Merry Month of May

Hello and welcome to summer in May :)

Time for yet another self-reflection.
This video is from early May.

Starting off I should point out that unlike a previous lesson and video the time for activating their schema, introducing the vocabulary and asking some CCQs about the vocab is much shorter. I timed it as over 9 minutes. Probably still too long but much better than the 17 minutes from the Vices Bingo lesson.
One small note: I should move the lectern out of the view of the smartphone before I start recording..ha..ha.
Using invitations to reply I activated their schema about synonyms for permission (the lesson title) and denying. However, at times in the past I have been good at waiting for answers but in this lesson I noticed that I was too quick to give the answers myself (self answering). Whoops!
I should have done much better at introducing the topic like I did when I had the lesson on lying. To be honest: the first two minutes comes off as awkward.
However, I quickly recovered and got the class going again when someone sneezed. I incorporated the sneeze into my teacher talk (TT) about the the topic and I got the class laughing. People can also see that I got some tissues for the student that sneezed (2:30). As I have mentioned numerous times classroom atmosphere is very important to me.
At 4 minutes I incorporate the students into the discussion of the target language by using realia. I take items from the students and ask if i have their permission (May I/could I/can I..) and I expect them to use the target language in their replies (Go right ahead/Be my guest/It is not possible, etc.).
I am not sure why I introduced another vocabulary item at this point (hoarder) as the students already have over 10 items from the permission lesson. The lessons I am making these days are going to have 5-9 vocabulary. Not 15! Not over 25! No more than nine.
For the activity where they write their ten dreams I will not read all ten of my examples in the future. It took too long (2-3 minutes) as I introduced yet again more vocabulary. Even if I reduce the lesson's vocabulary I still have a tendency to bring in more new words. Bad Kevan!
The one good thing is that I did well in eliciting answers from the students that lead to them understanding Mr. Mom.

At just over ten minutes (10:30) I finally give the students time to make ten dreams or wishes.
At this point I begin monitoring. I should point out that I rarely, if almost ever, sit at my desk while students work. I am always working around and looking at their written work or listening to their answers. I interact with the students quite well as I give feedback or ask questions of every single student (there are ten students in the class). While at times I help with grammar (articles for one student) my problem is I talk too much giving feedback in the form or opinions or advice. I should instead focus on questions to help them make corrections (or using scaffolding), and questions of clarification or information. This would move the focus of the feedback or talking away from me and onto them. For example: at 15:30 I tell one student who wrote something about Kyeongju that they should take the train there from the north. At 19 minutes I start comparing Canada and Korea with a student as well as old people in both countries.
I should have also given a time limit on writing their dreams. It went from minute 10-11 to minute 26. Too long as I feel now that 8-10 minutes would have been sufficient. My chit chatting with students most likely prolongs this portion of the lesson. Chatty Kevan indeed!

Looking back at my TT in Canada and at Suncheon University I am dismayed that I talk so much now. I had much less TT at Suncheon University because many students were low, and the classes were too big to chat with everyone. I would often chat with my students more outside of the class if they were interested in engaging me in discourse. In regards to Canada the students were younger so our conversations were brief and they did not have time to chit-chat in between classes. At my current job the students are older and speak better English so I am apt to chat more (more TT). During class time, as this video shows, I really need to go back to my old ways. Not so chatty Kevan!

Before I started the last activity I did quick verbal directions and then I modeled the activity.
Much better than in the past where I would verbally read 5-10 directions then model the actvity with one or two students.
For the modeling I had every student do one wish with me whereby they get a response denying or granting permission. Next time I will just do 2 at most and throw them into groups sooner. I should take the focus away from me.

Lastly, like a good Canadian I cannot get away from using "Please" and "Thank you". It might seem very formal but it is how Canadians were brought up in my generation. It is very hard to get away from it. Thank you for reading my blog. Please have a good day or evening.

Looking Back

In this post I am looking back at an old video from March.
I will evaluate my teaching during the video using PPiPP (Preview/Present/isolate/Practice/Produce).

For this activity I did not do a PREVIEW.
However, it would have been quite easy to do one. The target language was using "What would you do if..." for questions and "He/she would.." for answers.
For a preview I could have simply stated at the beginning "What would I do if I won the lottery?" and then answered my own question by saying "I would buy a big house in the countryside. Or I would give all my money away to charity." Then I could have asked a few students through individual nomination or invitation to bid/reply "What would you do if you won the lottery?". This would have alerted the students to the target language and gotten them to start thinking of things they would like to do especially in regards to dreams and wishes (activating schema).
As was discussed with reflection 8 I need to and I am therefore endeavouring to reduce my teacher talk regarding directions and vocabulary at the beginning of a lesson.
For this activity I took almost 2 minutes to read and repeat the activity's directions. After that I did a very thorough model with actions and a student helping me do the pair work. Considering the level of my students just modeling would be sufficient. Since the students are only completing five "What would you do if..." questions with their own words it is very easy for them. It is also possible that mnay Middle School students could do it without verbal/written directions and then modeling. Only modeling might work if the modeling is done properly.
In addition I would not repeat the directions verbally. Asking a few ICQs (after the modeling) would be much better as it would test their knowledge of the activity not mine. I am also trying to not ask "Any questions?" anymore. Again, an ICQ would be much better. And to be honest - almost nobody ever asks a question after I say "Any questions?". No one did in this video.

At least I did not spend 17 minutes on directions/modeling/vocabulary like I did in the previous video.

 I did do a PRESENTATION of the target language during the modeling (both questions and answers) as examples of correct completed questions were given (What would you do if your students were too noisy?) along with possible answers (I would scream louder than them).

I still have a little difficulty fully understanding ISOLATION or explanation. When the students individualy complete the questions with their own words - is that isolation? My understanding is that isolation involves controlled mechanical practice. Is isolation when we use the target language in a very simple way that is similar to filling in the blanks?

For this activity there is definitely PRACTICE. During pairwork the students will read their questions to their partner. The partner will verbally reply with "I would..." and the asker must write down their partner's answer onto the paper (He/she would...). Five questions and answers are down by each person.

This activity is missing any PRODUCTION. For production (using Blooms' revised taxonomy of higher order: analyze, evaluate, create) I could try the following: have the students survey their classmates using the questions they created. After the survey each student could write a paragraph or more describing the results of their survey. "What answers were common?", "What were some unique answers?" and "Did anyone think the same as me (have the same answers)?" Students could present their findings in groups of four. Or students could compare themselves with only their partners. Ask each pair to make a poster with two circles showing what was common and what was different. Common answers would be where the two circles overlap and differences would only be in their own circle. The students could also be asked "Why?" they gave the answers they did in a written assignment or in group discussion.

During individual work and pairwork I did not give time limits. I find that with higher level students, such as my current students, they can keep talking for a long time with just a few questions to get them started. Time limits might not be necessary as I can monitor them and see when everyone is finished. You will notice that I almost never stand at the front. I am constantly monitoring the class giving feedback, reading their answers and listening to their discourse. Now with middle school and high school it might be necessary to keep time for activities lest the students get bored (takes too long), the better students finish quickly and are bored, or it takes too long to wait for some slower students to complete the task. When teaching in public school in Canada I did time activities whereas in my current job I am often very flexible with time (except for public speeches: 2 to 4 minutes).
In this video we can see that I most likely gave them too much time for the pairwork (minute 12 to 29 for a total of 17 minutes).

Onto next week and more evaluation :)

Looking At Me

My activity for this video was VICES BINGO with the Elementary Teachers.

After some reading on the brain in the SLA class I have become aware of a problem in my class.
I often teach too much vocabulary.
For this video you will see me introduce over 25 expressions/words of vocabulary.
Studies have shown that the optimum amount of vocaulary one should teach per activity/lesson is seven to nine (7 to 9). The amount I taught in this video was about three times too much.
I gave them three pieces of paper with expression about expressing amusement (oh my god; that's amazing;etc.), expressing sympathy (sorry for your loss; that is terrible;etc.) and vocab about habits and temptations (daily habit;give in to temptation; etc.). Therefore, way too much vocabulary. It took 12 minutes for me to go through the vocabulary. The only good thing I can say is that I asked many CCQs about the vocab and other questions to confirm that they understood the expressions and words.
As a result of too much vocabulary there is too much teacher talk (TT) for the opening 15 minutes. I would also add that I do not need to say that this is "useful" before I start teaching. The students can guess that I feel it is useful (in my opinion only).
I also spent 5 minutes on the directions and modeling. As my students are high level I can just model the activity. There is no need to read the directions. For lower level reading the directions with actions and then doing a model with students would be more useful.
Therefore, it wasn't until 17 minutes that the students actually got to practice the vocabulary in an activity. I do not think anyone would disagree that 17 minutes is too long for preview and presentation.

In regards to the activity I would like to change it.
Instead of working in groups I would get them to walk around the classroom talking to each other.
I would get them to pick a sentence from the cup.
Then they would find a partner and read their sentence to their partner. The partner will respond to the sentence using some vocabulary and hopefully by adding much more such as answering the question "Why?" (why did they say that).
After talking with two partners I will allow them to choose another sentence (a different one) from the cup so that we get a variety of responses and answers. Plus, it would be boring to repeat the same sentence over and over.
This activity would have everyone active at all times and practicing the target language a lot.

As with my micro-teaching demo I found that I too quickly gave them the answers and I need to reduce the teacher talk while giving feedback.
Though I feel I did display one good example of scaffolding/feedback at the 20 minute mark.
A student asked me about stalking. Rather than give an answer I asked them to tell me what Koreans call a crazy fan (I think I forget the expression right now: is it sasaeng?).
I used this question and discussion to show them what stalking is.

I feel that my forms of praise were varied and I certainly did not use "Good job".
When asking questions I used individual nominations, and invitations to reply (varied).
And as mentioned earlier I used many questions and examples to make sure they understood the target language.
And I walked around monitoring both groups through the group discussion.

Micro Teaching 2 - Reflection

With a cheery "Good Afternoon" the second demonstration began.
It was certainly better than the first demo in terms of my presentation skills.
However, as pointed out in my feedback the lesson plan needs a facelift.

Prior to the lesson I had difficulty understanding TDBU. Top Down I understood to be reading for gist. Bottom Up I understood to be looking for specifics such as vocabulary. Now, TDBU was more difficult for me to grasp. However, after Jeff's demonstration I understood TDBU. The activity whereby Jeff had everyone read the menu and find three vegetarian options made all the students read the entire menu and try to find specifics (veggie dishes). I should add that as a vegetarian myself I appreciated the fact that it is hard to sometimes find a dish for me.
The original scan at the beginning of my lesson could be changed to have them look for the vocabulary (language police, etc.). Another option is that I could have written a question on the board such as "What is the arguement against Chinese language only signs?" and had the students look for it.
Another changes: need to vary my praise expressions. I did try to use different forms but I noticed that I used "well-done" too much. Good, excellent, OK are some other options. At least I did not use "good job" as it is my pet peeve as I often hear Korean teachers use it (too much).
When interacting with the students during pair work I jumped to give them the answers or strong hints too quickly. I should have asked questions and engaged in scaffolding in order to get them to the answer without my supplying it. Also, in regards to the question about Quebec I gave a long answer rather than activating their schema. I could have asked them "Why is Quebec different from the rest of Canada?" and "Do you think they have laws promoting French or English? Why?" Therefore, less teacher talk from me and more talking from them. Lastly, when I got Laura to help another student (Dee Dee) with the answer I supplied too much help again. I should have asked Laura "Why?" she got the answer she did and to explain it to Dee Dee.

I feel that my energy level was much better than the first demo.
I monitored the students during pair work (I walked around and checked their answers).
I used a technique from a co-worker for pairs to confirm their partner. In my demo each person had to say "Hello" to their partner. My co-worker has also used handshakes and pointing for students to identify their partner(s).
At the beginning I worked hard to engage the students with questions such as "What is controversy?", "What is the title of the article?", and "Where does the story take place?" I could have asked some follow-up questions such as "Please give me an example of controversy", or "What do think the article's main idea is?"
Lastly, it was very interesting to see my classmates' demonstrations as I could see other ways to use the reading material.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Rgys3qy8cM