Logbook part 2

Facultad CIencias de la Educación

María Ignacia Aguilar Haase Teacher’s Name: Heather Bruyere Major: English Teaching

Personal Logbook  May 20th, 2015 This day, during the PIP VI class, we worked again with the five criteria we have to take into consideration at the moment of creating an assessment tool. We evaluated 10 different ways to assess knowledge, and we shared and discussed our answers, giving reasons why we scored them in that way. The objective seemed to be to make us reflect upon how important is to think on what we really want to assess, before creating the tool. The activity, because of the intended aim, was good enough. In addition, it helped us to remember the key concepts, and to recall previous knowledge that, in my personal case, I would try to take into consideration at the moment of designing my own evaluation tools in my future job as a teacher. If the chance appears, I would try to do it at my teaching practice school as well, if I get the opportunity to actually teach, or do something more productive than just being “teacher’s support”.  May 21st, 2015 I did not have classes at school because of the holiday.  May 27th, 2015 PIP VI class was based on two microteachings. The first one was a task based activity, which consisted on identifying music’s genre, while watching a video.

After that, we were asked to work in groups and create a band, choosing a genre and write 3 titles of songs, expressing feelings. The activity was great, because we all had fun working on it. In addition, we were all force to talk, due to we had to make decisions, so it was really communicative and well applied.

The second microteaching was based on the creation of recipes. First, we were introduced some vocabulary related to the topic, and then the student – teachers showed us a sample of a recipe. Finally, in groups, we were asked to write the recipe to prepare a dish that we were told. The adaptation that was made to introduce vocabulary, and the fact that a sample of the task was shown, were two good ways to assure the success of the activity.

In general, both microteachings were well done and achieved their aims, and I would consider the first one as an option to do a dynamic class that would really catch students’ attention, due to music is something everybody likes, and also allows students to practice speaking.  May 28th, 2015 At school, students had a “Reading Fluency Evaluation”. To assess students’ fluency, the teacher called them one by one, randomly, while the rest of the class was supposed to practice their reading, in silence. The idea of evaluating them individually was good, but the problem was that the rest of the class started to misbehave, because they got tired of waiting, as they did not have any other task to do. Taking into consideration the problem that emerged with the students, what

I would have done was to give them an extra task, in order to keep everyone busy.

Considering what I mentioned before, my performance during the class was only to make sure students were in their seats, in silence, while their classmates were being evaluated.  June 3rd, 2015 PIP VI class was done by Marlene, based on a full class “microteaching”. The topic of the class was the sensory stimulation, and possible ways to do it, and what for, with our future students, at school. The class started with student – teacher asking us to massage each other. Then, we were asked to form groups, and mention ways to stimulate senses inside the classroom. Finally, we had to present our ideas to the rest of the class.

In general, it was a good class, because the student – teacher chose a topic that was interesting for students. In addition, the teacher used real materials to show us what she was talking about, and it made the class even more interesting, as she was calling our attention quite often.

The techniques that we were taught are something that I would try to apply in the future, as a teacher, because I consider them really useful ways to actually engage students to work, and so to improve my classroom management skills.  June 4th, 2015 During this day at my teaching practice center, students started to work with Flayers: Cambridge “Movers” test samples, specifically the reading and writing section. My guide teacher asked them to work in pairs to complete the tasks. The samples included different items: vocabulary section, use of language in context, and reading for gist. From my point of view, the aim the teacher was trying to achieve was related to “collaborative work”, and so practicing “language in context”.

The ideas of working with these standardized tests really catches my attention, because it is a good tool to measure students’ progress in their process of learning a foreign language, compared to the international standard. I would like to apply it someday, as a teacher, but instead of making students to work in pairs to develop complete tasks, I would ask them to work individually, in order to get a general view of how each student is improving his/her skills.  June 10th, 2015 The theoretical class of PIP VI today was in charge of Gabriela A. and Jacqueline M., based on their microteaching. The activity they prepared was designed according to the “Task – based” methodology, and consisted on first showing us a set of short movie clips, and asked some questions. Then, we were shown Titanic’s clip with the main characters’ sinking scene, in order to work in groups, and take it as a reference to rewrite that scene and create a new ending. Finally, we had to act in front of the class.

The activity itself was really productive, attractive, and entertaining to me, because it “forces” us to be creative and to actually speak. Personally, I would take the idea to apply it with high school students, in order to do something different than what they are used to, and so motivate them to be creative, especially at that point at which they do not seem to care much about activities like that.  June 11th, 2015 Today at school I was supervised, so it was my very first time actually teaching. I had to work with 6th grade A during that class and, according to my guide teacher’s requirements, I had to prepare a class about Listening Section of the Flyer Cambridge Movers Test, as a way to practice for their real test. The sample test was divided into 5 sections, which involved identifying specific information, matching, painting and drawing, according to what they heard in the recording.

By the end of the class, I checked the answers with the students, by making them to stand up and go to the board, in order to either write or match the answers, according to each section. Timing was a problem, so I could not finish correcting the last part of the test entirely. By the very end, before they went to their break, I gave them candies as a reward for their good behavior.

I consider I achieved the aim of the class, because they were able to identify the information they needed and complete the tasks.

That class help me to realize I still need to work on my classroom management techniques, especially if I have to work with primary students, and so I need to improve my time management. Despite not being able to teach till that day, I felt really comfortable with the students and what I was doing, I guess I showed it.  June 17th, 2015 During today’s theoretical PIP VI class, we worked in groups with a jigsaw reading activity about informal assessment, which included some definitions and examples of informal assessment tools. After reading and writing summaries about the texts, we had to share it with the rest of the class. Taking into account the information we read in the first module of the class, we saw and analyzed some videos with assessment tools being applied in different classes, with different purposes.

Apparently what we did was intended to show us how it works applying, in a real context, the ways and instruments to assess learning. The information and the examples seen on the videos were really useful to have a reference to find out other possible ways to evaluate if our students are learning. Techniques that I hope I will be able to apply someday, if I teach someday again during this period, or when I become a Teacher.

 June 18th, 2015 Today, at school, I was asked to help my guide teacher correcting different reading and listening tests, while students were working in pairs in order to complete another reading test. The test the teacher applied was the same they started the previous week: Flyers Cambridge Movers Sample Test. Considering the methodology my guide teacher used to apply the test, I would say it was not totally appropriate because I do not consider results are going to be totally valid, as they were working on it in pairs, and not everybody was keen on actually contributing and helping his/her classmate to complete the test. I would have asked them to work alone, in order to make sure they really worked on the task they were assigned.  June 24th, 2015 As we are almost finishing the semester, and we are running out of time to have all the marks required for the subject, we were asked to work on a microteaching based on “Assessing the four skills” that we must do the following week. In order to do that, we were told we had to work in groups, and read information according to the skill we decided we would like to teach, and prepare the class, taking into account we will be assessed on the process as well. The main purpose of this kind of activities is to both improve collaborative work, and help to process and apply knowledge.

Considering previous teaching practice experiences, I have seen that depending on students’ attitude towards the topic and the activity itself, working in groups is an excellent way to improve their social skills, the feeling of “I am part of something and what I do is important”, and a way to teach students to share responsibilities, in order to complete a tasks. That is the reason why I liked the activity, and I will keep on applying team activities to develop projects.  June 25th, 2015 Today was my last day at school, and students had a reading test about a book called “The course of the mummy”. The test was based mainly focus on identifying vocabulary and using it according to the context, and it also included some true/false questions.

My performance, as usual, was limited to help my guide teacher to control students’ behavior, help students to solve their doubts, and make sure they were not trying to cheat. Once again, my day at school was not very productive, but helping students with their doubts allowed me to practice different ways to explain concepts, avoiding giving them the answers (as they were trying to make me to).