4.3 Classroom Observations
4.3.5 Lesson observation 5
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the classroom was too small for learners to freely explore mathematics such as allowing them to sit on the mat to do sorting individually. The limited light due to school bags that hung from the windows created a dark atmosphere which demotivated learning in all aspects. She used concrete materials which were locally available like empty containers and bottle tops to teach mathematics, but her teaching did not integrate mathematics with any subjects.
4.3.5 Lesson Observation 5
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(Learners were seated on chairs eating soft porridge from mugs. There were seventy two learners in the class. After breakfast, the teacher helped them to clean their hands, mouths and noses and then she ordered them to sit on the mat. She informed them that their visitor had arrived and warned them to behave well.
She then distributed blocks and asked the learners to engage in free play.
Learners were excited and they played in pairs and in groups while a few played alone. Teacher Tselane moved around each group and asked questions that required learners to explain their play or game. Learners’ responses were different: some told the teacher that they had built a church or a house while some were playing ‘morabaraba and liketoane’.
After ten minutes of free play the learners were asked to return the blocks to the container, but Mosola, who had been playing alone, was instructed not to dismantle his creation and all the learners were asked to look at his work. The teacher asked learners to explain what Mosola had done. Some learners contributed that Mosola had put red blocks on one side and green blocks on the other side and just one yellow block on its own.)
Teacher Tselane: Good! Mosola has sorted blocks according to colour and size.
(Teacher Tselane was not correct when she said that Mosola had sorted blocks according to size; the correct category which was clearly demonstrated by Mosola’s creation was only colour, as learners had responded.
Teacher Tselane then asked each learner to take two blocks from the containers and instructed them to arrange the blocks according to size. Learners rushed to the containers and were fighting over blocks. The teacher intervened by taking the container and then starting to hand out two blocks to each learner. After all the learners had been given blocks they were seated on the mat to order the two blocks according to size. The teacher moved around handing out more blocks.
After each learner had completed the task, the teacher asked them to stand and form a circle around their creations.)
Teacher Tselane: Look at your creations! Aren’t they beautiful?
Learners (together): They are beautiful.
(The teacher told the learners that they had ordered those blocks according to size. She informed them that some blocks were tall and that others were short. She then asked learners to make pairs of short and tall learners. Learners paired
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themselves as instructed but it was difficult for some learners to find a partner because most of the learners were of the same height. The teacher then asked those who did not have partners to sit down. She then asked the ‘tall’ learners to raise their hands and the other learners were to confirm if all the learners who had raised their hands were taller than their partners. Before the learners could contribute, the teacher concluded that those learners with their hands up were taller than their partners. The teacher then asked all learners to be seated on the mat. She then concluded the lesson by telling them that they had learnt to order things according to size; as a result they had learned about tall and short objects.
The teacher then asked the learners to go for a short break. The lesson took approximately seventeen minutes.)
This observation demonstrated that teacher Tselane’s understanding of the teaching of mathematics had a limited influence on her teaching of mathematics because she was challenged in understanding the mathematical concepts she was teaching. Her lesson was about ordering according to size but her teaching referred to height; in this context she used inappropriate words to describe size, such as ‘tall’ and ‘short’. This indicated that teacher Tselane was not competent in using the content itself; nor was she competent in teaching at the development level of her learners. This shortcoming led her into problems such as failing to emphasise the main points of the lesson, omitting to consider learners’ prior knowledge and failing to connect it to new knowledge, and not asking challenging questions that would help learners to think critically. As a result, it was possible that learning did not occur.
Teacher Tselane had planned activities to engage learners to learn mathematics but those activities were not engaging learners in deep learning of mathematical concepts. She engaged all learners even though there were challenges with classroom management and learners’
discipline. Learning styles were not appropriately addressed by the activities so this demonstrated that teacher Tselane’s teaching of mathematics in this Grade was not effective.
Teaching strategies like questioning and answering, discussion strategies and free play were used. During play teacher Tselane was walking amongst the learners and asking questions about their creations. She was able to use free play as an introductory activity for the lesson, and that was good.
Teacher Tselane arranged her classroom by partitioning it into five ‘corners’, namely a book, block, fantasy, art and discovery corner and there were different concrete materials such as
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empty containers and boxes. However, while teaching a sorting skill, teacher Tselane used only bought plastic blocks despite the fact that there were lovely home-made wooden blocks in the block corner. She also had a laptop which she reportedly used to teach phonics or stories. The classroom was big enough to allow learners to explore mathematics through physical activities and games, but the activity that I observed was relatively stagnant. There were posters on the classroom walls denoting numbers. There was a discussion area where learners sat on a mat in a semi-circle during discussion time and even when sorting shapes, they were nicely scattered on the floor and the space was enough to accommodate each learner.