Comments on ICT

Thanks Group 7 did a great presentation on ICT.  They introduced several useful

softwares to utilize into language teaching, such us Hot potato and U will as well as on-line resources (U-will and Podcast).  In addition, they demonstrated how to download and utilize these softwares in class. In this way, we learn these successfully.

 Just as teacherAlice mentioned, the ICT do not merely refer to PowerPoint teaching. Rather, teacher should utilize ICT to create more communicative interactions and to facilitate independent learning that the traditional teaching pedagogy is lack of.

  A great number of on-line teaching resources and materials are available in this high-tech society. Therefore, as teachers-to-be like us, in teaching contexts, we should have the ability to choose the most suitable on-line resources for different students.

  At first, it seems difficult for me to learn those softwares introduced by group 7. However, after errors and trials, I did learn it in the end.  Hence, in my opinion that challenging and adventurous personalities are essential for being an ICT teacher.

“delicious”

This adjective, delicious is not used to describe food. Rather, it used to classify useful on-line webs. 

Here is my account, del.icio.us/cynthia 0502. 

Through delicious, we can explore useful and “delicious” materials altogether.

Comments on Writing

Activity I. Opening, Theory about writing, William Wordsworth, Alexander, (teacher-led) II. Other studies on writing, Krashen’s theory: To read is the best way to writing, and Stephen King (teacher-led) III. Main activity, Role play, and explain star war (teacher-led) IV. Main activity, Students are asked to summarize the plot V. Peer edition, Ask students to share their summarize in pairs VI. Process writing, Elaborate the pedagogy to teach writing more clearly, especially process writing. Advantage: 1. Teaching style is humorous enough to catch students’ attention. 2. Create well learning environment. However, we may feel a bit puzzled what should we write in only fifty words that should include the whole plot. Therefore, I think teacher should give us more clearly instruction on how to write a summary well and introduce more holistic background knowledge on Star War. In addition, teachers should correct our writing more clearly, rather than praise us. Writing is the most difficult part for teachers to teach. As a teacher, I think we should build up enough vocabulary for students first, and then teach transitional words, or collocation. However, I still think the best way to learn writing well is by reading.

Mid-term paper, teacher interview report

Attachment 1. Teacher Andrea’s Speech

Attachment 2.  Crearive English Writing

Attachment3. (Picture with teacher Andrea)

Report :teacher-interview-report.doc

School Visit~~ Second one

Class Observation Notes 

School: Linshuan Junior High   Teacher: Miss Luin   Class: 912   Date: 04.25.07

Lesson objectives: Relative Clauses, Prepositions, and Adverbs

Teaching Materials: PPT and handouts

 

Opening

1.      Greet students in humor 2.      At the very beginning of the class, inform students what they will learn, including Relative Clauses, Prepositions, and Adverbs.

Body

Activity I: Relative Clause Sequence of the activity: 1. Define and preview Defining Relative Clauses 2. Introduce and explain the new grammar point, Non-Defining Clauses with pictures (three cats) and clear examples. 3. Contrast the Defining Relative Clause and Non-Defining Clauses. If the sentence have comma, it is Non-Defining Clauses. 4. Review the usage one more time with clear sentences. 5. Draw students to answer questions about Relative Clauses and distinguish between Relative and Non-relative ones on the PPT. Patterns of interaction: Mostly one-way instruction, and lectures with humor. Pacing: About 25 minutes   Activity II. AdverbsSequence of the activity: 1.      Quickly preview the rules of regular Adverb variations, such as +ly,slowà slowly, -y+ ly, happyà happily, adverbs and adjectives and the same form, such as early, late, fast, hard, high, far, right, wrong 2.      Quickly preview the irregular Adverbs variations, such as wellà much, 3.      Draw students to answer the questions about the correct form of Adverbs. Patterns of interaction: Mainly teacher-led instruction Pacing: About 15 minutes

Closure

1.      Next time, teacher will finish the untaught part, Preposition in today’s lesson. 2.      Assign homework 3.      Remind students have to review what they learned and will test them next time.

 

Feedback

     After observing, what came into my mind first was grammar-oriented teaching, which seems inevitable in real teaching context. Although it is a grammar lesson, teacher Liu vividly taught it through pictures showed on PPT. In addition, grammar points present systematically with real examples help students learn better. In short, computer efficiently integrated into teaching context is what I am in favor of.   

     I observed that teacher instructed class with less interaction. However, interaction, such as pair work or group work is an essential element to motivate students’ learning willingness and enhance their involvement in teaching context. It may benefit students with actively interaction either teacher-students interaction, or students to students at proper time.

     I am amazed by the works done by gifted students. All of them are great and talented. I truly admired their hardworking and amazing works from my bottom of heart.

Comments on Reading Teaching

Thanks for group five’s presentation.

I think it is a good warm up to ignite students’ interests and motivations by showing related pictures at first. After that, they teach new vocabularies by flashcards and ask students to make sentences. However, teaching vocabularies within context may be a better way than teach in isolated. Teachers can make sentences first to help students get overall understandings on how to use these words before asking them to do.

Actually, I quite enjoyed the information haunting, which is a collaborative activity. But some of these sentences are too long to remember and too time-consuming.

 

This group did a well job on they both explain content and language parts. While teaching reading, these are two basic elements should be concerned.

Comments on Speaking Teaching

The authentic environment that Harry and Billy created is quite successful for us to emerge into the learning context—how to order at a restaurant. They also set the example for us how to order dishes in advance as a main teaching part. And students can clearly follow the way after teachers’ instruction. I deeply enjoyed learning in the form of role play since it gave us the opportunity to practice speaking with our imagination and creativity.

However, after today’s lesson, I’m still confused about what the better way to teach speaking is. In fact, the phrases, vocabulary, and patterns we learned in classroom for different situations are quite different from outside contexts. Maybe the best way to learn speaking well is in the “authentic” environment.  

Listening Teaching

When it talks about four skills, listening is the most difficult one for students to pick up at a short period of time. I think that learners should acquire unfamiliar vocabulary or new grammatical rules first so as to enhance listening comprehension quickly.

 

I think group three did a good job in that they arise our learning motivation through a movie and active interaction. But I think this movie material may be too tough to learn for secondary students. It is difficult to fill in every blank without the prior knowledge and relevant vocabulary on this film. Teachers should explain the necessary vocabulary or keywords in advance rather than elaborate these after students’ performance.

 

In pre-listening section, teachers can provide prior knowledge first, after that, in follow-up section, teachers can design role play or written activities to further interaction and discussion. In the last section, post-listening, teachers can elaborate the whole context in detail. However, in my opinion, the best way to learn listening skill is “swim method”.

School Visit Report

School Visit Report

About Grammar eaching

First of all, I’d like to thank for other groups’ participation and cooperation. Without your participation, we won’t have the opportunity to present what we have prepared for grammar lesson, and review our teaching procedures and styles from your feedbacks.

We presented grammar both based on PPP model (Presentation, Practice, Production) and inductive approach. It seems quite successful to learn imperative through PPP model since it is not a complex grammar pattern. However, when it comes to complicated grammar rules, such as relative clauses, it is difficult for students to learn grammatical rules merely through PPP model. It takes more time for teachers to tailor materials that can match students’ learning stages. No matter what kinds of grammars to teach, the better way for students to learn is inductive approach, that is self-discovered and learner-cantered approach.

For me, it is hard to learn grammar through memorizing grammatical rules because I seldom have chances to exercise these grammatical patterns. Rather, learning grammar by means of reading is better way since I can discovery the grammatical usages from contexts by myself.

In sum, grammar teaching should involve form, meaning, and use rather than focus on discrete rules.