The first week

Saturday, February 20, 2010

el 20 de febrero (sábado)

This is just a practice, as I have never done BLOG in my life.....

I call myself Low-tech teacher, but this year I will transform to a decent-tech teacher, and soon I will be a high-tech teacher.

Yesterday I went to the Health Department to get TB test. I will go back for NEGATIVE result on Monday (2/22).

My Clinical II will start on Monday (2/22) with Mrs. Pasty Ross at Cabell Midland High School.

I am really excited because I have never taught Spanish in English.

Well, I hope that everything will be OK.

The first week

(02/22 Monday - 02/26 Friday)

at Cabell Midland High With Ms. Patsy Ross.

Textbook and Workbook REALIDADES

4th mod is a mixed class of SPANISH 3 and 4 (18 students)

5th mod is Spanish 2 (29 students, one being a Special Ed student)

6th mod is a mixed class of Spanish 2 and 3 (27 students)

I am writing this blog not only for the class assignment (CI515) but also the record notes for my own sake (if I may).

It was an amazing first week. Since I teach Japanese during 2nd and 3rd mods (being 1st mods as planning period for Japanese), I already know the school, teachers, and facility really well. That took off my nervousness, but it was very different being in the Spanish classrooms from teaching in the Japanese classroom. I observed Ms. Ross for the entire week (15 hours in total), and she did not use the textbook at all because I came in the middle of review, no textbook week. Only for Spanish 2 students, she told them to finish the certain pages of workbook which were review to them. Spanish 4 students are currently going to Latin American virtual tour, and this week was Guatemala and its presentation to the class.

Connection with Marzano

The first thing I have noticed in Ms. Ross's classes was the use of "cooperative learning" in her 6th mod. Before I came into the classroom, students in Spanish 3 and 4 (SP3 & 4) were assigned to work on Guatemala. Because this class has mixed level students with even different textbooks, the organizing group on ability level was used unfortunately (SP 2 vs SP 3). They were seated close together within their own level group. However, students (SP3) were given the choice to work as a group or individual within the group, and what amazed me most was her method for keeping these groups small for suitable assignment. Even though there are 11 SP4 students who were all supposed to do Guatemala, students voluntarily find about 10 different sites to visit within Guatemala through online, so that each student or small group of 2 students have a place to research. That divided assignment actually made the learning about Guatemala more deep and thorough as well as keeping the number of students in cooperative learning "small." These group are called formal groups (p.90) according to Marzano because the project was carried over for several days.

I also noticed that students knew exactly what procedures they were supposed to take, so she must have given a clear direction about what to do last week. The students did not have any difficulty researching on the web, and the teacher's precise and corrective-nature feedback during and right after each group's presentation was very effective. For example, she gave her feedback in the question form, that "do you think the hotels in Guatemala are comfortable? Can you imagine how we would feel like there?" This type of question form of feedback made them re-think about what they researched, and I think she was targeting a big picture of objectives which was to select and use resources from the local and/or global communities that foster a deeper understanding of the target language and cultures. Definitely this type of performance activity is another way of evaluation from traditional pencil and paper exams.

Starting next week (March 1 Monday), I am going to teach Unit 3 for SP2 students ( in mods 5 and 6). After this blog, I am going to create pre-test to see where each students are at. This test is not for the grade, but rather will be just for my reference so that I would know how each students vary, and I can accommodate/ modify accordingly. I also need to make lesson plans. I think it is going to be a huge challenge because these level 2 students vary from almost none to quite advanced. How to bring students with almost none to even comprehend Unit 3 will be very challenging.