Teacher Candidates Show and Tell for Showcase Day
On May 10, graduating Teacher Candidates returned to the Faculty of Education to participate in Showcase Day. Having spent the past nine weeks completing the practicum and Transition to Professional Practice (T2P) components of the program, graduates were keen to reconnect with their peers and colleagues and showcase their T2P experiences at the event.
T2P provides Teacher Candidates with exciting placement opportunities that enrich their teaching skills and broaden their perspectives of the teaching profession. Experiences ranged from international service learning assignments in the Dominican Republic and Poland to local placements with a variety of organizations such as museums, hospitals, social agencies, libraries, and arts and community centres.
Showcase Day also featured several mini-workshops led by Teacher Candidates that covered a wide spectrum of compelling topics in education:
- Synergizing Culture and Music Through Hand Drumming by Eric Froats
- Occasional Teaching: The Good, the Bad, and the Opportunity by Kendra Ferris
- From Kenyan Refugee Camp to Canadian Classrooms – Challenges to Girls’ Education by Dahabo Noor Abdi
- SWAC: School Within a College (swacstory.blogspot.ca) by Nick Tomasic
- Twenty One Toys’ Connexions™ Toy – A Tool for Empathetic Learning by Michele Ivanisevic
- Learning Shakespeare through Play: An Interactive Workshop with Stratford Festival Materials by Steve Senik
- Dynamic Movement for Special Needs Students by Erin Unsworth
In addition to faculty, students, staff, and interested members of the Western community, over fifty new Teacher Candidates (class of 2013-14) attended Showcase Day and were pleased to have the chance to network with the graduating class and meet one another prior to starting the program. The diversity of attendees, presentations, and workshops made the event a bona fide success!
