Student Profile - Sahera Khanam

For the placement periods in my first year I worked in two different private day nursery, at the first one I worked with the pre-school group (3-4 year olds), getting involved in various parts of the day to day running of the nursery. 

I had great experience of working with children both indoors and outdoors; activities included baking gingerbread men, an indoor assault course, freestyle painting and other stimulating activities. Outdoors there were lots of trips to the local park and reservoir, where we had a teddy bears picnic. I was also lucky enough to experience the snow outside with all the children building a snowman and having snowball fights.

My second placement was also at another private day nursery, but here I worked with the babies (4 months-2 year olds) this was a totally different experience, working with the babies was more hands-on and included feeding and changing them. Music was very much loved by all the babies, so nursery rhymes were a popular activity.

My second year placements were in schools; firstly with a reception class (4-5 year olds); here I had first hand experience of working with children who have special needs in a mainstream school. In the school I worked alongside the teacher and teaching assistant to plan out lessons and help out in general with wall displays and assemblies. I was also working along with the Special Educational Needs Co-ordinator (SENCO) and had the chance to look at Individual Educational/Behavioural Plans.  My second semester placement was at another state school but here I was with the Year 3 group (7-8 year olds).

The placement experience was invaluable as it helped me put theory into practice, much of the knowledge I gained from my lectures was used when I was on placement.