Observation Sheet Questioning

(Please complete this form for both primary and secondary professional
experiences and place in your ePortfolio)
Graduate Standards - AITSL
Professional Knowledge:
Professional Practice:
and learning

1. Know students and how they learn

2. Plan and implement effective teaching

Question Type
Do you feel your
questions were clearly
structured and readily
understood by the
students?

Did you use a variety

of question types?

What balances was

there between the
various questions
types?

Yes, the students understood what I was asking them.

I did use open-ended questions and explanatory
questions that challenged some of the students, in
this instance I dont think the questions were readily
understood per se but once the students put some
thought into the question they understood what I
required from them. Since I was only in the high
school setting for a limited time it is hard to make
statements on the nature of the questioning but I
found that some of the students were taken out of
their comfort zone with questions that required more
than a simple response. I enjoyed being able tap into
some students curiosity and get them to delve into
the topics I was questioning them about.
I did use a variety of question types; the structure of
my lesson catered towards self-discovery rather than
teacher led data transmission, so there were more
open-ended questions than there were closed
question types.
I wanted to have more open questions because I
wanted to check that the students had a deeper
knowledge rather than recall ability. The structure of
my lesson was geared towards the students taking
the lead and working out what to do themselves. To
that end I did not provide the students any written
instructions, so that generated several questions
about how they were to complete the task assigned
to them (creating a model of a lung). I let them have
some attempts to create their own model based their
existing knowledge and then showed them an

Consider both why

and when you made
use of the different
question types?

example of one I had made earlier. I found by doing

this I was able to create an environment where the
students asked lots of how and why questions out of
their own desire to learn more about what they were
doing.
I used the closed questions when I wanted to check
knowledge quickly and easily. Other questioning
types were used to develop further knowledge on
topics.

Distributing and Directing Questions

Did you recognise any
pattern in the
distribution of your
questions amongst
the students?
Consider reasons for
this pattern?

How have you

directed questions to
the group?

Have you used wait

time?

The students who were possibly more interested or

the students with outgoing personalities tended to
ask more questions of me and the other teachers.
Personally I tended to ask the students who were not
as boisterous and tended to fade into the background
so I would know that they were still acquiring the
knowledge from the lesson.

There were two main ways that I directed questions

to the group. One way was when the whole class was
required to respond; these were generally closed
questions which required short responses. The other
way was asking an explanation question to whole
group but only having one student answer the
question, depending if the answer was right or not
this method can continue for a little while.
When using the whole class questioning and one
student answering wait time is vital in eliciting
quality answers from the group.

Yes, this is not just good teaching technique it is

Did you make eye
common courtesy to show respect to the students.
contact with the group
as you directed your
questions?

Reactions to Students Responses

How do you deal with
correct responses? Do
you qualify any praise
given?
How do you deal with
incorrect responses?
How do you deal with
students who stumble
and grope for an
answer?

What use do you

make of the students
responses to develop
the teaching point?
Have you redirected
any questions in order
to add to an initial
response?

Are you the only

evaluator of the
students answers?

Overall Comments

Yes, praise is given but it is not over done and is

often used to elicit further responses by using how,
why, what, and where extensions from the initial
response.
Any attempts are encouraged. I found that students
rarely got questions completely wrong, more often
they would repeat an answer that had been
previously said or something along the lines of the
required response but not quite what myself or the
other teachers were after. With a little prompting the
student would often find the right answer or one of
the other students would help their classmate.
I did this is often, I wanted the students to direct their
own learning so if their line of questioning took the
lesson somewhere relevant but not off track I would
let the students take the lesson in that direction. I
found that when this happened it added significant
value to the lesson for the students and myself.

No, nor should I be. My opinion of what is a wrong or

right is not necessarily the correct one, multiple
points of view are necessary when evaluating
students answers.

There were less open and explanation questions than I previously thought
there would be. It is difficult to tell if this was because some of the higher
year levels were doing exam preparation so they were not doing
traditional lessons. Whilst at high school I observed a lot of worksheets
and power point presentations which limited the ability of the students to
ask questions somewhat. When the students were doing more hands on
activities the students interest was sparked and a lot more questions
were asked of the teacher and of the students themselves.
Observation Sheet Management
(Please complete this form for both primary and secondary professional
experiences and place in your e portfolio)
Graduate Standards AITSL
Professional Practice:
1. Create and maintain supportive and safe learning environments
2. Planning for Effective Management
It was, due to the way I structured the lesson
Was your lesson plan deliberately not giving the students the instructions
effective for
and letting the students choose their own small
managing the class?
groups to work with. My lesson was more exuberant
than the classes I had observed. I was able to
e.g. How did the
manage the class effectively and safely for the
students react to your duration of my lesson.
lesson overall and to
Whilst not completely unexpected there was a
your planned
significant variation between the students in their
activities?
abilities, some students took to the fluid nature of the
lesson and needed extra activities which I had
Did anything
planned for whereas some of them needed to be led
unexpected happen? step by step through the experiment and the
questions.
Did you provide a
I did not provide different activities as the lesson
variety of activities?
objective was to make a working model of a lung and
describe the functions of a diaphragm. I did use
Were you satisfied
different questioning depending on what stage the
with your timing,
small group was at.
particularly for the
I was satisfied with timing of my lesson, I dont focus
end of the lesson?
on having exact times for each component of the
lesson as I find I the way I run lessons is too fluid to
Did you feel you were have exact timings. The class was able to fulfil my
able to change things lesson objectives even though the lesson had to be
if needed?
cut short due to the school having an assembly to
attend.
Were you aware of
classroom procedures
and school

I was aware of the whole of school disciplinary policy

as I read this document prior to my placement at the
school. The mentor teacher had a few different
classroom procedures depending on what subject,

disciplinary policy?
How much did you
know about your
students?
How did your mentor
teacher maintain a
safe learning
environment?

year, or academic level she was teaching.

Because my placement took place in the third term
the students were well versed in what safety
procedures were required of them. There were also
safety rules and posters clearly visible around the
classroom. When required there was personal
protective equipment available.

What strategies did

your observe your
mentor teacher using
to maintain this?
Maintaining a Positive Attitude in the Classroom
How did you
demonstrate to the
students that you
valued them, and
enjoyed learning?
e.g. Tone of voice,
facial expression,
sense of humour,
introduction to
students and topic.

Which aspects of your

teaching style do you
feel helped you
maintain class
attention?
e.g. Variety of
activities, class or
group discussion, pace
of lesson, interest at
class level.

I demonstrated that I cared firstly by telling them I

was there to help them learn and that I valued them.
The second and less overt way was through general
knowledge about the things that interest them; it
goes a long way knowing a little about sport, video
games, music and, anything else that is going on in
the world.
I also used humour and a conversational style to
engage the students. I made a conscious effort never
to be condescending towards them and I made sure
that they knew I had high expectations about what I
wanted them to achieve.

By making the lesson I took very interactive and

relating it back to real life experiences. I also used
the authentic learning methodologies that we were
introduced in the first semester. I deliberately gave
the students no written instructions so of the
students were able to take this concept and run with
it and others struggled not being told step by step
exactly what they needed to do.

This is where my lesson struggled the most and

Did the students know where I feel there is a disadvantage in this lesson

what was expected of

them?

only being part of a five day practical experience.

Some of the students really enjoyed the lesson style
where they were able to work things out for
themselves and let their curiosity drive their
questions but some students did not enjoy this and
wanted a more structured step by step lesson focus. I
need to get better juggling the different learning
styles and preferences within a classroom
environment.

Were you able to

redirect energies of
attention seeking
students? Did the
students have enough
to do?

The students had more than enough to do. The

attention seeking students really enjoyed the lesson
and were engrossed throughout whilst some students
struggled with the student centred teaching and had
to be given more thorough instructions.

Dealing with Minor Misbehaviour

Were you aware of
what was happening
in all parts of the
classroom? Did you
know what each
student was doing?

I have found that apart from the beginning and end

of my lessons I like to be on the move around the
classroom answering questions and supervising
students. I felt like I knew what most of the students
were doing and my mentor teacher reflects that.

Did you take any

action when you
observed poor
behaviour? Why?
Why not?

I used techniques that I observed my mentor

teachers doing and from we learnt in our workshops
at university. I always took some form of action when
I observed poor behaviour. I think by enforcing the
rules it helps to keep the classroom focused and
engaged.

Did you use nonverbal cues? e.g.

I found that because I was always on the move I was

able to use the proximity technique effectively. I was

Contact, pause,
gesture, movement
toward student/s
concerned.

fortunate that the students were receptive and

generally came back into line, by building a rapport
with the this was easier to achieve.

Overall Comments
The atmosphere at the high school was more segregated than at the
primary school. The science teachers stuck with the science teachers,
maths with maths and so on. This meant that the teachers in my faculty
were tightknit but I didnt observe them interacting with other
departments. I had a chance to observe a staff meeting which was more
business-like than I had expected. The teachers who were there did not
seem enthused to have to be there and the topics discussed were quite
dry. There was less of a whole of school approach due to the separated
nature of the school and so each teacher I observed had different
disciplinary measures that they choose to implement; this led to a lack of
consistency in how classes were managed.
Schools as text looking at the whole school
Describe the school in
terms of its
demographics,
appearance and
resources (be general
here and do not name the
school).

The school has a reputation as a rough school

due to a low socio-economic demographic of
the students. The school has recently
undergone a renovation/revamp so the school
buildings are of an excellent standard and are
maintained well, the school has a visually
appealing appearance. I had a brief look around
at the other facilities that I wasnt working in
and they were also of a high standard.

What were the roles and

responsibilities of the
teaching staff you
observed?

The teaching staff conducted numerous roles

during my time at the school. The staff room
was utilised more than during my time at
primary school, because of this the staff had a
strong team ethic and were very supportive of
each other. It also gave the staff a chance to
take a break from the students.
The staff room was where lesson plans were
researched and prepared.
On Monday afternoon there was a staff meeting
where I was surprised at how business like the
meeting was with things like kpis being
discussed and short medium and long term
goals being developed and the success of
previous goals debated.
The teaching staff also conducted lunch, recess,
and bus duty.

After discussion with your

mentor teacher describe
how policies and
processes of government,
administration and
schools have an effect on
the work of the teacher?

extra unnecessary paper work that I dont

want to do. Certain policies created external
stressors that the mentor teachers didnt feel
benefited them, the students, or the school.
Some students were allocated an EA so there
was the requirement for the teacher to do
lesson planning for them so those students
continued to have the funding to support them.

What did you observe non-teaching

staff doing to support teaching and
learning in the school?

Because I conducted an experiment

the lab assistants were a great help,
preparing and sourcing the materials
that I needed. The administrative
staff helped sign me in and show me
around the school. I saw gardeners
and handymen repairing and
maintaining the buildings and
grounds.
I observed education assistants
helping in the class keeping the
student they were allocated to
focused and also maintaining whole
of class order.

Students
You will have observed the
diverse nature of your
classes. How was this
diversity supported?

The school was predominantly Caucasian with

few other ethnicities in my section. There was
a diverse range of abilities this was catered for
by having streamed classes where students
were placed with students of similar abilities.
Education assistants were placed when the
criteria had been met by students.

Function of Schools
Did you observe the
connection of your
schools with the broader
community? How did
this happen?

This was spoken about in the staff meeting and

was an area the teachers agreed they needed
to work on. With the exception of a R U ok
day assembly the school did not interact with
the community significantly during my time
there.

What do you think the

function of school is?

I think that the function of schools is too

prepare children to live a fulfilling life, the
school achieves this by developing the
knowledge and skills that will empower the
children to succeed.

Reflection think about

your experiences during
the week and describe
how your previous
experiences have
informed your view of
teachers and schools.
Has anything changed?

Upon reflection at my time in a secondary

school, I found that I did not like the setting as
much as I liked the primary school setting.
Although the teachers got more time during
the day to complete duties other than teaching
than in the primary school I found the non-stop
nature of primary school appealed to me more.
I didnt like the lack of variety of being a high
school teacher as I dont think there is one
particular subject I feel passionately enough
about to just teach that one subject.
I also liked being able to be with the same
students the whole year rather than several
sets of students. I think the that high school
teachers are amazing and that they deserve
abundant praise for performing their roles.