So it's been nearly a year since I finished my practicum!! I remember feeling like I would never get through it and I don't think I have ever been as stressed in my life as I was during the 10 odd months I did my prac over.
My uni runs a rolling prac rather than block prac sessions as part of the Diploma of Education. I found this to be a good thing and a bad thing.
Pros:
- More authentic experience of what you will most likely be doing once you finish - casual teaching
- You get to know the school, teachers and students better
- Expose to a range of activities within the school - the most useful for me was HSC and HSC trials. If you aren't in the school during these times you simply don't get the exposure to it. I was lucky enough to help write and mark HSC papers which I think is an invaluable skill.
- Improves your time management skills
Cons:
- You may only be there a few days a week so it's even more difficult in terms of behaviour management as the students have different teachers for the same class and can be confused as to what exactly the boundaries are.
- You are stuck with the same Master Teacher for a long time (not so bad if your MT is awesome!)
- It is very difficult to manage full time study and work on top of prac. I would advise against working all together if possible but I know this is almost impossible for the majority of us.
Overall, I think the running prac is a better albeit more challenging method of running a practicum placement. It can be very stressful not just for you as the student teacher but your Master Teacher as well. Often they are juggling HSC or Naplan for primary on top of dealing with a student teacher.
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