Metaphor

Teaching, a concept that can be defined differently depending on who is defining this word. The thing is that we can agree on something: it involves a process. Taking this concept to one more ordinary, we can say it is like a bicycle. How so? Well, just as a bicycle allows us to travel distances and arrive at our destination, teaching is that conveyance that takes us from the darkness of the ignorance to the end of the road: understanding and knowledge. Although contradictory, in this journey, there is no end, but it is a path worth taking. In this sense, the bicycle travels through the road, which is the learning process.

Journal IX

APPENDIX 3: POST OBSERVATION STUDENT

TEACHER’S SELF-EVALUATION FORM (Journal)

Name: _Astrid Yarleth Trujillo Urriago_ Date: _Monday, June 3, 2019 to Friday, June 7, 2019_

Write a reflection about the classes you oriented this week (bear in mind the following aspects: what you planned, what you did, and what you would do differently if you were to teach your lessons again). Give examples and descriptions of those situations that, in your view, are relevant to your learning experience.

Ninth Week: Teaching and Testing

During the ninth week of my pedagogical practicum, I implemented two lessons since with the third group a test about the learned topics was carried out. In this sense, for Wednesday’s session, I prepared the questions for the test, which were about comparative and superlative adjectives and modal verbs when being used for making requests. The test was developed during the first moments of the class and after all the students had finished, I was in charge of checking the answers along with the students. I asked different students to read the questions and the corresponding answer for each. Therefore, students know how well they did in this test immediately. I realized that students do not have any problem regarding comparative and superlative adjectives. However, in terms of modal verbs, they got confused about the degree of formality of these. Consequently, I think something I should do differently about this is giving students only two options instead of three so that they can see the difference between these easily and do not get confused.

On Thursday, I had a class with students from the first level. The topic to be taught was “some and any with countable and uncountable nouns”. At the beginning of the class, students worked on the vocabulary of the book by categorizing groups of food according to the group they belong to, for example, dairy products, drinks, and protein. In terms of vocabulary, there were no major problems. Subsequently, I proceeded to explain the countable and uncountable nouns. Even though I provided examples and explained the reasons why some nouns are uncountable, they kept on making sense of the Spanish situation for telling that they can count those nouns. In the end, they understood a little more about the topic and worked on the activities. I explained to them how to make questions and express sentences with both positive and negative meaning. When I asked them to classify the nouns from the first exercise, they could do it without any inconvenience. The listening exercise I planned to do, was successful, students understood the audio track and could answer the questions about it. However, the time passed so fast that it was impossible to carry out the last activity. Then, I thought it was better that students had the topic clear instead of jumping to the other activity. I have to consider the time management and how I address my explanations for me not to take more time than the estimated.

Finally, on Friday, I introduced the modal verbs when used for giving advice. The verbs to be worked for this lesson were “could, should, ought to, must, and have to”. I prepared a reading exercise for introducing the topic and asked students to try to tell me what the letter was about. Students managed to do so. In the beginning, they tried to participate but at the end of the reading exercise, they just stopped doing so. However, I tried to give them the first idea for them to complete it. After that, I told students that in the text there were some specific words that we used when giving advice. I wrote an example of a piece of advice on the board using all the modal verbs and explained to students when we use each one of them. The topic was addressed successfully since students understood right away how and when to use these modal verbs. I also asked them to tell me how they would advise their parents and their little siblings. Afterward, they played a game in which there were some problems or situations to which they had to provide a piece of advice. They played in small groups and at the end; I asked them to read the last situation they advised to and the corresponding piece of advice. At the end of the class, students were given a situation to which they had to provide as many pieces of advice as possible and then, we reviewed all the situations and advice given.

Journal VIII

 APPENDIX 3: POST OBSERVATION STUDENT

TEACHER’S SELF-EVALUATION FORM (Journal)

Name: _Astrid Yarleth Trujillo Urriago_ Date: _Monday, May 27, 2019 to Friday, May 31, 2019_

Write a reflection about the classes you oriented this week (bear in mind the following aspects: what you planned, what you did, and what you would do differently if you were to teach your lessons again). Give examples and descriptions of those situations that, in your view, are relevant to your learning experience.

Eighth Week: Explanations and Clarifications

During this week, I taught superlatives to students from the second level. At the beginning of the class, I showed them some pictures in which there was an obvious difference between the three objects in each picture. For example, I showed them a picture with three buildings and I told them one of them was the highest and another was the shortest pointing to the corresponding building. After I did that, I show them another image and they made sentences in Spanish. Afterward, I explained the grammar. Students got a little confused since the previous topic was comparatives and the rules are almost the same. Then, I had to clarify the difference between these two grammar topics. Later on, students worked on some exercises from the book in which they had to write the corresponding superlative for some nouns and other in which they had to write superlative sentences according to some information provided in a chart. Finally, I prepared a kind of a general knowledge contest for them to play and practice the superlative structure. From this lesson, I think I what would change is the amount of practice I allowed students to do since they are not used to English I had to explain more than once the grammar so they had little practice before making the contest.

Then, I worked with students from the other level II. There was no topic to be taught to them since what my class was based on is in practicing both comparatives and superlatives. At the beginning of the class, I asked students some questions using both of the structures. Some of the students participated but most of the students do not like participating when doing it in this way. As I noticed there were still some problems when expressing a correct sentence, I decided to make a quick review of the topics. However, I did not implement some examples to contextualize students. In spite of that, students remembered the correct use of the structures. After that, I gave a handout in which students had to complete the sentences writing a comparative adjective or a superlative adjective. Most of the students worked on the exercise but some others were just waiting for the activity to finish. I think I have to work more on making these students participate in every activity. Finally, students were divided into two groups and each group will make some questions to the other. The other team had to answer the questions providing the right answer and using the structure correctly. I tried that the students participating were different students from the ones that always participate.

Finally, on Thursday, I taught “should and should not for advice” to students from the first level. I brought a comic to the class and handed it out to students so that everyone had the comic and could read it. I asked them some questions such as “what was happening in the comic” and then we focused on the part in which one of the characters provides a piece of advice. Then, I explained the situation and proceeded to explain the grammar topic. I provided some examples. Students were a little confused about the use of the main verb in the sentences because it is always used in its base form and does not change when referring to the third person. When the grammar was explained, they worked on some exercises in their books for making some practice and then we checked them. Finally, I gave each student a piece of paper with a problem and a chart for writing some advice. They had to ask for advice to solve their problem and then select the best one. Before doing so, I made an example with the whole class so that they did not get confused with the instructions. This time, students were more focused on the class. Regarding something I would change, I think I would slow a little more when explaining because there were some doubts when doing the last exercise more than anything because of the use of the auxiliary verb should and the main verb.