Beetlejuice...Beetlejuice...Beetleju....

Since my video is taking forever and seven days to upload onto my computer, I have the perfect opportunity to do some “pre-viewing” reflection.

To be honest, I’m not sure how my micro-teaching went… I feel like my lesson plan was ‘solid enough’ but something felt like it was missing yesterday?  Fun, maybe??  Maybe fun was missing.

I think I established a context for the reading activity.  I think the lead in of looking at the title page worked, and the students knew what they were ‘in for.’  Similarly, I felt as though the students were ready to read, and had enough ‘instruction’ to work with.  While I’m curious to see what my T-talk was like… I do feel as though I tried to make sure I set up the TD task, as well as the TDBU task.  So…possibly what I’m bothered about was a ‘lack of enthusiasm’ from the students?  Sorry guys – I’m not saying you weren’t awesome (‘cos you KNOW you were), but it just felt like the class was too boring – and maybe I got that because the responses seemed … lacklustre. 

I tried putting in some PW – which is something new for me.  I’m trying it in my classes at school, and I’m seeing results, however, I’m not sure whether I’m so comfortable with it yet.  It’s hard for me to “let go” of all the control, I guess (hangs head in shame…)  Now, I’m not sure about how the report-back section would have gone, but I sort of foresee some problems that may have occurred. 

I wanted to have students ask each other questions “X, ask a friend question A1” I think that may have become confusing – because what if the friend wasn’t an A?  That happened yesterday when I asked Kevan what he would do…So perhaps I should rethink that whole A1, B1 thing…

I guess I’m disappointed that I didn’t get to finish my lesson.  I feel like “the good stuff” may have come later (hopefully?)

WHY is this video taking so long to load????

Ok…here I go…

My “opportunity area” feedback from my first MT centred around:

T-talk and MIC.  I was curious to see what kind of questions I used… so those are the things I focused on during the watching.

T-Talk - Here are some ‘stats’ to look at:

No-one other than me spoke for the first minute of the lesson.

When I explained the first TDBU activity (the bold sentences) – it took 1min55secs – during which there was a period of complete silence (tumbleweeds rolling around – the works…)

There was S-talk – I can hear discussion in the PW – students asking each other the questions, some comments – a general ‘buzz’ (haha  - that was NOT an intentional pun…)  – BUT…it’s definitely not a 50% ratio…

Lordy – the “A – ask B1 their question” debacle was a nightmare to listen to…

*MIC Techniques*

Hmmm… well I definitely have some repetition, some rephrasing and some “checking in” on people (the bold – dark sentence went on a bit long??)  – but… I feel like the MICs took too long… So – did they help, or did they just increase T-talk???

Questions – not  a lot other than display questions…  Perhaps later on in the LP there would have been some…maybe not…

Can someone please tell me when I’m going to learn to shut up???  I watch the video and think to myself: “Just GIVE them the reading – don’t TELL them you’re going to give them the reading…”  That was one of the first things my tutor said to me in my CELTA course… “Don’t explain it – just do it!”  Clearly that’s STILL a problem … seven YEARS later!!!

I can’t lie – I’m disappointed – this is week 9…  I see the same mistakes.  I try to “plan” for them by writing scripts in my LP – but it doesn’t help.  I tried the MIC techniques – but I’m not sure they helped either…

All that prep…and I stand up and… it’s like an “Amy Show” (yes, Tom…I see what you mean now…)

I’ve come to the conclusion that there is only one solution….  See you next week!

Korea: Have More...

I suddenly have so many things I want to blog about this week…

I will not lie – yesterday… I wished this course were over.  Yesterday I realised I would miss a wedding of some good friends of mine because of this course… following which I made it ALL ABOUT ME – and spent the evening having a complete tantrum…  I found myself in a quite the conundrum – I know I love the course… it’s been one of the best things I’ve done in the last few years… but yesterday, that didn’t seem enough…

(sigh…)

Then… this afternoon happened.  I got a call to say one of my students in my advanced class would be absent – leaving me with one student… and I had this thought, “Well – I don’t want to continue with the novel… so… hmmm why not try that ICC lesson I planned for last weekend?”  It was the perfect opportunity!

So – admittedly, the lesson couldn’t go as planned, because with only one student, there was no opportunity for PW.  Also – in me getting swept up in how much I was enjoying the class – I ‘forgot’ to add in the TL focus (In my opinion… / I think…) but she expressed herself well.  To me – it felt like a productive class.  My student was enthusiastic about the activities – and overall – I found many of her answers insightful – and quite beyond what I expected.

The Preview stage went well – we went through a print advert – and I managed to elicit the target vocabulary from her – with some MIC techniques to make it a little easier.  When we got to the Presentation stage – I did my Type 1 task of playing the commercial for 5 seconds and she guessed where she thought the commercial was filmed.  Interestingly, she thought the South African advert was British (because of the accent), and she hesitated between Korea and Japan for the Korean advert because, as she mentioned, she knew it was ‘in Korean’ but she said she felt the actors looked more Japanese.  We then did a full viewing during which she had been asked to identify who the main characters were in the commercials.  We did some feedback, and she had some comments and questions.  When we did the Type 2 task of finding the tagline, identifying the target market and thinking about what message KFC was trying to tell the viewers – she did really well!  I felt like it was a little difficult for her at first, so I rephrased questions and gave my own examples – and after that – she managed to express her thoughts with ease.

Our TDBU extension tasks of identifying values, and then going further to think of other values (not seen in the video) that are important in Korea – she gave honest, mature answers.  In fact – I think I was most excited about the mature way in which she talked about the topic, and took it seriously (bar one moment when she had some fun pausing and playing the recording…)

I realise now – I didn’t incorporate a purely BU task… (live and learn ‘ey?)

Finally, we got to the “Closing” task – to make our own tagline for Korea.  I gave her an example of the South African tagline, The Rainbow Nation, and this seemed to help her with some ideas.  We looked through the values that we had identified – and initially she said, “Money” … but I could tell she was still busy thinking of how to express her thoughts…and finally she said, “Have More.”  I can’t explain how I felt in that moment.  I don’t think I could have come up with a more appropriate answer… When I mentioned it to my co-teacher she said, “Oh…does that mean greedy?” but in all honesty, I don’t believe that my student meant that at all – I think with those words, she was able to express what is central to the motivation of many Korean people – don’t settle for less… work hard… get educated… stay honest… Have More! (It’s yours if you want it!)

In those last 5 minutes of class – all that “wedding moaning” and hostility dissolved… In that moment – it was so clear why I love this course.  It’s pushing me – and I want to Have More too!

“Ms. Amy, what do we do?”

Our microteaching in Week 6 left me with a lot of questions about the way I teach, and even the way I understand my learners, their needs, and their performance.

There were aspects of my feedback from Tom that shocked me…or maybe bothered me, not because I thought he was wrong (although the thought crossed my mind, briefly) but because they challenged me to examine whether I truly know my students.  And whether or not I actively work to creating opportunities for them to discover language on their own.

Before I give some examples of what I have noticed in the past two weeks – I’d like to mention some things that may have influenced my Microteaching performance.  Apart from the obvious challenge of trying to ‘pretend’ my classmates were my real students, there were other things that I think affected how it went.

Firstly, I had taught the exact lesson the day before (you can see the video in my 5^th blog post) and actually, I thought it went really well.  The students spoke a lot, and seemed enthusiastic to participate in the activities.  One thing I did notice was that my timing was so off, that I purposefully tried to “cut out” sections which I thought would take too long.  Perhaps my choice of such omissions (rephrasing, repetition, modelling etc.) was a large part of the problem.  I tried to ‘move the lesson along’ but by doing so, took away some of the most valuable element of the lesson.

Secondly, and this is no fault of theirs, I found it difficult to respond to my colleagues, especially when their attempts at using “Intermediate Low” language was different to what I usually hear in my class.  I am tempted to say that my students speaking proficiency was higher than that used in the MT.  What I realise is that I may not have responded in the appropriate way (I may not have attempted MICs, because I was “too stuck” in thinking of my class – and not what the learners presented – which is ultimately what I should be doing!)

One of the main things that ‘bothered me’ about my feedback was that the task I set in the preview (looking at pictures of amusement parks) may have been too difficult for speakers of this proficiency.  When I watched my video from my class at my hagwon, I feel I saw my own students interacting with the material in a positive way.  While I do think that my own students responded with more enthusiasm than my colleagues, perhaps my students’ complexity and depth of response showed their inability to fulfil the task as I had set up “tell me what is happening in this picture.” 

Another comment on my feedback related to my use of MICs (or lack thereof) as well as my Teach-talk (speed, level of complexity, direction clarity etc.)  It was funny to think that I had shortened my Teacher-Talk for the MT  - because when I watched it…I saw clearly that I had not… (Oh how will I ever stop talking…I mean, look at this blog post…it’s probably already too long…)  This point was reinforced as I was typing up my Module 1 paper in hospital – looking at the transcript was almost a joke.

I’d also like to reflect on some examples of using/or not using MICs, as well as my directions that came up this week in my class.

This week I went into the same class and we were about to start a new activity, which I asked them to do independently.  I felt myself  making sure I rephrased my directions clearly, and felt happy about the ‘confirming’ looks of the girls – and so turned around and began writing something on the board…About 3 words of writing later, I had a question from Andy, “Ms. Amy, what do we do?”  which saw my MT feedback form rushing in front of my eyes… I wish I had videoed this class to review my directions…but perhaps I don’t need to.  What is clear was that whatever my directions were, they were not clear to all the students.  Even my attempts at rephrasing didn’t help – not to sound overly dramatic – but if anything, it has highlighted to me that even though I am trying to ‘change my ways’ (and proud of myself for what I am changing, slowly) the ways I am changing still may not be enough for what the students need.

Andy’s comment really felt like a wake up call… “Wow – he may be that student who I lose every class…maybe he’s not shy?  Maybe he’s just lost…”

Incidentally…a similar thing happened on Wednesday in class.  I had written some words on the board and asked students to identify the nouns and make sentences with 3 of them… Everybody got writing – everybody was done.  I had students work in pairs to share their answers (I do pair work now…it’s great!) and when we did a quick share as a group…I noticed my ‘star student’ hadn’t followed the directions…. When that happened I – all I thought was, “right…this has got to stop…”

Knowing is not enough...

It's been a while since I blogged about my classes.  Since my last blog post, and after some feedback from Tom, I really started to take note of "what was happening in the class" vs. "what I thought was happening."  I taught a class today - and even as I was teaching, I felt like I began to see and hear signs that would confirm "feelings" I had - or observations I made.  So here is something I'm hoping will set me on a new road of "constructive blogging" with evidence - it'll be like CSI - but with (hopefully) less blood (and no Horatio... boo!)

As I was doing my lesson plan and going through each step of the 'front matter' I realised how many things I take for granted when I teach.  After the class, I realised I had 'successfully' predicted a few things, which I was proud of. Then I realised that predicting them didn't mean I was able to stop them from happening. I probably can't STOP them from happening - but being more prepared about how to deal with them when they happen is something I want to work on. 

So to begin - I'd like to talk about my TIMING...a serious issue!

My goal was to teach my 10 minute preview (with the greeting included) and then move onto the next stages of the lesson. My class ran for just over 45 minutes - and I didn't finish the preview... I KNOW that I struggle with time - I noted it in my lesson plan - but still - I didn't take active steps to address it in the class. I gave students a direction of "2 minutes" to ask each other a greeting question but, I only moved to a new stage at 6m02s (and this wasn't even moving onto the warm up!)

During the class, I felt we were moving in the direction of dialogicality (ooh - is that a word??) I thought the students were talking to each other, asking questions, giving ideas.    I felt so good about it - I kept it going.
When I watched the video, I realised that I was a little hasty in my assessment.  The students were talking and did ask questions, but I  tended to "step in" a lot - sometimes to drive questions - sometimes to answer questions posed by students myself, rather than letting other students answer.  At 13m39s - 15m34s, I'm encouraged that they all took an interest in "Abbey" - but I shouldn't have stepped in - they could (and probably would) have been able to describe her themselves.

I also noticed that I really do go on tangents... Maybe I like the sound of my own voice... It's scary to think that I "need" to include something to give a 'stamp of authority' in a monologic way... that I don't think students can self-aquire knowledge (ask John to show you that diagram in the PowerPoint...he knows the one!!!)  If you look at 10m28s - 11m22s, Ara is answering a question - but I basically 'high-jack' it and start talking about myself (sigh...) and Ara is left to listen to me.  If you continue to listen for about a minute after - Ara does have more to add - after I ask her - I have to wonder whether she would have added that before I stepped in...

What I learned - I really need to stop talking...I've said it before in a blog post - it's clearly a hard habit to break (and we won't go into teacher echo...that in itself is still shocking...)


We had some issues arise in the pair work - as predicted.  First, 'choosing' and 'manoeuvring' into pairs (1m50s - 2m45s).
Then - there were a few instances of silence in the pair work (thinking of examples.)  If you watch Ara and Andy's dialogue (from 3m29s - the pair on the left), Ara asks the question, but Andy doesn't answer.  I tried helping Andy by rephrasing and giving examples (MICs which I had thought of during the lesson plan).  He still took some time, but gave his answer at 4m11s.  In an attempt to encourage details, I suggested that Ara ask him follow up questions, which she does! Andy tried asking some follow up questions later on for his turn (although he couldn't think of any 6m35s.) Yunice also has some periods of silence (4m04s ~).  I used the same technique to try and help her, and Julie joined me in trying to give her some ideas (4m55s - 5m30s.)
I noticed that there was a lot of silence at times - especially when I'm 'booming away' with one group - the others get distracted and listen to me...

What I learned - Silence may be difficult for me at times, but I do think I took positive steps to (a) let students think for a while, and (b) give some help (rephrasing, giving examples.)  I also need to be more aware of keeping my voice at a level that isn't too overpowering during pair work.  Also - I could have spaced out the pairs a little better so they weren't on top of each other.

I began the warm up at 16m47s! I did think that my "schema activation" plan worked well!  Using pictures containing examples of some of the target vocabulary is something I have mentioned before - it worked then, and it worked today, too! 17m30s - 22m57s shows some good dialogue - however in hindsight, I probably should've stopped it a little sooner - and I definitely didn't need to go on another tangent at the 23minute mark.  I also noticed a bit of a value judgement I made about Yunice's "vomit" sounds...which I tried to cover up...

Some small things I wanted to note:  
I really liked the way the children interacted with each other - Ara asked a question based on Yunice's story - and it was directed at Yunice (22m20s)  Yunice used sound effects to create meaning for the others - that reminded me of negotiating meaning in the Interaction Hypothesis.  Julie shared stories from her family, and Andy gave his opinions on my expression in a photo.  I think this was probably the most "dialogic" part of the class - and I loved it! I did, however, still creep into the conversations at times.

The last points I'll make before I wrap up are about the vocabulary section.
Something I think worked well was: when we got to the vocabulary, I remembered Andy used the word roller coaster in the pictures activity, so instead of explaining that, I asked him to explain it to the class (28m04s)  He did a great job, and I think from his expression and enthusiasm he felt good about doing it.  
We had some difficulty explaining the word 'vivid.'  I tried using different MIC techniques to help them understand - but they kept thinking the word meant 'transparent' - probably because I used the word 'clear'.  I should probably have brought in a picture / realia (maybe a tablet with good quality display, and something else to show what vivid colours means.)

We didn't have time for the last activity - matching words to the pictures and using the word to describe the picture / or something that was happening in the picture.  This would have given me the evidence to assess one of my enabling objectives, so it's a shame I didn't get there.

All in all, I think there were some positives - and good ones, too. There were also quite a number of examples of bad habits I've formed... Things I know about - things I've realised over the years, and things I identified in the lesson planning process.  I can admit that the hardest part is always making the small, active, and consistent steps to change for the better.  Knowing is not enough.  

Watch this space for my 'kicking the habit' action plan...