What started out as a good idea (perhaps) for whiteboard use
trailed off into wasted time…
This week I set out to teach one of my early middle school
classes a reading assignment. My focus
was reading for gist and comprehension. Target language included new “chores”
vocabulary and recycled simple future tense grammar structures. As often
happens in this class of energetic talkers in early evening if I’m not careful with my lesson plan and
every detail of CI , I allowed myself to get tired and we de-railed a bit. We
were unable to fully complete comprehension checks for material and do my
planned vocabulary activity.
I have been attempting to make use of whiteboard more often
and used that for “schema” activation. In fact, we spent too much time on
whiteboard because there was some difficulty with vocabulary I hadn’t
pre-taught. I allowed students to discuss it a bit but wasted too much time in
this area.
I tried to be more
conscious of initiating SàS
moves, but in watching the video, still found myself using too much Teacher
Talk in explaining/clarifying vocabulary. One noticeable MIC problem I’ve found
through this and my previous video is not doing repetition and rephrasing of
THE RIGHT THING. Instead of rephrasing student answers (the redundancy and
frequency of which action I noticed before) I might rephrase my own instruction
or sentence for clarity. Sometimes I move quickly from one idea to the next in
an attempt to allow the students in this class to dialogue.
My biggest problems with the lesson so far were not PLANNING
transitions well. We got bogged down by my attempts to let EVERYONE who raised
his or her hand have dialogue time. Also, I tried to explain and elicit TOO
much and both mine and the students’ energy –which was high at the beginning of
the lesson—flagged. Students were
challenged by new vocabulary called up during the SCHEMA activation, but lost
interest in the reading piece because we over-discussed in the preview.
On a positive note, I think I’m allowing students more time
to talk :-p
A couple of things here -- by definition, giving ss more time and opportunity to be interactive in the classroom IS going to mean less material gets covered. But if you cover the material without letting the students interact much, they will not acquire the material. They may LEARN it, but they will also lose it very soon. Krashen and everyone else have proven this.
ReplyDeleteI think I mentioned yesterday that I also have a little trouble with transitions -- I often forget that ss aren't in my mind, seeing the smoothly flowing lesson river; they're in the boat bumping over the rocks in the riverbed of my lesson plan.