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!

Intermediate I

Hello guys!! This is my last class with this group and I liked it. I started by greeting them as every class, and then we played “The hot seat” , I divided them into two groups and each group had to choose someone who had to be sitting in front of them to guess a word that the teacher had written on the board. The others had to mimic for the person to guess it. I used words like ghost, scary story, dark, monsters, etc. After that, they had a listening in which two persons were talking about scary stories, and they liked it, they worked in pairs; one of them answered the first part and the other one the other part, it was nice because they had a listening quiz after my class. Then, they worked in groups of 5 and I gave them a sheet of paper with a scary story, they had to read it and create a new one using the target structure (past simple and past continuous) and although we did not have enough time, they did their best and created the scary stories practicing the target structure.

Thank God I finished the practices of the first period and I know that we all have learned and improved a lot. Thank you, for your comments and suggestions guys, blessings!!!

Intermediate I

I had my class on Monday 12^th and I started by greeting the students. Then,  I developed the warm up activity which consisted on a game known by them,  I called it “the hanged man” and the words I used was the verbs, but in the past tense, they had fun, but I realized that they do not know the past of some verbs. The topic was “Simple past and Past continuous”; after the warm up, I explained the grammar point and I felt very nice, because I was not nervous and the students understood the topic. The next activity was the controlled one and I gave them a sheet of paper that contained 3 exercises, in which they practiced the simple past, the past continuous and in the third one they practiced the use of both and thank God they did it very well. I could not continue because of the time, but I felt fine because I know they understood the topic.

I felt more comfortable in this class, because I knew the students a little bit and it helped me to prepare the class. I hope to read your comments; it will be a pleasure for me, believe me that your pieces of advice are important and I learn a lot from them. Thank you a lot, blessings!

Intermediate I (First class)

Hello there!! I hope you are fine.

I had the first class of this semester on Monday 29th, and it was a hard day for me, because  my great grand mother had problems with her health and I could not leave home early, so I came really late to the University, but I talked to the teacher and thank God she understood the situation and gave me the second hour.

I started the class by greeting the students and introducing myself, then  I developed a warm up activity called “truth or lie” in which they write 3 sentences (2 of them are true and the other one false) and at the end , they guess what the lie is; they had fun and and get relaxed, because I started my class after a quiz.  After that, I explained the grammar structure (so and such) I gave them  some examples describing some of them and they understood the topic; then they solved a multiple choice activity and I noticed that they did not make many mistakes, and that made me feel great. I could not develop the rest of the lesson plan, because as I told you before, I had som problems at home and I had to teach in the second hour, also they had a quiz, so I taught just 30 minutes. Even though I did not have enough time, I can say that I did my best, because I was worried about my grandma, but I left my problems when I began the class and that made me feel that I have improved a lot.

Thank you for reading and leave you comments, I wish you the best and I know that every of us is learning new things, blessings my friends!!

Basic level (Last class)

Today ( May, 20^th) I had my last class with this group. I started the class with a warm up in which the teacher starts by saying; for example, “I went to the market and I bought some fish”, then, the students have to continue this by saying something similar, but using another word related with food, this game was for them to practice the vocabulary about food and introduce the topic “countable and uncountable nouns”. Then, I explained the topic, besides explaining the countable and uncountable nouns, I explained the use of “some and any”, unfortunately I had to improvise, because I had some problems with technology. After that, I gave the students a sheet of paper that contained a list of vocabulary about food and they had to write if they were countable or uncountable, they had some problems with some words, but they did it very well, because as the teacher told me, they already knew about the topic. In the next activity they imagined that they were going to go to a picnic the next day, so they needed to prepare a shopping list for going to the market, I gave them some minutes for them to write the list, then 3 volunteers shared what they had written and believe me that they did a great job. The last activity was a race board, I asked them to make two groups (A and B) and then they made two lines in front of the whiteboard, group A had to write uncountable nouns and group B the countable ones, they started to write and had fun, after some minutes I said “stop!” and checked what they had wrote, I felt glad, because the only mistake that one of the group had was a repetition of a word.

I am happy for having finished this experience, It was very nice for me to learn in this way; I learned from every tutor I had, and also from my co worker.  I had good and bad moments and every time was a lesson for me. I hope you have enjoyed these practices my friends. Thank you for your comments!! May God bless you all!!!