School Visit
The school visit was a good experience that gave me the opportunity to
see the how different professor apply their own strategies to teach. For example,
the first class that I visited was a reading class. The students were in group
of two listening to the teacher and following the lecture. The class was very
interactive. The teacher asking questions and the students answered with
confidence and without fair to be wrong. However, the professor ends the class
before the class finishes, so the students got hyperactive. The last class that
I visited was different. The class was interactive too, but when the teacher finished
her class, she starts reading a book with images that she projected by using
the data show. She said that it doesn’t matter
if the this is not a reading class. This strategy is helpful because you can
keep them entertained while they are waiting that the class end.
That's a very interesting idea (about reading/showing a book at the end of class). However, do you think it was only about entertaining the Ss? Entertainment was one obvious advantage, but could there have been more to it?
ReplyDeleteThe Ss that you observed were all ELL students, correct? I'm thinking back to me elementary education days. So much of early childhood education is focused on language and literacy. The idea being that if Ss can't read well, it will significantly impact their future ability to learn. Thus, mot elementary Ts have books ready to read aloud at any moment. For the youngest Ss these might be books with pictures, and for older Ss, chapter books may be chosen. Whatever the case, elementary Ts commonly reach for a book whenever they have extra time before lunch or before the end of the day. This way Ss are not simply playing; they're rather getting language input. And books, in general, are much more language-rich and vocabulary-rich than most video, so if one would chose between a book and a Youtube video, the book is the better choice with regards to language.
My thought is that, for these ELL Ss, the Ts rightly conclude that if there's extra time, the Ss can best be helped by providing additional language input. Do you think that's an accurate assumption?