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Hina Rahman

Design and Technology Tutor, Teacher

Walsall, England

My passion to teach Design and Technology stems from my university degree background in Home Economics (BSc and MSc) and my considerable teaching experience in this field. I completed my NQT at Hans Price Academy in July 2014,along having completed the PGCE D&T in 2013 at the University of the West of England and obtained QTS. These qualifications have added to my international experience of lecturing in Art and Design to BSc level and teaching to GCSE in educational institutions in Pakistan. I am now confident at imparting knowledge and practical skills to students of differing ability levels and behaviour. I am familiar with the curriculum requirements of Key Stage 3 and 4 in Food preparation and Nutrition, Resistant Material, Graphics and Textiles and have also taught ancillary subjects: Personal Social and Health Education; and Careers. I have also been involved in school enrichment and clubs at my school such as: the ‘Cookery Club’ focusing on healthy recipes and a celebration cake for Christmas; ‘Coursework catch-up’ that, offered extra sessions in GCSE Food Preparation and Nutrition, Resistant Materials and Graphics ( CAD/CAM); and ‘Homework Club’. I am keen to offer these pastoral and extra-curricular contributions in my next appointment and also will be actively involving myself in other lessons and activities at the school. With my past experience and through the recent academic and extra-curricular activities I have participated in I believe I now understand the way children learn and use this to maximise their benefit from the lessons I plan. Each child I teach is encouraged to develop through a tailored personalised programme by using contributions from a range of professional inputs. This is achieved by developing an environment where the pupil and I have an understanding of clarity, mutual respect and fairness between us. Believing successful learning accrues from making the subject matter relevant and accessible through differentiation I initially identify and target the Gifted and Able, the Average and those students who are in greater need of support and I use Individualized Education Programs to best facilitate their learning. Also, I identify those who have English as an additional language and support their needs. I understand that it is not just ability that should be differentiated but behaviour also. When presented with challenging behaviour rather than viewing negatively I see this as a challenge which both stimulates my interest and my commitment to push these students to higher levels. I have developed learning strategies and found my students have interacted more, becoming less disruptive and performing better. I found this experience to be personally rewarding. I derive my goals of the learning process from Bloom’s Taxonomy and concentrate on the combined areas of Knowledge, Skills and Attitude. By addressing each of these pillars I feel the pupil is able to acquire a complete understanding of the subject matter. This develops a higher form of education focusing on analysing and interpreting rather than just remembering facts. As part of the learning process I find it helpful to engage with and encourage parents to participate in their child’s education and have found this to have a positive effect. Assessment is an integral part of my lesson preparation. My experience of marking Key Stage 3 & 4 theory and practical work using the formative assessment technique and learning dialogue has meant I am able to focus on educational needs. Learning is a journey and if a check is kept on students’ learning by identifying ‘What went well’ and ‘How to improve’ they perform better. I regularly ask students to keep a record of their thoughts and how they hope to act on my comments. I use students’ grades for target setting during plenary sessions. As I have matured in my approach to teaching, the knowledge and understanding I have developed has naturally become part of my practice. One such example is using the Every Child Matter outcomes in planning a ‘Fruit Salad’ lesson: using seasonal fruits to stay healthy; awareness of health and safety with cutting/chopping; enjoying the preparation and feeling achievement when taking home a tasty fruit salad; contributing positively as part of a team; and using home ingredients to keep simple and costs low. From the extra-curricular perspective I like to play a full and active part in the school’s life. I encourage teacher-student relationship-building exercises and one such example was a trip to Laser Quest. Although a fun day out and reward for hard work, the trip had the important objective of developing the student/teacher rapport. This excursion was kept within the boundaries of health and safety and the policies of the School. I am constantly reassessing myself and working to develop personally and professionally and so I regularly attend after school meetings. To update my health and safety practices I completed the DATA safety course. In order to acquire additional knowledge of the UK’s attitude to food I attended the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health course on Food Safety and the Licence to Cook course. I have gained proficiency in Information Technology (IT) through completing the Computer Literacy and Information Technology and the European Computer Driving Licence courses. I use these skills in IT to make my lessons more visually appealing and stimulating to pupils who now are proficient with graphics and computers. At Hans Price Academy I have used Corel draw 12, Creo, illustrator and Pro desk top 8 softwares in my key stage 3 Product Design lessons and generate plan schemes of work for my Key stage 4 COPE group – Food and Catering based on healthy eating. Through my background I have introduced various multicultural cooking in my food lessons too. Through my passion for Design and Technology I have developed a literacy, Stage 3 booklet which will help students to attain higher levels. I also run a series of extra curricular after school salt dough modelling and photo editing workshops. These have been met with great enthusiasm and attended by students across the whole school. I have taken part and encouraged fun day initiatives which include house musicals and leading on assemblies. I believe teaching to be a vocation and am willing to contribute and support the team and go the extra mile. A teacher must strive to bring out sensitively the best in pupils, parents, oneself, colleagues and the school itself. It is the collective responsibility of all users of the school to improve the environment as a place of learning. The role of a good school is to provide a learning environment where pupils are keen and happy to attend whilst enjoying learning on a daily basis. It is a place where pupils are taught the importance of learning and the benefits and what can be accomplished by it. I have trained food assistants and NQT to inspire, motivate and challenge pupils by setting high expectations in practical sessions. My plan for a session is always to initially to draw attention to the health and safety issues in the practical sessions and follow-up with the learning objectives. I use an interactive style with my pupils so they are able to ask questions so as to feel comfortable and understand what is required of them in a safe and stimulating environment. During sessions I interact with the pupils, and encourage my Teacher assistant and NQT to do the same, so as to mentally stretch and stimulate the pupil in order to maximise their potential during these learning exercises. I have been able to show and explain to the colleague how to plan and make the Literacy based project booklets. How to assess the progress of the students during that session how to explain clarify the misconceptions in order to make a memorable experience for the students. I am able to create stimulating environment with mutual respect , e.g. from the start of lessons students clearly knows their targets and their current levels, they are clearly explained through detailed and effective tracker system, what they need to be focusing on to achieve higher grades. I always try to share the bigger picture to students in timely manner. I collaboratively work with other colleagues and contributed through effective Professional Development coaching sessions. Based on development and implementation of various coaching strategies that lead to good progress and outcomes. I try to met regularly on fortnight to discuss and exchange notes and try the strategies in lessons. I also Completed my Emerging Middle Leader course, which gave me the opportunity to help, guide and support my fellow colleagues in the schools’ wider community. I always demonstrated secure subject knowledge and kept myself updated with current changes. In lockdown I done various online Professional Development sessions to keep myself updated and in line with National Curriculum. I collaboratively work with Professional Development colleagues and supported various teaching strategies by experimenting the technique on students and assessing their progress of learning . My Priority always has been for students to achieve good grades and progress in life is always , E.g the non- attenders and vulnerable students in my Year groups whose attendance was below 70%. By collaboratively working with College leaders, mentors, Head of department and ELT, I arranged catchup sessions in lunch,break and afterschool time for them to motivate and build positive relationship with them which lead them to complete and achieve reasonable good grades especially in GCSE. I have been actively moderating the GCSE Food Preparation course work with senior members of CLF federation. Which greatly help to understand and help students to achieve good grades in course work. On other hand I collaboratively worked with SENCO of Schools to offer students the experience of doing cooking practical and learning new skills in a secure and friendly environment. All students had various individual complex behaviour needs, I was able to build good relationships and offer memorable experience to them. They were able to adapt to the situation and behaved very well. I am also have been the active member of the school engage centre, to support and teach 1-2-1 sessions to students identified with special requirements, such as teaching DT sessions and cooking practices for the ones who missed out regular lessons and EAL to build bridges to overcome language barrier, especially year 11 students in order to help them at least achieve level 1 for college course. I was invited to be part of the CLF Food Curators team, I planned and designed the collaboratively the Year 7 and 8 scheme of work to go live at the time of lock down ( which is available on CLF website). I always try my best to give the students every opportunity to exceed in life.

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