The last practice

Let me tell you about the last teaching practice. As soon as the teacher gave me the topic to be developed, I started getting ready for this class. The grammar topic was about the pronouns However, whatever, whichever, whenever, wherever, whoever, so for the warm up, I prepeared the hang man activity. I divided the class into 4 groups, also I wrote some dashes on the board according to the number of letters the word had, and each grup had the opportunity to guess the word by suggesting a letter, some groups guessed the word easily. 

Then, as I had to intruduce the topic, I deveoped a short converstion, but before that, I asked the students to stand up and to talk about what they usually buy for some special occasions like mother`s day, birthdays, weddings, Christmas, etc.

Later, they were practicing the conversation, and as many of them wanted to share the conversation for the whole class, I let them do it.  Then, in order to check if they had understood the conversation, I asked them to developed an exercise part in their books; as they worked so fast, I moved on to the grammar part.

I presented some charts, also I gave them the meaning of each pronoun, and I provided some examples, and when I considered that they were ready for the exercises, I asked them to go to their books and to work in the grammar practice.

To sum up, I asked them to stand up again, and I provided them a sheet of paper in which they had to ask and answer some questions using the pronouns previously studied so that the objective of the class was fulfilled.

First Practice/ Second Period

I arrived at the classroom around 6:25, and just two girls were over there, so I started writing the date, agenda and the objective. Also, I cut masking tape for the charts. When the teacher and the other students arrived, I was ready to teach; after some minutes, the teacher told me    “now you can start”, so I greeted the students and introduced myself, and after asking them if they were going to watch the parades the next day, I gave the directions for the warm-up; they understood what they had to do, so the warm-up was developed in a nice way, the penalties for the losers where some questions about the previous topic that my classmates Christopher taught it; also, I included some candies; they really had fun. 

Later, I asked them to go to their book in page 52 in order to read and repeat a short conversation; after having them reaping, I asked for volunteers to read the conversation for the whole class, and they did it well.

 Now it was time for the grammar phase; first, I pasted on the board two little charts about the possessives adjectives and possessives nouns; then, I provided them some examples using the possessives with gerunds, and finally, I provided other sentences for the students to do it in order to see if they had understood, and they did it well. 

As I realized that they had understood, I moved on to the next stage, controlled practice; I provided them a sheet of paper with ten items for they to work on it using possessives with gerunds ; at the beginning, they got troubles, so I were monitoring and helping them out. Finally, I checked it out, and they worked well; I corrected around 4 of the ten items. 

Third Practice

Let me tell you about my last teaching practice of the first period.

The teacher told me that as she had already explained the grammar phase (future with will), she asked me to develop the controlled and semi-controlled practices, so I got ready for doing that.

I arrived to the classroom around 10 minutes before the class; I wrote the agenda, the date and the objective. When I started the class, I said to the students that it was my last class with them, and I encouraged them to participate; the first activity that I developed was tell me a secret ; I divided the class into two groups, ten and ten, and I said a sentence (in future with will) to the last student, and they had to whisper the sentence one by one until the student who had to write the sentence on the board; they had fun with this game, and most important thing was that they were practicing the structure that they had studied in the previous class.

 Then made a short review of the last class; I asked them to give me some examples, and they did it. Then I quickly showed them how to transform the positive sentences into negative and interrogative; when they were ready, I moved on to the controlled practice; I provided them a sheet of paper with some information where they had to write positive and negative sentences and interrogative also. After checking the exercises, I realized that they worked very well, so I moved on to the next activity which was the semi-controlled practice; in here I explained the students that I was going to give them some flashcards per pairs, and the they had to make predictions about the pictures; they had to write two sentences per each picture. When I realized that the majority of the pairs had done predictions about three flashcards, I asked them to give me back the flashcards, and later I showed them some flashcards, and the pairs, who had written sentences about it, had to say the sentences; as the previous activity, in this one they worked very well also. 

Second Practice

Second Teaching Practice

Let me tell you about my second practice. When I went to talk to the teacher in order to get the topic for the class, she told me that I had to develop just free activities because the grammar, the controlled, and semi-controlled activities had been already developed, so she said to me “you are free to do whatever you want”. Some minutes later, I stared looking for information on the internet, but as I didn´t find anything according with the topic which was “Would rather + base form”, I got a little bit worried, so I asked for help to some friends, and best option for me that I liked was to create a reading, so I did it.

I started the class at 8:40; I greeted them, and I gave them the directions for the warm-up which was the handball; the penalties for the students who let pass the ball between their legs was that they had to describe their favorite movie, and the rest of the class had to guess which movies was that. I could notice that students had fun with this activity, and the most important part was that they spoke, and they made use of the vocabulary that they had been studing.

As they were stood up, I asked them to make groups of 4 in order to develop a gallery walk; I have already pasted 5 pictures around the classroom about movies, so the students had to guess the name of the movie and to talk about it; to finish with this activity, I asked them to share about what they talked in their groups. 

Later, I provided them the sheet of paper for they to read it, and I gave them around 5 minutes to finish. When they finished reading, I asked them if they liked the reading, and they said yes, so I felt nice because I have created it. In order to know if they had understood the reading, I provided them some questions for they to discuss, and believe me, when they shared with the whole class, all the questions were answered perfectly, so I moved on to the next activity, a role-play, to achieve the objective of the class; I explained the students that they had to create a similar story or conversation using would rather in some sentences; they worked in groups of 4, and at the end, two groups performed the role-play, and they were able to use would rather in their conversation, and as I didn`t find any mistake in their performance, I just congratulated them for their work. At the end, I checked the time, and I spent exactly 45 minutes as I had planned it. 

Teaching Practicum II / first practice

I arrived around 8:15 to the classroom in order to get ready for the class, but unfortunately when I arrived there were still a class over there, so I waited some minutes more. When the classroom was ready, I started writing the date, the objective and the agenda. The class was supposed to start at 8:30, but as few students were there, I waited five minutes for more students. Then, I started by greeting them and introducing myself; then, I gave the instructions for the warm-up which was called The cinepolis. In this warm-up I was going to start saying yesterday I went to the cinepolis and I watched a romantic movie, and the next student had to continue saying yesterday I went to the cinepolis and I watched a romantic movie and a horror movie. And the other student had to add one movie more and mention the previous ones; they liked doing this activity, and they were paying attention to every single movie that their classmates mentioned in order to not make a mistake when their turn took place.

As my classmate in his previous practice had started teaching the vocabulary about movies, I continued with a conversation regarding movies as well, and after made students repeat the conversation, I asked them to look for the meaning of some words in the conversation.

For the grammar phase, first, I wrote two questions with their answers on the board for students to familiarize with the topic; then I pasted some little charts in order to explain the use of for and since in the present perfect. I gave them some examples and explained each rule. Then, in order to know if they had understood the explanation I asked them the same two questions that I first wrote on the board and asked for specific students to give me the answers using for or since, and as I realized they were able to do it, I moved on to the controlled practice in which one the students had to choose the correct option to complete a paragraph. 

For the wrap-up, I had planned to develop a short discussion of 5 minutes, but as the time had gone, I told the teacher that I was not going to do it, and she told me that it was ok, so my practice lasted 46 minutes exactly. 

the last teaching practice

As the teacher likes to have the practitioners observing one class before the practice, I went to observe on Tuesday in order to teach on Thursday; at the end of the class, she gave me the activities that I have to develop, and actually they were just two activities, but I have to include warm-up and wrap-up.

I arrived to the classroom so early; I was excited to start the class, but at the same time, I was nervous because I had the flu; and any ways I had to develop the class, so I wrote the date, objective and the agenda.

I started the class at 4:00 ó clock and in the classroom were just five students; the warm-up that I developed was “the handball” and in the penalties I wrote some questions in order to make a review of the previous topic which was the past of “be” and the teacher had already introduced the WH-Questions.

 After that, I read some adjectives to describe trips; I made students repeat the adjectives; then, I gave them an example of one of my trips using those adjectives, and later I asked them to write some sentences about one trip that they had done (because they had been talking about their trips) using at least two or more adjectives; something that I forgot to the explain here was the meaning of each adjectives, but when students read what they had written, I could notice that they knew the meaning because each adjective has one picture; but I learned that I have to explain to the students the meaning of each new word.

Later, I explained the students how to make WH-Questions in the past tense of the verb “be”. Then, I provided them some examples, and I gave them a sheet of paper in which they had to transform some sentences into WH-Questions. I provided them 10 sentences, and when I checked them, I noticed that some students had troubles in two sentences while others had troubles in three sentences; even thought it was a challenging for they to transform sentences into WH-Questions, I can say that they worked well.

As a wrap-up, I provided the students five questions, and they had to unscramble them; I noticed again that they had understood the structure to make WH-Questions because they were able to do it in a perfect way.

As I conclusion of the three practices that I developed, I can say that I leant a lot from the feedback that I received because even thought that things I didn´t develop perfectly, the teacher used to tell me those things  in a nice way, and also she provided me the way to improve them.