Losing the plot

Teaching Practice Two finally happened in the afternoon of Friday 14th March at Open Doors school. Eleven learners attended- far more than I have been used to of late. The learners are preparing for their reading test, but also need to prepare for their writing test, which they will do in the summer term.

The aim of the lesson was that they would be able to plan and draft a letter of complaint. I had changed a few things since the first attempt at this lesson with my own learners, mainly because when I observed this class, they seemed at a higher level generally. I felt they needed to be challenged a bit more - but that was really my first mistake.Also , though I had tried, I had not managed to obtain a Class Profile - so believing this was a Level 1 group , only discovered today that some of them were actually only Entry 3. Mistake number two. The other thing I did wrong was to not stick to my plan !

The lesson started well and I was able to use the starter activity with the learners who arrived early. This activity was to get them thinking about formal and informal language in letters - those that did this actvity did it well, and seemed to be able to distinguish between formal and informal words and phrases.

When most of the class had arrived, I began the lesson with a jumbled letter activity, asking the class to work in pairs. They had to put the letter in a logical order and then tell me the purpose of the letter. All except for one pair managed to put the letter in the right order , the other pair just had one paragraph out of place. I had got an easier letter in case it was needed, and in fact feel it might have been better to use the simpler version at this point in the lesson after all, as I only wanted to focus on the format of the letter and not the details really.

One learner was able to tell me clearly that it was a letter of complaint. At this point I forgot to write the aim on the board and needed to explain more clearly what the aim of the lesson was and why we were doing it - though I had talked about the need to practise for the writing exam.

I had managed to photocopy the full version of the letter onto an OHT and used an OHP to show them the letter in the right order, and to look at the different parts of the letter with them. I had given them some cut up headings to place alongside their full version of the letter, to decide on the purpose of each section of the letter. This would have been clearer with the easier letter too. I pointed out the linking words, the greeting and ending of the letter and elicited from them when to use "Yours faithfully" and "Yours sincerely", we also looked at the opening sentence, main complaint , description of the problem and the request or demand, as well as the closing sentence.The words "request" and "demand" seemed quite new to them, and after eliciting their meaning , I checked they understood.

Having looked at the format I then went on to ask them to read parts of the letter aloud one by one, and to check pronunciation and understanding- this had not been in my plan and took quite a while to get through, especially as the letter was quite long and complicated. I think it was useful for the learners to practise pronunciation , word roots , stress and spellings too, but it took away time from the main focus of the lesson which was to get them to write a plan and draft of a letter of complaint.

Realizing the time was passing quickly, I chose not to do what was in fact a vital part of the next stage of the lesson. I gave them a picture of a vandalised playground, which was going to be the focus of their complaint, and then explained the need to write a plan first, giving them a blank plan with headings, and encouraged them to jot down some ideas onto the plan, before writing a draft.

Some learners embarked on this with no problem , but others struggled particularly with a lack of vocabulary to describe the park and its equipment.This vocabulary was not in their schema, and I needed to address this, so I gave some vocabulary on the board , but it would have been much more helpful if we had spent some time looking at the picture and discussing the complaints and requests together first, collecting some words and phrases together which they could then have used in their letter. A picture that was more suitable to their schema might have helped too. The previous lesson had involved mostly mums who have children,and so the picture was probably more relevant to them.

Some learners were also too keen to get started on their letter or draft of their letter, and I had to insist on them jotting some ideas onto a plan first. Some learners were writing full sentences on their plan - so I needed to make it clearer that this was not necessary on the plan.

One hour had passed already and most learners were still completing their plan or just beginning on their draft, so I did not manage to ask them to proofread each other's work, or review what we had learnt before the end of the hour.

I think the learners had a good idea of how to format a letter of complaint by the end of the lesson, though I needed to review this to be sure, and all seemed engaged in the task of writing their letter of complaint at the end. ( One learner had decided on a different topic to complain about - something that he felt strongly about himself ) but it was not a satisfactory end to the lesson, as not all aims or objectives had been achieved in the time.

I gave the learners a reading task to do for homework which consisted of a letter of complaint and several questions on comprehension, punctuation, and spelling, so it was similar to the kind of thing they will have to do in their reading test.

On the whole I think I needed to stick to the plan more and especially to the original plan and the original jumbled letter, so that I could have had more time to elicit vocabulary and phrases from the picture prompt and could have moved on more quickly to the planning and drafting stage of the lesson.

They say put it down to experience and move on. Sometimes I think I think too much....

Even more technology in the ESOL classroom !

I arrived one hour early -just to be sure ! The faithful caretakers had placed the laptop and projector in the classroom as requested. There they were standing there for all to see. There was no going back now - the learners would be expecting a show when they came into the room, and I shouldn’t disappoint them.
After avoiding the machinery for a few minutes, ( I did have other things to sort out first, after all ! ) I finally approached the laptop and switched it on…. it powered up - so far so good ! I carefully read the notes I had written down and followed Oriel’s instructions to the letter - must remember not to turn the projector on first, but must turn it off first at the end !

Next to pull down the screen. The first attempt failed, and the screen shot up again, wedging itself in the picture rail - I had to climb onto a chair to release it. After two more attempts, it finally stayed in position, completely covering the white board. Not sure about the convenience of that.

After successfully typing in passwords on the laptop and inserting my memory stick - it was all set to go- now for the projector….
I pressed the ON switch. Success ! The projector powered up too ! Now to follow the instructions on how to get what was on the laptop up onto the screen. The small instruction card that came with the laptop told me to press Fn and F8 to get it to project. Eventually, I had to call on a learning support assistant to find Fn for me . I had been looking where all the other F keys are situated on the keyboard, I had never noticed that one down in the corner !

Now there were two of us trying to get the projector to project - without success. In the end, we had to call in the Quality Assurance lady to see if she could help. She immediately removed the lens cap from the projector ( must remember to make a note of that on my list of instructions ! ) and there was my powerpoint presentation up on the screen, in all its glory ! And there were still fifteen minutes to go before the learners arrived !

The learners were excited at the prospect of this new technology in their lesson, and were suitably impressed. They enjoyed the visual delights of the various pictures I had added to the text - and were visibly motivated.
I used the Powerpoint to revise the topic of planning a trip. They were required to remember and ask possible questions and answers( Sc/E2. 2) prompted by the pictures, and then could see the text clearly written for them afterwards. They could also pick and choose different answers and express likes and dislikes ( Sd/E2.1c ) as I had used Action Buttons which meant the dialogue had various alternatives. They seemed to enjoy this element of choice and the interactive nature of the activity.
We then used the text to practise punctuation, stress and intonation too. (Sc/E2. 1a and 1b ) .I also used some TPR activities including hand movements and whole body movement to express the intonation going up or down. One learner from Bangladesh particularly seemed to benefit from that and improved in his intonation as the lesson went on.

On the whole, I think it was worth spending the time to create the presentation, and it is one I can use again and again. I am glad I have got over my first attempt at making one work in the classroom too, ( though I am also aware that technology can be unreliable, and so will always make sure I have an alternative plan ready in case. ) In the future, I will also make it available to individuals or pairs to practise together too, just using the laptop. There’s no stopping me now !