Category: Reflections

Date: Feb. 13 Guhyan Elementary School Open Class (30 minutes)

    The teacher starts by introducing herself and giving an example of what she wants the students to do. She goes around to each student and encourages them to speak loudly and clearly, helping them when they need it. She uses teams to gives students the incentive to answer questions for points. She uses a rhythm to gain students attention, which is very effective at getting students to quiet down and pay attention and get the class back on track. The class is quite repetitive for the first half as she gets students to memorize items on a board, which I’m not sure would be entirely effective at teaching vocab. However, she incorporates the vocab into a more physical activity afterwards, which would be more effective at teaching the material. While this was quite a simple lesson, I think it was appropriate for what they were learning, and incorporated some good teaching techniques.

Date: Feb. 12 ESL Demo Class-Mike’s Home ESL (1 hour)

    This class is much smaller than the previous, with only 7 students. He uses the same points method as in the previous class to give them a learning incentive. The method of teaching he uses is total physical response and incorporates lots of movement and energy into the lesson. This may not be the best way for all students, but gets these ones up and moving, and ready to learn. He uses rhymes and songs as well to get the students singing along and remembering what they’ve been learning. Throughout the class, he incorporates many methods of teaching, making sure that different learning strategies are used, as different students may have different strengths and weaknesses when it comes to learning. Having such a small class, he is able to single students out to assess their learning and get them speaking on their own. He then gets them speaking in pairs on their own and having a small conversation with each other while facilitating and helping them with words. He acts out the things he would like them to say and asks them to guess what he is acting out. This way he can see what their understanding is of the vocabulary and allows the students to think for themselves and answer on their own. This was a very well planned-out class that was high energy and engaging, and I will definitely be using these activities in future classes of my own.

Date: Feb. 12 Full ESL Class-Mike’s Home ESL (1 hour)

    This class demonstrates how to handle and teach a large class, which in this example, is a class of 55 students in China. The teacher starts with a warm-up that introduces the lesson. This warm-up gets the students up and moving, getting them ready for class. This is a great way to ensure students are awake and energized in order for them to be ready to learn. He then checks the students understanding with a short, fun video. As he goes over the subject, he encourages the students to repeat after him and he uses lots of hand signals to represent family members, which is what he is teaching about. He also encourages students to raise their hands to answer questions and is very positive when giving feedback. He does the reading together with the class, then gets the students to stand up and act out the reading. This is great because it gets the students physically moving and incorporating the words into their activities. As the class moves on, he splits the children into groups and checks their understanding in their small groups. He uses points to encourage learning, which I think is great, as it gives the students incentive to do well. This video is a great example of how to handle a large classroom, and keep all the students engaged and learning.

Date: Feb. 11 Building Literacy with Adult Emergent Readers (30 minutes)

This class focused on adult learners and is focused on reading, but also practises speaking in order for students to know how to apply what they’ve learned. The teacher reads out the text in order for students to connect the spoken words with the written word. The students read and speak the words and repeat multiple times what they are reading to solidify what they are learning. When going over the pronunciation, the teacher chooses specific words that sound the same or rhyme. She gets students up and moving by getting them to come to the board and create sentences together from the reading. The game that they play later in the class is great for recognizing the words that they are learning. The students use a fly swatter to hit words that are printed on the board and the first one to hit the correct word wins. The teacher later has the students work together in groups to spell the words, again cementing their understanding of the words. This class uses a variety of activities to engage students and help with their literacy and was very well planned and taught.

Date: Feb 10 TEFL Like a pro (Multiple Videos, 2 hours)

    This observation was of many classes taught to English learners. The women teaching use simple explanations of the lesson and ask students lots of questions to get students talking. They practice real-life worksheets such as applications or essays. This gives them the tools to do these things on their own. Other teachers in the example ask open-ended questions to get students to speak their mind, then gets students to read out assignments on their own with the class. There are many examples of students speaking together on their own in pairs while the teacher facilitates. There are also examples of bodily-kinesthetic activities, where students use objects to improve their understanding of writing and listening content. One of these games is a board race, with teams running back and forth from a board to categorize vocabulary. The teacher uses chocolate bars to encourage her students to run to and from the board and go as fast as possible. This game could be played in a small or large class and can be changed depending on what the class is learning. The videos go over bad teaching habits, such as repeating students answers and interrupting students. This was a good example video to watch so that I know what some of the common bad habits there are and can try to avoid them. All of the activities and lessons that are shown and demonstrated are great ideas to use for future classes. Activities like role-playing, board games, and mingles are all great ways to get students talking and interacting with each other in English. These videos are a great resource for watching in the future, as they go over a wide range of classroom activities and examples for what to teach in the classroom.

Date: Feb. 5 OUC English class in Japan (1 hr)

    The teacher of this class was more old fashioned then the previous teachers in Korea, however, he still manages to engage the students in different ways and teach a good lesson. When he introduces himself, he also gives his name in Japanese for students to understand easier. He uses hand gestures to convey meaning and is very open and friendly. When he puts students into groups, he gets them to read through the assignment while he walks to each group to see how they are doing. While he does encourage students to speak in English, he does speak Japanese to relate to them and tells them his processes for learning another language. By telling them how he learned a language, it encourages students that he will be able to teach them how to do it too, and he encourages them by telling them that they will be able to learn the language. While this teacher seems very good at his job, there is quite a bit of teacher talk, and the students don’t get to practice their English very much. He also doesn’t use any visuals or play any fun activities, which is less engaging for students and could lead to students becoming bored and not listening. In general, a good lesson, but more interactive activities could be used.

Date: Feb. 3, 2021 (1 hour) EFL Class in Korea (EPIK) 

This fast-paced ESL class in Korea was almost like a performance. The teachers were very animated and had a well-planned out lesson. During the lesson, they used a variety of methods to keep students engaged and to aid in learning the language. Additionally, they use prizes to give incentive for students to answer questions and take part in activities. I really like the idea of using a clap to signal for the students to listen, and I remember one of my elementary school teachers doing the same thing. It really cuts through the noise if the students are working in groups, and uses auditory cues to keep the lesson under control. The game that they play is fast-paced, which gets students thinking on their feet and engaged with the class. When students are unsure of an answer, one of the teachers asks them leading questions tha hint at the answer, which gets students to think and come up with the answer without it being explicitly told to them. Familiar characters are shown on the whiteboard with dialogue, as the students are young and interested in things like Hello Kitty and Superman. Overall, this class was very creative in the uniques ways that the students were engaged, and the teachers were enthusiastic and captivating with their props, music, and games.

Class (Beginner Level 1-2) Date: Jan. 20, 2021 (1 hour) Tanya Cowrie Class

Tanya seems like a very experienced, positive, and caring English teacher. Her class was well planned, interactive, and enjoyable to watch, and I’m sure, participate in. She begins with a warm-up activity that reviews the previous lesson, reminds students what they’ve learned and reinforcing the language that they were taught. Throughout the lesson, she uses props and images to better engage students and make it a more hands-on learning environment. She uses simple and slow language and praises students frequently when they give her answers. For her go fish activity, she goes through the game first with one group and the others watching, making sure that they understand. This is to ensure that students do not get confused when sent into their own groups and so that they can ask questions together. When they break into their separate groups, Tanya walks around and helps those who need it, but also allows students to make mistakes and try to figure out how to play on their own. After the game ends, she again reviews what they have been taught to further solidify their understanding of the language. For her closing activity, she assesses what they’ve learned by getting them to answer a question before they leave that has to do with the vocabulary that they’ve learned.

Class (Intermediate Level 4-5) Date: Jan. 27, 2021 (Jason Brown) (2 hours)

Hour One

During my time observing Jason, I saw what a teacher who is very comfortable and calm looks like. At the start of the lesson, he had a slide up showing what the homework was to remind students, which is a really good idea, as it reminds students what they have been learning and what the class will be about that day. He then got students rather than himself to remind the class what they did last class, giving them an opportunity to practice their speaking. He helps out if any student is unsure and is very positive and encouraging. As he reads through what the reading is, he makes sure to repeat what he’s said multiple times in case anyone has trouble understanding. He also asks questions frequently and chooses students to answer and speak on the mic.

Hour Two

In the second half of the class, Jason used breakout rooms to split the students into groups and discuss together what adjectives could be used to describe certain characters in the story they were reading.  Before this, he makes sure students know what an adjective is, and asks if there are any questions, as he does frequently throughout the lesson. After each activity he goes through the answers with the students, making sure that they know that there is no wrong answer. He shows many examples and samples so students know what their work should look like, and actually goes through a full essay and reads through it for them. One small criticism I had for the class was that there was quite a bit of teacher talk as Jason was explaining everything that was needed for the essay. Other than that, it was a well-executed class.