Intermediate I

I had my class the last Monday and I enjoyed it a lot, because the students were very active and participative. I began the class with a warm up activity that was also the presentation of the topic; I made a chart with the name of the topic (Phrasal verbs) and prepared some numbers made with foamy to cover the topic. I wrote some questions using the common phrasal verbs like “When do you usually get up?” so they chose one number and I asked them the question with that number, at the end they saw the topic and I started with the grammar explanation. I gave a list of 12 phrasal verbs and I worked just with those ones; after the explanation I gave them two sheets of paper with the controlled practice and they did a good job. After that, I pasted some phrasal verbs around the classroom and I asked them to make two groups to make a competition; I said the meaning of the pv and they had to run and get the correct pv, they had fun with this activity and I could see how much they had understood the topic. At the end, I asked them to make one sentence using a pv, then they were going to pass in front to the class and read his/ her sentence, but saying “jigglypuff” instead of the pv, so that the others could guess the pv, this activity was to see if they could use the target structure, and they did a great job and had fun.

 Thank God I am learning a lot with the practices. When I received the feedback I realized that I have improved a lot, and it made feel proud of myself, because it is nice when you see the results of your effort.

Thank you for your comments my friends, blessings!!

Intermediate I

Hello guys! I hope you are doing well.  Let me tell you that I had my second class with this group the last Monday and this was a special class, because I had some problems with my attitude. As my tutor told me, this is good for us to happen in our practices for gaining experience.

I have always tried to be on time in my classes, but I could not arrive on time that day and it affected me a lot; to be sincere I do not know what happened to me that day.

The topic was comparative and superlatives; I started my class with a song (Fighter by Christina Aguilera) as warm up, and they had to underline the adjectives, but while the music was playing I noticed that no one was underlining, so I asked some of them and they told me that they did not remember what an adjective is. When the music stopped I explained to them what an adjective is; after underlying the adjectives I told them that we were going to sing the song and I played the song again, but I saw some of them talking, so I stopped the music and told them “as nobody is singing I am going to start with the grammar explanation!”, everybody got like surprised and I started. I just wanted to take advantage of the time and I did not realize what I was doing.

I used a power point presentation to explain the topic and it was nice, because they understood, I included some exercises in the ppt and they solved them on the board. After that, I gave them some sheets of paper with more exercise and I explained the doubts they had. Every time they were with their cell phones I said “please put your cell phones away!!!” or “speak in English!!!”

When I finished my class, I apologized for having arrived late and thanked them for their participation.  I like to analyze what I do in every class, and that day  I felt bad and ashamed because of my attitude, I am not in that way. In my feedback the teacher told exactly what I have told me myself before; the students asked the teacher was happed with me, they asked him “Was she angry? She is not like that” I was with them the last semester. A girl thought that I got angry because she was with her cell phone and they tried to guess why I got angry for some minutes he said. I was not angry; I do not know what happened with me that day. The teacher told me that he was surprised, and that I have to control myself in my classes. I appreciated every word he told me and I know that I was worried because of the time and other things, but I am sure this won´t happen again, I will be better in the next classes.

Your pieces of advice are welcome. Thank you very much!!

Intermediate I (second period, first class)

I had my first class with this group the last Monday, and I was eager to start, because I had this group the last semester and I remember that it was a little bit hard, for they were afraid of making mistakes; that is why, they did not like to participate. In the observation I could see that now they are totally different and love to participate.

I started the class by greeting them and saying what I want in my classes; then I began the warm up activity "Follow the leader", and they had fun; then I made a review of "the verbs with two objects"; after that, they practiced the topic with some exercises I gave to them and they did it very well. I could see that they had understood the topic.

 For the next activity, I divided them into 2 groups for making a competition activity, so I gave an envelope with some sentence strips to each group for them to form the sentences putting the indirect and direct object correctly. They showed me that they knew what they were doing; both groups did it very well.

I finished the class by saying thank you for their participation, they are a nice group, believe me that they are totally different and that is great!

Thank you for your time and comments my friends!