Cooperative Learning

Cooperative learning is very important in each class. Cooperative learning is the process in which the students work together in the classroom. It is essential because it builds a good relationship between the students. There are many characteristics of the cooperative learning, some of them are that the cooperative learning is more productive. When all of the students learn together they will produce more. Also it provides creativity because when there is more than one thought and more than one mind creativity would occur. Besides it is a kind of helping each other. When there is a cooperative learning the students would help each other and explain for each other the points that are not clear. One more thing is that the cooperative learning is funny. When the students work together they feel that they are having fun at the same time they are learning, while when the students are learning each one alone they would be bored and they will not have fun while learning and they wouldn't be interested. Motivation occurs when there is cooperative learning because they will motivate each other to do the work and they will be more motivated and challenged in other way. Finally, cooperative learning would provide for the students support. In each group you will find that the students are supporting each other, helping each other, interacting with each other and motivating each other. It provides a unity between the students.

Cooperative learning is very beneficial for the process of learning, for the relations between the students and for the students themselves.  It provides a positive feelings in the class. 

Routines in Classrooms

Routines are needed in every class especially with the younger students. Routines in the classrooms help the teacher more to manage the students and to make the students more calm inside the class. Also it is a main thing to help the students to learn in a better way. 

The presence of routines is essential. They may help the teacher to be faster in the lesson and explaining it rather than stopping from time to time to give the students instructions. 

Routines may help in behavioral management. For example, if there is nothing in the class to do around the students, so some students will make their own activities. In this case routines may help them to minimize their misbehavior. If there are routines in this case, the students will know what is expected from them and they would follow it.

Besides, routines could be funny. For example, have the students clean their desks every morning by singing a song. In this way the students may be interested in the routines rather than being bored from them. 
There are four main types of routines to manage the classroom: 

1. Housekeeping: It is about the routines that are usually done in the classes. For example, How to enter the classroom, taking attendance, erasing the board between two classes and to clean the classroom. They are happened unconsciously. 
2. Operational teaching: It is called also operational features. They are the routines that are somehow basics like where to sit, making announcements, and showing the homework, if you want your homework to be checked just put it on the right side of the table. 
3. Work habits and procedures: They are routines that are related to the work that is done in the class. For example in my class i put for the students a poster about the copy rules. They should write their names, title, date, leave space between the words, and write between the small lines. Also it is used to tell the students how to work in groups and the rules of working in groups.
4. Interpersonal: They are more about the relations in the class. If the students enter the classroom they should say "Good Morning", also it is about the politeness and saying please when you want something. 

The presence of routines in the classrooms are very important. The process of learning would be much faster and better when there are routines. 

Six Types of Professional Knowledge

If you want to be a good and professional teacher you have to be skillful teacher. What is a skillful teacher? 

A skillful teacher is a teacher that has a wide knowledge about everything that is happening in the school and inside the class. To be a skillful teacher you have to acquire many traits like patience, you have to make good relationships with the students, also it is very important to have a good personality. Besides, a skillful teacher should have a knowledge as we said previously about everything in the school and in the class. 

There are 6 main types of knowledge: 

1. Content knowledge: To be a good and professional teacher you have to be aware of the content that you are teaching. If you are teaching English Language, you have to be aware of everything that is required from you in the English language. It is important to know the subject that you are delivering to the students. 
2. Pedagogical content language: It is about the knowledge that you should have about how to teach particular subject to your students. It is essential to know some techniques of how you should teach the subject that you are teaching to your students. For example, the way the teacher explains an English Language lesson differs from the way the teacher is explaining a math lesson. 
3. General pedagogical knowledge: It is very essential. It is about how to deal with general teaching. In other words, it is about issues related to teaching in general. For example, how to manage the students in the classroom. 
4. Knowledge of the students:  To know your students is very important thing that each teacher should have. It is important to know the students' cognitive levels, their backgrounds, and many other things about the students. If you know your students you will be able to build a good relation with the students. 
5. Knowledge of the parents:  The teachers should know the students' parents in order to be partners with each other and build a bridge between them to help the students. If the teachers know the parents of the students they would be able to know more about the students and how they would deal with them. 
6. Knowledge of the curriculum:  A good teacher should know the curriculum, how it is designed, what the students learnt before, what they should learn now, and what they will learn after.

These are the 6 types of knowledge. Each teacher should have them, if you have them you have a high confidence.