Until this moment, I never understood how hard it was to lose something you never had...

Last day, I asked my students to complete an assessment sheet about my job and to ask some questions. I wrote the questions in three languages: English, Catalan and Spanish, because I was aware that they had problems to understand it. Moreover, the size of the letter was bigger in English, because I want the students to read first in English. In addition, I complete the sheet with some funny pictures and with a nice quote. The favourite activity for the majority of the students was the first one in which they had to guess the name of the countries from their flags and put them in the map. I was very happy, because I worked very hard to prepare the materials for this activity and I can say that it was worthy! The game that the students liked most was the one that we played with the ball, it was a very good decision! Moreover, all of them told me that they learnt a lot and they asked me for coming back to see them and they thanked me for helping them to do so nice activities. So cute!

I asked them to write a mark for me as well and I couldn’t believe it when the majority of them write a 9 or a 10 for me!

I prepared a surprise for them as well… I had a power point with some text and photos about them to thank them for their good behaviour, interest and motivation and, specially, for making me happy. They all really love it!

ICT activity

I used the ICT activity that we created in the classroom during this lesson. The activity consisted of a treasure hunt about the different countries from where my students are. They had to find the answer for the questions that I wrote and they had some problems to understand the texts and to find the answers due to their low level of English. On the other hand, they were very motivated and liked this activity.

My third lesson or how to write a letter

I was very happy and proud of my job, because another objective of my unit was how to write a letter and put into practice what they learnt about hobby, free time, etc. Núria told me that they already knew how to write a letter, because they wrote letters with foreign students last year, but they had already forgotten… I thought that if I put the letters into an envelope it could be more interesting for them and it was what I did. I gave them a envelope with a piece of paper inside it where I have written some questions to give them ideas about what they must write. Moreover, I design a model of a letter in order that they know the structure of it. It worked well, because they were very motivated and made an effort to complete the task, but I realized that they had a lo of problems to understand the instructions, although I explained the task with a power point presentation, in a oral way and with the model of the letter as well. In my opinion, I think that these kind problems are due to the low level of general knowledge that they have, because anybody taught them of basics things that they should already know and now it would waste a lot of time.

I was very worried about these problems and this is the reason why I decided to help them learning how to use a dictionary and they were very happy with my project and I think that the sticks really were helpful for them.

Thank you very much guys for the nice things that you wrote in your letters!! :)

1st ESO

I can’t believe the difference between the children of 1^st ESO and the ones of 2^nd ESO! The first ones are very childish and it is more difficult to cope with them, while the students of 2^nd of ESO are more motivated and more adults, I could say. Núria tried to play a memory game to study the parts of the body, but it was quite impossible, because the children spoke very loud and the classroom was a completely mess!

It is a pity, because they are very lucky of having a teacher like Núria, but they don’t let her to do her job.

Tutoría

I looked forward to take part in a “Tutoría”, because when I heard this word, I thought about what we did during this hour when I was in the school and I realized that the teacher used it to correct exams and they didn’t do anything with the students, although it was supposed to help the students, listen to their problems and so forth and so on.

In this case, the “Tutoría” was with the students of 2^nd of ESO and Núria used this hour to change the places were they seated and to talk about the “Crèdit Cooperatiu”.

I was surprised, because anybody wanted to be seated with a boy, because he doesn’t let them work. Núria explained them that he had serious problems at home and they had to help him, because he needed them and friends are for good and bad times. This was one of the times that the teacher should do more than her job; we have to realize that we must educate our children as well. You are a good model, Núria.

On the other hand, Núria explained them everything about the “Crèdit Cooperatiu”. Never heard about this?

This is one project of my high school that they do during the last week of the first term and each year is dedicated to one topic, this time is “The languages in the world”. During these days, they don’t have normal lessons and they work in this project, each group prepare different activities about languages and the Tower of Babel’s myth like taking photographs of different alphabets around the district, building a tower of Babel, drawing the tower, a concert, etc.

Cristina's lesson

This was the first time that I was in the classroom of one my mates: Cristina. She taught in 1^st ESO and the core of her unit was similar to mine. I realized that the activities that she did were very similar to the ones that I did as well.

Firstly, she did a warm-up activity: the Chinese whistle. She stood in the middle of the classroom that was organized in an U-shape and she told the first child one part of the city like bakery or town hall and he or she had to whisper to the classmate who was seated next to them until the first one who was the responsible for choosing the photo that went with the word and that were on the teacher’s table. It was very funny, the children were very motivated and they loved the game.

The main activity of Cristina’s lesson was developed in groups that Cristina organized by giving them different pieces of papers in different colours and the children had to find the students who had the same colour. In each group there were a time keeper, a presenter, a recorder and a material manager and Cristina gave a map of a town and several cards with the name of parts of the city and they had to put them in the map to tell other students how to go from the city centre to another point. It was very interesting, but maybe the activity was a little difficult for them.

I liked this experience and I think that she did a good job! Congratulations to Cristina!

Evaluation

I took part in the evaluation of 4^th ESO and I was very surprised and disappointed, because there were really few students who passed all the subjects, but the rest of them failed more than three!

All the teachers of 4^th ESO were in this meeting and the tutor spoke one by one about each student and about the whole group and the other teachers were allowed to make comments. Moreover, one of the teachers was the responsible for writing a report about that all of them had to sign at the end of the meeting.

On the other hand, they talked about the different posibilities that the students have to finish the ESO or to start working.

I felt that things are really complicated and we have to do some thing to change this situation!

I love this children!

One of the objectives of my lesson was to learn how to describe an image, the vocabulary related to hobbies and free time and the use of the present continuous. I decided to introduce all these objectives in a nice and funny activity. I prepared a power point with photos and videos about different activities and they worked again in groups. They liked this activity, because the power point was very funny and they kept the eyes looking at the blackboard. Moreover, I had decided to do this activity as a game as well, so each group had to decide what they were doing in the photo and write in the blackboard to check that they know how to write it correctly.

Firstly, the volunteers gave them their license again, while I prepared the projector and the computer. Moreover, I told them to write each sentence in their notebooks, because I thought it would help them to learn the vocabulary and the grammar structure. The students behaved very well, the classroom was very funny and when we have finished, we played another little game to win some extra points. I told one student an activity, she had to represent it and the members of her group had to guess what activity was. It was very happy and they were very motivated.

I have forgotten to say, that we played again a warm-up activity with the realia that I used. They loved this game, although at the beginning they had some problems to understand how to do it. I wrote on the blackboard three statements: say a number, say a country and say a colour. I threw the ball and asked the students to say a colour and they had to do the same.

My first lesson

3,2,1…! My teaching experience started and the decisive day came!

I would like to say, as you surely know, teachers must work very hard. There are many people who think that our job is the perfect one or that we live as kings or queens, because we have a lot of holidays, free time, a supposed good salary… but I checked what I have already experienced before, to be a teacher is like to be a cook, we have to work a lot to prepare our meals and the time to enjoy the pleasure of eating them is very short.

The core of my unit is the multiculturality and I am very happy, because this is the main reason why I decided to do my practicum in this high school. I am really interesting in this topic and this is why I would like to become a teacher as well, I am more interesting in educating as in teaching and I could experience this side of our job in this school, where you become more involved with your students and you have to act as a mother and help them with their personal problems. Moreover, this experience is more rewarding, because when you arrive at home, you realize how lucky you are, because you have a kitchen, drinking water, a family… This reward doesn’t have any price.

After deciding the core of my unit, my brain was full of nice ideas and activities, but the first problem was how to develop them and how to keep the students motivated.

My first decision was to create a kind of “driving license points” to put into practice in the classroom. Everybody had their own classroom license with ten points and their photo and I explained them that if they don’t respect my rules, they lose their points.

Moreover, I decided that if I wanted the students to participate and I had to create something to motivate them, so I created two volunteers cards and four cards for the responsible of the groups.

And the decisive day came! I started teaching to my classroom and I was quite nervous, because I didn’t know how the children could react, but after the first twenty minutes of my lesson, this feeling was over and I was really comfortable with them. I would like to say that I wasted a lot of time preparing many materials and games, but it was worthy!

Firstly, I introduced myself again and I told them what we were going to do during my lesson. I was quite afraid, because their level of English is very low and they have problems to understand oral English, but I solved this disadvantage by writing on the blackboard my expectations and my procedures. These students are quite conflictive, because the have a lot of personal problems and they are not really interesting in learning English, so I had to make a greater effort to motivate them.

During the first lesson we worked in groups that I had organised before according to their nationalities, because the main activity of this lesson consisted of guessing the situation and the name of different countries from their flags, so I wanted to have someone from different countries in each group. While they were sitting in their groups, the two volunteers helped me to give them their classroom license points and I prepared the computer to start with the activity. I felt so proud of my job when they saw their licenses! They were shocked and very happy, because it was innovative and they appreciated my job.

I arranged my lesson in three parts: the presentation, a warm-up activity and the main one. This time the warm-up activity consisted of introducing themselves and I motivated them with a realia: a nice and soft ball. I was very happy, because they loved this activity and they wanted to keep doing it!

Afterwards, we started with the main activity. I gave a map for each group and the flags of the countries that I projected in the blackboard. As I said before, the activity consisted of guessing to which county belonged the flag that I projected and to situate the flag and the country in their maps. They really enjoyed this activity and I felt very happy as well.

Self-assessment

On 4th of December I came early to the high school, because I wanted to have everything ready for my lesson and I was quite nervous… The first hour I attended the English Songs’ lesson again and this day Núria assessed them. They had to give her their dossiers with all the hand-outs that they had, but some of them didn’t have them or they were very untidy. I am very obssessive about presentations and I think that they have to be in a perfect way, because I believe that it helps students to learn and to memorize.

On the other hand, they had to complete a self-assessment and Núria wrote the following questions in the blackboard:

• Què t’ha semblat aquest crédit? T’ha servit pra aprendre ?
• Quines activitats t’han agradt més ?
• Quines activitats t’han agradat menys ?
• Amb quines activitats has après més ?
• Amb quines activitats has après menys ?
• Canviarias alguna cosa del crédit?
• Pensant en el teu esforç quina nota creus que et mereixes?

Na, und?

Memory game

This day I was again with my students and I was quite afraid of them, because we were three teachers in the classroom and Núria tried to explain them the present continuous, but they spoke the whole lesson to each other and it was a mess. After doing some exercises, we played a memory game with some sports to introduce the present continuous and this vocabulary in a funny way. However, they didn’t stop shouting and one teacher came to tell Núria that there was too much noise and her students couldn’t concetrate on doing their exam. Núria told the students that it was very embarrasing, but they didn’t really care. After this disgusting experience, I had to teach my own lessons…

Claustro

This was my first experience with all the teachers of the high school and I have to say that in this kind of centre every decision takes a lot of time. The first topic of the meeting was the suggestion of one teacher to participate in the Comenius Project. This is a project of the European Union which seeks to develop understanding of and between various European cultures through exchanges and co-operation between schools in different countries. The problem was that the students should stay in the house of the families and some of the students of my high school do not live in a house in good conditions and some of the teachers think that it is not fair. Another teacher suggests staying in a hostel, but it may not be allowed. In my opinion I feel quite disappointed, because it is very sad that my students could not enjoy this great opportunity… C’est la vie…

The second point of the meeting was the “Cooperative credit” a project run by the school in the last days of the first term. Every year there is a topic about which the students must work and present projects and at the end they show them in the school. Some of the teachers disagree with it, because they think that the effort that must make to develop the project do not worth it. The language is the topic of this year and the students suggest different works like taking photographs around the district or a radio programme.

The other topics of the meetings were the usual ones: the absenteeism, the project to promote reading or the assessments.

My first project

I sometimes think that it would be better not to have so nice ideas... because I have to work hard to develop them!

One of the things that I have learned during my practicum is that the students of the ESO do not know how to use a dictionary and I think that this must be changed...


The main problem that I observe in this high school is that children do not know many things that they must have already known for years, but nobody has taught them before and nobody has time to teach them now... I decided to teach them how to use a dictionary, so I had to think how to make things easier for them. I remembered what one of my teachers taught us when I was in the high school and it worked very well, we sticked some pieces of paper in each page where a letter beginns and if we wanted to look up a word, we only have to search for this letter. This was what I also made with my students, because it helps them to memorize the alphabet and to save time.

Anna

This was the third day that Anna was the teacher and it worked very good. The core of the unit was again the song ‘My Umbrella’, because they had to finish the exercises that she had prepared. The students had to work in groups organised by Núria, but I was quite surprised, because one girl went to tell her that she didn’t want to work with a boy. I thought that these incidents never happen nowadays…, but I sometimes forget how I was like when I was a teenager...