Third class in Intermediate II (Second Period)

                                                                                                    Thursday, April 4th 2013

Greetings!!

Thanks God, my third experience with this group of students was very good and I enjoyed it.

What went well?

Most of the activities turned out the way I expected and students were very participative this time. Among the activities that the teacher liked the most were: The warm-up because I started the class by activating schema/prior knowledge, the presentation because I used a song in which ss had to paste the most relevant lyrics for the topic, which was about “Countable and uncountable food”, and finally, the teacher liked the fact that I used a PowerPoint presentation to explain the grammar.
In the next link is the PowerPoint presentation, in case you want to check it.

https://powerpoint.office.live.com/p/PowerPointView.aspx?FBsrc=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fdownload%2Ffile_preview.php%3Fid%3D505139276218351%26time%3D1365610861%26metadata&access_token=100000164512276%3AAVKtfnPpAa1HWcB-2QMQyatydidFJHoBpJormyQZQmqtfw&title=COUNTABLE+AND+UNCOUNTABLE+NOUN_+presentation.pptx

What didn’t go so well?

Well, I had troubles with the equipment; the projector wasn’t able to show the presentation that I had in my computer so I had to use the teacher’s computer. Nevertheless, once we could see the PowerPoint presentation everything was good and actually helped me to save time since I didn’t have to write too much on the board or spend time pasting charts.

At the end of the class I thanked the students for their participation inasmuch as I wasn’t expecting their good behavior, I didn’t tell them that, but I did thank them for their behavior since the first class and they applauded me, so I felt very happy because I know they did it with their heart :3

All in all, I’m really thankful for all the experience that I have gained during my teaching practicum till now because I have learned many good things from all people around me; I have learned from their good attitudes, how to present the activities better, how to manage the class better, and many other things that helped me to be better not only as a professional, but also as a person.

Second class in Intermediate II (Second Period)

                                                               Thursday, March 21st 2013

Salutations once again my dear peers!!

Thanks God, my second experience with this group of students was very, very good despite of the fact that the lesson that I did and developed was kind of simple since I didn’t include any visual aids or copies, but I developed meaningful activities which were  helpful for the students’ learning.

What went well?

Thanks God, most of the activities went well. My class was based on a brief grammar review about the verbs “make” and “do”, and speaking activities that allowed me to make it more student-centered, which was good!

Among the activities that the teacher and students enjoyed the most were: the famous “Hot potato”, which I used to do a quick grammar review, the role-play and a TPR game “Swap place if you…” in which I said a sentence, for example: “Swap place if you usually make your bed”, and the students who “usually make their bed” changed their sits with another student; students had fun as the same time that they learned with these activities.

What didn’t go so well?

Well, I conducted a debate and there was a problem with the students because before the debate some of them were reluctant to expose their ideas and get in agreement with the rest of their team, and during the debate just a few students participated, which was also because of the time. This doesn’t feel good because you as teacher notice their attitude and try to do something about it, for example, I got close to those students, who didn’t want to work,  in order to motivate them to participate by telling them: "Come on guys, let's work!! :D"  And they immediately did what they had to do in my presence, but when I went to monitor the rest of them, they were just not doing anything; thus, I pushed them to work by reminding them about the short time they had, for example: "You just have one more minute, so let's work guys!" So, this was not likeable, but at the end of the day, it was a good debate and I gained experience on how to manage these kinds of situations since the teacher gave me some tips:

-  In order to push students to do something, change your tone of voice, like showing authoritarianism, and/or tell them that if they don’t work they will get a penalty.

-  In order to make all students participate in a debate, deliver a piece of color paper to each student and take it back when they speak; this will avoided them to speak more than once as well as it will help you to monitor and make sure that all of them participate.  

All in all, despite of the inconvenient in the debate, everything was cool, students participate in the rest of the activities and they were supportive; they are nice guys, what I think that happened for the debate was that the groups were too big, fourteen and fourteen, so I guess that some of them were thinking that their opinions were not necessary, and as you know in every group there are people who really like to express their opinions, so the quietest/shiest guys let the more talkative speak, which is not good in an English class and we as teachers most use strategies to avoid that happen/continue happening.

Well, this was my experience and I am happy and satisfy of have had the opportunity of lived it and acquired it as always. J

First class at Intermediate II (Second Period)

Thursday, March 14^th 2013

Kind greetings!!!

First of all, I’d like to thank God in public too because He’s the one who has helped me to overcome obstacles, to learn from my failures, to move forward and to have such a nice experiences teaching at UNICAES.

Planning this class took me a lot of time because I honestly didn’t remember too much about the target grammar, which was about phrasal verbs, so I had to study it again; nevertheless, all the time spent on it was worth it because the class was very, very productive.

What went well?

Well, I feel bless because all the activities that I developed turned out well, the way that I expected, and I this time I felt less, less, less nervous than the other times. I guess that’s because the result of previous experiences helped me to gain confidence when teaching as well as the fact that this group of students is very kind, they participate, they work and they respect you as a teacher; in addition, the teacher is very kind and supportive too.

What didn’t go so well?

I had troubles with the time, I didn’t measure the time for each activity correctly; thus, I had to omit one activity of my lesson and I also took more time than I should. Nevertheless, that happened too because the teacher allowed me to do it, and he did it because he really liked what I was doing, so at the end of the day the troubles with the time didn’t become a big deal; however, the teacher advised me to measure the time for each activity appropriately.

This is the way that I developed my class:

For the warm-up, I did a mimic game in which some ss acted out some phrasal verbs whereas the rest guessed them.

For the presentation, I provided a reading for which ss underlined the phrasal verbs that were in it; then, I gave ss a worksheet containing the phrasal verbs that were in the reading and their possible meanings, ss just had to underline one of the three options (the possible meanings) for each phrasal verb. Once ss finished, I checked it orally. Finally, ss discussed some questions in which they had to provide their personal information/experience.

For the grammar, I presented a chart and I also gave ss a copy with the same information of the chart so that they didn’t waste time writing it. I provided the grammar explanation, I asked ss if they had any doubt, I clarified doubts and I finally CCQ ss.

For the practice, I used the same worksheet that had the phrasal verbs and their meaning. This worksheet also had a sentence from the reading per each phrasal verb, so for the activity, I provided the next instructions: “Find out if the phrasal verbs are transitive or intransitive and write “T” or “I” in the blanks; if they are transitive, circle their object. Then, write “S” for the separable phrasal verbs and “N” for the non-separable phrasal verbs, according to each sentence.” Finally, I checked and discussed the answers orally and in general. Some ss question the correct answers, they weren’t convince that those answers were correct, so I explained them why those answers were correct and that was amazing because I didn’t hesitate in the explanation, I knew the grammar, it was easy for me to clarify doubts and I felt as a real teacher who really knows. It was really amazing to see that they were really learning and interacting with me. I really liked it!

To finalize my lesson, I split the class in two and I asked ss to do a horizontal line in front of the board in order to do a TPR and listening game in which one student per each team had to go and pick a phrasal verb up from the wall and paste it on the board as fast as he/she could. Before the class began, I had pasted all the phrasal verbs on the wall and around the classroom in order to make the task funnier and difficult. The mechanic of the game: I just gave the meaning of each phrasal verb and ss had to remember/analyze the phrasal verb to go and get it. All the phrasal verbs were separable and were seeing in class. At the end of the game, both teams won because both teams got the same number of points, each phrasal verb were equivalent to a point.

I really enjoyed this class!!

My third class

                                                                                Monday, February 18^th 2013.

Salutations Everyone!

Thanks God my third class with the guys of the ACCESS Program was successful despites of the fact that I began it 5 minutes later because the people in charge to open the classroom’s door weren’t there which was very strange because they have always been there the previous times.

This is what I did:

After greeting students and establishing rapport, I did a TPR activity as a warm-up in order to awake students because they are always kind of tired inasmuch as they attend to high-school the whole morning. Thus, they need to be motivated and get into another level of consciousness so that the class will be of benefit. The warm-up activity was called: “Don’t do what you see, but do what you listen to”

Then, I did a quick grammar review by eliciting examples of affirmative and negative sentences as questions and answers with The Simple Present Tense. Next, I gave students a short reading with some blanks which they had to fill in by writing the correct verb. I checked the activity orally by eliciting answers from the students in general. Finally, I did some comprehension questions about the reading.

For the next activity, I did a short TPR game in order to make random trios; it was called: “Rabbits to your house!”. I love this game because students always have fun with it. Then, when students were in trios, I gave them the instructions for the role-play in a sheet of paper and orally too, and I set the time they had to create their dialogues. In the role-play, student A was supposed to be a TV reporter who interviews students B and C who were supposed to be famous people; I asked students to be creative and funny and they were very, very funny by the time they were acting. We all have a lot of fun and laugh with their performances; I tried to make the interviews more vivid by playing talk-shows’ intro music at the beginning, and by playing clapping’s sounds when they finished their interview. It was very cool! After the role-plays, I let students know about the most common mistakes that I could notice during their performance; I did it in general and just as a remainder.

For the wrap-up, we played “ The hot potato”; the lucky student who had the medium dice in his/her hands when the music stopped, talked about his/her habits or daily routines for 30 seconds  without stopping. When I gave students the instructions, I reminded them to use the target grammatical structure, which I consider it’s very important. Finally, I let students know about the most common mistakes that I could notice during their participation and I asked the participants if we should give the rest of the students a candy and they said: “No”; nevertheless, I gave them all a candy.

All in all, what I liked the most from this class was that it was very interactive, It was student-centered, we all had fun and students were excellent actors and participants; I’m going to miss this group!

My second teaching experience

                                                       Monday, February 11^th 2013

Hello once again!

I’m so excite it to tell you about my second experience because everything went so well; it was wonderful to me, I didn’t have any problems with anything, of course, my tutor and peer gave me a couple of suggestions for the things that I need to improve, but I feel very, very satisfied with my performance of that day.

Some of the things that really help me to be less stress and consequently teach better were the facts that I could work on my lesson plan as well as rest during the weekend; in addition, I applied all the pieces of advice that my tutor gave me in my previous feedback.

What went well after all?

Everything went well thanks GOD. I began the class with a mimic game and I gave all students a candy to motivate them. Then, I used a short reading, which had many pictures; students listened to the audio's reading and then I asked some comprehension questions about it. Finally, students underlined the sentences that had the target grammatical structure, which was the simple present tense. For the next activity, students stood up and worked in groups of four to discuss some questions for 5 minutes. The last two activities were the ones that students enjoyed the most since I developed them outside the classroom, on the basketball court for being more specific. For the penultimate activity, which was called “find someone who…?”, I asked students to make a circle in order to give them directions about it and then to check their results. For the wrap –up, I developed a TPR activity in which students needed to speak and listen to their classmates too; it was called “Swap place if you…”.

About my feedback:

Well, I’d like to share it because I think it can be very helpful for you too guys. Among the positive observations that my tutor gave me were: enthusiasm, good CCQ, good transitions among activities, good activities, good interaction with students and he also liked that at the beginning of the class I gave students a piece of paper so that they could write their name on it and paste it on their chest. On the other hand, my tutor advised me to do not give too many directions at the same time; this is something that I already knew, but that I couldn’t avoid at the moment of teaching. Hence, my tutor shared with me a technique to give directions better; he told me to use only three verbs at once, for example: “Stand up, come to the board and work in groups of four”.

So, this was my second teaching experience at UNICAES and I really enjoyed it; I really hope that the rest of them can be even better and I wish the same for you too.

My first teaching practice at UNICAES in the ACCESS program

                                                                                                               Friday, February 8th 2013

Hello everyone, I hope you be doing well with your practice.

My first teaching practice was on Friday, I taught a teenagers’ group of the ACCESS program. 

At the beginning of the class I felt very nervous because you know, it was the first time and I really wanted to do a great job. At the end, my performance was not the one that I expected because of my nerves, I was very, very nervous so I committed some grammatical and pronunciation mistakes; however, it was not that bad, it was just that it was not the way that I expected because I knew that I could have done it better.

In regard with my lesson plan, everything was very good and appropriate for the student’s level of English and for their likes; I used a song with a rap rhythm to teach grammar just like teacher Melendez taught us, I cut the lyrics into pieces so that students could pasted their part of the song on the board when they listened to it in the song. I also used some flashcards to get them speak during the warm-up and the worksheet for the controlled-practice had some pictures too; I think pictures always help students to understand better an activity and they also motivate them.

About the students:

I taught a group of 19 students, they are teenagers who are still in high-school, but they already speak English since this is their second year at the ACCESS program. I had a really good time with this group because they are smart, obedient, willing to participate and willing to learn; in addition, they respect you as a teacher and they also respect your class. My advice to you for this group is that you should include many speaking activities as well as TPR activities not only because they like them, but also because these activities help them to be more “awake” during the class.

About my feedback:

I received two feedbacks for this class, one from my tutor and the other one from the teacher of the group that I taught. The pieces of advice that both teachers gave me were tremendously helpful for me. I’m going to tell you the things that they liked and the things that they advised me to improve so that you can take advantage of my experience too. My tutor liked the lesson plan in general, he especially liked the song and the fact that I taught grammar with a song; he also liked the transitions that I did among the activities and that all the activities were perfectly matched with the objective.

The teacher and my tutor advised me to ask students to speak aloud in this way: “I’m sorry, what did you said?” and put my hand on my ear. This is because some students don’t speak aloud. They also advised me to use more CCQ and to do not speak while I’m writing on the board because this is as if I was talking to the board; this last comment was kind of funny for me, but that was what I did in first class and they told me that it is something that often happens to novice teachers.