Reham+Hassan

=Introduction: =

toc My name is Mrs. Reham Hassan. I have a Bachelor degree of engineering Cairo university - systems and biomedical engineering department.  I am currently a pre-IG Math Teacher at Al Bashaer International School.

Although teaching is far away from my college degree and although it came to me by chance, i have developed a deep affection to the teaching profession. I feel that teaching is a constantly changing career, each day , each year and with each class you get to interact and learn from different people.I believe that a teacher develops overtime as much as her students, and to develop properly a teacher should always be ready to learn from not only educate students.

This is a great opportunity for me as a teacher to share with my fellow teachers and classmates a sample of my work.


 * = Teaching philosophy =

I have been teaching math for the past six years over which my personal teaching philosophy has developed immensely. I believe that no effort is too much when it comes to shaping young minds. I dedicate my knowledge, effort, time and devotion entirely to my students during school hours and even after wards. I deal with students in middle school and they had already developed a preconceived idea that math has nothing to do with real life and we don't like math anyway. This might be due to that fact that they saw math as an abstract science with no real relevance to their life. Bonding and expressing the real world application is vital for understanding the bigger picture and appreciating the lessons learned. I believe that demanding discipline requires presenting a model in advance. I like to set a good example to my students, if I want them to behave in a certain way I would rather start with myself. Through my teaching years I got to teach many systems -national, American diploma and finally pre-IGCSE. What I like to teach is the best of every system in an attempt to educate my students in the best possible way. Being passionate and enthusiastic about my subject is in fact contagious, students tend to feel the passion and appreciate it whenever they spot it. My students think that anything is achievable and nothing is too hard to learn. I like to introduce ideas, some of which go beyond the courses, and watch them take off with their own ideas and debates. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">I like to encourage my students to critically think about their problems and develop a meta cognitive proficiency. I think it is easier to present the answers right away but it is far more effective to let them express the problem, analyze it and divide it into manageable tasks and then they get to solve their problems on their own. Watching closely, I like to think of myself as their own safety net at a time, some other time I provide the scaffold and I am always available to intervene whenever needed. Although they resisted the approach they now understand that they benefit more this way. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">Having a good personal relation with my students represents a great part of my interest. It is important to set a healthy learning environment based on a friendly relation outside the classroom. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">Learning is a two way process, it is never a one man show. My students know that they are an important ingredient in their education process; they get to question, negotiate and take actions whenever considered necessary.


 * = Media Competencies =

<span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">A teacher should have a strong knowledge of his tools. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">Over the time these tools have changed from the textbook to the use of modern technology and internet. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">I think that technology is best used when it is the only way to do the job effectively and efficiently. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">This was true last year when our school was closed for two weeks due to the swine flu. The school administration thought of a smart way to teach the students the lessons while they are at home. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">Since Al Bashaer School does not have a problem when it comes to providing technology such as internet connections and smart boards, it was up to the teachers to show their competencies in using such tools. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">We had to demonstrate the lessons using smart board and record them using video maker programs. The difficulty lied in the fact that the lesson had to be recorded without a mistake or else it had to be recorded again. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">As tiresome as that was, the fact that I learned a lot just by using the smart board, and how encouraging the feedback was, all the effort was worth it. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">i am honored to show a sample of my online lessons ... i hope you enjoy it.

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> =<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;"> = <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">One of the most important tools in teacher's evaluation is the observation report. The math supervisor selects a class for the teacher and enters this class without prior notification to observe first hand a real sample of how the education process looks like. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">After my first year I stopped paying attention to the observer and focused my attention on my students and how I want my session to work. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">This report was filled last year. It was a grade 9 American mixed class. The title of the lesson was "equations as relation". <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">I started my session with a question to know what did my students knew from previous lessons or previous years, followed by examples to be solved by the students on the board. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">From those 10 to 15 minutes I get to prepare my students and put them in shape for the new parts that needs to be explained. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">I usually take the next 10 minutes explaining the core of the lesson just the basic information during which the students are allowed to ask freely about any misconception they had or about any unclear points. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">Any tricky questions or questions requiring critical thinking are usually left for my students to think about them rather than being handed on a silver plate. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">After-wards I start the learning activity which is usually an interesting way to engage the students into practicing and exercising their learned concept. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">My favorite activities are games and competitions that involve solving the check for understanding questions without assigning them directly. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">Some lessons don't have a real life application and are simply abstract knowledge and needs to be a lecture based session, and in my own the lecture part does not exceed a 10 to 15 minutes. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">In this session I was granted 96% based on the criteria included in the report. <span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">i used a lot of scaffolding with the weak students as well as encouraging cooperative learning through team work and enabling the students to evaluate their work by assigning the judges to be members of both teams.
 * =<span style="color: #800080; font-family: Georgia,serif;">Evaluations =

<span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">For me the observation reports are a very important feedback which is necessary for further self assessment by the teacher.

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 * = Bulletin board ideas =

<span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">I have to confess that the artistic part and creative aspect of my teaching career did not fully develop until last year. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">Changing the working environment by changing schools gives a great opportunity to re-explore yourself and expands your vision in a quest to fulfill your duties. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">One of the duties assigned to teachers are the bulletin board. I was lucky to avoid it last year due to the flu which gave me a golden opportunity to try few ideas before actually implementing them. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">One of the ideas that I liked as well as my students was forming the angles relations ex: alternating, corresponding angles or the lines relations ex: parallel or perpendicular lines using the students themselves. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">My students had to divide themselves into angle formation and they took photos and they were posted on the board. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">Another idea was geometry related as well. The lesson was transformations ex: reflection, rotation, translation and enlargement. Instead of assigning the students the task of solving many transformations I assigned them a sheet with a plane and asked them to translate the plane in order to get a formation of planes or enlarge the original figure, later they had the time to color it and justify their drawings through completely describing the transformation they used. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">They had fun doing what they needed to do practicing the lesson and they got to decorate their class and their board and brag about their work.


 * = Awards and Certificates =

<span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">Teachers rarely acquire thanks or or even wait for it but there is no doubt that a simple thank you with a smile does do miracles. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">Of all the certificates i received over my teaching years,I chose this award because it meant a lot to me personally and professionally. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">This year our principle decided to hold a competition between classes to chooses their best mum-teacher figure. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">I have to say that one year ago I couldn't care less for my student's affection to me. I used to think that this will never affect their learning experience and that no matter how much I liked them I never cared to show nor had I looked for their fondness and worked to achieve it. Of course teaching middle school with this notion did not help much! <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">The turning point was after attending the 501 course "childhood development for classroom teachers". I learned more about adolescent and how some of their reactions and behaviors were merely due to the hormonal changes accompanied with that age group and how that it was never a personal issue with me. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">This year I had a new year 7 girls class and this class as challenging as it was to me- given that I have failed miserably with the year 7 Girls class last year- I decided to earn their love in a quest to provide a better learning environment and the surprise was not only did they choose me as a mum figure but that the votes were almost unanimous. <span style="direction: ltr; display: block; font-family: Georgia,serif; text-align: left; unicode-bidi: embed;">I still have my faults as a teacher and as a human being but the important thing is to seek perfection through knowledge and self development.

=<span style="color: #800080; font-family: Georgia,serif;">Reflection #5: =

=<span style="color: #800080; font-family: Georgia,serif;">Unit plan Reflection: =

=<span style="color: #800080; font-family: Georgia,serif;">lesson plan: =

<span style="font-family: Georgia,serif;">This file includes the word document for the lesson plan, the power point presentation used, the assessment and worksheet

=<span style="color: #800080; font-family: Georgia,serif;">lesson activity: =

sorry but i had a hard time uploading the file so forgive me for the 5 minutes