Mackayzine on Bloggers

Mackayzine on Bloggers

Teaching in Nursery School

Free Songs, Dream English
Digital Storytelling
10 little pigs

When teaching nursery school, there are different methods that can be used:

• Story Telling
• Songs, flashcards and games
• Phonics

Choose one of this methods. Imagine and describe a classroom setting. Plan a lesson using the siop template, prepare the materials and perform the lesson in front of our class.

Techniques and principles in language teaching

Revision of the different methods

Work in pairs or groups of three. Choose one of the methods presented in the book by Larsen Freeman.
Read the chapter carefully. Prepare an oral report including the following:
1. Introduction or contextualization.
2. Explanation of 4 principles supported by examples taken from the corresponding chapter.
3. List and description of the techniques.
4. Two questions for your classmates (to check if they are paying attention ;)
5. After class, prepare a concept map. I suggest to download this software:http://cmap.ihmc.us/
6. Upload the concept map in your blog. Try to organize Methodology II in a different page.

Classroom Management Strategies

Classroom managment is one of the key aspects to be an effective teacher.
Work in groups of 3 and make a list of the managment problems you have observed in your practicum.
Provide some solutions.
Role-play one of the situations.
Ask your classmates to give opinions.
Listen to this video...Do you agree with the rules?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JvXzDHlKaYo&feature=related
More links to comment
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wx-BQT-V5Wg&feature=related
Classroom Management Strategies - TeacherVision.com

Are Teachers the Culprits Behind Poor Behavior?: Behavior Management Resource (Grades K-12) - TeacherVision.com

Are Teachers the Culprits Behind Poor Behavior?: Behavior Management Resource (Grades K-12) - TeacherVision.com

Behavior Management -- Proactive Measures - TeacherVision.com

Behavior Management -- Proactive Measures - TeacherVision.com

Teaching Speaking

Some other examples of speaking activities:
oral presentations
Oral news reports
Radio/tv commercials
Radio/tv show
Interview
Singing a song
Telling a tale/story
Contest
Debate
Drama (mini play)
Poem declamation
AND MOOORE :)

http://www.univirtual.it/corsi/2002_2003/bertin/download/M03.pdf
http://www.icpna.edu.pe/documentos/HOW%20TO%20TEACH%20SPEAKING%20IN%20AN%20EFL%20CLASS%20II%20-%20Carolina%20Terry.pdf

http://www.nclrc.org/essentials/speaking/goalsspeak.htm

Techniques for Eliciting

Techniques for Eliciting
Read this article carefully. I've been detecting some problems in the "elicit performance" section of the lesson plan template. This will be considered from now on and, specially, in catedra 2 and your exam.

Randall's ESL Cyber Listening Lab - For English as a Second Language

Useful links to teach LISTENING!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/skillswise/words/listening/
Randall's ESL Cyber Listening Lab - For English as a Second Language
http://www.elllo.org/
http://www.cdlponline.org/
http://grooveshark.com/ (if you want to work with songs)
http://www.englishclub.com/listening/news.htm
http://www.esolcourses.com/content/topicsmenu/listening.html
http://michel.barbot.pagesperso-orange.fr/hotpot/movies.htm
http://www.teacherjoe.us/Listen.html
http://www.englishpage.com/listening/
http://edition.cnn.com/video/

Methodology I: Classroom interaction

Dr. Harvey Silver, founder of The Thoughtful Classroom, will guide you through four learning sessions that will help you develop more effective questioning practices for your classroom. 


TASK: (taken from Ur, P. A Course in Language Teaching)
Observe one or two lessons.  After the obsevation, discuss or reflect on the following questions:
l. Was there one particular type of interaction that seemed to predominate?
2. Did teacher activity predominate? Or student activity? Or was the interaction more or less balanced?
3. How appropriate did you think the chosen interaction patterns were for the teaching objectives in the different activities?
Post your comments here :)

Methodology I (Day and Night)

Hi class!
Follow these steps for your "Topic Content: Teaching literature assignment"
1. Read the corresponding module in A Course in Language Teaching
2. Check and study the ppts  in http://www.mackayzine.cl/wordpress/?p=1012
3. Go to http://www.uamericas.cl/ and download the lesson plan template and "The Landlady"
4. Design or look for activities to teach this short story considering the two levels: linguistic content and underlying ideas (themes, values, perspectives)
5. Be 80% prepared next Monday.
6. Model one activities in front of the class.

Talk about Assessment: Strategies and Tools to Improve Learning.

How do you feel as subject of assessment? Do you agree with these ideas? Which one called your attention the most? Post a comment ;)

From Cooper, Damian. Talk about Assessment: Strategies and Tools to Improve Learning. Toronto: Thomson, 2007) 5

 

Eight Big Ideas [in relation to assessment] Assessment serves different purposes at different times: it may be used to find out what students already know and can do; it may be used to help students improve their learning; or it may be used to let students and their parents know how much they have learned within a prescribed period of time. Assessment must be planned and purposeful. Assessment must be balanced, including oral, performance, and written tasks, and be flexible in order to improve learning for all students. Assessment and instruction are inseparable because effective assessment informs learning. For assessment to be helpful to students, it must inform them in words, not numerical scores or letter grades, what they have done well, what they have done poorly, and what they need to do next in order to improve. Assessment is a collaborative process that is most effective when it involves self-, peer, and teacher assessment. Performance standards are an essential component of effective assessment. Grading and reporting student achievement is a caring, sensitive process that requires teachers' professional judgment. (Cooper, Damian. 2007)

Rubrics, an holistic way to consider our student's needs

I found this useful website: http://school.discoveryeducation.com/schrockguide/assess.html
and I thought about all the opportunites to consider the factors and students needs given by this assessment tool. When I went to school, I remember the answers were only right or wrong. Sometimes, teachers applied their own criteria, but it was not explicit for us, the learners of the time. Rubrics are a democratic way of assessing, they are clear, adaptable and, overall, public. We need to continue in our effort to help the students to be aware of their processes. Rubrics are part of this task.

Methodology II, April 1st

If you haven’t finished the SYLLABUS task, work at HOME

Today you must evaluate the textbook that you brought using the chart presented on page 186. Assess from 1 to 7. Write a reflection. Blog it.

Today, task 2: Supplementary materials. BOX ….WE talk about it. I’ll mention some supplementary materials based on technology.

So, this week (blog)

1. Reflection on using a coursebook (Monday)

2. Evaluation of a coursebook

3. Suplementary materials: name, description and two links in each case.

The Product approach for writing

I absolutely agree with the process approach to teach writing, specially if we talk about beginners. The second language learner is in an interlanguage continum; therefore, he or she is experiencing many interactive processes. These depend on several internal and external factors, in this way, evaluating the production of a text as a product in one specific moment may be unfair and stressful for the learner. When I started teaching, the product approach was the only one I knew, therefore, that's the one that I used. In some way this is more objective to evaluate because you may determine some criteria, for example, grammar, text features and vocabulary to use as parameters, without considering the emotional or social factors that you may observe during the process. Now, as I know both of them I prefer the process approach. I can see that my studets feel more comfortable and motivated in this way.

Ideas from Pre-writing

When I start writing I usually brainstorm and cluster my ideas on a piece of paper. Once I have this sort of sketch, I look for material to support my paragraphs. I also use a lot of questionnning.

Most of my students find pre-writing useless. Students want everything to be instant nowadays. Another problem is that they understand pre-writing and writing as separate stages, i.e. they may use different techniques during pre-writing but start textualizing following new ways of thought. This is very personal and it is connected with the student's learning style.

Overall, I think that pre-writing is very important to activate previous knowledge and retrieve information from the long term memory.

Giving feedback on writing

The first activity I'm going to analyse is a brochure created by the students to promote tourism in our country. This was part of a unit related to this topic and text type. They had time to research in order to have information to use according to the different parts of a brochure. I think that my feedback was very poor. I just circled or underlined the language patterns that I considered incorrect. I didn't provide the correct answer or talked to the students about it. I didn't give them the opportunity to defend or explain their language choices. I didn't help them to notice what were they doing wrong. The main reason for this lack of professionalism was time and motivation on my side. This is something important to consider, when the teacher is comfortable and motivated with a group, he or she will probably try different ways to guide the learners in a more personalized way. This is what happened but it is not a acceptable excuse. It was, as I mentioned before, my problem as a teacher. I hope this does not happen again.

The second activity I would like to present is the feedback provided for some literary commentaries written by a group of teenagers. They techniqued used in this case was mini-conferences with the students. I read their texts, underlined and took notes in order to explain and discuss with the students other ways to express their ideas or may be reorganize the content or add or leave out information. In this case, I had a very good relationship with the learners and the classrrom environment was very positive. I could notice that the conversation with each student was beneficial.

Affect in speaking lessons

As a foreign language learner I would say that I was shy and usually embarrased to make mistakes in front of my classmates. Most of them had a very good level of English and didn't have many problems to communicate or to use new structures.I think that this interfered with my learning process the first two years because my professors were more concentrated on the product than the process; therefore, If I was not able to show what I was learning in the way they wanted I was ignored or got low marks. After some years, I was gaining more confidence and expressing my ideas in the second language was not a problem anymore. Working in pairs or groups with the guidance of the teacher was the most useful for me. Following models and rehersing before the presentation of a specific task was also of great help. I would say that the activities more related to fluency involving problem solving were more meaningful and helped me to avoid feeling examined every time I tried to speak.

Most of my classmates were different from me. They loved talking and were more proficient (due to different reasons such as, travelling, living in an English speaking country before, or attending bilingual schools). Their personality and accuracy didn't help much in my learning process, because most of the times, I felt that my English was too basic. Nowadays, I have  a mixture of students learning styles and personalities in my groups. Some of them feel that they know everything, so most of the activities are considered boring, in this way, the weaker ones are not very motivated.

To work in a mixed abilities class, it is important to offer a variety of activities and to get to know each learner. I think that it is necessary to have an idea of the student's need and cognitive style to decide which speaking activity would be more useful.