Eighth Observation - La Trobe Univerity - International College

The school that we visited on that day was the LTU International College. The class that I went to was 3B - an average English class with 15 students. In addition, the students first language are not English and they are together in the class to learn English so that they could go to the main campus - La Trobe University within a short period of time. To me, the students' level of language are average with some usage of code mixing among fellow countrymen. There are also a vast variety of culture experiences. Despite all of those things, the teacher was very patient when teaching a lesson.

The lesson began with grammar revision in the first hour. The students were learning active and passive voice. The teacher went over the answers with the students as they should have finished their activity at home at the previous day. It went well with not a lot of questions. The teacher also went through a series of drills on the grammar to make sure that students are familiarize with the grammar as well. The teacher used repetition exercises as this would not make students bored with learning grammar. The teacher also let students play a game on active and passive. It is also a good way for students to understand the two clauses in a fun way.

In the second hour, the teacher asked students to form themselves into groups of four and they were to discuss about the newspaper cutting. It started brightly for the students but somehow, what a lot of time remaining, the students that I had in my group ended up out of ideas. I therefore guided them to think of things outside the newspaper cutting. The teacher asked the students to take note of what they haven learnt and attempt any new words that could be useful to them so that the students could use the phrases given in the future. It maybe useful in a way. At the present moment, however, it did not work as students in the class also need to learn how to use stress and intonation in order to make the phrase of the sentence speak more smoothly and fluently.

To conclude, I think this school is completely different to other schools as the target audience are mostly adults studying at the International College.The students want to learn more English and then get into university and I could say that the teacher is fulfilling their needs as I think the intonation, stress and speaking ability are lacking. Finally, it was a great pleasure to observe this class as the students and we as teachers-to-be are more or less the same age.

Seventh Observation - Defence International Training Centre: Laverton Base

This observation is focused on adults and these people are there for their teaching training. A note in advance, this place is a military base and it does not allow any photography unless permitted to do so. The 'students' are those military soldiers that were sent from their respective countries (South East Asia and Pacific) to Australia along with the funding from the government. They were here for the next six months and they will be thought about the metalanguage and the methodology on teaching military students back home.

In the base, the militarily-to-be-teachers were seated in a circle. There were no straight rows or lines from what we saw from movies. They were more expressive rather than being vivid. The class started off brightly as we were to introduce ourselves to the soldiers. Very surprisingly, they were not very strict and they told us a lot about their stuffs. We also have the opportunity to know the soldiers background and why they would like to be teachers to teach military students back home. The teaching of that lesson was in an intermediary level (vocabulary) for teachers. I have taught vocabulary to students before but this was the first time that I have received that sort of training. The lesson then followed the methodology of teaching. I would have no comments towards the teacher on her way of teaching. To the in-service teachers (soldiers), the two from my group did not enjoy /like what she was doing as they told me that the method that she was teaching would never happen in their classrooms back home. In a normal classroom, the students would not follow the teachers method and the two of them suggested that they would do it their own way in the class.

To conclude, I think it is interesting to see a military base where military personnel, mostly from South East Asia come to a place and had their training to become teachers. The teachers methods to students could not be commented however I think there are some students (military personnel teachers) do have an opinion but are unable to say it out. This is because they think that the teacher is too one-sided, too teacher-oriented. As what I have heard, the teacher does all the talking and the students do not have the chance to speak due to the different cultures at their respective countries. I think it is best to have a resolution or clean-the-air talks with their teacher so that the teacher could understand the students' situation back home.

Sixth Observation - Glen Eira College

The sixth school that we visited was Glen Eira English Language Centre. Like Blackburn, this school does provide new immigrants the change to brush their English Language for 20 weeks and then sent to mainstream secondary schools. In contrast, the school provides students to have the experience of what a typical Australian school is before going to a mainstream school. Facilities such as a large playground was included and a chance to study at the school after the 20 weeks of ‘training’. In addition, the school does provide students that are overage to go to a TAFE course upon the 20 weeks completion. The school also provides international secondary school students from other languages to take the English course at the school.

In class, the students were set into small class sizes and studies of different subjects were taught in order to widen their knowledge of Australian contexts. The teachers told us that they have to prepare their own materials and implemented free teaching as long as they are up the Victorian Education Learning Standard (VELS). Teachers in the college would give students more time to think about on what they are doing rather than giving those tasks that could be a serious challenge. Code switching could be used depending on situations. The teacher told us that they do encounter some culture issues and gender issues. There are also at times that the boys and girls could simply not work together and things were not going to their plan but they had to face the fact, hoping that the situation could change when time carries on.

There is one thing that is interesting that is that students at the school do not need to have any exams to get into the desirable school. All they need to do is to work hard and hopefully, be accepted into their desirable school. There is also a rule that schools are not allowed to decline any student under 18, in which their area of location of residency is closest to the specific school.

To conclude, I have seen two classes during the time there. The first one was useful as there are some challenges faced by the teacher and how she prepared the materials for her students taking Social studies. The second class was more or less similar to the ones at Blackburn and I think it would have been better if they had shown some speciality/strongest courses for us to observe.

Fifth Observation - Blackburn English Language Centre

The fifth school is, by all means, acts as an intermediary to handle students before they go to their primary or secondary schools. It can be said that the school handles screening and helps students to brush/develop their English Language so that they could get to the mainstream schools and Australian education system. The students in the school undergo a 20-week program to understand the English system and then sent to schools by random distribution. The students do not have a specific class according to age but they are classified by their language skills.

I have observed two classes. The first one was a Computer lesson with English contexts. The teacher told the students to look at the website 'Behind the News' from the ABC website. It did take the students some time to finish the job and answer the questions. The lesson took almost one lesson (40 minutes) to finish the whole process (worksheet, watching, and reading). The teacher did give some useful information on casual English language and told the students to look out for casual English used in 'Behind the News'.

The second one was rather a straightforward class - Maths in the Secondary section. By coincidence, they were having a Maths test therefore; I do not have the opportunity to observe much from it.

I have to be frank to say that I did not enjoy this comparing to the previous observations, as there is nothing special from it. Other than using ‘Behind the News’ from the ABC, there is basically nothing else that I could take something away from it. All I can say that the teaching was pretty average despite them being very approachable as well as showing their enthusiasm in teaching new immigrants on English Language in all subjects. They do have a mission to cater students needs in order that they would reach the mainstream schools after the second term.

Fourth Observation - Macleod College 7/6/10

The school that we sent to is a fifteen-minute drive near to Macleod station. Macleod College is a school, which does provide education from early years up to the end of secondary. The college is not the best nor is the worst in reputation but the college widely respected in the vast range of co-curricular activities and learning English as a secondary language from Primary to Secondary.

I will discuss mostly on the secondary section. The surprising thing from the school is that the classroom is an open class and the school had implemented the ‘breaking down the walls’ system. They also have teachers who have to teach from Primary to Secondary. It is a very unusual issue as most teachers usually take students by either level-wise or from the subject they are specializing in. It seems to me that the teacher also used the widening of space so that students will feel comfortable when they are in class. I also felt that the spacing of the learning space is a good thing as well as something new because it is impossible to see something like this back home and indeed, the teachers could merge the class; say for example, three classes in the same level could merge into one if the teacher co-operate on one particular material. This does shows the flexibility of the classes both from the teachers and from the students.

The surprising thing is that I do like the visibility of the classroom because the school provide every class and every staff room as visible as possible so that students and staffs could develop at a higher level. Teachers desks are also widen so that students could stand around the teachers’ desk. There are some drawbacks. With the breaking of the walls, classroom will become much noisier and there will be many children that will be looking around in every direction. That could mean that students' concentration could be be focused in every class. There is a possibility that teachers do not like the method of how the school operates with the breaking of the walls system implemented. Teachers are mostly part-time rather than full-time as teachers are going on shifts on a certain number of days. In order to satisfy that, timetable on lessons have to be carefully planned and this might dampen the students development with the teacher teaching only a number of days and a reserve teacher taking over. That could show the inconsistency.

To conclude, I think the school is very ambitious in many things in order to break the barrier between teachers and students but I believe that the school is looking on the long term basis rather than a short term results.

The connection of two classes into one big classroom

The visible staffroom

Third Observation - Sacre Coeur - 2/6/10

Sacre Coeur, which literally means 'Sacred heart' in French, has around 150 sister schools (feeder schools) in over 40 countries. The school is an independent catholic school and it is a all-girls school. The school can be comparable to Melbourne Grammar School. Unlike other school observations, this school was a short one and everything had to be done quickly and smoothly.

With no time to waste, we were introduced by the principal of the school and showed us the details of the school. It seems that the girls could have fun and learn at the same time as the school had given them the balance of study and play. There were, in some cases, that girls could go out and have an exchange at one of the the possible 150 feeder schools. This, in fact, could broaden their horizons.

The next part was touring around the school and the school's campus was a mixture of old and new buildings. The old ones were well preserved and interestingly speaking, the school management told us that the school is co-operating with the school next to them so that both students could go to each others' school and study. Courses or lessons that could be taught by either one of the schools were just surprising because in Hong Kong, this kind of co-schooling would never happen in Hong Kong. I was very impressed by how the two schools could compromise and let both students go to the schools and learn.

The following event was the class observation time. I, along with Vivian Lee and Crystal Leung, went to a Maths class in Year 9 and was introduced by the teacher. I can say that I do not like Maths since coming back to Hong Kong but as the class proceeds, I was sitting down and listening to the teacher about dependent and independent variants and the 'x and y theory'. The teacher was explaining how to work out the x and the y and even students do not know what they were, the teacher showed some supportive (alternative) questions to ask them. I like it as this could make the students understand better. As an idiot who knows nothing about Maths, I tend to get what the teacher had said and did some questions as the teacher asks the students to try out. there was a question that I did 'challenge' the teacher on one equation but it was a good experience.



At the end, I enjoyed the lesson so much that I was very reluctant to go because I can say that that teacher had made me learn something and I can bring that thing back home. The reason I am saying that is in Hong Kong, teachers usually give the equations to students and then asks them to solve it by themselves. There were no or limited explanations given and students were usually puzzled by the questions given. When the students asks the teacher how to do that specific question, the teacher would usually respond that we do not know how to do it and we were too reliant to the teachers. the teachers there would usually give more time for students to understand the theory and then carry on whereas in Hong Kong, the teacher just rush the chapters regardless the students prior knowledge. I do really hope that teachers should give more time for students to understand rather than rushing the chapter in order to tick the boxes.