Finishing my countable experiences, but just adding to the uncountable learning

Finally, I got to the end of my teaching practicums. This last time, I had the opportunity to teach countable and uncountable nouns to my basic students. I started with a warm up that I call : “my mom went to the supermarket and bought…” Each students had to choose the name of a food or a drink and whenever they heard their names they had to say the sentence my mom went to… finishing with a different name of fruit or drink and so on. The idea was to arise students sense of alert and to practice the target vocabulary.

Then, I was coincidentally supposed to teach grammar points again ( I have done it several times so far ); moreover, I was supposed to develop an appendix from the handout, so I took out my charts this time because I had already taught grammar with Presentations and I wanted to vary my methodology, and I started explaining. I enjoyed giving that explanation as I always do; however, I made the mistake of asking my students to help me create examples right after my explanation, and my tutor told me that in basic you first give your own examples; then, you ask them to help you with more examples, and you give the practice at the end. 

I had my students develop appendix six which was about the use of how much and how many with uncountable and countable nouns, and that is how thanks to this subject, I could count my ninth teaching practicum that added more experience to this uncountable learning regarding teaching at university level.

Thanks for reading and commenting friends! Regards!

There is a new entry where there are many new experiences

I had the chance to develop the topic there is/there are this time. I tried to connect the warm up with the Unit 9 (The House) by making a game in which students were to identify, run, and grab the corresponding item of the house. It was a 2 groups competition that helped me to start with the practice I was supposed to develop. 

The following point in the agenda included some exercises from the handout and one from the book, all of these exercises were written, so I took a lot of time to explain, help, and check them. It’s incredible the time that basic students take to solve something that for us would take like five minutes.

 

Since my tutor asked me to develop an oral activity, I designed my own.  I asked them to get in pairs in order  to sit back to back; then, I gave one of each pair a picture, and the other one just a sheet of paper. I had the student who had the picture describe to his partner the images using the target grammar, and I noticed while I was monitoring that they did pretty well. There is a great experience when you achieve meaningful learning, I believe my students did. Here's the picture I used.

Memories from the Past (Simple Past)

This first class in the basic level made me remember many things, especially because my tutor was the same teacher I had when I was in basic, but in this blog entry I’m just going to share the memories I have from the recent past, teaching Simple Past.

Everything started with a warm up oriented to favor memorization skills. I wrote a short paragraph on the board and I had my students read it several times, but each time I erased at least 3 or four words, at the end I gave a prize to the ones that memorized the paragraph.  After that we went through a reading about Michael Jackson, and I made my students follow the reading by playing hot seats at the same time.

I gave them some questions which they were supposed to discus and answer; eventually, I noticed they were taking too much time to answer them, and that was not so good since I still had to develop a grammar explanation and an oral practice; Unfortunately, due to the time, I was just able to explain the interrogative and negative forms of the past. Good news my kind tutor said that there was no problem, and she took care of the practice, but I still think I shouldn’t let that happen again. I will use that memory from the past to become a better teacher in the future.

Being Observed & Recorded

This time, I did not get pictures of my class because I got a video of it. I thought I was going to get more nervous, but I fortunately did not. I started to prepare my students  for the topic by playing  the game "the golden letter" in which students, in groups of four people, made a competition about writing words on the board according to the letter considered golden, the golden letter would change every certain period of time. I did not erase the words  on the board because I had plans for them later on.    

  

My second activity was a short quiz that the book presented in order to answer the question: Are you a chocoholic? First, I asked the students to answer it and discuss it in groups of three; Then, I asked them as a group what the results were. I did my best to make them talk since only three of them were eager to participate.

Remember the words on the board? I used them to introduce the topic “countable and uncountable nouns”. I asked the students to help me eliminate the ones that were not nouns and they did it pretty well (at least the ones who participated); After that, I explained the difference between countable and uncountable nouns so that they could classify which of the words left were countable nouns and which were uncountable nouns. Moreover, I explained the use of  much and many and I ended up with some drills to reinforce my explanation.

I think I struggled more with the student’s attitude than with the fact that I was being recorded, but I did not get upset because that is something I can’t have total control of.

“Looking over” some phrasal verbs

Our teaching practicum can also be seen as a mean to learn more or to reinforce the knowledge we already have. In this opportunity I had the chance to learn a lot when studying phrasal verbs for my practicum since I never studied that topic as such; however, it was not a hard task to investigate about separable and inseparable phrasal verbs. I prepared a presentation and practice and here’s how it came about.

I took up the lesson with a warm up called hot balloon, like hot potato, but in this case the student who stayed with the balloon when the music stopped would blow up the balloon and define target vocabulary that was written on a piece of paper inside the balloon. We all had fun playing and going over the vocabulary.

After that, I started to explain the difference of separable and inseparable phrasal verbs by using an interesting presentation I had prepared; moreover, we tried to come up with some examples by using a 3 pages list of phrasal verbs I had downloaded from the web, so I was really busy writing examples and solving students’ doubts for some time.

The last thing I developed was a crossword solving that my tutor had suggested me to use to have the students working on something they like; therefore, this was another successful class in which I learned not just teaching skills but also interesting phrasal verbs that I’m looking forward to using the rest of my career. ;)

The Origin of the Second Part

It is definitely not the same to teach in the afternoon than to teach in the morning. I’m personally enjoying more this second period in which I’m supposed to teach in the morning because  both  students and the teacher are more alert and with more disposition; however, they may always occur unexpected situations. This morning, for instance, I got very early to my classroom and I noticed some of my students were talking outside the classroom, and I didn’t know that they were arguing until another student told me that both girls were crying.  Students seemed a little curious about the situation as they were getting into the classroom, just a few of them were early, so I decided to start preparing the material expecting  nothing terrible could  happen.

I pasted the agenda on the whiteboard, and I started the class with the few students that were there on time. The warm up I designed was called “give me good luck”, it consisted in having one student tell me a number and counting students until finding the lucky one according to the number mentioned. The lucky student was supposed to tell me what he/she remembered about the previous class. I did it like four times; then, I gave the students a page with the exercises my tutor had given me and I assigned them an appropriate time to work; after that, we checked them as a group and I solved all the doubts they had about the topic even though there were some I hadn’t considered. The last point in the agenda was a reading from the book, I took advantage of this part to check students’ pronunciation, to arise their participation and discussion, and  to clarify some vocabulary. They asked me for a word I have already checked but had forgotten in the moment, so I recognized I didn’t remember and took out my phone and checked it.

The students who were arguing outside never got into the classroom, but there were no more surprises; therefore, I can assure that nothing went wrong, yet I learned that next time I check vocabulary at home, I will keep it written so that I don’t have to take out my cell phone when teaching, in case I don’t remember.

you reap what you sow

This last class  in the advanced group made me remember myself when I was still studying grammar points.
I started with a small review to please my tutor. I just made some questions about fronting and inversions and I gave the students who participated a lollipop; then, I started the presentation I had prepared to teach hedging where what marked my experience was the insistence of this student in asking something I was not really sure about.

I was explaining everything when I asked students to create some examples using hedging, and this particular student gave me a kind of weird example. At the beginning I felt a little unconfident, but then I came up with an explanation which made me doubt a little bit, so I stopped that part and kept on explaining; surpisingly, the same student came up again with a similar situation like to set me in Jake again. In that moment, I remember I liked to do the same and that sometimes teachers even told me " you know,  I don't think I have the right answer." but somehow I couldn't say that, so I replied him saying him that I thought that I was telling him was the right thing, yet implying that I was not really sure; obviously, that affected my grade, so I decided that next time I face a similar situation I will directly say I don't know the right answer. The rest of the class was just me explaining and the students asking and providing examples.

I don't see this as a bad experience because I learned a great lesson, and I didn't get a bad grade anyways. I think I was too nervous to recognize my error, but hopefully that won't happen again; moreover, I suggest you to take note of it before it happens to you. I hope you had been a good student. You know what they say "you reap what you sow."