The title is an excerpt of the dialogue I made for my third graders to practice. Yeah, I am not teaching adults when you see such a sentence. I would never have used it when I taught business English, but in it we are practicing structure I need to teach children so they can grow up and be successes.
Boys need topics they like. I am soooo glad. I decided to link all my lessons for the week around the theme of zombies with great success.
My lessons are going so well this week that I realize now that I had been in a slump with lesson planning because I've actually been having fun in my lessons. I found the zombie lesson at just the right time, when I've felt really bad about my teaching and uninspired.
My students are friendlier to me this week. A smile is appearing their faces when I talk to them. The most sarcastic students are being really chummy. My co-workers are saying good bye to me friendly. People are laughing at my jokes. All are reminders that my spirits have changed.
The students have perked loved it and I've been able to get my students to do things they don't want to do. None of them have asked for candy. None of them complain.
Why not when its interesting.
For instance, my first graders are doing careers so being a zombie killer was linked to my career lesson last week. My second graders are working in groups on selecting survival supplies for flashlights, bottled water, AK47s that links with to practice shopping language. My third graders are practicing scheduling a meeting with someone to kill zombies.
This week has been revitalization for teaching. I can use some of the zombie theme to language from the book, which they need to practice, and they are having so much fun they don't realize they are speaking English and they are SPEAKING ENGLISH!
I've had success in the hallways and outside of class, but never in my class. Finally, After months of slogging it out, I am becoming a better teacher. One that is able to link an interesting theme with a good structure and adapt a textbook for difficult students.
I've used an interesting topic, but linking it to the textbook was really difficult for me. Now its coming easier. I've used an interesting them but not linked it with the next lesson. Or good language with a boring topic, never together. I used to play a lot of games. Before this week, I lost a lot of inspiration and enthusiasm in my teaching.
This feels really good.
No comments:
Post a Comment