Micro-teaching pt.2
Hello!
This week has been quite warm, the weather makes us all excited for the upcoming spring! Another season to spend with our students! Trees and flowers are blooming, and so is my hope for the better tomorrow :)
Today I would like to focus on something I found interesting and surprising. Some time ago I had an opportunity to conduct a CLIL lesson on trees for 2nd graders. To my surprise I found it fun and fascinating, planning it was more challenging but at the same time it was much easier to activate students during the lesson and make them use the language authentically.
The lesson was a part of the"In the forest" unit. It was about what do we have from trees, why are they needed and so forth. There was a reading planned and a short writing exercise.
A the beginning of the lesson I asked my students to come to the carpet and sit in a circle. When they were ready I put a bag in the middle of the circle and told random students to go and pick one thing from the inside, tell us what is it and then place it in a visible place. There was a book, an apple, chocolate, a pencil, and some walnuts. When all the things were already visible for the students I ask them about the suggestion, what do those things have in common. After hearing some suggestions I posted a support questions where those things come from, but I didn't get the answer, so I let myself answer this question and watched students' faces changing from interest to negation and lack of believing. One of my students said then "Yes! That's true! Chocolate, paper, wood, and fruits come from trees!" and somehow it made me feel happy that I didn't have to convince them because there was an expert among them!
Then I posted another question "Why are trees important for us?" and I heard many amazing answers that I didn't expect from 2nd grades: "We can breathe thanks to them" or "We get food from trees".
After all the students that wanted to say something did it, we moved on to reading. First, we were listening to the text, then I asked for understanding, then we were reading along with the recording. When everything was group went on to connect the proper tree with the fruit it produces (basing on the listening task). We drilled the names, checked the exercise and we went on to the quiz! I put some questions and their task was to think and put up their hands if the answer is "yes" and stay with the hand down when the answer is "no". Surprisingly students had no problems with answering correctly (funnily, before the class while I was preparing it, I was checking everything in books and the internet not to make a faux pas while teaching :X and they just had the right feelings on it). And when we were done with the quiz we went to group work. I divided students into 4 groups by counting from 1 to 4. Each group got a topic and their task was to create a poster with the answer to this topic. For example, I asked about the usage of trees in music or in the food industry.
2 groups did an excellent job, 2 groups were little weaker with the result, but I blame it on the wrong way of dividing the work in the group. Maybe I should have told them to divide the work so everyone can do something, but that's a great lesson for the future for me as a teacher. There were some problems with cooperation, especially in one group, but I really wanted to mix them up randomly, as the skill of cooperation with everyone is very valuable and necessary for the 21st-century human being. Next time I will ask the mentor teacher for help in this.
We ended the lesson by sharing the dark chocolate and enjoying this gift of nature together.
It surprised me how much fun I had during this lesson. It also gave me a sense of letting my students do things on their own!
Now am really looking forward to conducting the whole CLIL unit for the 1st graders. It might be hard and challenging, but it brings lots of satisfaction.
Thanks for reading, See you all in a week!
XOXO
This week has been quite warm, the weather makes us all excited for the upcoming spring! Another season to spend with our students! Trees and flowers are blooming, and so is my hope for the better tomorrow :)
Today I would like to focus on something I found interesting and surprising. Some time ago I had an opportunity to conduct a CLIL lesson on trees for 2nd graders. To my surprise I found it fun and fascinating, planning it was more challenging but at the same time it was much easier to activate students during the lesson and make them use the language authentically.
The lesson was a part of the"In the forest" unit. It was about what do we have from trees, why are they needed and so forth. There was a reading planned and a short writing exercise.
A the beginning of the lesson I asked my students to come to the carpet and sit in a circle. When they were ready I put a bag in the middle of the circle and told random students to go and pick one thing from the inside, tell us what is it and then place it in a visible place. There was a book, an apple, chocolate, a pencil, and some walnuts. When all the things were already visible for the students I ask them about the suggestion, what do those things have in common. After hearing some suggestions I posted a support questions where those things come from, but I didn't get the answer, so I let myself answer this question and watched students' faces changing from interest to negation and lack of believing. One of my students said then "Yes! That's true! Chocolate, paper, wood, and fruits come from trees!" and somehow it made me feel happy that I didn't have to convince them because there was an expert among them!
Then I posted another question "Why are trees important for us?" and I heard many amazing answers that I didn't expect from 2nd grades: "We can breathe thanks to them" or "We get food from trees".
After all the students that wanted to say something did it, we moved on to reading. First, we were listening to the text, then I asked for understanding, then we were reading along with the recording. When everything was group went on to connect the proper tree with the fruit it produces (basing on the listening task). We drilled the names, checked the exercise and we went on to the quiz! I put some questions and their task was to think and put up their hands if the answer is "yes" and stay with the hand down when the answer is "no". Surprisingly students had no problems with answering correctly (funnily, before the class while I was preparing it, I was checking everything in books and the internet not to make a faux pas while teaching :X and they just had the right feelings on it). And when we were done with the quiz we went to group work. I divided students into 4 groups by counting from 1 to 4. Each group got a topic and their task was to create a poster with the answer to this topic. For example, I asked about the usage of trees in music or in the food industry.
2 groups did an excellent job, 2 groups were little weaker with the result, but I blame it on the wrong way of dividing the work in the group. Maybe I should have told them to divide the work so everyone can do something, but that's a great lesson for the future for me as a teacher. There were some problems with cooperation, especially in one group, but I really wanted to mix them up randomly, as the skill of cooperation with everyone is very valuable and necessary for the 21st-century human being. Next time I will ask the mentor teacher for help in this.
We ended the lesson by sharing the dark chocolate and enjoying this gift of nature together.
It surprised me how much fun I had during this lesson. It also gave me a sense of letting my students do things on their own!
Now am really looking forward to conducting the whole CLIL unit for the 1st graders. It might be hard and challenging, but it brings lots of satisfaction.
Thanks for reading, See you all in a week!
XOXO
I enjoy reading your writing, at the beginning, middle or the end. I have gone through the exact lessons as you have shared here. From your sharing, I can tell that you really well prepared this lesson and it worked as you have planed, it was really great joy for the moment that you have created by your own idea and hard work. I would be very lucky if I could be one of your students.
ReplyDeleteIt seemed that some of our classmates have actually faced the group issues according to the reflections I have read so far, it would be great if you have some idea for organizing the better group work during teaching.
Good luck to your whole CLIL unit with 1st grade.