Habemus magistrum!

This semester passed by really quickly. For 2 months straight I’ve been observing my mentor teacher in the classroom, but also I’ve conducted some micro-teaching. It was fun and challenging. Now it’s time to look back at it and reflect little more to summarize my new experiences. During the practicum time, I’ve been enjoying each minute in the classroom. Observing such a young teacher doing a great job was very inspirational. It gives me a lot of hope for the future, maybe one day (if I learn hard enough) I will master teaching just like she did. My favorite group to observe was grade 0, and I got some new ideas of games and fun activities to do with such young learners. At the very beginning, everything seems to be challenging, starting with planning a lesson, finishing on when to correct errors, but the biggest challenge that I face in the classroom is the management part. I am very humanistic, I know that children are just children and they might be loud or not listen to me...

Just as with reading, writing is not practiced much in the language classrooms in 1st grade yet. My mentor teacher has said that there will be plenty of time for this later on, but still, there are some simple tasks, which help students to get familiar with writing. The most popular activity for writing practice is rewriting words in correct places. There are words written for example in the table and students have to sign some pictures with them. Another activity that was used during the language classes in tracing the line. Teacher gives some handouts to students where they have to trace the line to create for example a letter to Santa, plus, fill out the empty spot for the name of the present on their own. Most of those are just guided the practice of writing, but it is obviously necessary to practice the hand and prepare it to fluent writing. In 2nd grade there is much more writing, students rewrite sentences, create ones on their own, for example, what they like, what they don...

Reading is a key competence taught in school. Reading in L1 is quite a challenge, so reading in L2 is much more difficult, especially in English, where the written form is different from the one that we pronounce. In my practice, I’ve observed some signs of reading. My mentor teacher said that she is not focusing on reading that much in 1st grade yet, because there will be plenty of time to practice it later, for now, she sticks to global reading and connecting the written form with meaning. The main task used to prepare students to read is a flashcard game. At first, she shows flashcards with pictures, students have to name them, later on, it gets more difficult, as she shows flashcards with names written on them. Thanks to a constant practice students are aware of the written form and easily can say what word is that. This king of global reading is very useful especially for young learners, as it might help them realize the specific of English language. Another activity I’ve notic...

Correcting students is a tricky thing. A good teacher should know when and how to correct. The first and most important thing is to know what we are currently practicing: accuracy or fluency? If we focus on fluency, let’s not correct, it’s about using the language on our own, making students realize their actual capabilities in L2. But when the task is focused on accuracy then yes, corrections might be necessary. So…how should we correct? As an answer to this question, I’ve focused my observations on this issue for around 4 lessons. Seems like my mentor teacher follows the idea of correcting in case of accuracy practice. The corrections are usually used with drilling or one answer tasks. And how does she do it? Mostly asks students to repeat after her many, many time, if individual drilling there are still some problems with pronunciation she gives some opportunities to improve them. Sometimes she asks the students what do they think if they are sure. If they are not aware she asks o...

Teaching materials are a very important part of the lesson. They are like tools used to make the learning process easier, more effective and attractive. My mentor teacher uses many materials while working with students. It is visible, that she spends a lot of time preparing for lessons, creating new preps to facilitate the process. Except for the coursebooks, which are great by the way, she uses many extra things to work with students. Focusing on coursebooks, in grades 1 and 2 Footprints by MacMillan are used, and with grade zero there is Captain Jack by the same publishing house. I find those books really well made and nice to work with. They are visually pretty, well made and little challenging for students. For example, the coursebook that I work with my kids is much poorer, contains almost no written text and basically, tasks are so easy that kindergarten children would do them on their own. A good coursebook is a big plus in teachers’ work, and if it’s well-made it can be a cor...

Both teacher and student talk time are important during the language lesson. Teacher talk exposes students to the use and sound of language, make them used to the tempo of speaking, accents. Student talk instead is important, as it stimulates the production, use of language, converting passive vocabulary into active. With young learners it’s difficult to have them elaborate on some topics, so most of the speech is connected with questions and answers, drills and simple things considering, for example, their opinion, possibilities. In the classroom, I’ve decided on which students I would like to observe. One very active, the other one less active. Honestly, the only difference that I’ve noticed is the level of excitement. Both students answer teachers questions when addressed by their names. If the teacher asks whole class it is more likely that the active student will answer it, but it happened that the less active one gave a very nice answer to the question. All of the students in...

Managing a class full of young learners is surely a hard thing to do. One can never know what to expect and what can happen during a lesson. That is why a successful teacher should be flexible. Chit-chat? Coming back to the class management, I’ve observed some interesting things about it during my practicum. The most frequent disruption is obviously chit-chatting between students. Talking is natural for humans, but once you enter the classroom with the aims to achieve, it might become difficult because of the noise. I asked myself, why do they talk? Except for the fact that I mentioned, that talking belongs to human nature, it might have some causes that could be overcome. From my observations, it came out that students talk when they are excited about something. It might or might not be connected with the lesson, still, it strongly influences the course of events. For this reason, the teacher has a nice way of dealing, as she follows the topic and asks students to share with her in...