INDIANA UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF EDUCATION

Student Teaching Final Narrative/Final Recommendation

Candidate’s Name: Kathryn Stuff Date: 28th May 2018
Subject Area :Primary School (All Subjects) Grade Level: Year 1
School Name: West Kidlington Primary School and Nursery School Corp: White Horse Federation

Having Kathryn Stuff complete her placement in Year 1 at West Kidlington Primary School and
Nursery has been an absolute pleasure. She has consistently demonstrated her teaching to be of
‘great’ and ‘outstanding’ qualities.

Kathryn has constantly shown that she is very able to teach and work alongside the children on an
individual basis, small group, and whole class levels. At the beginning of her time in Year 1, Kathryn
developed a strong rapport with all the children, taking careful and accurate observations and notes
of their level of ability, academic needs, as well as their social abilities and unique personalities. This
ensured that when she began to take a lead in teaching the children, she could successfully tailor the
learning to the ability level of the child. For example, in English (literacy) lessons she has worked
with lower ability children to think carefully about sentence structure and basic punctuation,
whereas with higher ability children she has successfully extended their learning by challenging them
to think of powerful adjectives, adverbs, and think about more advanced punctuation. Similarly, in
Mathematics (Numeracy), she has explored concepts of number, shape and measurement at a basic
level, and then challenged children to ‘go deeper’ in their learning by exploring the concept in a
different, more complex way. This was also apparent in situations where learning was tailored to
reflect social and behavioural needs of the children; for one child who struggles to remain in his seat
and continue focused writing, Kathryn successfully used timers, short work breaks and simple
instructions as incentives to maximise the produced written work.

Across the Year 1 year group there have been some very challenging behaviour from the children;
Kathryn has used a wide range of behaviour management techniques in various situations, to
outstanding effect. For example, with one child who is prone to violent outbursts as well as
aggressive verbal and physical behaviour towards both adults and children, Kathryn, on more than
one occasion, successfully confronted the behaviour with verbal cues and warnings. She calmly
explained to the child how solve the issue sensibly that was causing them frustration. By doing so
she has consistently diffused these situations. With this same child, Kathryn used initiative to create
an intervention to help the child calm down in these situations; a five finger breathing exercise. This
method has proven successful, especially initially. She has also proved to have a patient and positive
attitude towards children who are being non-compliant and deliberately ignoring adult requests, as
well as in situations when children have become physical and violent in nature, using various
strategies of rewards and sanctions to motivate and encourage the students.

Kathryn has also shown a highly professional attitude towards the ethos surrounding teaching at
West Kidlington – she has excellent time-keeping and has willingly offered to stay later or come in
earlier to help; contributing many ideas during planning sessions and developing activities for our
Year 1 area. Perhaps one of Kathryn’s best qualities is her ability to remain positive and upbeat in
any situation. As a school, we have faced a hard couple of months, but Kathryn ensured that every
day was positive, using humour and good nature to motivate and encourage those around her to
smile. Other examples of her contribution to the ethos include the attendance of various staff
meetings, suggestions of ideas and strategies during Key Stage meetings and planning meetings. For
a member of support staff who was going on maternity leave, she gave up time in the evening to
find suitable leaving presents, which were gratefully received.

Finally, Kathryn has also helped bring the Year 1 curriculum alive by actively taking the lead in not
only Mathematics and English lessons, but for curriculum subjects such as science and music and ICT.
An example of a brilliant lesson is when Kathryn placed shaving cream on each student’s desks for
the children to practice writing in cursive! The children loved this and wish to do it again. Often,
when unplanned situations have occurred, Kathryn has shown a ability to jump straight in to
teaching, using her initiative to teach effectively in these spontaneous situations!

To conclude, Kathryn has been an asset to the Year 1 team during her time here, and her positivity,
dedication and hardworking nature will see her become a teacher of outstanding quality. I have so
much confidence in her future as an educator, and know that any child who is lucky enough to be
taught by her will learn and achieve so much. Along with all the other teachers and children at West
Kidlington Primary School and Nursery, we wish her all the luck and success with teaching in the
future.

Daniel Pearson

West Kidlington Primary School and Nursery