Question 4 Hattie

In the rush of the school term, it is often difficult for teachers to find time to reflect, but John Hattie provides a useful checklist for teachers seeking to monitor and develop their own performance. According to Hattie, outstanding or expert teachers:
Relate lesson content to other school subjects, underlying principles and students' interests
Are passionate about teaching and learning
Respect students as learners and as people
Encourage risk
Set challenging goals
Seek feedback and analyze the effectiveness of their own teaching
Monitor and provide feedback on student progress
Are more likely to develop closeness to students
Have a deep understanding of how learning occurs (Masters).
He also says that expert teachers can
Respond to the needs of students
Take a flexible problem-solving approach
Anticipate, plan and improvise as required
Make decisions based on student questions and responses
Monitor student problems, understanding and progress (Hattie).
Personal reflection: I encourage and enjoy risk-taking, set challenging tasks, willingly admit to mistakes or ignorance. I readily improvise in response to student need: these are some of the most satisfying lessons. I am not a highly-structured teacher, but as some students find this difficult, I also provide some structured activities. However, I need to work much harder on monitoring individual student progress - I do this well in response to written work, but find it hard in the hurly burly of class-room activities. Many of my colleagues are much better at this. However, I do achieve closeness with a significant number of students, and I am so passionate about what I do that the students laugh at me.

Exam Reflection

I think I demonstrate Hattie's thinking in the same way I demonstrate Bruner's - by putting elements of myself into my Blog - particularly the work I am doing t\for Michael Elphick - but also, in the exam, in my conclusion to the question 3 and the use of personal anecdote, images and references to literature - all of which relate to my true and personal concept of myself and being myself in of\rder to engage authenticaly with my students.