First Group Teaching

To protect the identity of the teacher and the students, all names are made up.

It was short 40 minutes lesson that I taught for the speaking/listening class. The teacher (Candy) had a meeting for last half of the class, so I worked on their vocabulary part inside of the book. There was a sub-teacher (Lily) which made me feel more relaxed. I was nervous because I wasn't sure I could explain all the vocabularies to the students. It wasn't because I don't know the meaning of the words, but I mostly have trouble coming up with easier words or good explanations for the words. However, I wanted to try.

I couldn't plan it well, first of all. Candy told me brief things that she wanted me to do. It wasn't too hard to plan roughly what I need to do, but one thing I was worried about is; I'm not experienced as much yet.

Before I went on to the chapter, I made the students look at the picture to let them know what the chapter was about. I wish I could have went over the cool pictures on next pages, but I didn't plan anything, so I skipped it. For the sentences in the box, I asked students to read around the lobby. Maybe I should have picked students out randomly instead of going around. But this was hard for me. So I let them read around, but I didn't explain the meaning of vocabs or sentences. Lily helped me while I was asking students to read the sentences; she would correct their pronunciation, or explain some words. Then, I asked them to work on the definition silently. I saw many students were struggling, and Lily suggested maybe we should go over the sentences again, and explain the definition of the words while we read it. And it worked nicely. Some of the students already finished the part B, but I think it helped other students to understand what the words mean.

Then I paired up students; I had trouble thinking how I should pair them up. I matched them up depending on their performances in the class. I let Jane (I think she is in the most advanced level in this class) work with Joy (she had trouble with fill in the blank test before), and Bear (I think he is in similar level as Jane, but maybe little bit less than her) with Jim (he is not really motivated, and I'm not sure how good he is), Honey (she has trouble saying /p/ vs. /b/) with Aurora (her English is also very advanced as much as Jane), then other four guys (I can't come up with more names right now, but I'll fix it as soon as I can) who speak same language. It seems like, instead of working as a pair, they were mostly doing it by themselves. It was understandable since they need to read and write them down instead of discuss it. The good thing I got from this pair work is that, I saw some reactions between the students, and noticed that some students weren't interacting with each other. I felt like, maybe they don't want to work together. So, after going over the sentences, and Lily helped me explaining all the words that are necessary, we went to do part B.

For the last activity, I switched the pair hoping that this would work better. It seems like, Bear and Jim doesn't interact each other as much, also Honey and Aurora. I paired up Bear with Honey, and Aurora with one of the student who was sitting next to her. Jim also worked with one of the guy from the other side. Kris, who was in one of four guys who speak same language, had trouble understanding the question. While Lily was helping John who was Kris's partner, I sat down next to Kris, and helped him. However, he couldn't comprehend "which one is the most interesting fact" from the passage. So I talked with him with the easier questions "what makes you in a good mood and bad mood" and he understood and spoke about it.

All the students were talking in English, and it seems like they were enjoying the discussion. I couldn't go around and wrap things up which I really wish I could have done it, but we ran out of time.

Next time, if I get to have a change again, I should talk about vocabs that seems like difficult for them. Even thought it's hard for me to explain, I should try. Only practice makes lesson better.

Do I plan too much?

After every class, I always felt like I didn't teach enough. And that was because we never finished all the activities that I planned. For my second class, I planned to do some family tree and numbers. However, the second class got canceled, so I had more time to think about, how to help my student to read some alphabet. I borrowed some books from my teacher, and copied one chapter--it was only ten pages with simple sentences such as "Pat has a hat" or "Tom hops the rock". The first chapter was focusing on /a/, /o/, and /i/, and it looked very simple. I thought, once she can read one or two sentences, she can pick up the letters and start reading it.

So I put this one chapter before all the family trees and number activities because I thought once she knows how to read, she might be really excited to read all the family trees and numbers!

However, the class went way different than I thought it would be:

First of all, even though I read the sentences and let her repeat the sentences, if the sentence has more than three words, she forgets how to read (or how to mimic the sound) the last one or two words. It seems like, she can't connect the sound of the words and the spelling at all.

Second of all, she has some very strong connection between the alphabet /t/ and the sound /k/ (or some sort of velar sound).

Third of all, she just can't remember (not that she is not smart, but I just think reapetition isn't her strong field).

The first two pages took almost 40 minutes because she started talking about the "hat" she had at her work, and then she talked about "cat" (oh yes, we were learning /a/ sound).

Then, she forgets how to read "Pat." Same thing happened to "Tom." She kept read "Tom" as some sort of /kam/, even after I read it for her several times. It was hard for me to disconnect the sound and alphabet she already made with this method.

At the end, reading four pages of this chapter took one and a half hour. All I could do was giving her homework; write down alphabet and review those four pages.

I still have these plans that I would probably never get to do.

Now I'm going to use Language Experience Approach (LEA). The main activity would be doing "steps." For example, I'll ask her if she knows how to make an orange juice (now I think about it, I think she'll just buy orange juice rather than make it... so maybe I can ask her how to make rice or something).

I just hope that with this methods, I can plan just enough, and my student gets interested in these new activities.

Goals: Having small goals helps students to be motivated

Well I tried to make my title more professional so I skipped putting "I think." Anyway, the reason why I think that having small goals would help students is that, because it did help me. I guess lots of teachers (and also students) know about this, but I still wanted to write about my experience in the ESL class.

When I was in the ESL class, I took this one class which was very unique--American culture through sports. We were there to study and learn about the American culture through sports, and our ultimate goal is to improve our English skills, but we had small goals for each chapters. We didn't have any textbook (which I really liked about this class) so each chapter was certain sports that we picked--any sports that we would like to learn (i.e., baseball, basketball, football, and so on).

First week or so was about the baseball. I think we spent one day learning about the game--rules, little bit of history, and maybe some songs that you can sing when you go watch the game. Next class, we would actually meet outside, and play the game! Then next class, we'll have some discussion about how was the game, and what kind of rules that we knew, and so on. We had small assignments like study about the game beforehand, or present the sports that I like. This was fun because it wasn't just about learning English itself. We were improving our English skills with various activities.

So each week or so, we'll have different goals--"Let's learn about this sports".

Not only we learned about the rules, we learned about the culture. What people think about football in America versus in Japan? What kind of sports is popular in America? And why?

Because we knew that after we learned about the game, we played the game, we were so excited to learn all those rules and memorize them, for fun!

I know that language classes can be really boring even with various chapters in the textbooks because the ultimate goal for the class is "learning and developing the English skills" . Plus, most of the students are already in the language class for at least few months. Probably more than 8 months for the students who are in the advanced level. I know the fact that when I was in one of those English classes, I did really feel like all the classes were boring--even though I did have really fun classes because I felt like I can't reach my goal, ever.

So I always think about, how can I make the students more motivated (or keep motivated)?

Remind them about their ultimate goals like getting into the University?

Make the class more fun (if that's possible)?

Use new technologies?

Those seemed to be all great ways to make them motivated.

And I just wanted to add one more way--set some small goals which is not really about improving English skill only. Something more tangible that students can feel like they finished something (i.e., learn about sports, cooking, books, or maybe even songs).

Then maybe, when they accomplish those small goals, they'll be more motivated (hopefully).

ps. Please add "I think" on the title and various parts of this post. Thank you.

ps2. I'm trying to be vague about where I took the classes and so on, just in case. Hope I don't get in trouble by mentioning some of classes that I took...