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By: Ahmed Isse Jama (Gade), Regional Education Inspector
Teaching – Practice, In Primary Schools
Preparing To Teach
Additional points concerning schemes of work
In cases where a pair of teachers is sharing the teaching of a class during teaching practice, the teachers must work closely and consult each other's scheme of work. They may find they have to adjust their schemes when they change over their subjects.
It is not advisable for an in-service student-teacher in a school to make schemes of work to last a whole term. This is because he needs experience before he can do this successfully. It would be more advisable for him to make schemes for only the first few weeks of the term to see how they workout. When he is more confident of his capability then he can start to plan further ahead, and may be for the rest of the term. Similarly it would be unwise to make schemes for the whole year. Practice really makes perfect in these situations.
A student teacher should not merely follow textbooks when preparing schemes of work. (Some authors even write detailed schemes of work for their particular subjects). Schemes of work and lesson plans should be the student-teachers’ own original work. Suggestions given in textbooks are not meant for a particular group of pupils. Each class has its differences. Each teacher knows his own pupils best. He knows who are the bright pupils, who are the average and who are the slow learners. It is this kind of understanding that enables him to adjust his schemes where and when necessary. He knows whether to allow more or less time for a particular topic. He may discover in the process of teaching that he has to re-teach a particular section using a different approach.
Student-teachers are warned not to use the details of the schemes of work as a substitute for lesson plans. It is not uncommon to find a lazy student-teacher who has merely copied his scheme of work for a lesson into his lesson-plan book. His lesson might well be characterized by:
Lack of detail and illustrative material
In complete subject-matter
Incorrect facts
Disorderly presentation of information.
The scheme of work is only a skeleton plan which must be expanded and developed carefully before it can become a meaningful lesson.
[To be continued ….]
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