The last Friday 27, I had my second teaching practicum with the group of intermediate. I arrived very early, but the students always come to class late; that´s why it is kind of hard to do the warm up activity since they are getting one by one to the classroom, and I have to explain every single student what they are supposed to do (it is something I hate). Anyway, I decided to do a wordsearch as a warm up because I was supposed to do a review of the simple past tense. This wordsearch contained about 20 regular and irregular verbs in their past form, so I thought this would be a good idea for them to remember about how the verbs are written and pronounced in the past form; it was kind of difficult to find the verbs, so I asked them to work in groups of 5 or 6, and the group finishing first was the winner. I think they liked this activity although it is not that dynamic.
I took a very nice dialogue for them to remember the affirmative, negative, and interrogative form of the simple past tense. I gave them some minutes to read it, then, I read it to them so that they could listen to the pronunciation, and at the end, I required some volunteers to perform the dialogue.
Later, I explained them some of the use of the that tense and I provide some examples. I asked them to provide some examples as well. Then, I had them doing some written exercises, and to finalize the class I did a story telling activity in which they had to use the simple past in the oral form. In order to develop this activity, I took a picture of a princess and a witch so that they could invent like a tale or story; I aked them to do a big circle and to say at least 3 sentences using the simple past. I began the tale, and then, each student would add a short part. I guess they liked this activity, and I think it is extremely helpful when teaching this tense since it contributes to check if the students are using the tense properly; in the case of this group, I could notice that there are still some students struggling with the correct use of it.
I think it was a nice class, but as always, there are still some weaknesses which I need to work on to keep improving as a teacher. My tutor told me to be firmer and not to let them use their native tongue, which is something I will definitely consider in further classes.
I think everybody has had problems starting the class because not all students are on time to start with the warm-up and then you have to be repeating directiones many times which is not pleasing.
ResponderEliminarcongrats for your activities, I am sure they were very useful for you to have students involve and "produce English."
I'm sure you will do more than fine in the next classes but it is obvious that kids (2 year students) will be late to class, they do it on purpose :D, remember when you used to do it? Well, about your class, the idea of using visual aids with the princess picture to create a story sounds very interesting because you make them create an image in their head of what they can come up with, besides I like princess stories XD
ResponderEliminarLiliana,
ResponderEliminari can see that ytou are improving a lot. Do not worry, we all have some weaknesses, but it is good when you recognize that you have them and try to improve.
I've had the very same problem and that's why sometimes it's uncomfortable to develop the warm-up under those conditions, hope you have more luck next time.
ResponderEliminarI really like the activity about the tale. I think that it is when you really see if students understood what you explainded. One teacher told me that grammar must be short, but practice very long. Congrats Lily.
ResponderEliminar