Practicum First Post

Post 1: Describe how Literature is being taught in the school you are posted to for Teaching Practice?


Literature is being taught as an 'O' Level subject in my school. The texts for the levels are as follows:


Secondary One: Tales of the Unexpected, Roald Dahl
Secondary Two: Red Sky in the Morning, Elizabeth Laird
Secondary Three: (Literature is not offered)
Secondary Four: Crick Crack Monkey


Sec One students, (whom I am teaching) began the year with being taught the short play, Zeep by Stella Kon. The teacher has also managed to tie in poetry to teach students personification as a literary device as personification also appears in Zeep. In my first week at the school, I observed the tail end of the lessons on Zeep, which had culminated in the students performing excerpts of the play in small groups. The week after, I observed the teacher starting to teach similes, which I then took over before going on to teach metaphors in the third week. 


In summary, students will concentrate on Unseen and Plays for two terms, before concentrating on Prose for the third term. 'O' level students focus more on Unseen and devices in Sec 3, before starting on Crick Crack Monkey, which they will focus on till Sec 4.


The Sec Ones, I am told, will only read a prose text in Term 3. In the second term, they will be concentrating on another play.


Su Zhen