Observations of an Observation

On Tuesday, I was given the opportunity to observe a classmate’s work during their conversation club. I like this idea of students at the university being able to practice their conversational English in a lower stress environment than their ELI classes. This also provides them with an opportunity to meet other ELLs at UTA that they may not otherwise interact with.
The leader/instructor/facilitator/teacher of this group was Yujeong. I am glad that I was able to observe her class because I know that she has some teaching experience (I was one of those students) and was looking forward to stealing some of her ideas. What I would rather have is her seemingly unshakeable ease when she is interacting with her class. Unfortunately, personality is not as easy to steal as ideas.
First, the class began with a game of twenty questions. One person stepped into the hall while the class decided on a verb. This person then came back into the room and had to ask yes/no questions in order to ascertain what verb had been chosen. This was a fun game that had the class laughing, but increasing levels of frustration put a damper on the mood. The second participant to guess grew more unsure of himself and flustered after about the fifth question. At the same time, some of the class was growing increasingly impatient with the seeming inability of the participant to guess the correct verb. In the end, everyone was excited when he finally guessed “talk.”
Second, the class played a “hot potato” game. After an initial word was said, a ball was thrown to someone else in the circle. The person who caught the ball then had to say a word that began with the last letter of the previous word. (Ex. ball-light-toy-young-game, etc.) During the game I noticed a few issues that came up regularly. Several people seemed to try to avoid catching the ball when it came near them. Others became a little confused about ending letters versus ending sounds. It was also difficult to understand what words people said sometimes with all the excitement of the game. All in all, the students really seemed to enjoy it.
Lastly, the class got into two small groups and discussed garage sales. A handout was provided with some guide questions to hopefully keep the conversation going. Unfortunately, Yujeong was only able to be in one group, so the other one seemed to get off topic several times. On the other hand, this is a conversation club, so all they really have to do is converse, and they certainly did that. Both groups definitely seemed able to keep talking, and were sad when it was six o’clock and time to leave.

Let's do the time warp again

Rocío decided she wanted to try something new on Tuesday. She changed the groups from intermediate and advanced to Spanish speakers and non-Spanish speakers. She said that it was because she wanted to work on translation exercises and that translation is going to be very helpful in those students learning English grammar. So I guess we are going to warp through time and live in the era of the grammar-translation method.
I just don’t know if I agree with splitting the groups up in this manner. In my group, which now consists of Vietnamese, Chinese, Laos, and Farsi speakers, we picked up right where they left off in the “intermediate” book. Unfortunately, a couple of the non-Spanish speaking students were previously in the more advanced group and became increasingly bored today because the subject matter we were covering was too basic for their skill level.
One of the biggest issues that I have been struggling with involves translation. I just don’t think, especially at an advanced level, that words and concepts should be translated into the L1. It was incredibly helpful when I was in a Spanish language class where the teacher only spoke in Spanish. What I find interesting is that I haven’t had nearly as big of a problem with the students constantly translating for each other in my new group. It may have to do with the relatively small number of same-language speakers, but I am not sure.
I do know that when my group consisted of about 90% Spanish-speakers, that other 10% felt left out at times. The look on those excluded students’ faces made me sad and frustrated at the same time. I have no desire to exclude any student from learning, and I think that by having “private” conversations (during class) in non-English, that is exactly what has been happening.

Got spare change?

A strange thing happened last Tuesday. Students showed up. People that I haven’t seen in weeks or months came for class. One guy had a reasonable excuse, he broke his wrist at work. To be honest, I guess I don’t really care about why people stop coming to class. I just want them to show up. What kills me the most is that I am guilty of the same thing. What a hypocrite I have turned out to be.
When only two or three students have shown up by 8:30am, I think about how good it will be for those who actually came to class. Then, more students start strolling in later and later. It drives me crazy when students are late, but in pure hypocritical fashion, I shouldn’t expect them to. The truth is, I don’t always start class at 8:30am. So, why should I assume that people will keep showing up for the beginning of class at 8:30 when it doesn’t always actually start at 8:30?
I have also found it to be more difficult to show up for my own classes at UTA. I have come to realize this semester that taking classes four nights a week is not for me. In the same vein, I think that the students who show up for ESL Monday through Thursday and computer class on Friday get burnt out after a certain number of weeks of the same thing. Having to get up every single weekday morning and be somewhere ready to go at 8:30am may not be everyone’s cup of tea.
I know that people are going to occasionally miss class due to illness or car trouble, etc., but as the instructor I feel that if they miss class then they are missing an opportunity to learn more English. While I know that is true, a desire to learn isn’t the only component needed. A counselor once told me that in order to change, there are four necessary elements:

1. Acknowledge that a change needs to be made
2. Seeing the “post-change” potential
3. Knowing the steps needed to fulfill that potential
4. The willingness to complete those steps

The final one is definitely the most difficult. It certainly has been for me. I know I need to go to class more often. I know that I would understand the material better if I went to class. The trouble is, when it is time to leave for class, the will is hard to come by.

My legal(istic) issues

I can’t believe I have never thought about this before. I don’t know if it was naiveté, ignorance, denial, wishful thinking, or some combination of these. Perhaps I preferred to not know the truth so that I wouldn’t have to deal with that knowledge. Illegal immigrants have infiltrated my ESL class. Now I don’t know what to do. I actually spoke with someone who happens to be an attorney, she told me that they don’t really have many options to become legal citizens. I have even done some additional research online and the information that I have found indicates approximately a 0.0001% chance to become a legal resident if you are an illegal immigrant.
My own feelings on illegal immigration are hazy at best. Building a wall is a stupid idea, that’s for sure, just look at Germany. Although, if it had been built centuries ago (like the one in China) then it would be a landmark rather than a “solution” to illegal immigration. To be honest, I am really struggling with trying to figure out what is the “right” thing to do.
All of these questions keep rolling around in my head. Should I turn them in? How can I turn them in? How many do I not know about? Would I even still be able to get a job teaching ESL if there weren’t illegal immigrants? How can I best help them? What can I do to help them become legal residents? Where do I draw the line?
My wife, Angie, works at an elementary school. She has come home a number of times with stories about a family being torn apart because the dad was deported. Earlier this week she told me that two kids that went to her school won’t be returning because both of their parents got deported. It is sad to think about how those kids lives have changed. (Unless, of course, the family is able to sneak back in. They did it once already, right?)
I don’t think I have ever been this torn up about something. I am truly of two minds about this. I am so confused.

Just right

            Apparently, it is important to teach ESL students about pragmatics.  Really, it isn’t just pragmatics that plays a role, because culture does too.  I know that we can’t prepare our students for every situation, but it is upsetting when you feel like that you could have prevented a negative experience for a student if only you had prepared them better.

            One of the students is a hostess / greeter at a chain restaurant.  Tuesday, she came in to class and I could tell that she was upset about something, but I didn’t really want to pry into her personal life.  Finally, about halfway through the class, she mentioned what was bothering her.  A man came into the restaurant, so the student / hostess asked “how many?”  The man replied “one.”  To which the student (whose only “fault” in my opinion is in not knowing all the pragmatic and cultural implications of English) said, “just one?”  Upon hearing this (as told to me by the student), the man asked to speak with the manager and proceeded to gripe and complain about how insulting it was for the hostess to use the word just.

            I felt / feel bad because I should have been more proactive in anticipating what errors that the students could make, especially related to social interaction.  I also know that I am probably being too hard on myself and cannot expect to be able to teach them everything about English and prevent them from ever making any errors or mistakes. 

What I am having trouble with figuring out is about the timing of lessons.  It is definitely important for beginners to understand phonetics, morphology, and syntax.  Intermediate students could then build on those concepts and add in some semantics.  Finally, the advanced students would add in pragmatics.  The problem with this “perfect” plan is due to the fact that there is always more to cover on any of these topics and that all speakers need these, no matter their proficiency.  So, how can a class be structured so that students are able to learn what they need to know by the time they need to know it?

Stop laughing with me; Start the business?

Part One

            I found out some information last week that I meant to blog about before now.  For a couple of weeks, one student in particular, “Jill” has been somewhat standoffish toward me whenever I ask her a question.  After class one day I finally asked another student (who seems to be a friend of hers) about the situation.  She informed me that when I ask Jill a question or attempt to elicit more of a response, I do so in a joking manner which she does not like.

            I have to say that I was a little surprised by this discovery.  Rather than keeping the class from getting boring and maintaining a positive atmosphere, my sense of humor has caused a student to be less motivated.  As of late, I have been trying to be more aware of how Jill feels and more mindful of how I prompt her.  I think the situation is improving, but it isn’t really about what I think.

Part Two

            This past Tuesday, only three students showed up for class.  Two of them were a married couple, so they always come together, and one was a brand new student.  This is the first time that I have had less than five people show up for the advanced group.  I was so frustrated that more people did not show up for class, but then after class I started thinking about it some more.

            By only having three students, I really got to spend more time focusing on each of them.  When we were having discussions, I didn’t have to worry about keeping them all engaged because they didn’t really have a choice.  All of them got more chances to practice and had more chances to get feedback (corrective or otherwise) on their answers.  I don’t necessarily want a large number of students to miss class every time, but it is certainly nice to be able to spend more time answering specific questions that students may not want to share in a larger group setting. 

Tuesday really made me start thinking about private tutoring or some sort of very small group setting.  I thought about a couple of issues that would almost certainly come up with this.  Where would we meet?  Where does the funding/pay come from?  How would I find students?  There are definitely more hurdles to this idea, but I am willing to explore and research this more thoroughly.

Burra Wrestling

This past Tuesday I ran into a brick wall…

            Class was proceeding as it normally does.  We were in our groups and working through our respective lessons from the workbooks.  I was once again asking my group of students if they had any questions about this particular exercise that we were working on.  While I was answering a student’s question, another student turned to her neighbor and began speaking in Spanish.  I finished answering the first question and then turned to the other student and asked what her question was.  She said it was nothing and after pressing her to no avail, we moved on.

            Later, the same student turned and asked her neighbor another question in Spanish.  I interrupted her and requested that she ask me her question in English.  She said something along the lines of “no, it’s okay.”  I told her to please go ahead and ask me her question and I would be happy to clarify or explain anything that she may not understand, but I wanted her to ask me in English.  She then replied, “no, I don’t need to practice speaking in English.” BOOM!

            It took me a second or two to recover from the crash.  I can’t believe this girlady (girl+lady), who has been coming to class very frequently for the entire school year told me that she didn’t need to practice speaking in English!  I think that most of the rest of the group was taken aback as well.  I asked her why she thinks that she does not need to practice, and she said that she gets enough practice at work (she is a hostess at a chain restaurant.)  My response was that you can never practice too much or too often, especially when it comes to learning a language, but she did not seem to agree.  Even some of the other students chimed in and told her that “practice makes perfect” and “of course you need to practice.”

            So that is pretty much where I left it.  What else can I say to convince her of the necessity of practicing speaking?

            Later that day, though, I had a strange thought (well, I always have strange thoughts, but this one was related to this problem.)  What if this is in some way like a “silent period” in which a learner is focused more on absorbing the information rather than trying to produce?  Is it really okay for me to let her just take notes and listen?

If it can go wrong...

            I would definitely say that I was nervous about having to videotape me teaching, but I cannot say that I expected things to go anything at all like they did.

            To prepare for this day, I worked on a lesson that would hopefully improve the students’ pronunciation.  I own a book “Pronunciation Contrasts in English” and it has not only minimal pairs, but phonological information as well as a small sampling of languages that would have more trouble with any particular contrast.  Using this book, I made a spreadsheet and eventually whittled down the content to a manageable ten contrasting consonant sounds.  After doing three of them in class, I was afraid that I would totally lose the majority if I continued.

            I knew I had to prepare something, even without the video assignment because the actual teacher, Rocío, was away at a conference.  I did not know, however, that a co-worker of hers would be filling in for her.  Here, I would like to point out that if you can’t say anything good, don’t say anything at all…

            Following the whole class pronunciation fiasco, we split into three groups like we normally do.  During this semester, I have been working with the advanced group.  This would not have been good film, so “the fates,” or “destiny,” or whatever you want to call it had me work with the beginners.  I had no idea where they were in their book, which they had just started using this semester.  As is evident on the video, I am not entirely sure that they did either.

            Watching myself on the video was a somewhat awkward experience.  Maybe it would be better to say that I was watching myself be awkward on the video.  After seeing what I look like interacting with the students, I feel like I could work on my classroom management skills.  Conversely, I also feel like not being so authoritarian contributes to an overall positive affect in the classroom.  These are not mutually exclusive, plus, with these being adult students, I think a delicate balance is the answer.

            I think that one of my biggest strengths is my positive attitude.  I keep smiling and laughing while using my sense of humor to engage students and (hopefully) keep class more enjoyable.  In my experience, class is infinitely more fun and interesting when the teacher wants to be there and actually likes teaching.

            I believe that one aspect of my teaching that needs improvement is my ability to stay focused.  When covering certain areas of English, I find myself providing too many examples or too many exceptions to the rule.  I need to focus on covering the topic and making sure that this particular concept is grasped before I start piling on more information.

            After watching the video, I feel that how I view myself teaching is pretty similar to what was actually on the video.  (I did not realize, however, how much background noise there is in class).  It seemed like so many things were going awry that day: Rocío wasn’t there, her “fill-in” wanted things her way, we ran out of coffee cups, we didn’t have our normal snack food (because Rocío brings it), the door that has the extra tables and chairs was not unlocked for us, and I worked with a different group than usual.  Despite all the things that go wrong and all the problems or issues that arise in the future, I will be able to adapt and improvise workable solutions.

Getting in the way

          I had to deal with something in ESL class for the first time this week that I had never dealt with before.  One of the students was upset and walking out of the class in frustration.  I know that what transpired was at least partially my fault, so I feel guilty for contributing to the problem.

          Two other students asked a question that somewhat related to American culture (or so they thought).  They asked what I was taught in school was the number of continents in the world.  When they went to school (not in the U.S.) they were taught that there are five continents.  (I still don’t know what those five are).  Then, I asked for the name of the man who discovered “America.”  All of the students responded with Cristobal Colón.  I then proceeded to tell them that here we are taught that it is Christopher Columbus.  Someone said this is a translation of his name, but that is not the point I was confused about.  Why did his name need to be “translated?”  I can’t think of one other historical figure whose name is “translated.”

          In the midst of this, I decided to grab one of the pan dulces that were brought to class.  On the way back to my group, I checked to see what the beginners were working on, and was flagged down by one of the intermediate students because she did not understand a word in her book.  By the time I got back to the advanced group, some of the students were still arguing about the continent issue and one student was walking out the door.  Rocío stopped him before he left and I overheard some of their conversation.

          He was upset because he came to class to learn English, not debate about education.  I know that there is a cultural aspect to it, and one could even argue that people were practicing their speaking skills.  When I think about it, I allowed a few students to get us off topic and that detracted from everyone’s opportunity for learning.  When it comes down to it, I think that I not only allowed it, but encouraged it.  I don’t like the feeling of getting in the way of someone’s education… especially since I am the one who is supposed to be teaching them.

First Reflection (Week of 1-24-11)

This semester, after having worked with the beginners in the ESL class, I wanted to get some experience working with the advanced students. After my first couple of classes working with the students that have placed themselves in the advanced group, I have learned that it isn't necessarily any easier working with the more proficient English speakers than the less proficient English speakers.

One of the bumps in the road that I have encountered is the difference in formal education that each student has received. While reviewing some of the material that they covered last semester, I found out that only a couple of them knew what I meant when I said something about a verb in the past tense. I definitely don't think that students need to know every single metalinguistic term, but I feel like it is important for them to know certain basic ones. As a minimum, I think that students should learn the lexical categories of noun, verb, adjective, and adverb. I also think that they should know what typical form is required for verbs in the past, present, progressive, and future tenses. There are more terms which may be necessary as students get more advanced, but I really don't know if I should expect students to learn these terms because the majority of ESL students are not in these classes to continue into formal education, but to improve their communication skills in the English-speaking community. This is definitely something that I am going to have to keep in mind, because I need to understand the goals that students have for themselves and not project onto them what I think that their goal(s) should be.

Another stumbling block that I have encountered at all levels is translation. I thought that this would be less of an issue with the more advanced students, but clearly I was wrong. Within the three hours that I spent working with the advanced students this past week, there were at least a half dozen times that I would be interrupted while I was attempting to explain a word or concept. These interruptions were one of the other students, who obviously already understood the concept, explaining it in their native language. As of late, I am finding myself more and more in the camp of “those who think that L2 instruction should be in the L2.” This is an area of some debate, even within my own mind, and something that I will continue to think about as this semester and my learning continue.