3rd Class at Intermediate English I

Today´s class was much better than the previous one because students were using the structure in different speaking and writing activities I developed.

The activity that went well was a television interview in which I asked the students to practice a conversation between a TV presenter and a doctor. It was about a new flu shot people were getting. It was very nice because I asked for volunteers to perform it in front of the class....and guess what....I had volunteers!!! At the end, the other students who did not participate in front of the class, chose the best group by giving claps to the best presentation. I liked that they were developing the roles (TV presenter and doctor) very well.

The activity that did not go so well was the warm-up activity because once again, it was interrupted by the late comers. Fortunately, I knew that it is not their fault to come late. I asked some students why they were coming late and they said that they have classes in the same building and that their professor finishes the class too late. I did not believe, but my tutor teacher went upstairs to see if that was true, and he saw that most of the students were still attending the class!! . Again, it took too much time because the ones that were just coming wanted to do the activity.

I noticed that the activity in which the students spoke more was when I asked them to discuss 10 questions I brought to the class. Some of the questions were:

-What has been your biggest fear?
-Who has been the person you have admired the most?
-Have you ever loved somebody forbidden?

I asked them to discuss these questions with a classmate and then, I asked them to share their answers. Something good is that they were giving reasons. For example, one student said that the person he has admired the most is his mother because she has played many roles in his life. She has been his mother and his best friend. He also said that because of the good relation they have, she has been everything for him.

I had planned to develop 4 activities and the warm-up (5 in total) but unfortunately, I just could develop 4 activities because I lost time in the warm-up. I thought that my tutor teacher was going to tell me something about it, but he told me that it is better to do few well developed activities in which students are going to learn and use the structure at the end of the class, than developing many activities in which students will do the things in a hurry and won´t be able to use the structure.

If I teach that lesson again, I will bring different activities in which the students will use the structure in different ways because in this class, they were practicing just speaking and writing. I noticed that they need to practice the other skills, too!

Second Class at Intermediate English I.

In this class, the students were studying the modals of probability.
In the warm-up activity, the students were using the structure really well. The activity was “class secrets”. I asked them to write a sentence about a classmate. They were saying funny things like:
-He/She will marry a famous person.
- This person may keep a serious secret.

The problem was that it took too long for being a warm-up activity. Later, I couldn´t develop an activity I had planned. As you can see, I still have the same problem with time!!

The activity that didn´t go so well was a song I brought. I asked them to share some ideas based on the name of the song (A harvest for the world). I played the song and I asked them to pay attention to the lyrics. I wanted the shy students to participate but unfortunately, they were not able to understand the message of it even when I brought the lyric in a big chart for them to read it while they were listening it. At the end, I wanted the students to sing the song, but they took it as a joke!! Even the tutor teacher asked them to participate, but it did not work.

For my next class, I am planning to separate them from their friends because they speak too much Spanish and most of the time they don´t know what to do in the activities because they don´t pay attention. I guess that this is the hardest experience I´ve had.

If I teach that lesson again, I will bring a short activity as warm-up because the one I did in this class took too much time. I will also include only the students that arrive on time because I lose time giving directions to the students that come late.

My First Class at Intermediate English I

This class was really interesting for me because I knew almost all the students; that is why I just had to memorize like six new names but it was very easy.
I noticed that the students liked the warm up activity. It was a TPR activity called “class secrets” in which they needed to be as quickly as possible because it was a competence between two groups. I gave them some troubles and the first group to pass them had the opportunity to take one piece of paper containing a question. This group had to answer the question by giving a complete sentence.
Example: Who may secretly be in love?
The group said a name of someone they thought may be in love. If the group made a mistake structuring the answer, they lost the point.

At the end the group with more points was the winner.

Then, the activity that went well was one in which the students were sharing some ideas and they were using the required structure (may, will, might, won´t). I brought a chart in which there were some incomplete sentences, the students were adding information according to them.
Example: In five years…………..
Students: In five years I will be a professional.
In five years I may buy a car.
All their answers were really good and what I liked is that the prompts I brought made them think about the things they may, might, will or won´t do.

The activity that did not go so well was a competence activity. I brought a chart that had incomplete sentences. The sentences did not have the modals (may, might, will, won´t) so, I asked them to make three groups and I gave to each group the modals that were missing (in small pieces of paper in different colors). Each group had a different color. I read the sentences and they had to paste the correct modal I mentioned. The group that pasted it first was going to get a point. I did not like so much this activity because the students were making a kind of mess and the activity did not work as I had planned it. Also, the room was kind of small and I did not have the space I needed for the activity.

Fortunately, time was not a problem for me in this class. I know that it has been a challenge for me in every class, but this time it wasn´t.

If I teach that lesson again I will develop activities according to the way the students work. I will also think about the space I have in the classroom and if I know that it is too small, I won´t bring activities in which the students need enough space. Finally, I will take into account if the activity I plan to develop can create a problem, especially if it can create a mess in the class.

My last class at Advanced English I!!!!

If a doctor, lawyer, or dentist had 40 people in his office at one time, all of whom had different needs, and some of whom didn't want to be there and were causing trouble, and the doctor, lawyer, or dentist, without assistance, had to treat them all with professional excellence for nine months, then he might have some conception of the classroom teacher's job. ~Donald D.

My last class was really interesting because the students were studying discoveries and inventions. It helped me a lot to remember some discoveries I studied when I took this subject. In other words, I learned more about it in order to teach it to the students!

The part of the lesson that went very well was a short debate I developed at the end of my class. I divided the class into two groups and I gave each group an invention or discovery. They had to say the advantages and whatever information to prove that the invention/discovery they had was better than the one the opposite group had. They also said the disadvantages of the opposite group´s topic. Some of the shy students were participating, but not all of them!! I did not want to push them to participate because they had done a great job in other activities.

The part of the class that did not go so well was the warm-up activity because I had some problems establishing the rules of the game.

In the grammar phase, as always, the students were participating asking questions and giving examples. I presented the structure (past perfect tense) and almost all the work was done by the students. I just gave them some examples and then I gave them the beginning of sentences and they began adding ideas to complete it (orally).
Some examples of the prompts I gave are:
I did not have any money because...
Students´answers:
I had spent too much.
I had lost it.
I hadn´t worked.

They felt bad about selling the house because....
They had spent a lot of money on it.
They had lived there for a long time.
It works very well for advanced students!

Unfortunately, I had problems with the time I was going to give to each activity. I could not develop the final activity I had in my plan. My tutor teacher told me that this is the challenge I have in almost every class. I have noticed that I spend too much time when I am developing speaking activities, but it happens because I like when students are motivated to participate that is why I prefer that they continue speaking instead of stopping the activity when I know that what they are sharing is really important to reach my objective, and at the same time they are improving in different skills.

If I teach that lesson again or whatever other class I will try to be careful with the time I spend in the activities because as one of my classmates says, we have to distribute time according to the level of difficulty the activities have!

I learned a lot from this group and I liked to work with them because as I have said in other journal entries, they are a good group of students that like to participate and they give really nice ideas!
I also learned many things from my tutor teacher. He shared some ideas with me in order to help me develop my classes. He showed me how to turn a boring activity into something interesting for the students. He has a great ability to make students participate.

I would work with this group without thinking twice!!