, they'd have to use a subtraction. They would then experiment with various numbers, writing every step down, using their calculators. Ultimately, they'd come to realise that 21 -13 = 8

That concludes the recap of our Mathematic lessons with our first grade!

We also had to introduce our countries to them, but that is easier said than done!

We decided not to confuse them with difficult political problems, but rather just tell them we spoke a few languages, we have 11 million people in our country, we're bigger than denmark, ... AND WE HAVE CHOCOLATE, K3, and a statue that wees on the street!

Goodtimes.

Week 10 - Day 68

Argh!

Today was our first meeting with our teaching practice school, the Langelinieskolen in Osterbro. It seems like a nice school, with very motivated teachers, who are very happy to have us as guests!



The bad news however, is that it takes me quite some time to get there. Osterport station is at the final end of my 7 zone journey. Since school starts at 8AM, I will often have to wake up at 5.30 to make it there in time. Painful!

The teachers who will be guiding us were very helpful though, they gave us a very nice booklet with pictures of all the classes, we got a guided tour of the school, and we got some more info about the school too.

The school looks very diverse. A few of the third graders we met spoke fluent English, for example. They seemed especially motivated when they realised some "strangers" would be sitting in/participating in their classroom experience.

We were also told the school has quite a big truancy problem, with pupils sometimes arriving 2 hours late, and going home during the lunch break. Measures are being taken to change that though.

Since we will be observing some very young pupils, I was very keen to learn more about two things the teacher mentioned:
- A way to motivate the pupils to get ready for class after entering the classroom, namely a race to see which group could put away their bag and hang their coats first, with each group having a head boy/girl with a green card to indicate they're done!
- An inductive way of teaching mathematics, which we will experience hands-on when we are helping the teacher with his math lessons on Friday!

I'm looking forward to it!

Week 9 - Day 66

Wooooooooooowie, holidays!

What did we do? We -selvfølgelig- relaxed, partied, and celebrated!



Other than that, we also crossed the border into Malmö! For 20 Swedish Kroner (Which is approximately 2 euros, THANK YOU STUDENT DISCOUNT!) we got access to quite a few museums in the city.



One of those was an old fortress, where you could visit an exposition about Nelson Mandela, as well as see the old King's quarters when he stayed there, various armaments and modern art. (Among other things)

Another one was a more technical museum, where you could walk through an old submarine, see various cars, do experiments, etc etc.


They also had a miniature zoo, which focused mainly on fish and nocturnal animals. We saw some creepy critters, including piranhas, but I quickly found my two new favourite fish: The "blind cave fish" (which has no eyes), and this fish with a massive bump on his head:


After spending some money (3 euros for a coke? I'll gladly drink the ice, thank you very much!) we headed home.

During the weekend, the Copenhagen Games took place, which is a LAN-party which offered a sizeable cash prize, and saw many top gamers from across Europe attending. This gave me the opportunity to meet up with some friends I hadn't seen in a long time, and meet some people for the first time ever.



Richard "DrGonzo" Lewis and Tom "DuRuS" Nevill arrived on Thursday, and after helping them find their hotel (poor lost Brits!) we hit the town of Vesterbro (a part of Copenhagen) - We came to the conclusion that, much like Norrebro, this place was quite the ghetto. "Gogo bars, prostitutes and drug addicts" pretty much sums it up.

On Saturday, we (as in, the Erasmus students, not some scabby gamers) decided to give Vega another go. After 10 minutes it became clear to me that it was just as boring as last time, and we headed to Kulør Bar yet again. A great way to finish off a week of holidays!

Week 8 - Day 58

Oh what a week!

All our projects have been handed in, all our presentations have been made, and classes are officially over. (We still have two or three, but they're not official)

So far, it's all looking pretty good. I received my certificate for Globalisation & Professional change, which was pretty neat. We had two more sessions of the class on Friday, but in a very relaxed atmosphere.

Egon, Lilian & Marcus made sure the whole day was amazing. We "officially" had class from 15.00 'til 23.00, but everything took place in a relaxed atmosphere. After the two sessions, we had dinner together, prepared by master chef Marcus! It was delicious, Selvfølgelig!



Then we had some entertainment, in which we all had to write down a wise saying, or life lesson, but we had no idea why. The cards on which these were written were then handed out to actors in a play, which caused some hilarious dialogue. (Parapapapapapappapapapapapapaparapapam!)

After that we had an award ceremony, and we were officially sent on our way! We all received our certificate of participating (and passing) in the Globalisation & Professional change course. We also got back our portfolios, with some feedback.



And now, our holidays start! Gives us time to do some work for back home, and of course relaxed. The end of our theoretical courses was (selvfølgelig) celebrated in style!

Week 7 - Day 51

Busy busy busy busy!

So many projects due, so many group efforts to combine, busy busy busy!

In the past week, we have finished our Wiki page about Karen Blixen, continued and finished our Multicultural Classroom project, and worked on our Comparative Education project.

Of course you need some relaxation time as well, and the glorious holiday of Saint Patrick's Day came to our rescue!



Overall, I'd say this was a busy, but very fun week. I will try to give a more thorough update tomorrow, but tonight, it's VEGA TIME!

Week 7 - Day 46

It's official! We're half-way there! I wish I could stay longer already. Yes, I'm still loving life in Denmark 2010.

Today we had another "Multicultural Classroom" session with Lilian, where we talked about the use of the "Scottish Method" (or Story Method) to teach in a way so that the pupils remember facts in a context.

We saw an example of a Scottish school, where elementary school pupils looked at life, geography, and a myriad of other subjects through a very efficient and fun cross-curricular method. They were asked to create an alien, and then interact with him/her/it. This way, the pupils look at subject matter from a different point of view, and more importantly, they create their own context in which to remember these facts.

For example, they looked at geology, planets, humanity, and many more subjects. The entire project looked really captivating for the pupils.

Then it was time for us to get stuck in, we received a letter saying that all Erasmus students were accepted into a contest, where they can design their own school, recruit their own teachers, and map out the entire educational portfolio.

I actually bought it completely, it wasn't until it was pointed out to me that the person who wrote the letter was Lilianne Rhodes (Lilian Rohde) and other peculiarities that I realised how silly I was being.

Anyway, we're really into this whole project, and we look forward to showing you more about "Gateway Grammar School" soon!