2 de SEPTIEMBRE
OK, now that I’ve transcribed Au’s individual interviews, I feel that her way of being may offer more insights because she’s more talkative, more of sharing her reflections with me without the need to be pulling teeth. I hope this doesn’t affect my future data analysis and discussion stages as I now fear I may see Anahí under a poor light.
I’m also thinking that Au has the right to go thru a second cycle even if that won’t be part of my thesis. I’ll see what we can do about it.
viernes, 2 de septiembre de 2011
viernes, 5 de agosto de 2011
Mmmm ethics ethics
5 AUGUST
Now that I’ve made the transcription I noticed two things: 1. I took over entirely for I had to explain everything to Au in a nutshell, what we had done, what we were intending to do and how.
2. I didn’t actually hear Sandra say that she didn’t like the topic of abortion and she felt that the lesson wouldn’t be quite as good. T’s demotivation? Motivation clashes again?, which made me think whether she should be open to the stu, tell them that she doesn’t feel comfortable with it and whether it’d be a good idea to deal with drugs/decriminalisation which was the second most voted topic. I’ll ask her today what she thinks.
This has made me wonder to what extent we need to accept what stu say and want and to what extent we need to negotiate and compromise so that one’s wishes/interests whatever are not carried out at the expense of others’, in this case the teacher’s. If she already feels the lesson will be crappy, do we still have to go on? Who am I to still push her to do sthg she doesn’t really want to do? Wouldn’t it be fair to discuss this with the stu and say ‘ok, we can still debate/discuss/exchange opinions and watch videos and all that but with another topic? FOOD FOR THOUGHT
Now that I’ve made the transcription I noticed two things: 1. I took over entirely for I had to explain everything to Au in a nutshell, what we had done, what we were intending to do and how.
2. I didn’t actually hear Sandra say that she didn’t like the topic of abortion and she felt that the lesson wouldn’t be quite as good. T’s demotivation? Motivation clashes again?, which made me think whether she should be open to the stu, tell them that she doesn’t feel comfortable with it and whether it’d be a good idea to deal with drugs/decriminalisation which was the second most voted topic. I’ll ask her today what she thinks.
This has made me wonder to what extent we need to accept what stu say and want and to what extent we need to negotiate and compromise so that one’s wishes/interests whatever are not carried out at the expense of others’, in this case the teacher’s. If she already feels the lesson will be crappy, do we still have to go on? Who am I to still push her to do sthg she doesn’t really want to do? Wouldn’t it be fair to discuss this with the stu and say ‘ok, we can still debate/discuss/exchange opinions and watch videos and all that but with another topic? FOOD FOR THOUGHT
jueves, 4 de agosto de 2011
title here
4 AUGUST 2011
Today we had our first teacher meeting. Change? Due to health reasons, A is leaving Year 2, her replacement, Au, was happy to continue with the project. Needless to say this will change some things during this second cycle.
I handed them copies of the survey results stressing that their exercises and input should reflect what the students wanted. We can still do some reading and writing, but listening and speaking need to be exploited.
I gave Au Sandra’s sources as she has now to teach about the Nazis. We said that again we’ll work alone but we can share and exchange our ongoing work next Thu.
We agreed that all of us would teach 2 lessons only for there are many school things coming our way :S
All our lessons will take place between 5-7 Sept. In that month I’ll do the interviews, surveys etc etc etc, we will then see whether we can start a third cycle but we’re not very sure about that.
Now, transcription time again!
Today we had our first teacher meeting. Change? Due to health reasons, A is leaving Year 2, her replacement, Au, was happy to continue with the project. Needless to say this will change some things during this second cycle.
I handed them copies of the survey results stressing that their exercises and input should reflect what the students wanted. We can still do some reading and writing, but listening and speaking need to be exploited.
I gave Au Sandra’s sources as she has now to teach about the Nazis. We said that again we’ll work alone but we can share and exchange our ongoing work next Thu.
We agreed that all of us would teach 2 lessons only for there are many school things coming our way :S
All our lessons will take place between 5-7 Sept. In that month I’ll do the interviews, surveys etc etc etc, we will then see whether we can start a third cycle but we’re not very sure about that.
Now, transcription time again!
lunes, 1 de agosto de 2011
CYCLE 2
Action Stage
01 August
I'm in Buenos Aires. I can sense some time issues cropping up in the near future as I’ll be travelling around the country :S…that’s why I’ve been collecting sources for my lessons on Drugs for Year 1. First I downloaded pdfs from Wikipedia about cannabis and drug legalisation. Later I went for YouTube: I got trailers, some news reports about drug decriminalisation in Europe, and USA-LatAm. Then I remembered Amy Winehouse’s Rehab song. It fits perfectly for in their evaluation they said they wanted songs and documentaries. I went back to the results from Year 1 Evaluation Survey and I searched for more short vids about marihuana effects and all that.
As I was beginning to select my sources and think of activities I decided to keep Year 1 feedback at all times as a reminder of what they had said. I thought of adding more reading input but it wasn’t ranked. But because they suggested activities such as ‘summarise and comment orally’ I did include reading extracts from one of the articles.
OK, I decided to start with the song. Reason? To have a cheerful start. I did the usual brainstorming and use her drug/alcohol to introduce the topic. Because they had previously liked the ‘listen and complete the lyrics’, I did the same here. Then, rather than doing the ‘answer these questions’ I gave that a tweak and turned it into a group discussion to report later orally as they also demanded more speaking opportunities.
From there I went to some vocab work. I reread the Wikipedia articles and I decided not to use them because of their appalling quality. I only used one picture which I could link to one vid about a doctor talking about short-term effects. The vid was better than the articles and I could still develop the listening activities they had chosen in the survey. Because the vid is also flawed content-wise, I designed a simple exercise to encourage critical thinking.
For each of the three videos I selected, I did activities like they wanted. I disregarded some of the other news reports and trailers because their English was a little too high and were quite European in treating the topic. I also selected only one bit of a video for it specifically deals with marihuana as a gateway drug.
I ended with a debate-type of activity.
I think that experience, feedback and observations from the first cycle have allowed me to be more selective. Rather than preparing a 9-page handout, now this one has 4 pages. They’re not as crammed as the others. This will take 2 lessons only so that I am fair with A and S.
Nice first attempt! Let’s see what I can get or change during August J
01 August
I'm in Buenos Aires. I can sense some time issues cropping up in the near future as I’ll be travelling around the country :S…that’s why I’ve been collecting sources for my lessons on Drugs for Year 1. First I downloaded pdfs from Wikipedia about cannabis and drug legalisation. Later I went for YouTube: I got trailers, some news reports about drug decriminalisation in Europe, and USA-LatAm. Then I remembered Amy Winehouse’s Rehab song. It fits perfectly for in their evaluation they said they wanted songs and documentaries. I went back to the results from Year 1 Evaluation Survey and I searched for more short vids about marihuana effects and all that.
As I was beginning to select my sources and think of activities I decided to keep Year 1 feedback at all times as a reminder of what they had said. I thought of adding more reading input but it wasn’t ranked. But because they suggested activities such as ‘summarise and comment orally’ I did include reading extracts from one of the articles.
OK, I decided to start with the song. Reason? To have a cheerful start. I did the usual brainstorming and use her drug/alcohol to introduce the topic. Because they had previously liked the ‘listen and complete the lyrics’, I did the same here. Then, rather than doing the ‘answer these questions’ I gave that a tweak and turned it into a group discussion to report later orally as they also demanded more speaking opportunities.
From there I went to some vocab work. I reread the Wikipedia articles and I decided not to use them because of their appalling quality. I only used one picture which I could link to one vid about a doctor talking about short-term effects. The vid was better than the articles and I could still develop the listening activities they had chosen in the survey. Because the vid is also flawed content-wise, I designed a simple exercise to encourage critical thinking.
For each of the three videos I selected, I did activities like they wanted. I disregarded some of the other news reports and trailers because their English was a little too high and were quite European in treating the topic. I also selected only one bit of a video for it specifically deals with marihuana as a gateway drug.
I ended with a debate-type of activity.
I think that experience, feedback and observations from the first cycle have allowed me to be more selective. Rather than preparing a 9-page handout, now this one has 4 pages. They’re not as crammed as the others. This will take 2 lessons only so that I am fair with A and S.
Nice first attempt! Let’s see what I can get or change during August J
viernes, 17 de junio de 2011
And suddenly, Cycle 1 finishes...
DAY 27 6 DE JUNIO
My first intervention stage lesson. It was OK, nothing special, quite regular. While I thought they’d be interested in Elvis Presley, it turned out they became interested in Diana Ross and the Supremes. Stoooop in the name of love before you break my heart. The song theme and my simple questions generated a lot of debate. I should have taken advantage of that opportunity to ask them to discuss in pairs, but oh well, for some reason I let it pass. Shame on me
The table exercise wasn’t wow. What was positively challenging was the writing task: transforming the table into a text. I skipped an entire page of exercises for they didn’t seem to care much about Elvis The Pelvis.
Tomorrow we have the groupwork activity. Let’s see how that goes. I’ll try to finish everything next Mon, even the feedback session.
I’m changing my own planning at the very last minute, just like we said in the last meeting of the action stage. (see my printed planning and my own penned comments)
DAY 28 13 JUNE
Today’s mistake: entered the classroom with my teacher’s mind rather than my researcher’s mind and I forgot to switch on the recorder. I missed the recap section of my lesson where the stu provided a summary of the main things we had done previously.
I’d say it was a profitable lesson, it was way way less T-centred than the two others as this time they had to summarise, come up with a mindmap and present it to provide a brief account of each decade (50’s to 80’s) of rock music.
After the lesson I asked them to vote for topics for the second cycle:
Winning topic: Drugs (meh) took a photo of it.
DAY 29 14 JUNE
S delivered her first lesson on the Nazis. Stu were more asleep than usual so she had to provide scaffold all along. It was as t-centred as my first lessons. I don’t think she managed to make the stu interpret and analyse the sources as she was expecting though with reservations. It was a good thing that the sources activity was grouped into themes so that everybody had the chance to summarise and somehow offer an interpretation of the extract given.
They seemed to be interested in the two videos shown. The listening activities were achieved successfully. During the lesson S asked the stu to be quiet or pay attention and a couple of times she reminded them that she was doing this because they had wanted it. I don’t think they ever took up this ‘accusation’ (recording: 00.7-00.16, 00.24, )
On the minus side, A’s second lesson had to be cancelled for she called in sick. I don’t know whether she can wrap this up tomorrow and immediately after I can do the feedback session with the students.
On the plus side, I carried out the evaluation session with my stu. It was rich though as I had suspected only the leaders spoke. I’ll definitely do the survey to collect everybody’s opinions.
DAYS (it can’t be true, I don’t not how to count) 15-16 JUNE 2011
Mentalllllll, Intervention and Evaluation stages are overlapping because while I’m doing the evaluation with my stu, A is still at the intervention stage. The problem is not them of course, the problem is me because I want to have everything transcribed, coded and written up before God knows what.
Topics:
Year 1: Drugs
Year 2: Nazis
Year 3: TBC
DAY 17 JUNE 2011
Skype tutorial with Ema but…previously in my life I designed two slightly different surveys as I tailored them according to the group interviews. I then piloted them. Good. Ema said they were OK so now I’ve just made copies. Wait and see.
I told Ema, and this is an issue I’ll need to raise later, that my presence in a class which is not mine, I mean, where I don’t teach regularly is causing tension with the regular teacher. She uses the mainstream coursebook and follows the syllabus. I teach with my own materials now and then and now the students think I’m great and that their teacher is not great. She’s being criticised. It’s not her fault, it’s just that I have the time and it’s part of the CAR. This is a problem that may arise when a teacher re-.enters the site partially. Unless she begins to change her own practices even when she’s not one of my teacher-participants. Hmmm.
My first intervention stage lesson. It was OK, nothing special, quite regular. While I thought they’d be interested in Elvis Presley, it turned out they became interested in Diana Ross and the Supremes. Stoooop in the name of love before you break my heart. The song theme and my simple questions generated a lot of debate. I should have taken advantage of that opportunity to ask them to discuss in pairs, but oh well, for some reason I let it pass. Shame on me
The table exercise wasn’t wow. What was positively challenging was the writing task: transforming the table into a text. I skipped an entire page of exercises for they didn’t seem to care much about Elvis The Pelvis.
Tomorrow we have the groupwork activity. Let’s see how that goes. I’ll try to finish everything next Mon, even the feedback session.
I’m changing my own planning at the very last minute, just like we said in the last meeting of the action stage. (see my printed planning and my own penned comments)
DAY 28 13 JUNE
Today’s mistake: entered the classroom with my teacher’s mind rather than my researcher’s mind and I forgot to switch on the recorder. I missed the recap section of my lesson where the stu provided a summary of the main things we had done previously.
I’d say it was a profitable lesson, it was way way less T-centred than the two others as this time they had to summarise, come up with a mindmap and present it to provide a brief account of each decade (50’s to 80’s) of rock music.
After the lesson I asked them to vote for topics for the second cycle:
Winning topic: Drugs (meh) took a photo of it.
DAY 29 14 JUNE
S delivered her first lesson on the Nazis. Stu were more asleep than usual so she had to provide scaffold all along. It was as t-centred as my first lessons. I don’t think she managed to make the stu interpret and analyse the sources as she was expecting though with reservations. It was a good thing that the sources activity was grouped into themes so that everybody had the chance to summarise and somehow offer an interpretation of the extract given.
They seemed to be interested in the two videos shown. The listening activities were achieved successfully. During the lesson S asked the stu to be quiet or pay attention and a couple of times she reminded them that she was doing this because they had wanted it. I don’t think they ever took up this ‘accusation’ (recording: 00.7-00.16, 00.24, )
On the minus side, A’s second lesson had to be cancelled for she called in sick. I don’t know whether she can wrap this up tomorrow and immediately after I can do the feedback session with the students.
On the plus side, I carried out the evaluation session with my stu. It was rich though as I had suspected only the leaders spoke. I’ll definitely do the survey to collect everybody’s opinions.
DAYS (it can’t be true, I don’t not how to count) 15-16 JUNE 2011
Mentalllllll, Intervention and Evaluation stages are overlapping because while I’m doing the evaluation with my stu, A is still at the intervention stage. The problem is not them of course, the problem is me because I want to have everything transcribed, coded and written up before God knows what.
Topics:
Year 1: Drugs
Year 2: Nazis
Year 3: TBC
DAY 17 JUNE 2011
Skype tutorial with Ema but…previously in my life I designed two slightly different surveys as I tailored them according to the group interviews. I then piloted them. Good. Ema said they were OK so now I’ve just made copies. Wait and see.
I told Ema, and this is an issue I’ll need to raise later, that my presence in a class which is not mine, I mean, where I don’t teach regularly is causing tension with the regular teacher. She uses the mainstream coursebook and follows the syllabus. I teach with my own materials now and then and now the students think I’m great and that their teacher is not great. She’s being criticised. It’s not her fault, it’s just that I have the time and it’s part of the CAR. This is a problem that may arise when a teacher re-.enters the site partially. Unless she begins to change her own practices even when she’s not one of my teacher-participants. Hmmm.
jueves, 2 de junio de 2011
End of action stage
DAY 26 2 de Junio 2011
Today we carried out our last planning materials meeting. It was short, why? Because one of the teachers couldn’t develop anything and the other has preferred to wait until the last minute. In her words ‘my best lessons are the ones I don’t plan much in advance’. I’ve got to say she’s right. I made photocopies for her and for me about some source texts that we will use, we don’t know how but at least we already have them copied.
I shared my own reflections about my developing materials style, S did her part and I forgot or I don’t remember now about A. Thank goodness I have my iPod to record everything. If she didn’t say anything, I’ll ask her in the one-to-one post-observ interviews.
The intervention stages starts next Monday :)) which means I become a teacher again :))
Today we carried out our last planning materials meeting. It was short, why? Because one of the teachers couldn’t develop anything and the other has preferred to wait until the last minute. In her words ‘my best lessons are the ones I don’t plan much in advance’. I’ve got to say she’s right. I made photocopies for her and for me about some source texts that we will use, we don’t know how but at least we already have them copied.
I shared my own reflections about my developing materials style, S did her part and I forgot or I don’t remember now about A. Thank goodness I have my iPod to record everything. If she didn’t say anything, I’ll ask her in the one-to-one post-observ interviews.
The intervention stages starts next Monday :)) which means I become a teacher again :))
viernes, 27 de mayo de 2011
More planning
DAY 24-25 26-27 MAY 2011
It’s been almost a week since I last was in my PhD mode. The reason? The action stage in its planning materials stage suffered some complication due to national holidays which made it impossible for us to meet.
Yesterday we finally met again. Because I’ve got time at my disposal I was the only one with every thing ready so to speak. A ans S spent their limited time collecting, selecting sources and planning how they’d structure their lessons without any concrete activities to share. They said, however, that they’d bring sthg the following meeting. Working at home seems more beneficial for all of us. Although we shared what we had been doing, I did not receive much feedback about my activities. I didn’t encourage them to say much either. It was like I showed them what I’d do and that’s all.
What I feel is that because content is the key aspect here, A and don’t want to produce activities that become the usual language-oriented exercises. Perhaps they don’t want to plan anything in this sense or don’t want to feel in a straitjacket as a consequence of teaching following a coursebook for so long. Now that they have freedom, they want to have it all and do nothing so to speak.
As I was going through the transcription, I noticed that our lessons will be very different and maybe mine will be the most traditional. Then we’ll see what our students think and what feedback each of us gets.
It’s been almost a week since I last was in my PhD mode. The reason? The action stage in its planning materials stage suffered some complication due to national holidays which made it impossible for us to meet.
Yesterday we finally met again. Because I’ve got time at my disposal I was the only one with every thing ready so to speak. A ans S spent their limited time collecting, selecting sources and planning how they’d structure their lessons without any concrete activities to share. They said, however, that they’d bring sthg the following meeting. Working at home seems more beneficial for all of us. Although we shared what we had been doing, I did not receive much feedback about my activities. I didn’t encourage them to say much either. It was like I showed them what I’d do and that’s all.
What I feel is that because content is the key aspect here, A and don’t want to produce activities that become the usual language-oriented exercises. Perhaps they don’t want to plan anything in this sense or don’t want to feel in a straitjacket as a consequence of teaching following a coursebook for so long. Now that they have freedom, they want to have it all and do nothing so to speak.
As I was going through the transcription, I noticed that our lessons will be very different and maybe mine will be the most traditional. Then we’ll see what our students think and what feedback each of us gets.
viernes, 20 de mayo de 2011
AR with a personal advantage
DAY 22-23 19-20 May 2011
I’ve spent and enjoyed two days finding sources, selecting them, planning activities, calling Robert to provide me with more insights about American Rock. Of course all this is wonderful but it’s not real. I can personally do it because I’m almost doing this and that’s all. I’m a comfy position now, I don’t have to be running from one school to the next and spending my day marking exams. I’m at home sipping coffee, enjoying my place and working leisurely and if I want, I can devote a whole day to doing this only. Because Anahí’s lessons will be similar to mine, I won’t have any problems if we share the materials. It’s collaborative work. And if she ends up using my activities, so much the better as it’ll allow me to see how she uses them, how she introduces them, etc etc. A question: should I begin to change the scope of my study? (it may mean reanalysing my data or starting to get new data with new insights) I mean, should I widen the scope and think more about CLIL pedagogies rather than focusing only on materials? Hmmm, good question
I’ve spent and enjoyed two days finding sources, selecting them, planning activities, calling Robert to provide me with more insights about American Rock. Of course all this is wonderful but it’s not real. I can personally do it because I’m almost doing this and that’s all. I’m a comfy position now, I don’t have to be running from one school to the next and spending my day marking exams. I’m at home sipping coffee, enjoying my place and working leisurely and if I want, I can devote a whole day to doing this only. Because Anahí’s lessons will be similar to mine, I won’t have any problems if we share the materials. It’s collaborative work. And if she ends up using my activities, so much the better as it’ll allow me to see how she uses them, how she introduces them, etc etc. A question: should I begin to change the scope of my study? (it may mean reanalysing my data or starting to get new data with new insights) I mean, should I widen the scope and think more about CLIL pedagogies rather than focusing only on materials? Hmmm, good question
domingo, 15 de mayo de 2011
Some thoughts about my own role now
DAY 21 15 May
Back to my PhD mode. Today I managed to transcribe the first meeting in our action stage. I even did the basic categorising but now I need to wait until the end to produce sthg more tangible (and coherent).
As I was going thru it, I began to observe my let’s say selfish, extra-scientific interests in this CAR project. Because I want things to go right I went to the first meeting armed with sources: Wikipedia, articles from mazaines, print outs for everyone, videos. My role is input/sources provider which is fine as I’ve got more time than my colleagues to do this and to be honest we’ve usually worked this way, why shouldn’t I do it now? My second intervention was that all handouts and photocopies for our students will be paid by me as I want to make sure money so to speak is not an issue. This is NOT USUAL but I don’t care as long as we know it’s for a good cause and everyone’s happy with it.
Back to my PhD mode. Today I managed to transcribe the first meeting in our action stage. I even did the basic categorising but now I need to wait until the end to produce sthg more tangible (and coherent).
As I was going thru it, I began to observe my let’s say selfish, extra-scientific interests in this CAR project. Because I want things to go right I went to the first meeting armed with sources: Wikipedia, articles from mazaines, print outs for everyone, videos. My role is input/sources provider which is fine as I’ve got more time than my colleagues to do this and to be honest we’ve usually worked this way, why shouldn’t I do it now? My second intervention was that all handouts and photocopies for our students will be paid by me as I want to make sure money so to speak is not an issue. This is NOT USUAL but I don’t care as long as we know it’s for a good cause and everyone’s happy with it.
It's not easy
DAYS 17-19 9-11 MAY 2011
A little bit stuck with how to put into words my observations and six interviews. Ema came to the rescue though. The action stage has now begun. Lots of preparations as it’s our turn to produce materials.
Contrary to what I had planned, we asked each class to suggest topics. Mistake? The voting was spoken and probably because of peer pressure, voting was induced by popularity or conformity to the masses J) Next time? We’ll do real SECRET voting.
Year 1 chose…History of Music 50’ onwards, The Mayas.
Year 2 chose…History of Rock 50’onwards, Countries and Capitals, History of Football, content, texts, short videos, a song.
Year 3 chose…Nazis (in Argentina) and History of Rock, sthg interactive, stu can read before the lesson, short vids and texts, discussion, a little intro-explanation.
DAY 20 12 March
I need to keep this journal on a daily basis. I don’t wanna miss a thing. Anyway, today I sort of finished drafting the first two stages. Ongoing analysis is really helping me plan the coming stages and reflecting about where I want all this to go and how I can help my fellow teachers more.
Today we got together at the school. We felt that we need to develop the materials individually and then share our thingies for everyone’s considerations. We don’t think the school is a good place to actually produce the materials. We’ll work at home and then get together for a round-up of how we want to do them. I tried no to influence them, that is, I said that the materials could take any form, they could be a worksheet (my style) or like loose activities like the ones they developed.
We’ll try to teach with the materials between the second and third week of June before S leaves for England and I have to substitute her. Nice :S but it’s the least I could do when they are always so amazingly supportive and don’t get paid for all this extra time.
A little bit stuck with how to put into words my observations and six interviews. Ema came to the rescue though. The action stage has now begun. Lots of preparations as it’s our turn to produce materials.
Contrary to what I had planned, we asked each class to suggest topics. Mistake? The voting was spoken and probably because of peer pressure, voting was induced by popularity or conformity to the masses J) Next time? We’ll do real SECRET voting.
Year 1 chose…History of Music 50’ onwards, The Mayas.
Year 2 chose…History of Rock 50’onwards, Countries and Capitals, History of Football, content, texts, short videos, a song.
Year 3 chose…Nazis (in Argentina) and History of Rock, sthg interactive, stu can read before the lesson, short vids and texts, discussion, a little intro-explanation.
DAY 20 12 March
I need to keep this journal on a daily basis. I don’t wanna miss a thing. Anyway, today I sort of finished drafting the first two stages. Ongoing analysis is really helping me plan the coming stages and reflecting about where I want all this to go and how I can help my fellow teachers more.
Today we got together at the school. We felt that we need to develop the materials individually and then share our thingies for everyone’s considerations. We don’t think the school is a good place to actually produce the materials. We’ll work at home and then get together for a round-up of how we want to do them. I tried no to influence them, that is, I said that the materials could take any form, they could be a worksheet (my style) or like loose activities like the ones they developed.
We’ll try to teach with the materials between the second and third week of June before S leaves for England and I have to substitute her. Nice :S but it’s the least I could do when they are always so amazingly supportive and don’t get paid for all this extra time.
jueves, 12 de mayo de 2011
AR cycle 2 – Speaking skills lessons
Day 30-32, 9-11 May
It took slightly more time on day one because I needed to introduce the activity in the class and also the material that I had prepared for students. Everything went according to the plan except for the fact that a few students were not taking much interest in interviewing their peers as they didn’t want to evaluate their peer’s performance. I tried to motivate them by telling them that their peers will do the same the following day as there will be role reversal. Also, I managed to monitor students’ on-task behavior as I sat with different groups several times, but it was tiring. Although I was quiet satisfied with the way things went on the first and second day of the lesson. However, I do feel that implementing this kind of a plan needs close monitoring from the teacher’s end because in a way I had to monitor not only students’ on-task behavior, but had to encourage them to carefully mark the evaluation form as it will benefit their peers in improving their skills of appearing in interviews.
On the third day of the lesson, I asked the SS to review their reports on voluntary basis. With a little hesitation in the beginning, a few pairs raised their hands and shared their positive points. Since the classroom has no audio aid and I really wanted other SS to benefit from individual feedback, I decided to use the blackboard to see the positives and negatives of their classmates. Even the SS agreed to the idea so I made two columns on the board one each for positive and negative feedback. I kept writing the positives and negatives that the SS shared with the class and tried answering their queries based on the negative point each SS shared. Due to the time constraint some SS didn’t get a chance to share their feedback in the class so I asked them to see me after the class. Of course, these were only a few students. But I really enjoyed putting everything on board as it not only summed up the two-day lesson, but particularly helped the students sitting at the back. Unlike the previous cycle, the individual feedback in this cycle promoted whole class uptake of feedback.
My AR cycles end with today’s class. I’m left with just two more classes before the examinations begin after one week.
It took slightly more time on day one because I needed to introduce the activity in the class and also the material that I had prepared for students. Everything went according to the plan except for the fact that a few students were not taking much interest in interviewing their peers as they didn’t want to evaluate their peer’s performance. I tried to motivate them by telling them that their peers will do the same the following day as there will be role reversal. Also, I managed to monitor students’ on-task behavior as I sat with different groups several times, but it was tiring. Although I was quiet satisfied with the way things went on the first and second day of the lesson. However, I do feel that implementing this kind of a plan needs close monitoring from the teacher’s end because in a way I had to monitor not only students’ on-task behavior, but had to encourage them to carefully mark the evaluation form as it will benefit their peers in improving their skills of appearing in interviews.
On the third day of the lesson, I asked the SS to review their reports on voluntary basis. With a little hesitation in the beginning, a few pairs raised their hands and shared their positive points. Since the classroom has no audio aid and I really wanted other SS to benefit from individual feedback, I decided to use the blackboard to see the positives and negatives of their classmates. Even the SS agreed to the idea so I made two columns on the board one each for positive and negative feedback. I kept writing the positives and negatives that the SS shared with the class and tried answering their queries based on the negative point each SS shared. Due to the time constraint some SS didn’t get a chance to share their feedback in the class so I asked them to see me after the class. Of course, these were only a few students. But I really enjoyed putting everything on board as it not only summed up the two-day lesson, but particularly helped the students sitting at the back. Unlike the previous cycle, the individual feedback in this cycle promoted whole class uptake of feedback.
My AR cycles end with today’s class. I’m left with just two more classes before the examinations begin after one week.
miércoles, 11 de mayo de 2011
Preparing for the Action Stage
DAYS 17-19 9-11 MAY 2011
A little bit stuck with how to put into words my observations and six interviews. Ema came to the rescue though. The action stage has now begun. Lots of preparations as it’s our turn to produce materials.
Contrary to what I had planned, we asked each class to suggest topics. Mistake? The voting was spoken and probably because of peer pressure, voting was induced by popularity or conformity to the masses J) Next time? We’ll do real SECRET voting.
Year 1 chose…History of Music 50’ onwards, The Mayas.
Year 2 chose…History of Rock 50’onwards, Countries and Capitals, History of Football, content, texts, short videos, a song.
Year 3 chose…Nazis (in Argentina) and History of Rock, sthg interactive, stu can read before the lesson, short vids and texts, discussion, a little intro-explanation.
A little bit stuck with how to put into words my observations and six interviews. Ema came to the rescue though. The action stage has now begun. Lots of preparations as it’s our turn to produce materials.
Contrary to what I had planned, we asked each class to suggest topics. Mistake? The voting was spoken and probably because of peer pressure, voting was induced by popularity or conformity to the masses J) Next time? We’ll do real SECRET voting.
Year 1 chose…History of Music 50’ onwards, The Mayas.
Year 2 chose…History of Rock 50’onwards, Countries and Capitals, History of Football, content, texts, short videos, a song.
Year 3 chose…Nazis (in Argentina) and History of Rock, sthg interactive, stu can read before the lesson, short vids and texts, discussion, a little intro-explanation.
lunes, 9 de mayo de 2011
Planning cycle 2 – Speaking skills lessons
Day 28-29, 7-8 May
Plan
For today and tomorrow, I will be working on my lesson plan for the next cycle. This time round we are focusing on giving interviews as this is the graduating batch and they will soon be going through their real life interviews. Practice in giving interviews is part of students oral communication course outline. This time I am very much dependent on the material I design so that not only my feedback is communicated, but also the up-take of feedback is ensured.
The lesson on mock interviews will be carried out over the final 3 lessons starting from 9-11 May. The interviews will be in groups of 4 because it will be easy for me to monitor at least 4 students at a time. Each group will be sub divided in pairs so that the task is manageable by the students. Each pair will conduct a mock interview of their partner based on a scenario/case given to them. I will also give them a list of interview questions that one member of the pair will ask the other member. Students will also be given liberty to ask any other relevant question. Each question will be marked by the interviewer on a three point Likert scale. I am using 3 point Likert for the interviewer’s convenience and also because the interviewee can later go through the evaluation and can get some feedback. To enhance the effectiveness of feedback in a class of 80+ students, a short report will be filled by the interviewer after completion of the task, and will calculate the total points from the Likert scale and also total the positive and negative aspects of the interviewee. The likert scale and the short report will act as my feedback to the students because the questions in the likert scale are the actual areas where I want the peers to evaluate the interviewees and act as feedback agents.
In the next class on 10 May, the second member of the pair will do the same with his/partner. Once the pair completes the round of interviewing each other, they would share their judgment reports with each other and would fill out the summary report to select the one that has more positive points. Finally, for up take from the evaluation report, the SS will fill out an up-take of feedback form so that they can discuss it in the class the next day.
On the third day i.e. 11 May, SS will review their reports in the class on voluntary basis in order to gain further feedback from the teacher. Each pair will first share one positive point each from the review form and will then ask questions. My focus will be to probe each pair to ask at least one question regarding whatever they think they need to improve.
Since the lesson is designed in a way that peer-peer learning will be focused, I will get more time to observe students’ on-task behavior. The interview questionnaire, short report, summary and form for the up-take of feedback are the main tools that will engage students in order for them to get feedback on learning to participate in interviews. My primary focus will be to move around in the class monitor how students carry out the task.
Plan
For today and tomorrow, I will be working on my lesson plan for the next cycle. This time round we are focusing on giving interviews as this is the graduating batch and they will soon be going through their real life interviews. Practice in giving interviews is part of students oral communication course outline. This time I am very much dependent on the material I design so that not only my feedback is communicated, but also the up-take of feedback is ensured.
The lesson on mock interviews will be carried out over the final 3 lessons starting from 9-11 May. The interviews will be in groups of 4 because it will be easy for me to monitor at least 4 students at a time. Each group will be sub divided in pairs so that the task is manageable by the students. Each pair will conduct a mock interview of their partner based on a scenario/case given to them. I will also give them a list of interview questions that one member of the pair will ask the other member. Students will also be given liberty to ask any other relevant question. Each question will be marked by the interviewer on a three point Likert scale. I am using 3 point Likert for the interviewer’s convenience and also because the interviewee can later go through the evaluation and can get some feedback. To enhance the effectiveness of feedback in a class of 80+ students, a short report will be filled by the interviewer after completion of the task, and will calculate the total points from the Likert scale and also total the positive and negative aspects of the interviewee. The likert scale and the short report will act as my feedback to the students because the questions in the likert scale are the actual areas where I want the peers to evaluate the interviewees and act as feedback agents.
In the next class on 10 May, the second member of the pair will do the same with his/partner. Once the pair completes the round of interviewing each other, they would share their judgment reports with each other and would fill out the summary report to select the one that has more positive points. Finally, for up take from the evaluation report, the SS will fill out an up-take of feedback form so that they can discuss it in the class the next day.
On the third day i.e. 11 May, SS will review their reports in the class on voluntary basis in order to gain further feedback from the teacher. Each pair will first share one positive point each from the review form and will then ask questions. My focus will be to probe each pair to ask at least one question regarding whatever they think they need to improve.
Since the lesson is designed in a way that peer-peer learning will be focused, I will get more time to observe students’ on-task behavior. The interview questionnaire, short report, summary and form for the up-take of feedback are the main tools that will engage students in order for them to get feedback on learning to participate in interviews. My primary focus will be to move around in the class monitor how students carry out the task.
domingo, 8 de mayo de 2011
Starting my ongoing data analysis
DAYS 14-16 6-8 MAY
No more fooling around. No more procrastination. Went over the first group interview again and again. Thematic approach taken, categories, sub-themes, organsing themes. This took me for ever and still not fully satisfied. www.mindmeister-com proved to be a good tool, thank u Robert. Well, as I was reading the data, finding quotes, double-checking and correcting my themes and categories, the poor thematic network suffered several transformations. Overall, I’m happy I’m doing this ongoing data analysis approximation now as that wil give more feedback for the action stage beginning next week.
It’s not easy though to present the data and discuss it as if I were dissecting the interview. All the categories and themes are closely knit. Motivation and topics selection affect everything so it’s a mess now, but, hey, don’t panic, this is just the beginning…
No more fooling around. No more procrastination. Went over the first group interview again and again. Thematic approach taken, categories, sub-themes, organsing themes. This took me for ever and still not fully satisfied. www.mindmeister-com proved to be a good tool, thank u Robert. Well, as I was reading the data, finding quotes, double-checking and correcting my themes and categories, the poor thematic network suffered several transformations. Overall, I’m happy I’m doing this ongoing data analysis approximation now as that wil give more feedback for the action stage beginning next week.
It’s not easy though to present the data and discuss it as if I were dissecting the interview. All the categories and themes are closely knit. Motivation and topics selection affect everything so it’s a mess now, but, hey, don’t panic, this is just the beginning…
viernes, 6 de mayo de 2011
Reflections cycle 1, ph 1 – speaking skills lesson
Day 26-27, 5-6 May
Though the lessons in cycle 1, phase 2 were more interactive as compared to my routine teaching practices that took place during the initial investigation, however, my concern here is not just students’ involvement or participation in classroom activity. I really think that improving the quality of individualized feedback and also monitoring students’ on-task behavior needs major input from my side. In the previous cycle, I did manage to move around in the class and monitor each group’s participation in the discussion and also, on the third day of the lesson shared with students, the feedback that the evaluators had given to them along with my own observations of the discussions. I still feel that this whole strategy is promoting individual feedback, but not to its fullest as the feedback is still very general and not detailed enough. I mean giving individual feedback is not the only target. In fact, I also need to consider the up-take of feedback so that students actually improve their skills. And I am not very satisfied with the up-take of feedback from the previous cycle as the feedback remained very general and broad. This could be because the task was such and probably because the evaluators were not given enough practice in evaluating students. Similarly for me, the task is even more challenging because giving feedback to 80 plus students is virtually impossible in a 50 minutes class. Therefore, I intend to develop the activity in the next cycle in such a way that whatever material I prepare for the students, that should communicate my feedback at the end of the lesson.
Though the lessons in cycle 1, phase 2 were more interactive as compared to my routine teaching practices that took place during the initial investigation, however, my concern here is not just students’ involvement or participation in classroom activity. I really think that improving the quality of individualized feedback and also monitoring students’ on-task behavior needs major input from my side. In the previous cycle, I did manage to move around in the class and monitor each group’s participation in the discussion and also, on the third day of the lesson shared with students, the feedback that the evaluators had given to them along with my own observations of the discussions. I still feel that this whole strategy is promoting individual feedback, but not to its fullest as the feedback is still very general and not detailed enough. I mean giving individual feedback is not the only target. In fact, I also need to consider the up-take of feedback so that students actually improve their skills. And I am not very satisfied with the up-take of feedback from the previous cycle as the feedback remained very general and broad. This could be because the task was such and probably because the evaluators were not given enough practice in evaluating students. Similarly for me, the task is even more challenging because giving feedback to 80 plus students is virtually impossible in a 50 minutes class. Therefore, I intend to develop the activity in the next cycle in such a way that whatever material I prepare for the students, that should communicate my feedback at the end of the lesson.
AR cycle 2 (ph 1- Writing)
Day 23-25, 2-4 May
Ahh! I enjoyed the three lessons. Things went well and I’m quite pleased with the way students responded to the changes. Surely the sample memo was a great help for the students. In addition, the self-help exercise gave SS an opportunity to rationalize. I did move around in the class to monitor SS and also asked a few questions. The activity became like an oral quiz and SS participated in it. Though some students were still reluctant to fill out the peer review form, but these are only a few as compared to the number of SS in previous cycle. Students continued the writing activity for two consecutive days as there were two practice tasks and at the end of the second class I asked them to hand in their booklets so that I could mark them. One thing that I hadn’t planned and I decided on the spot was that while monitoring SS on the second day, I also gave feedback on draft 2 of the first writing task of this week. This exercise helped SS in improving their second writing task though I couldn’t give everyone a feedback. But generally SS not receiving feedback do listen very carefully when their peers sitting next to them get feedback. Useful learning strategy indeed!
Ahh! I enjoyed the three lessons. Things went well and I’m quite pleased with the way students responded to the changes. Surely the sample memo was a great help for the students. In addition, the self-help exercise gave SS an opportunity to rationalize. I did move around in the class to monitor SS and also asked a few questions. The activity became like an oral quiz and SS participated in it. Though some students were still reluctant to fill out the peer review form, but these are only a few as compared to the number of SS in previous cycle. Students continued the writing activity for two consecutive days as there were two practice tasks and at the end of the second class I asked them to hand in their booklets so that I could mark them. One thing that I hadn’t planned and I decided on the spot was that while monitoring SS on the second day, I also gave feedback on draft 2 of the first writing task of this week. This exercise helped SS in improving their second writing task though I couldn’t give everyone a feedback. But generally SS not receiving feedback do listen very carefully when their peers sitting next to them get feedback. Useful learning strategy indeed!
jueves, 5 de mayo de 2011
Planning cycle 2 – Writing lessons
Day 22, 1 May
Keeping in view the observations and documentary evidence from both initial investigation and cycle 1, I reflected on the lessons and took into consideration the following issues while planning my next cycle today:
a. During the initial investigation, not all students came forward to get feedback on the written tasks. Feedback was self-initiated (students approached me if they wanted feedback) In addition, those who came, received a very general feedback (i.e. on structure, and communication principles) due to lack of time.
b. In order to maximize the effectiveness of feedback in cycle 1, I focused on the writing process rather than the end product and also on students getting feedback on draft 1 through peer review form and later improving draft 1 and writing a second draft on which I gave them feedback. However, analysis of peer review forms revealed that most of the forms were either blank or incomplete. Students avoided giving reasons for why they marked a particular skill as good or average. Also, suggestions for improvement were quite general without any indication of error/mistake in draft 1 and in some cases irrelevant feedback too.
c. In cycle 1, though the writing tasks were better structured (the booklets) with improved guidelines and instructions and almost everyone submitted their booklets. However, when I marked the tasks, I found only a few booklets that actually followed the instructions in its entirety (i.e. completion of draft 1, peer review form and draft 2). Majority of the students had given incomplete booklets for correction and feedback. So I gave feedback to only those students whose booklets were complete. Rest I returned without marking and asked the students to complete the task.
d. Though in my initial investigation, I did not make much effort to monitor students’ on-task behavior, in cycle 1 I did manage to move around in the class and see whether all students were on-task. In doing so, I was particularly able to guide students who were struggling with the task. Though, student satisfaction was greater when I moved around and signed their booklets. BUT MOVING AOUND IN THAT HUGE ROOM IS BREATHTAKING.
Here’s what I plan to re-consider:
a. Creating interest in the value of feedback from both ends (students and the teacher).
b. Ensure completion of the task.
c. Design self help guides which means developing material with more clarity: giving proper instructions, samples, self-help exercise and peer review form that has greater precision so that students avoid giving a general feedback.
d. Leaving blank sheets for both draft 1 and 2 for SS ease.
e. May be there can be others ways to ensure that everyone is doing the task…hmm…what if I ask random questions regarding the lesson or what exactly are they writing at a particular moment? OR if I can get them to write the task in parts and randomly make a few students to read each part as they write (but this is time consuming). I think I’ll stick with the tiring exercise and also ask questions regarding the task.
Plan for Cycle 2
The topic for the next lesson is memorandum writing. I’m using the booklets again, but this time I have made it look like a self help booklet. First, I will introduce students with the concept of memos. I plan not to talk much about the topic; instead I’ll give them a sample memo and will ask them to go through it. Then the next task will be to review the parts of the sample memo by answering some questions about the key characteristics of memos (E.g. structure, content & organization). Spending roughly 15 minutes on this task I then plan give 5 minutes for Q&A before I initiate the memo writing task. Upon completion of draft 1, students will fill out the peer review form (which I revised keeping in mind the outcomes and feedback from the previous cycle). Then there is another blank sheet for draft 2. Unlike the previous cycle, I have not given a self – assessment form in this booklet as I realized students are more interested in teacher feedback then self assessment. I plan to ensure that students complete at least draft 1 and peer review form in the class and draft 2 can then be given as a home assignment. All I’m interested is in the process of writing and generating effective peer feedback. I think getting the first two tasks completed in the class will allow me to ensure both effortlessly in the given time. Rest, I hope things run smoothly tomorrow!
Keeping in view the observations and documentary evidence from both initial investigation and cycle 1, I reflected on the lessons and took into consideration the following issues while planning my next cycle today:
a. During the initial investigation, not all students came forward to get feedback on the written tasks. Feedback was self-initiated (students approached me if they wanted feedback) In addition, those who came, received a very general feedback (i.e. on structure, and communication principles) due to lack of time.
b. In order to maximize the effectiveness of feedback in cycle 1, I focused on the writing process rather than the end product and also on students getting feedback on draft 1 through peer review form and later improving draft 1 and writing a second draft on which I gave them feedback. However, analysis of peer review forms revealed that most of the forms were either blank or incomplete. Students avoided giving reasons for why they marked a particular skill as good or average. Also, suggestions for improvement were quite general without any indication of error/mistake in draft 1 and in some cases irrelevant feedback too.
c. In cycle 1, though the writing tasks were better structured (the booklets) with improved guidelines and instructions and almost everyone submitted their booklets. However, when I marked the tasks, I found only a few booklets that actually followed the instructions in its entirety (i.e. completion of draft 1, peer review form and draft 2). Majority of the students had given incomplete booklets for correction and feedback. So I gave feedback to only those students whose booklets were complete. Rest I returned without marking and asked the students to complete the task.
d. Though in my initial investigation, I did not make much effort to monitor students’ on-task behavior, in cycle 1 I did manage to move around in the class and see whether all students were on-task. In doing so, I was particularly able to guide students who were struggling with the task. Though, student satisfaction was greater when I moved around and signed their booklets. BUT MOVING AOUND IN THAT HUGE ROOM IS BREATHTAKING.
Here’s what I plan to re-consider:
a. Creating interest in the value of feedback from both ends (students and the teacher).
b. Ensure completion of the task.
c. Design self help guides which means developing material with more clarity: giving proper instructions, samples, self-help exercise and peer review form that has greater precision so that students avoid giving a general feedback.
d. Leaving blank sheets for both draft 1 and 2 for SS ease.
e. May be there can be others ways to ensure that everyone is doing the task…hmm…what if I ask random questions regarding the lesson or what exactly are they writing at a particular moment? OR if I can get them to write the task in parts and randomly make a few students to read each part as they write (but this is time consuming). I think I’ll stick with the tiring exercise and also ask questions regarding the task.
Plan for Cycle 2
The topic for the next lesson is memorandum writing. I’m using the booklets again, but this time I have made it look like a self help booklet. First, I will introduce students with the concept of memos. I plan not to talk much about the topic; instead I’ll give them a sample memo and will ask them to go through it. Then the next task will be to review the parts of the sample memo by answering some questions about the key characteristics of memos (E.g. structure, content & organization). Spending roughly 15 minutes on this task I then plan give 5 minutes for Q&A before I initiate the memo writing task. Upon completion of draft 1, students will fill out the peer review form (which I revised keeping in mind the outcomes and feedback from the previous cycle). Then there is another blank sheet for draft 2. Unlike the previous cycle, I have not given a self – assessment form in this booklet as I realized students are more interested in teacher feedback then self assessment. I plan to ensure that students complete at least draft 1 and peer review form in the class and draft 2 can then be given as a home assignment. All I’m interested is in the process of writing and generating effective peer feedback. I think getting the first two tasks completed in the class will allow me to ensure both effortlessly in the given time. Rest, I hope things run smoothly tomorrow!
miércoles, 4 de mayo de 2011
More interviews and planning the action stage
DAY 12 3 May 2011
Last lesson of this stage observed. The lesson bit I was interested in only lasted 10 minutes and the teacher prepared nothing. She just covered the page with whatever was there. Great because it supports what emerged from the interviews, that the coursebook is unappealing to both teachers and students. Fue un trámite. I also noticed, well it may be part of all this later, that in this class (year 2), teacher-led activities cause more noise and lack of attention than when stu assume a more active role thru stu-centred activities. We need to address this during the action stage when we develop the materials and activities, provided that we teachers don’t change them when actually using them.
DAY 13 4 May 2011
Decided to interview A today rather than yesterday. Both were more relaxed today and we had more time at our disposal. We met in the teachers’ room at school. We started and finished talking about other stuff, but the good stuff was in the middle. She didn´t say much because she doesn´t find any motivation from the coursebook. This time I talked more. Somehow I also need to record what I think and I must share it with the others so that they know what I think.
Because we started planning the action stage in this interview, it occurred to us that next week we can ask our stu to suggest some possible topics so that we start from there next time we meet to develop materials. The three of us will ask our stu next Tue, and we agreed that we’ll do it in Spanish, the what after all is far more important than the how this time.
Last lesson of this stage observed. The lesson bit I was interested in only lasted 10 minutes and the teacher prepared nothing. She just covered the page with whatever was there. Great because it supports what emerged from the interviews, that the coursebook is unappealing to both teachers and students. Fue un trámite. I also noticed, well it may be part of all this later, that in this class (year 2), teacher-led activities cause more noise and lack of attention than when stu assume a more active role thru stu-centred activities. We need to address this during the action stage when we develop the materials and activities, provided that we teachers don’t change them when actually using them.
DAY 13 4 May 2011
Decided to interview A today rather than yesterday. Both were more relaxed today and we had more time at our disposal. We met in the teachers’ room at school. We started and finished talking about other stuff, but the good stuff was in the middle. She didn´t say much because she doesn´t find any motivation from the coursebook. This time I talked more. Somehow I also need to record what I think and I must share it with the others so that they know what I think.
Because we started planning the action stage in this interview, it occurred to us that next week we can ask our stu to suggest some possible topics so that we start from there next time we meet to develop materials. The three of us will ask our stu next Tue, and we agreed that we’ll do it in Spanish, the what after all is far more important than the how this time.
lunes, 2 de mayo de 2011
Reflecting on cycle 1, ph 1 - writing lesson
Day 19-21, 28-30 April
I intend to spend the next three days reflecting on my lessons in cycle 1 and analyzing students’ writing samples so that I can then plan the next writing skills cycle that begins after 4 days from now. I find this a lengthy and tiring task, but I need to keep myself motivated for this one! Though initially I didn’t have a concrete plan as to how I will analyze the writing samples, but as I started the process, I found myself developing an endless list of what I need to focus on in my next cycle. Undoubtedly, the AR cycle is just not meaningful without the reflection stage. In fact, I have now begun to question myself in my other classrooms where I’m only carrying out my teaching activities. I never get the chance to reflect so deeply on how a lesson needs to be planned and whether there’s any scope of improving the quality of teaching and learning. I guess I found my motivation for going through the writing samples :)
I intend to spend the next three days reflecting on my lessons in cycle 1 and analyzing students’ writing samples so that I can then plan the next writing skills cycle that begins after 4 days from now. I find this a lengthy and tiring task, but I need to keep myself motivated for this one! Though initially I didn’t have a concrete plan as to how I will analyze the writing samples, but as I started the process, I found myself developing an endless list of what I need to focus on in my next cycle. Undoubtedly, the AR cycle is just not meaningful without the reflection stage. In fact, I have now begun to question myself in my other classrooms where I’m only carrying out my teaching activities. I never get the chance to reflect so deeply on how a lesson needs to be planned and whether there’s any scope of improving the quality of teaching and learning. I guess I found my motivation for going through the writing samples :)
domingo, 1 de mayo de 2011
Cycle 1 phase II
Day 18, 27 April 2011
Feedback day! I brought all the monitoring forms and read aloud only the suggestions, the evaluators wrote on the forms. They students asked me not to call out names so I shared the feedback by calling out only the group names. I realized that the feedback was more general (for example, give more arguments or ideas not relevant). The evaluators had not given individual feedback in most of the cases. Overall, there are quite a few things that I learned for my next cycle.
Day 17, 26 April 2011
The task was much easier today. My students knew more clearly what they will do in today’s class so I didn’t need to say much. They were all sitting in groups when I went to the class today. I just assigned the group names and topics and everyone began the discussion. I was now charged up to monitor individual groups. In some cases I found that one or two members were not contributing to the discussion. So I stood at their back pointing at them while my face was towards the evaluators and gave non-verbal cues to the evaluators to probe the individuals. Also some evaluators were having problems in filling the forms so I made a few clarifications. I collected all the forms once the discussion was over and told the students that they’ll get the feedback tomorrow.
Day 16, 25 April 2011
As planned, I carried out AR cycle 1, but this time the focus was speaking skills (phase II). I first decided to form groups today, but once again thing didn’t go as planned. I thought of conducting group discussions with 9 groups, but there were only 7 complete groups present today. In other groups, there were one or two absentees so I decided to go with 7 groups only. I first made them sit and then randomly asked 3 – 4 students t to sit with the groups and evaluated the group discussion. One member from each group came and picked two pieces of paper: one having a group name and the other, the discussion topic. Then I quickly explained the monitoring form to the evaluators and told them what they were supposed to do.
First 10 minutes, the groups spent on planning the discussion and then the discussion began. While groups were engaged in discussion, I moved around in each group to learn if everyone was on task. For sure this is much more tiring. I didn’t even complete one round of monitoring each group and I was already exhausted…phew! But I could see the groups taking part in the discussion. I also found the evaluators (students) probing the group for further clarification. I was satisfied with the fact that most students were involved in the activity, but my classroom looked much messed up today. Since we have fixed benches and it is not possible to sit in a big round, the groups were sitting of the benches whereas the students evaluating the discussion sat on the front desks so that they could face the group. I planned to audio record some of the discussions by leaving the recorder with the participating groups, but some group members were quite reluctant, so I decided not to record them. At least the discussions gave more time to students to improve their speaking skills. I didn’t share any group markings or feedback with the class today as I plan to do that once I complete the next round of discussions tomorrow.
Feedback day! I brought all the monitoring forms and read aloud only the suggestions, the evaluators wrote on the forms. They students asked me not to call out names so I shared the feedback by calling out only the group names. I realized that the feedback was more general (for example, give more arguments or ideas not relevant). The evaluators had not given individual feedback in most of the cases. Overall, there are quite a few things that I learned for my next cycle.
Day 17, 26 April 2011
The task was much easier today. My students knew more clearly what they will do in today’s class so I didn’t need to say much. They were all sitting in groups when I went to the class today. I just assigned the group names and topics and everyone began the discussion. I was now charged up to monitor individual groups. In some cases I found that one or two members were not contributing to the discussion. So I stood at their back pointing at them while my face was towards the evaluators and gave non-verbal cues to the evaluators to probe the individuals. Also some evaluators were having problems in filling the forms so I made a few clarifications. I collected all the forms once the discussion was over and told the students that they’ll get the feedback tomorrow.
Day 16, 25 April 2011
As planned, I carried out AR cycle 1, but this time the focus was speaking skills (phase II). I first decided to form groups today, but once again thing didn’t go as planned. I thought of conducting group discussions with 9 groups, but there were only 7 complete groups present today. In other groups, there were one or two absentees so I decided to go with 7 groups only. I first made them sit and then randomly asked 3 – 4 students t to sit with the groups and evaluated the group discussion. One member from each group came and picked two pieces of paper: one having a group name and the other, the discussion topic. Then I quickly explained the monitoring form to the evaluators and told them what they were supposed to do.
First 10 minutes, the groups spent on planning the discussion and then the discussion began. While groups were engaged in discussion, I moved around in each group to learn if everyone was on task. For sure this is much more tiring. I didn’t even complete one round of monitoring each group and I was already exhausted…phew! But I could see the groups taking part in the discussion. I also found the evaluators (students) probing the group for further clarification. I was satisfied with the fact that most students were involved in the activity, but my classroom looked much messed up today. Since we have fixed benches and it is not possible to sit in a big round, the groups were sitting of the benches whereas the students evaluating the discussion sat on the front desks so that they could face the group. I planned to audio record some of the discussions by leaving the recorder with the participating groups, but some group members were quite reluctant, so I decided not to record them. At least the discussions gave more time to students to improve their speaking skills. I didn’t share any group markings or feedback with the class today as I plan to do that once I complete the next round of discussions tomorrow.
jueves, 28 de abril de 2011
Almost at the end of the Initial Investigations phase
DAY 10 25 APRIL 2011
Mehvish is right, AR is not linear, I mean every stage within the cycle. It happened to me, when S asked to meet her to discuss what she had in mind with 3ro Polimodal, she was in fact sort of starting with the action stage, which, according to my plan, comes after I’m done with the initial investigations (observ + indiv interviews).
I suspect schedules will again suffer this week as there seems to be God knows what tomorrow at the school. Once again I’ll have to put off one observ I think.
DAY 11 27 APRIL 2011
Observed S’s lesson and OMG, terrible preparation, I forgot the iPod to audio-record the lesson. Fortunately, a saw a student with his iPhone and borrowed it. Bad bad boy.
The lesson went smoothly. I realised later that S never bothered to do the useless task on the page and instead focused on practising reported speech in relation to verbal communication and the game Chinese whispers or (Broken) Telephone.
Did the interview at 9pm over the phone, horrible horrible thing to do, I was tired, she was tired too, it was short, only 9 minutes, I didn’t feel like asking her things we already know, still couple of issues emerged that I need to explore in future interviews
Mehvish is right, AR is not linear, I mean every stage within the cycle. It happened to me, when S asked to meet her to discuss what she had in mind with 3ro Polimodal, she was in fact sort of starting with the action stage, which, according to my plan, comes after I’m done with the initial investigations (observ + indiv interviews).
I suspect schedules will again suffer this week as there seems to be God knows what tomorrow at the school. Once again I’ll have to put off one observ I think.
DAY 11 27 APRIL 2011
Observed S’s lesson and OMG, terrible preparation, I forgot the iPod to audio-record the lesson. Fortunately, a saw a student with his iPhone and borrowed it. Bad bad boy.
The lesson went smoothly. I realised later that S never bothered to do the useless task on the page and instead focused on practising reported speech in relation to verbal communication and the game Chinese whispers or (Broken) Telephone.
Did the interview at 9pm over the phone, horrible horrible thing to do, I was tired, she was tired too, it was short, only 9 minutes, I didn’t feel like asking her things we already know, still couple of issues emerged that I need to explore in future interviews
sábado, 23 de abril de 2011
planning again
Day 15, 21 April 2011
A few conscious decisions I made: one, no more structured/planned group presentations (as students focus more towards memorizing content in English), second, group discussion rather than presentation (so that they experience something new). Finally, 5 for 1 (I mean 5 evaluators for each group) to keep it rather unbiased (if that’s what students think). Keeping in view the previous speaking lessons I had to take these decisions. Obviously I could anticipate issues/difficulties even here like if I carry out group discussions, how I will deal with the classroom organization? How I will monitor each group more effectively? What kind of feedback they will get?
First I’ve designed a group monitoring form that both me and one other students (whose not part of the group being evaluated) will use during the group discussion. The evaluation sheet includes space for writing group and group members’ name and an open ended question at the end that the evaluators will use to write their feedback for a particular group. The evaluation is broadly on the basis on content, participation, manner, communication. The student evaluator will mark on a scale of 1 to 5 which I’ll later marks from an average of 10. Since there are 17 groups of 5-7 members each, I’ll ask each group to pick one small piece of paper that has an alphabet written on it so that each group has a name. I’ve pre-selected nine different topics (all argumentative) and will ask one member from each group to randomly pick a piece of paper. I intend to select four students as evaluators for one group each whereas I’ll be the fifth evaluator who will move around in each group. The plan is to carry out group discussion with 9 groups on the first and 8 groups on the second day. The students who are not among the groups participating in the discussion will act as evaluators for that particular day. I do think that I’ll have to go through the monitoring form with the students before I give it to them for actual use. It all looks lengthy, but I’m hoping that if I carefully follow the steps as per plan, I will achieve the aims set for the lesson. Good luck to me!
A few conscious decisions I made: one, no more structured/planned group presentations (as students focus more towards memorizing content in English), second, group discussion rather than presentation (so that they experience something new). Finally, 5 for 1 (I mean 5 evaluators for each group) to keep it rather unbiased (if that’s what students think). Keeping in view the previous speaking lessons I had to take these decisions. Obviously I could anticipate issues/difficulties even here like if I carry out group discussions, how I will deal with the classroom organization? How I will monitor each group more effectively? What kind of feedback they will get?
First I’ve designed a group monitoring form that both me and one other students (whose not part of the group being evaluated) will use during the group discussion. The evaluation sheet includes space for writing group and group members’ name and an open ended question at the end that the evaluators will use to write their feedback for a particular group. The evaluation is broadly on the basis on content, participation, manner, communication. The student evaluator will mark on a scale of 1 to 5 which I’ll later marks from an average of 10. Since there are 17 groups of 5-7 members each, I’ll ask each group to pick one small piece of paper that has an alphabet written on it so that each group has a name. I’ve pre-selected nine different topics (all argumentative) and will ask one member from each group to randomly pick a piece of paper. I intend to select four students as evaluators for one group each whereas I’ll be the fifth evaluator who will move around in each group. The plan is to carry out group discussion with 9 groups on the first and 8 groups on the second day. The students who are not among the groups participating in the discussion will act as evaluators for that particular day. I do think that I’ll have to go through the monitoring form with the students before I give it to them for actual use. It all looks lengthy, but I’m hoping that if I carefully follow the steps as per plan, I will achieve the aims set for the lesson. Good luck to me!
Resuming fieldwork
Day 14, 20 April 2011
The reason why I enjoy the AR cycles is because it is practically not as linear as it looks. There I was moving to the 3rd day of cycle 1 where I had planned to implement a similar writing lesson that I had done before leaving for the conference. I went into the class with a new handout, but then some students came to me and asked if I had checked/corrected the drafts they submitted last week. Due to lack of time I couldn’t check those drafts. However, I decided to give feedback to them in today’s class only because if they revisited their work they would probably identify their own mistakes in a better way than before. So I quickly returned their drafts and asked them a list of questions that I had already prepared with the idea of checking/marking each draft at home. I read my marking criteria while they checked their work. Usually students are more motivated in doing something that offers them marks, but here for the first time I found them engaged in the task even though there was no reward involved. Hmmm, I still wonder what derived them…may be the fact that I told them that they will have something similar in the exam or because they realized it’s for their own benefit…I really don’t know. But there were clear signs of uptake of feedback as they asked me to repeat the criteria while they check and recheck their work. Since they sit in three wide rows of 7 seats each, I faced one row at a time while going through each marking criteria. I did notice that while I faced one row, students sitting in the other two rows would try and follow the criteria even though they’d get a chance to check their work later. Although I didn’t plan to give feedback in this way, but I thought I worked quite well both for me and the students. I think there’s enough food for thought for my next week’s lesson as I’ll be continuing with cycle 1, but I’ll be focusing on speaking skills again.
The reason why I enjoy the AR cycles is because it is practically not as linear as it looks. There I was moving to the 3rd day of cycle 1 where I had planned to implement a similar writing lesson that I had done before leaving for the conference. I went into the class with a new handout, but then some students came to me and asked if I had checked/corrected the drafts they submitted last week. Due to lack of time I couldn’t check those drafts. However, I decided to give feedback to them in today’s class only because if they revisited their work they would probably identify their own mistakes in a better way than before. So I quickly returned their drafts and asked them a list of questions that I had already prepared with the idea of checking/marking each draft at home. I read my marking criteria while they checked their work. Usually students are more motivated in doing something that offers them marks, but here for the first time I found them engaged in the task even though there was no reward involved. Hmmm, I still wonder what derived them…may be the fact that I told them that they will have something similar in the exam or because they realized it’s for their own benefit…I really don’t know. But there were clear signs of uptake of feedback as they asked me to repeat the criteria while they check and recheck their work. Since they sit in three wide rows of 7 seats each, I faced one row at a time while going through each marking criteria. I did notice that while I faced one row, students sitting in the other two rows would try and follow the criteria even though they’d get a chance to check their work later. Although I didn’t plan to give feedback in this way, but I thought I worked quite well both for me and the students. I think there’s enough food for thought for my next week’s lesson as I’ll be continuing with cycle 1, but I’ll be focusing on speaking skills again.
martes, 19 de abril de 2011
Catching up
DAY 8 18 April 2011
Delivered my second lesson. It was OK; I think I was better prepared but even though I tried to plan most things and what to say I started with my usual rumbling and digressions. I intended to do some language work, managed but it was VERY peripheral. VERY, so peripheral that it was hardly noticed. I did more vocab though and some pronunciation features but very little as regards conditional sentences, grammar point of the coursebook unit.
We couldn’t get together with C to discuss her observations and feelings more but we only chatted for about ten minutes during the break between lessons.
DAY 9 19 April 2011
Observed A’s first lesson. Only 40’, I had to leave the classroom but thanks to the ipod everything’s there, well, at least what the teacher said… I don’t think I’ll be able to interview her today, I was tired, so was she, then I tried to arrange a phone interview but that didn’t work either…I don’t to be a burden
Then, later, I ended up recording a meeting with S. Out of the blue she decided to plan History lessons for her YEAR 3 Polimodal. As I was listening to her, the idea of motivation is beginning to emerge more strongly. Also, I begin to see again this idea of the teacher as a ‘resourcer’: like ‘I give you these photocopies, and you make a presentation based on this material plus others you might find and bother to find’. I’ll transcribe it and keep it stored, it might be beneficial. To some extent, S’s plan sort of advances what I have in mind for May and June but I’m not sure to what extent is intimate to the AR project as this is more of an individual endeavour to fight this lack of motivation and interest S perceives in her class. Again, she determined the topics and contents because A. She’s got worth exploiting sources (book and films) and she likes English History. I guess she’s at a loss or she confirms her low expectations about her students as the told me that she asked them what they are interested in and nobody said a thing. Does it have to do with the way she asked them? Maybe she asked them in English rather than in Spanish? I should ask her.
I couldn’t help it and opened my mouth again by suggesting a couple of things for the stu’s benefit: stu presentations on Tue, film discussion on Wed, more scaffolding for their presentation and follow-up activities for their peers. It’s a fact that we don’t think the same about our stu, I don’t have to let that affect the process of research and, above all, our friendship WAY more important than our professional relationship.
Delivered my second lesson. It was OK; I think I was better prepared but even though I tried to plan most things and what to say I started with my usual rumbling and digressions. I intended to do some language work, managed but it was VERY peripheral. VERY, so peripheral that it was hardly noticed. I did more vocab though and some pronunciation features but very little as regards conditional sentences, grammar point of the coursebook unit.
We couldn’t get together with C to discuss her observations and feelings more but we only chatted for about ten minutes during the break between lessons.
DAY 9 19 April 2011
Observed A’s first lesson. Only 40’, I had to leave the classroom but thanks to the ipod everything’s there, well, at least what the teacher said… I don’t think I’ll be able to interview her today, I was tired, so was she, then I tried to arrange a phone interview but that didn’t work either…I don’t to be a burden
Then, later, I ended up recording a meeting with S. Out of the blue she decided to plan History lessons for her YEAR 3 Polimodal. As I was listening to her, the idea of motivation is beginning to emerge more strongly. Also, I begin to see again this idea of the teacher as a ‘resourcer’: like ‘I give you these photocopies, and you make a presentation based on this material plus others you might find and bother to find’. I’ll transcribe it and keep it stored, it might be beneficial. To some extent, S’s plan sort of advances what I have in mind for May and June but I’m not sure to what extent is intimate to the AR project as this is more of an individual endeavour to fight this lack of motivation and interest S perceives in her class. Again, she determined the topics and contents because A. She’s got worth exploiting sources (book and films) and she likes English History. I guess she’s at a loss or she confirms her low expectations about her students as the told me that she asked them what they are interested in and nobody said a thing. Does it have to do with the way she asked them? Maybe she asked them in English rather than in Spanish? I should ask her.
I couldn’t help it and opened my mouth again by suggesting a couple of things for the stu’s benefit: stu presentations on Tue, film discussion on Wed, more scaffolding for their presentation and follow-up activities for their peers. It’s a fact that we don’t think the same about our stu, I don’t have to let that affect the process of research and, above all, our friendship WAY more important than our professional relationship.
miércoles, 13 de abril de 2011
Dealing with the unavoidable
Day 13, 13 April 2011
I had to reschedule today’s class because one of the teachers asked me that she needed the auditorium for some seminar that the department had arranged. I could not have my class in any other room as the other rooms didn’t have enough seating space. I’ll also have to reschedule some of my classes next week as I’m leaving for a conference. I now hope to resume classes from 20 April.
I had to reschedule today’s class because one of the teachers asked me that she needed the auditorium for some seminar that the department had arranged. I could not have my class in any other room as the other rooms didn’t have enough seating space. I’ll also have to reschedule some of my classes next week as I’m leaving for a conference. I now hope to resume classes from 20 April.
Action plan continues
Day 12, 12 April 2011
When I went for the class today, some students were busy writing their second drafts and some were filling up the self-assessment form. For a moment I felt annoyed that they were doing it at the last minute, but then I was happy to see them involved. Some of them requested that I give them 5 minutes so that they could complete. At least they were taking interest! So I encouraged them to quickly complete and submit the work. All I wanted was that they maintain their interest especially those who never cared about getting their worked checked. Once they all handed in yesterday’s work, I moved to the new lesson. This time it was easy as I didn’t need to explain much and students knew it was a similar task like the previous day. But then today I told them to spend 5 – 10 minutes separately on reading and interpreting the graph first and then another 20 minutes for writing. I had learned from the previous lesson that students needed more time to understand and write about the graph than I had initially planned. So today, I told them that they have around 30 minutes to complete the first draft. Meanwhile the students wrote their first draft, I decided to move around and see what they were doing. I knew this won’t be easy in fact; it will be quite tiring, but then I’d learn what each student was doing. I moved around and signed students’ first draft to ensure they were all doing the task. Also, if they had to take this task for home assignment (in case they couldn’t complete in the class), I wouldn’t mind as long as it is the same draft they submit to me later. I noticed that for some strange reason they all wanted to get their drafts signed. This is something that I had never seen in my previous writing lessons. Students who never cared about showing their work to me were now asking me to come and sign their drafts. A marked difference in their attitudes! Once they finished writing draft 1, they exchanged their work for peer review. After spending 10 – 15 minutes on peer review, I told them to complete the rest of the task at home and submit their work to me in the next class. In the last couple of minutes, I quickly asked if they were satisfied with peer feedback. Some students clearly said that the peer feedback of was not relevant as the mistakes pointed out were not really mistakes and so they decided for a second peer review. Once again I could see their serious attitude and involvement in the task. Good thing!
When I went for the class today, some students were busy writing their second drafts and some were filling up the self-assessment form. For a moment I felt annoyed that they were doing it at the last minute, but then I was happy to see them involved. Some of them requested that I give them 5 minutes so that they could complete. At least they were taking interest! So I encouraged them to quickly complete and submit the work. All I wanted was that they maintain their interest especially those who never cared about getting their worked checked. Once they all handed in yesterday’s work, I moved to the new lesson. This time it was easy as I didn’t need to explain much and students knew it was a similar task like the previous day. But then today I told them to spend 5 – 10 minutes separately on reading and interpreting the graph first and then another 20 minutes for writing. I had learned from the previous lesson that students needed more time to understand and write about the graph than I had initially planned. So today, I told them that they have around 30 minutes to complete the first draft. Meanwhile the students wrote their first draft, I decided to move around and see what they were doing. I knew this won’t be easy in fact; it will be quite tiring, but then I’d learn what each student was doing. I moved around and signed students’ first draft to ensure they were all doing the task. Also, if they had to take this task for home assignment (in case they couldn’t complete in the class), I wouldn’t mind as long as it is the same draft they submit to me later. I noticed that for some strange reason they all wanted to get their drafts signed. This is something that I had never seen in my previous writing lessons. Students who never cared about showing their work to me were now asking me to come and sign their drafts. A marked difference in their attitudes! Once they finished writing draft 1, they exchanged their work for peer review. After spending 10 – 15 minutes on peer review, I told them to complete the rest of the task at home and submit their work to me in the next class. In the last couple of minutes, I quickly asked if they were satisfied with peer feedback. Some students clearly said that the peer feedback of was not relevant as the mistakes pointed out were not really mistakes and so they decided for a second peer review. Once again I could see their serious attitude and involvement in the task. Good thing!
Action plan Cycle 1
Day 11, 11 April 2011
The students were sitting in the class when I went for the lesson today. They all had copies of the booklet with them as I had informed the class representative that they should get the photocopies before coming to the class. I first had to introduce them with the lesson and the booklet so that they exactly know what I had planned for them. It took me almost 15 minutes to familiarize them with the planned activity and particularly the peer review and self assessment form which they had never used before. I knew it would be difficult to expect them to finish the whole task in the class as this was the first time they were trying this kind of an activity. After explaining the task I asked them to spend 20 minutes in writing about the graph. They started doing the task while I moved around in the front row monitoring them and answering some of the queries they had. I could see some students sitting at the back discussing the graph. Half way through I realized that they will not be able to complete the first draft by the end of this class as some of them were struggling in trying to interpret and analyze information from the graph. So I moved with the natural flow and didn’t rush at all. They asked more questions today than they usually ask. I tried to explain things several times and made instructions easy and simple so that they follow me. Today, I didn’t call out the attendance, but I circulated a paper and asked students to write their names. So I had more time to observe them while they were on-task. Ten minutes prior to the end of class, I told them that they will complete the first draft today and give their draft along with the booklet to their peer for review and feedback. I told them that they can get peer feedback after the class and then complete the second draft and self-assessment form as a home assignment. I told them that I will collect their completed handouts along with draft 1 and 2 before we begin tomorrow’s lesson. I also gave tomorrow’s lesson to the class representative and asked everyone to get photocopies before coming to the class tomorrow. With that I finished today’s class and left.
The students were sitting in the class when I went for the lesson today. They all had copies of the booklet with them as I had informed the class representative that they should get the photocopies before coming to the class. I first had to introduce them with the lesson and the booklet so that they exactly know what I had planned for them. It took me almost 15 minutes to familiarize them with the planned activity and particularly the peer review and self assessment form which they had never used before. I knew it would be difficult to expect them to finish the whole task in the class as this was the first time they were trying this kind of an activity. After explaining the task I asked them to spend 20 minutes in writing about the graph. They started doing the task while I moved around in the front row monitoring them and answering some of the queries they had. I could see some students sitting at the back discussing the graph. Half way through I realized that they will not be able to complete the first draft by the end of this class as some of them were struggling in trying to interpret and analyze information from the graph. So I moved with the natural flow and didn’t rush at all. They asked more questions today than they usually ask. I tried to explain things several times and made instructions easy and simple so that they follow me. Today, I didn’t call out the attendance, but I circulated a paper and asked students to write their names. So I had more time to observe them while they were on-task. Ten minutes prior to the end of class, I told them that they will complete the first draft today and give their draft along with the booklet to their peer for review and feedback. I told them that they can get peer feedback after the class and then complete the second draft and self-assessment form as a home assignment. I told them that I will collect their completed handouts along with draft 1 and 2 before we begin tomorrow’s lesson. I also gave tomorrow’s lesson to the class representative and asked everyone to get photocopies before coming to the class tomorrow. With that I finished today’s class and left.
Entering planning phase
Day 10, 8 April 2011
I am planning my first cycle today keeping in mind the observations, students’ written samples and interviews with students and the teacher. In the next three classes, I will focus on writing skills again, but this time the lesson centers around analyzing information from visual cue or a graphic organizer to summarize, highlighting the key areas and main trends. Considering the two main challenges i.e. the limited class duration and greater number of students, I have to plan lessons in a way that allow for some kind of immediate feedback for the students. I plan to put together a small booklet which will also act as self-help handout of 4-5 pages. The idea is to basically reduce the lecture time so that students get more time to perform or practically do the task in the class. The booklet introduces students with simple steps of how to interpret and analyze graphs/charts and then write about 150 – 160 words. Also, upon task completion students spend some time in peer review and provide feedback. The booklet contains a peer review form on which students give feedback on the first draft and suggest how their peers can improve. There is a separate sheet attached in the handout where students write their second draft once they get the peer feedback. Finally the booklet has a self-assessment form which the students fill up after completing their second draft. The purpose of this form is to allow the students evaluate their own progress from the first draft to draft 2 and identify areas where they think they have improved in the second draft. The form also has some space where students can write about the difficulties they faced and areas that need to be addressed. The tentative time for the writing task and peer review is 20 and 15 minutes respectively. However, I’ll have to wait until next week to see if the lesson goes according to the plan.
I am planning my first cycle today keeping in mind the observations, students’ written samples and interviews with students and the teacher. In the next three classes, I will focus on writing skills again, but this time the lesson centers around analyzing information from visual cue or a graphic organizer to summarize, highlighting the key areas and main trends. Considering the two main challenges i.e. the limited class duration and greater number of students, I have to plan lessons in a way that allow for some kind of immediate feedback for the students. I plan to put together a small booklet which will also act as self-help handout of 4-5 pages. The idea is to basically reduce the lecture time so that students get more time to perform or practically do the task in the class. The booklet introduces students with simple steps of how to interpret and analyze graphs/charts and then write about 150 – 160 words. Also, upon task completion students spend some time in peer review and provide feedback. The booklet contains a peer review form on which students give feedback on the first draft and suggest how their peers can improve. There is a separate sheet attached in the handout where students write their second draft once they get the peer feedback. Finally the booklet has a self-assessment form which the students fill up after completing their second draft. The purpose of this form is to allow the students evaluate their own progress from the first draft to draft 2 and identify areas where they think they have improved in the second draft. The form also has some space where students can write about the difficulties they faced and areas that need to be addressed. The tentative time for the writing task and peer review is 20 and 15 minutes respectively. However, I’ll have to wait until next week to see if the lesson goes according to the plan.
Transcribing again
Day 9, 7 April 2011
Transcribing again! To my surprise the students have a completely different perspective of the classroom practices. In the entire talk, they said they feel quite satisfied with the way I monitor them and provide them feedback on written tasks. Although, they did mention that I don’t provide much feedback during speaking lessons. These students are the ones who usually came forward to get feedback and may be that is one reason why they seem so satisfied. They also think that I do know how each student is performing as I monitor them from the front of the room. They feel that the best thing about having classes in the auditorium is that the teacher can easily see the students from the front of the room. All I can think of right now is ‘appearance and reality’…Shakespeare’s greatest theme.
Transcribing again! To my surprise the students have a completely different perspective of the classroom practices. In the entire talk, they said they feel quite satisfied with the way I monitor them and provide them feedback on written tasks. Although, they did mention that I don’t provide much feedback during speaking lessons. These students are the ones who usually came forward to get feedback and may be that is one reason why they seem so satisfied. They also think that I do know how each student is performing as I monitor them from the front of the room. They feel that the best thing about having classes in the auditorium is that the teacher can easily see the students from the front of the room. All I can think of right now is ‘appearance and reality’…Shakespeare’s greatest theme.
Focus group
Day 8, 6 April 2011
Today I am meeting with my students for a focus group interview. We are meeting at 10.30 am in the mathematics department, the same room where we have our classes daily. I asked them a week prior to the interview about their willingness to participate in this study. Around 12 students gave their names to me, but only five showed up on the day of the interview. The ones who came requested that they’d be more comfortable if the interview was conducted in Urdu (their national language). They all read the consent forms and signed. I started recording and everything went well. The interview lasted for 70 minutes. After finishing with the interview, I waited for 15 minutes till all the students came in. I have a class with them now.
Today I am meeting with my students for a focus group interview. We are meeting at 10.30 am in the mathematics department, the same room where we have our classes daily. I asked them a week prior to the interview about their willingness to participate in this study. Around 12 students gave their names to me, but only five showed up on the day of the interview. The ones who came requested that they’d be more comfortable if the interview was conducted in Urdu (their national language). They all read the consent forms and signed. I started recording and everything went well. The interview lasted for 70 minutes. After finishing with the interview, I waited for 15 minutes till all the students came in. I have a class with them now.
Transcribing
Day 7, 5 April 2011
I am still transcribing, but one idea that has clearly emerged from our talk yesterday is that my colleague faces almost the same issues that I do even though we are teaching in different departments. While transcribing it, I realized that my participant teacher feels quite helpless in the given situation. According to her, it’s a very challenging task for the teacher to ensure that every student in the class participates in the speaking lessons. There were many issues that I hadn’t anticipated so I had to probe further. I think this interview will help me a great deal when I have the focus group interview with my students tomorrow. I am really looking forward to tomorrow’s group interview as students, who I believe are the real stakeholders as they are at the receiving end, should talk more about their feelings and expectations about the lessons in focus.
I am still transcribing, but one idea that has clearly emerged from our talk yesterday is that my colleague faces almost the same issues that I do even though we are teaching in different departments. While transcribing it, I realized that my participant teacher feels quite helpless in the given situation. According to her, it’s a very challenging task for the teacher to ensure that every student in the class participates in the speaking lessons. There were many issues that I hadn’t anticipated so I had to probe further. I think this interview will help me a great deal when I have the focus group interview with my students tomorrow. I am really looking forward to tomorrow’s group interview as students, who I believe are the real stakeholders as they are at the receiving end, should talk more about their feelings and expectations about the lessons in focus.
Exploring in-depth
Day 6, 4 April 2011
As planned, I conducted an individual interview today with one of my colleague who is teaching the same course in a similar setting. I wanted to explore how my colleague addresses the challenges of teaching in difficult circumstances. We met for the interview in one of the full-time cooperative teacher’s office at 11.00 am. My fellow colleague requested that we record the interview in this particular room as she spends the time between classes in this room only. The participant teacher signed the consent form and the interview lasted for around 50 minutes. The teacher was slightly hesitant when I started talking to her. It took her like 15 minutes to relax a bit and talk more openly about her classroom practices particularly related to feedback and monitoring of students’ on-task behavior. It went on smoothly from there onwards. Finished with the first interview, now I’ll go take my last lesson for today and then I’m on to the next task…something I don’t really enjoy doing…transcription!
As planned, I conducted an individual interview today with one of my colleague who is teaching the same course in a similar setting. I wanted to explore how my colleague addresses the challenges of teaching in difficult circumstances. We met for the interview in one of the full-time cooperative teacher’s office at 11.00 am. My fellow colleague requested that we record the interview in this particular room as she spends the time between classes in this room only. The participant teacher signed the consent form and the interview lasted for around 50 minutes. The teacher was slightly hesitant when I started talking to her. It took her like 15 minutes to relax a bit and talk more openly about her classroom practices particularly related to feedback and monitoring of students’ on-task behavior. It went on smoothly from there onwards. Finished with the first interview, now I’ll go take my last lesson for today and then I’m on to the next task…something I don’t really enjoy doing…transcription!
viernes, 8 de abril de 2011
Now
DAY 5, 8 April 2011 More transcribing, I feel more at ease now. There might be problems with my classroom observations next week as there will be general school meetings to discuss the new secondary education system to be implemented from next year. I will have to reschedule observations. Back to transcribing. Transcription finished. WOW!!! So many issues that emerged way way deeper than my planned questions could have triggered. Don’t know now whether to follow them up in the one-to-one interviews. What if my asking for clarification/unpacking makes them change their mind or say something different because I may be signalling that I don’t agree with them? Hmm.
Transcriptions begin
DAY 4, 7 April 2011 First group interview carried out in the teachers’ room at the school at 10.30 am, we chose this place because there’s a coffee machine and it’s the place where we usually meet between lessons. It went very well I think. They signed the informed consent form without even reading them, and then we started talking, but they never realised that I had started recording. It wasn’t a problem, they said they felt more relaxed that way because it didn’t feel like an ‘interview’ (probably meaning me doing the asking, them doing the answering). It lasted around 40minutes. After lunch I started with the transcription. Panicked and some decisions to make. Checked the different templates Keith had given us and decided to use the one with numbered lines, names, text and room for comments. It’s taking me way way longer than expected as there’s too much overlap and broken sentences. I’m trying to jot down some ideas just in case I lose them.
jueves, 7 de abril de 2011
First issues
DAY 3, 6 April 2011 Today I’ve started planning the lessons I’ve got to teach next week and I wonder whether I should plan them as if I were a full-time teacher or not. My point is that now I’ve got more time to devote to planning, adapting the coursebook, selecting and I can´t help it, I mean, I want to deliver ‘the’ lesson. However, I then need to bear in mind that the situation is not that normal in the sense that I’ll teach these two lessons without actually being their teacher all the year round. Something to definitely consider when analysing the data from observations and feedback from stu.
miércoles, 6 de abril de 2011
Almost there
DAY 2, 5 April 2011 More arrangements today! This Thu will be our first group interview. All my observations have been scheduled between next week and the week after. The arranging of individual interviews after the observed lessons might be a problem because of teachers’ tight schedule (they have a life too). However, I’m thinking that, depending on the outcomes of the first interview, I might not really need the one-to-one interviews. Perhaps we engage in heated discussions anyways, and I’ll be one participant now, it might be funny to interview S and A separately, who’s going to interview me? Unless I do a sort of recorded stream of consciousness or use this journal, but let´s wait and see what happens on Thu. In passing, I told one of the classes about my PhD project and their role in it. All of them seems interested and ready to be observed and audiorecorded. I also mentioned the ethical forms and all that. Yes, all that.
lunes, 4 de abril de 2011
At the other end, Esquel
Initial Investigations DAY 1, 4 April 2011 Today I went back to my dear secondary school in Esquel. The students thought I’d be teaching again, but but but, that won’t happen for the time being. I met one of my fellow teachers, explained to her in a rush what we’ll be doing this month and had a good time talking about the consent forms and all the ethical issues of the AR, she didn’t seem to care. She seemed willing and discussed about the importance of being honest, and writing about everything that happens around the cycle as planned. It was funny because when we agreed about the lessons I’d observe, she said sthg like she would prepare a lesson for me to observe, as if the lesson would be addressed to me, so I had to explain that she could plan and deliver the lesson the way she usually does, that her lesson shouldn´t be to me. Maybe it´s because of this idea of believing that I’ll also judge their performance. She´ll let me know when she plans a content-based lesson for me to observe based on Messages 2, OUP. Then I met the other teacher, the one who’s taken over after my other participant resigned. Well, again, she thought I’d be judging her so she began telling me about her approach and strategies and what have you and the lesson she would plan to display to me. Hold on a minute… Anyway, because I’ll be taking her course to teach myself, it’s gonna be two lessons this month, she relaxed a bit. She offered to observe me and she asked me whether we could meet some time this week so that we talk more about this stage of the AR. I feel really anxious now. I’m really looking forward to teaching again. I’ve got two lessons to plan, one for next Mon and the other in two weeks’ time. Such fun!! Is this reflective writing and keeping a diary? Well, it is to me J Now, I’ve got another challenge, to arrange a time for us three teachers to meet for my first focus group interview. I hope we can do it this week, let´s see how that goes. I’ll try to shut up.
domingo, 3 de abril de 2011
Journal entries for AR study
Journal – Wednesday, 2nd March 2011
Reconnaissance phase: Writing lesson 1
I am teaching Communication Skills course to BS 3rd year, Mathematics department. It is a three credit hours course with 50-minutes duration for each class and classes are held thrice a week. A total number of 110 students are enrolled in the course. These included both the BS 3rd year students and repeaters from the previous year. The classroom is a huge round-shaped auditorium on the ground floor of the Mathematics department. The auditorium has three staircases (one on each side and one in the middle of the room) leading down to the front of the classroom. There are wooden benches fixed in an arch in three long rows of the stairway. Each row had around 7-8 folding benches. In the front centre of the classroom, there is a huge arch shaped wooden board or table behind which the teacher stands and delivers their lecture. There is a green writing board fixed on the wall behind the arch shaped wooden board. Under the board is a thin cemented wall covered with a thick layer of chalk powder. There are only six fans attached to the ceiling and no windows for ventilation. The thick glass walls on two sides of the room are the only source of light as there is no light in the room. There is no audio-visual aid in the classroom and the teachers have to almost shout in order to make themselves clear to the students sitting at the back. Since there is no audio-visual aid in the classroom, the lecture handout and tasks are usually given to a student representative for photocopying.
Today there were around 74 students present in the classroom. I went to the classroom and started the by revising the previous day’s lecture in which I discussed with students, the various aspects of effective writing. I also revised the formal letter writing styles which I had explained in the earlier lessons. After spending 15 – 20 minutes in revising the last lecture, I asked the students to write a leave application keeping in view the formal letter/application style. I dictated the application question to the students and the students then began to write their individual applications. This was a practice task and students were supposed to finish it in the class only. The number of students is so big that it is not possible for me to collect their class work for corrections. It would take at least a week to correct students’ work and give any kind of feedback. So I thought I should make them practice in class and give feedback during the class.
Since the class duration is only 50 minutes I called out students’ attendance meanwhile they were doing the task. It takes almost 10 – 15 minutes to call out all the names. After I finished calling out their attendance some students came to me to get their applications checked. I checked the basic layout and style of the applications and gave feedback accordingly. My feedback included comments on the date format, line spacing, and missing subject line. I read the main content of students’ application, but did not provide any feedback on grammatical errors and proper paragraphing as there were too many students and less time for individual feedback. Not all students showed their work to me and I checked around 15 – 20 students’ work (particularly those who came to get their work checked). Most of the students who didn’t get their work checked agreed that they had done their work. I told the students that we will practice letter and application writing in the next class and asked them to finish today’s work if they haven’t and let me know if they have any problems. With that I ended today’s class.
Journal – Tuesday, 8th March 2011
Reconnaissance phase: Writing lesson 2
I went to the class on time today. I started off with some general announcements about the repeaters. Some students asked about the date for midterm examination and I told them to check with the department office as I have no information on the matter. There were comparatively more students present today as compared to the previous class. I assume this is because the midterm examinations are approaching and students want to know the topics discussed so that they can prepare well for the examinations. I told the students that so far they had written a request application and today they will write a job application. First I had a whole class discussion session in which I asked students about what kind of jobs they are planning to do once they graduate. Most of the students said that they are interested in teaching and would apply in a college whereas some said they would apply in a bank. Then I highlighted the importance of job applications by telling them that they will soon be applying for a job and they need to develop relevant skills in order to aim for a good career. I then asked what they would do to apply for a job in a particular organization/institution. Some of them said they will send their C.V. in order to apply for a job in any organization. Others remained quiet. I told the students that sending a C.V. is sometimes not enough and we also write an application or a cover letter along with our C.V.
After spending almost 15 minutes in this discussion, I then asked the students to write a job application assuming they are applying for a job after graduating from the university. I called out their attendance while they wrote their applications. Some students asked questions about how they should start but I told them to discuss with their peers and decide whatever they think is best. Given the difficult circumstances where the class duration is only 50 minutes, the classroom seating arrangement is such that it is not easy to move around, and other constraints like the greater number of students, no sound system or visual aid, I find it extremely difficult to check whether everyone in the class is doing the task. Therefore, I tell the students to complete their work and get it checked in the class if they want. A few students came to me for feedback on the written task and asked questions about effective writing. Then I reminded the students about the importance of effective messages. I discussed with them the 7 C’s of communication so that students can understand how to write effective messages. I could only discuss three of the 7 C’s with them today as the class time was over so I told them that we will continue the remaining C’s of communication in the next class.
Since today I spent most of the time discussing the significance of job applications, I did not have time to check students’ work. So I asked the students to complete their work at home and bring it in the next class so that we can discuss. I then finished and left for another the class.
Journal – Wednesday, 9th March 2011
Reconnaissance phase: Writing lesson 3
Today when I went to the class I started with the previous day’s work. I asked the students to show me their job applications to me. Some of them shared their work and I check it. My feedback was again general comments on application format and layout. I also pointed out that some applications were very direct and impolite. Also they were not giving complete information. After spending 10 minutes on giving feedback on the previous task, I started today’s class.
In today’s class I first reviewed the three C’s of communication and then discussed the remaining four of the 7 C’s of communication. For each C of communication I explained the concept first and then gave examples of how they can use it in both oral and written messages. I also discussed with them the relationship between the purpose of the message and the right approach for design effective messages. I told them that the purpose of the message decides the kind of approach we should use to write a message. I gave them examples of how they would write something in a direct approach and similarly where they would use the indirect approach. There were no handouts on the lecture and students only took notes in their notebooks. The main reason for not giving any handouts is to allow the students to understand the concepts in the class when they are being discussed and apply them later in the given task. Students often do not pay attention to the class activities if they have the photocopied handouts with them as they think they will learn or memorize the lectures for the purpose of examinations.
The lectures are usually followed by a practical task (which is an in-class activity) so that students get a chance to practice what is taught. The in-class practice activity is emphasized more for several reasons: firstly, to some extent it allows the teacher to monitor students’ learning, secondly, students become independent learners and particularly those who are keen to learn take the tasks very seriously. Thirdly, if students find any difficulty in practical application of knowledge, they can discuss among peers or can ask the teacher to clarify the concept further. Finally, this classroom practice discourages the weaker students to plagiarize and they are bound to perform in the class. Therefore, lectures and in-class practice activity blend in well for the purpose of optimum learning. For example, even in today’s class, after explaining the 7 C’s of communication and the different approaches, I told the students to write a complaint letter which was an in-class practice task. I gave them a question that asked them to write a complaint letter to the customer care of some company for a recently purchased product that does not work properly. They began writing their letters; meanwhile I called out their attendance. Some of them finished and came to me for feedback. I checked some students’ work. This time I particularly focused on how they had used 7 C’s and the approach in which they wrote their complaints. I mostly circled or underlined the phrases and sentences that needed to be revised. I told them to revise their subject line keeping in mind the politeness principle. I could only check around 15 – 20 students’ work. I asked the others to discuss with me if there were problems. Some students gave their work to me for correction so I took their work and told them that it will be returned next week. I then finished today’s class.
Journal – Tuesday, 21st March 2011
Reconnaissance phase: Speaking lesson 1
Today was the first day of presentations. All the students were sitting in the class and waiting for me when I went to the class today. The presentations were held in the same classroom where we have our routine classes every day. One of the students switched off all the fans because she could not speak in a loud voice. Since there is no sound system, multimedia or overhead projector in the classroom, all students needed to speak loudly and prepared chart papers as visual aid for their presentations.
Three groups had given their names during the previous week for presenting today. When I went to the class today, there were three chart papers posted on the writing board. I sat in the third row toward in right side of the room so that I could hear the presenters. When I asked the groups about who would come and present first, one of the groups volunteered and came to the front where they would present. Before the group began presenting, I told them the rules for the presentations which included the time for each presentation, the format of question-answer session and the assessment criteria. The presentations were assessed out of 10 marks with 5 main categories including content, body language, technique, appearance and question/answer in which I assessed students’ performance. Although these were group presentations where each group presented for 10 minutes, but the assessment was made on individual performance i.e. students’ performance in the 5 main categories was evaluated only when they presented their part. After I finished giving the instructions, the first group started their presentation on the topic ‘Recycling’. The first member was a little nervous while presenting. She stood behind the wooden board and kept reading from the chart paper. The chart papers were not quite visible even from the third row where I sat. All group members came one by one and presented. Only the last member stood on the side of the wooden board instead of standing behind it. She was very confident. Only one student asked a question from this group after the presentation finished and one of the group members answered it.
The second group came and posted their charts. They also chose the topic ‘Recycling’. This group had four members only and they all looked nervous. Although they did make charts but only one member used them during the presentation. All members read their presentation from paper. The group’s voice was not audible. While this group was presenting, some of the students constantly kept talking in the last rows. I also noticed that there were some students standing at the door and they were trying to peep inside. They also exchanged non-verbal signals with their friends sitting inside the classroom. The students standing by the doorway were from some other batch and were not enrolled in my course. Since I was getting distracted I went to the door and asked the students to stay outside. The group who was presenting also finished and nobody asked any questions. The room is so big and also the number of students that it is extremely difficult to key an eye on every student. When this group finished, I told the class that if they talk during someone’s presentation then I will deduct 2 marks from their presentation.
The third and the final group came to present on the same topic ‘Recycling’. This group looked confident except for one member who did not perform well. Almost all of them used their visual aid and spoke in a clear voice. Also during this groups’ presentation, I had to turn back and ask some students not to talk. When the group finished the presentation, some students asked questions and two members answered them. When all three presentations were complete, I told the students that I will give the results once we finish will all presentations. A few students asked me about my feedback so I told them that I will give general comments based on the three presentations that took place today. I asked the students who will present in the next sessions to learn from today’s presentations and not to repeat the same mistakes. I told them to improve the quality of chart papers and rehearse before presenting here so that they develop confidence. I did not have enough time to give detailed feedback and results because I had to rush for a class in another department so I left saying that I will mark everyone present for today.
Journal – Tuesday, 22nd March 2011
Reconnaissance phase: Speaking lesson 2
Today we had the second session of presentations. There were three groups who were supposed to present. I went to the class ten minutes early today. When I entered the classroom/auditorium, some students were doing their rehearsals. There were fifteen students sitting in the classroom/auditorium so I waited for 10 minutes for other students to come. Meanwhile, I distributed some students’ written work that they had given to me the previous day for correction and feedback. After 10 minutes, I asked the students to begin their presentations. All three groups who were supposed to present seemed a little hesitant when I asked which group would come first. They all seemed nervous to go and present first. So I told them to decide in 1 minute or I will randomly select a group. One group hesitantly got up and decided to present. They went in front of the classroom and pasted their chart papers on the green board. Like the previous day, there was no multimedia and the students used charts as visual aid for their presentation. I was sitting at the second last row today so that I could see everyone in the class. But sitting at the far end I realized I could not see the charts clearly as the charts were hand written in normal font size that I think could only be seen clearly if one was sitting in the front two rows. So I relied on listening to the groups’ presentation. Like the previous presentation session, I had an assessment sheet with me in which I marked students on their performance.
The first group started presenting and they chose the topic ‘Recycling’. The first group member started by introducing herself and the topic and continued with her presentation. She was a little nervous and read her points from the paper. She quickly finished her presentation and invited the next group member. The next member was also very anxious and also presented her part by reading from a paper. In the same manner all five group members presented without using/discussing the charts. I could hear the group clearly even at the back row. While the group was presenting, there were some students who come late to the class and sat in the last rows. I could see some students talking in the middle rows. Two students sitting in front were busy reading and preparing for their own presentation. Another girl sitting with these two students was busy arranging her chart papers. The first group finished and some students asked questions from the first group. When the first group finished, they removed their charts from the board. I did not tell the marks to the group and also didn’t give any feedback as it would waste too much time. One group took almost 15 to 18 minutes to present and I thought that if I spent another 5minutes in giving feedback then we will not be able to finish all three presentations in 50 minutes class. So the next group came and pasted their charts on the board and began their presentation.
The second group chose the topic ‘Bad eating habits’. During the second groups’ presentation, I was constantly giving non-verbal cues to some students’ sitting on my left to stay quiet. One student sitting in the middle row asked one of the presenters to speak a little loudly as her voice was not clear. Even I could not hear her properly. The presenter got nervous and stopped presenting. She invited the other group member without completing her part. One student left the class quietly during the presentation. The second group finished the presentation but one girl from this group made a request for some extra time before they could invite questions from the students. She continued to talk on the topic and gave examples from her personal experiences. Some students sitting in the class and also the group members started talking while the girl shared her personal experience on the topic. It seemed that the students did not take interest in what the girl had to say. Two group members from the same group looked quite surprised about what their group member was talking about. It looks like it was not planned. The girl took more than 5 extra minutes so I told her to finish quickly.
I quickly invited the third and the last group for today. They posted their charts on the wall. The third group also chose the topic ‘Recycling’. The first member stated. He looked nervous as he moved around hastily in front during his presentation. He was speaking too fast and it was difficult to understand what he was trying to say. He quickly finished his part and called the next member to present. The girl came and stated reading from small note cards. She did not maintain any eye contact with the students. She then invited the third group member who looked a little more confident. She tried to explain her part very clearly. When the fourth member came to present he looked nervous. In the beginning, he spoke fluently, but then he suddenly forgot his part and called the fifth member to present. The last girl presented confidently and showed some samples of recycled products that the group had made. After the group finished the students had many questions and only two members answered the questions. The others stood quietly at the back.
After the presentations I could not give any feedback as there was no time left and I had to rush for another class. Some students asked me about their marks in the presentation, but I told them that I will announce the marks when all the presentations are complete. I did not have enough time to call out their attendance so I told them that I will mark everyone present.
The presentations continued for another three lessons as there were 16 groups with 5 members in each group. Since each group presented for 10 minutes excluding the question/answer round which took another 5-8 minutes each group, only three groups got the opportunity to present in each lesson. All presentations followed almost the same format and after all the groups completed their presentations the result/marks were then displayed on the notice board. Since individual feedback was not possible, therefore, at the end of all the presentations, I gave a general feedback to students. I pointed out the common mistakes that the students made while presenting.
Reconnaissance phase: Writing lesson 1
I am teaching Communication Skills course to BS 3rd year, Mathematics department. It is a three credit hours course with 50-minutes duration for each class and classes are held thrice a week. A total number of 110 students are enrolled in the course. These included both the BS 3rd year students and repeaters from the previous year. The classroom is a huge round-shaped auditorium on the ground floor of the Mathematics department. The auditorium has three staircases (one on each side and one in the middle of the room) leading down to the front of the classroom. There are wooden benches fixed in an arch in three long rows of the stairway. Each row had around 7-8 folding benches. In the front centre of the classroom, there is a huge arch shaped wooden board or table behind which the teacher stands and delivers their lecture. There is a green writing board fixed on the wall behind the arch shaped wooden board. Under the board is a thin cemented wall covered with a thick layer of chalk powder. There are only six fans attached to the ceiling and no windows for ventilation. The thick glass walls on two sides of the room are the only source of light as there is no light in the room. There is no audio-visual aid in the classroom and the teachers have to almost shout in order to make themselves clear to the students sitting at the back. Since there is no audio-visual aid in the classroom, the lecture handout and tasks are usually given to a student representative for photocopying.
Today there were around 74 students present in the classroom. I went to the classroom and started the by revising the previous day’s lecture in which I discussed with students, the various aspects of effective writing. I also revised the formal letter writing styles which I had explained in the earlier lessons. After spending 15 – 20 minutes in revising the last lecture, I asked the students to write a leave application keeping in view the formal letter/application style. I dictated the application question to the students and the students then began to write their individual applications. This was a practice task and students were supposed to finish it in the class only. The number of students is so big that it is not possible for me to collect their class work for corrections. It would take at least a week to correct students’ work and give any kind of feedback. So I thought I should make them practice in class and give feedback during the class.
Since the class duration is only 50 minutes I called out students’ attendance meanwhile they were doing the task. It takes almost 10 – 15 minutes to call out all the names. After I finished calling out their attendance some students came to me to get their applications checked. I checked the basic layout and style of the applications and gave feedback accordingly. My feedback included comments on the date format, line spacing, and missing subject line. I read the main content of students’ application, but did not provide any feedback on grammatical errors and proper paragraphing as there were too many students and less time for individual feedback. Not all students showed their work to me and I checked around 15 – 20 students’ work (particularly those who came to get their work checked). Most of the students who didn’t get their work checked agreed that they had done their work. I told the students that we will practice letter and application writing in the next class and asked them to finish today’s work if they haven’t and let me know if they have any problems. With that I ended today’s class.
Journal – Tuesday, 8th March 2011
Reconnaissance phase: Writing lesson 2
I went to the class on time today. I started off with some general announcements about the repeaters. Some students asked about the date for midterm examination and I told them to check with the department office as I have no information on the matter. There were comparatively more students present today as compared to the previous class. I assume this is because the midterm examinations are approaching and students want to know the topics discussed so that they can prepare well for the examinations. I told the students that so far they had written a request application and today they will write a job application. First I had a whole class discussion session in which I asked students about what kind of jobs they are planning to do once they graduate. Most of the students said that they are interested in teaching and would apply in a college whereas some said they would apply in a bank. Then I highlighted the importance of job applications by telling them that they will soon be applying for a job and they need to develop relevant skills in order to aim for a good career. I then asked what they would do to apply for a job in a particular organization/institution. Some of them said they will send their C.V. in order to apply for a job in any organization. Others remained quiet. I told the students that sending a C.V. is sometimes not enough and we also write an application or a cover letter along with our C.V.
After spending almost 15 minutes in this discussion, I then asked the students to write a job application assuming they are applying for a job after graduating from the university. I called out their attendance while they wrote their applications. Some students asked questions about how they should start but I told them to discuss with their peers and decide whatever they think is best. Given the difficult circumstances where the class duration is only 50 minutes, the classroom seating arrangement is such that it is not easy to move around, and other constraints like the greater number of students, no sound system or visual aid, I find it extremely difficult to check whether everyone in the class is doing the task. Therefore, I tell the students to complete their work and get it checked in the class if they want. A few students came to me for feedback on the written task and asked questions about effective writing. Then I reminded the students about the importance of effective messages. I discussed with them the 7 C’s of communication so that students can understand how to write effective messages. I could only discuss three of the 7 C’s with them today as the class time was over so I told them that we will continue the remaining C’s of communication in the next class.
Since today I spent most of the time discussing the significance of job applications, I did not have time to check students’ work. So I asked the students to complete their work at home and bring it in the next class so that we can discuss. I then finished and left for another the class.
Journal – Wednesday, 9th March 2011
Reconnaissance phase: Writing lesson 3
Today when I went to the class I started with the previous day’s work. I asked the students to show me their job applications to me. Some of them shared their work and I check it. My feedback was again general comments on application format and layout. I also pointed out that some applications were very direct and impolite. Also they were not giving complete information. After spending 10 minutes on giving feedback on the previous task, I started today’s class.
In today’s class I first reviewed the three C’s of communication and then discussed the remaining four of the 7 C’s of communication. For each C of communication I explained the concept first and then gave examples of how they can use it in both oral and written messages. I also discussed with them the relationship between the purpose of the message and the right approach for design effective messages. I told them that the purpose of the message decides the kind of approach we should use to write a message. I gave them examples of how they would write something in a direct approach and similarly where they would use the indirect approach. There were no handouts on the lecture and students only took notes in their notebooks. The main reason for not giving any handouts is to allow the students to understand the concepts in the class when they are being discussed and apply them later in the given task. Students often do not pay attention to the class activities if they have the photocopied handouts with them as they think they will learn or memorize the lectures for the purpose of examinations.
The lectures are usually followed by a practical task (which is an in-class activity) so that students get a chance to practice what is taught. The in-class practice activity is emphasized more for several reasons: firstly, to some extent it allows the teacher to monitor students’ learning, secondly, students become independent learners and particularly those who are keen to learn take the tasks very seriously. Thirdly, if students find any difficulty in practical application of knowledge, they can discuss among peers or can ask the teacher to clarify the concept further. Finally, this classroom practice discourages the weaker students to plagiarize and they are bound to perform in the class. Therefore, lectures and in-class practice activity blend in well for the purpose of optimum learning. For example, even in today’s class, after explaining the 7 C’s of communication and the different approaches, I told the students to write a complaint letter which was an in-class practice task. I gave them a question that asked them to write a complaint letter to the customer care of some company for a recently purchased product that does not work properly. They began writing their letters; meanwhile I called out their attendance. Some of them finished and came to me for feedback. I checked some students’ work. This time I particularly focused on how they had used 7 C’s and the approach in which they wrote their complaints. I mostly circled or underlined the phrases and sentences that needed to be revised. I told them to revise their subject line keeping in mind the politeness principle. I could only check around 15 – 20 students’ work. I asked the others to discuss with me if there were problems. Some students gave their work to me for correction so I took their work and told them that it will be returned next week. I then finished today’s class.
Journal – Tuesday, 21st March 2011
Reconnaissance phase: Speaking lesson 1
Today was the first day of presentations. All the students were sitting in the class and waiting for me when I went to the class today. The presentations were held in the same classroom where we have our routine classes every day. One of the students switched off all the fans because she could not speak in a loud voice. Since there is no sound system, multimedia or overhead projector in the classroom, all students needed to speak loudly and prepared chart papers as visual aid for their presentations.
Three groups had given their names during the previous week for presenting today. When I went to the class today, there were three chart papers posted on the writing board. I sat in the third row toward in right side of the room so that I could hear the presenters. When I asked the groups about who would come and present first, one of the groups volunteered and came to the front where they would present. Before the group began presenting, I told them the rules for the presentations which included the time for each presentation, the format of question-answer session and the assessment criteria. The presentations were assessed out of 10 marks with 5 main categories including content, body language, technique, appearance and question/answer in which I assessed students’ performance. Although these were group presentations where each group presented for 10 minutes, but the assessment was made on individual performance i.e. students’ performance in the 5 main categories was evaluated only when they presented their part. After I finished giving the instructions, the first group started their presentation on the topic ‘Recycling’. The first member was a little nervous while presenting. She stood behind the wooden board and kept reading from the chart paper. The chart papers were not quite visible even from the third row where I sat. All group members came one by one and presented. Only the last member stood on the side of the wooden board instead of standing behind it. She was very confident. Only one student asked a question from this group after the presentation finished and one of the group members answered it.
The second group came and posted their charts. They also chose the topic ‘Recycling’. This group had four members only and they all looked nervous. Although they did make charts but only one member used them during the presentation. All members read their presentation from paper. The group’s voice was not audible. While this group was presenting, some of the students constantly kept talking in the last rows. I also noticed that there were some students standing at the door and they were trying to peep inside. They also exchanged non-verbal signals with their friends sitting inside the classroom. The students standing by the doorway were from some other batch and were not enrolled in my course. Since I was getting distracted I went to the door and asked the students to stay outside. The group who was presenting also finished and nobody asked any questions. The room is so big and also the number of students that it is extremely difficult to key an eye on every student. When this group finished, I told the class that if they talk during someone’s presentation then I will deduct 2 marks from their presentation.
The third and the final group came to present on the same topic ‘Recycling’. This group looked confident except for one member who did not perform well. Almost all of them used their visual aid and spoke in a clear voice. Also during this groups’ presentation, I had to turn back and ask some students not to talk. When the group finished the presentation, some students asked questions and two members answered them. When all three presentations were complete, I told the students that I will give the results once we finish will all presentations. A few students asked me about my feedback so I told them that I will give general comments based on the three presentations that took place today. I asked the students who will present in the next sessions to learn from today’s presentations and not to repeat the same mistakes. I told them to improve the quality of chart papers and rehearse before presenting here so that they develop confidence. I did not have enough time to give detailed feedback and results because I had to rush for a class in another department so I left saying that I will mark everyone present for today.
Journal – Tuesday, 22nd March 2011
Reconnaissance phase: Speaking lesson 2
Today we had the second session of presentations. There were three groups who were supposed to present. I went to the class ten minutes early today. When I entered the classroom/auditorium, some students were doing their rehearsals. There were fifteen students sitting in the classroom/auditorium so I waited for 10 minutes for other students to come. Meanwhile, I distributed some students’ written work that they had given to me the previous day for correction and feedback. After 10 minutes, I asked the students to begin their presentations. All three groups who were supposed to present seemed a little hesitant when I asked which group would come first. They all seemed nervous to go and present first. So I told them to decide in 1 minute or I will randomly select a group. One group hesitantly got up and decided to present. They went in front of the classroom and pasted their chart papers on the green board. Like the previous day, there was no multimedia and the students used charts as visual aid for their presentation. I was sitting at the second last row today so that I could see everyone in the class. But sitting at the far end I realized I could not see the charts clearly as the charts were hand written in normal font size that I think could only be seen clearly if one was sitting in the front two rows. So I relied on listening to the groups’ presentation. Like the previous presentation session, I had an assessment sheet with me in which I marked students on their performance.
The first group started presenting and they chose the topic ‘Recycling’. The first group member started by introducing herself and the topic and continued with her presentation. She was a little nervous and read her points from the paper. She quickly finished her presentation and invited the next group member. The next member was also very anxious and also presented her part by reading from a paper. In the same manner all five group members presented without using/discussing the charts. I could hear the group clearly even at the back row. While the group was presenting, there were some students who come late to the class and sat in the last rows. I could see some students talking in the middle rows. Two students sitting in front were busy reading and preparing for their own presentation. Another girl sitting with these two students was busy arranging her chart papers. The first group finished and some students asked questions from the first group. When the first group finished, they removed their charts from the board. I did not tell the marks to the group and also didn’t give any feedback as it would waste too much time. One group took almost 15 to 18 minutes to present and I thought that if I spent another 5minutes in giving feedback then we will not be able to finish all three presentations in 50 minutes class. So the next group came and pasted their charts on the board and began their presentation.
The second group chose the topic ‘Bad eating habits’. During the second groups’ presentation, I was constantly giving non-verbal cues to some students’ sitting on my left to stay quiet. One student sitting in the middle row asked one of the presenters to speak a little loudly as her voice was not clear. Even I could not hear her properly. The presenter got nervous and stopped presenting. She invited the other group member without completing her part. One student left the class quietly during the presentation. The second group finished the presentation but one girl from this group made a request for some extra time before they could invite questions from the students. She continued to talk on the topic and gave examples from her personal experiences. Some students sitting in the class and also the group members started talking while the girl shared her personal experience on the topic. It seemed that the students did not take interest in what the girl had to say. Two group members from the same group looked quite surprised about what their group member was talking about. It looks like it was not planned. The girl took more than 5 extra minutes so I told her to finish quickly.
I quickly invited the third and the last group for today. They posted their charts on the wall. The third group also chose the topic ‘Recycling’. The first member stated. He looked nervous as he moved around hastily in front during his presentation. He was speaking too fast and it was difficult to understand what he was trying to say. He quickly finished his part and called the next member to present. The girl came and stated reading from small note cards. She did not maintain any eye contact with the students. She then invited the third group member who looked a little more confident. She tried to explain her part very clearly. When the fourth member came to present he looked nervous. In the beginning, he spoke fluently, but then he suddenly forgot his part and called the fifth member to present. The last girl presented confidently and showed some samples of recycled products that the group had made. After the group finished the students had many questions and only two members answered the questions. The others stood quietly at the back.
After the presentations I could not give any feedback as there was no time left and I had to rush for another class. Some students asked me about their marks in the presentation, but I told them that I will announce the marks when all the presentations are complete. I did not have enough time to call out their attendance so I told them that I will mark everyone present.
The presentations continued for another three lessons as there were 16 groups with 5 members in each group. Since each group presented for 10 minutes excluding the question/answer round which took another 5-8 minutes each group, only three groups got the opportunity to present in each lesson. All presentations followed almost the same format and after all the groups completed their presentations the result/marks were then displayed on the notice board. Since individual feedback was not possible, therefore, at the end of all the presentations, I gave a general feedback to students. I pointed out the common mistakes that the students made while presenting.
lunes, 28 de marzo de 2011
Kicking the ball
Hi Mehvish! I think we might want to keep the blog restricted to ourselves for some time or until we feel this should be changed and invite some of our tutors to come and peek. Anyway, just begin posting as I'm starting my first stage on 4 April, next week. One of my participating teachers left the school last week, it might be an issue, you can imagine, but it seems that the new teacher is willing to come on board. Looking forward to reading your entries here! Dario
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