Class Management and Atmosphere

Creating a good environment

Teaching in a good environment

If we want to have our student's attention, we must have to have a nice environment. We have to devide our classroom in different parts. One could be a reading zone, another for playing, another for sleeping and other cutting and pasting. It is important they don't have distractions like sound and people moving around the classroom, etc.

Also, we have to have a big smile in our faces because see us happy they are going to feel the same feeling and the class is going to be better if we have that attitude. Also, we have to be patient  because every single person  learn in a different way, so we have to apply different techniques. The attitude they have is going to depend of us because they need to feel confident for doing the things like they feel okay. If we have a good enviroment and a good atmosphere, is going to be easier to share the class and the students will enjoy the class.

Activities

Teaching by playing games

Kindergarten students learn more if they play. As a kinder garden teacher i learned that they enjoy every single activity we did. As an example is, i played "Simon says" and they obeyed what i said. I used this activity when they were disobedient and they obeyed me again because they don't feel that activity like a game bacause they feel the responsability for obeying. Also they love to paint whatever thing. So we can see that if we do different activities we can have their attention and also we can create a good environment. If we have a song they love to sing because they can shout out and feel free.

We have to know that if we want to have a nice class we need a good environment, a good attitude and our students need to feel the things that we want to transmite. If we apply those things our students are going to be more successful in their life. If we apply those techniques in our subject, we are going to have better professional than today.

Class Management and Atmosphere

Creating an enjoyable teaching experience 

My first experience at teaching have been wonderful. Every class I go to the school is a challange for me. Talking about Management and Atmosphere, I realized that being a teacher is not an easy roll, but I really like it. When I'm teaching them, there are some students that are difficult to catch their attention because some of them are kind of troublemakers, but If I got the indicated activities, I can handle the class.

I enjoy the class with my students; I like to pay attention to them when they want to say something or when they want to participate; They feel very good when they know the answer for some questions.

Some of my students carrying out an activity

When my students like the activities that I have them develop, they themselves feel secure and confident. There are different kind of students in my class who have amazing habilities like drawing or memorizing. Talking about attitudes, I would like them to have more values. They are used to being so selfish one to another; therefore, they don't like to work in groups. Not all of my students behave in that way of course, but it's something worried.

I consider my way of teaching very active. I like my students to feel confident with me when I'm teaching them. When I'm in front of them, I got too much energy in order to catch their attention and let them participate by themselves; actually, they like to participe by themselves. It's very interesting the way they behave. I would rather develop many activities and games instead of giving them sheetworks to practice, but 15 minutes before finishing the class, I give them sheetworks to practice because it's part of the learning process and also it's  one way of getting knowledge.

I must be concious about what my students need for leaning effectively. Sometimes, it's difficult have the answer for many questions. I try to handle every situation that I'm involved. Treating with little kids could be stressful sometimes, but every single class help me to build up a good relationship with my roll as a teacher. I need to work on the creativity and in many other aspects that a beginner in this arena usually has, such as being patient, speaking louder, and some others.

I have been creating my shor-term goals by every single class I taught. Firstly, I want to get a lot of experience and knowledge putting them together to be a better teacher. I need to be careful with everything at teaching, creativity, grammar, pronunciation and so on. I want to be an excellent professional in my area.That's my long-term goal; that means that I need to work hard step by step. I want to reach my goals by practicing and enjoying.

Here there are some pages that have interesting resources.

http://www.toolsforeducators.com/fruit_vegetables.php

This page is in Spanish, but you can take some activities into account for the develoment of children learning process.

http://www.ehowenespanol.com/juegos-aprender-numeros-manera_385629/

This webside is excellent; you can find as many things as you can imagine.

http://www.eslkidstuff.com/esl-kids-songs.htm#.VESOQbCUexp

Class Management and Atmosphere

 Developing my own style of teaching little by little

Classroom management can be defined as a plan for what procedures our students will follow throughout each class as well as what the teacher’s role is in helping our students have a  flourishing experience each class. During my teaching practicum, that's what I have been trying to do; I have planned every single class, taking care of what activities, songs, games, books, worksheets, and other things that  I have to use to develop each topic; I have also looked for different methods and techniques to apply in my classes. If give children enough resources, they will understand, work and learn each topic successfully. 

My students sitting on desks formed by six kids.

I consider that my style is based on cooperative learning. I like the idea of learn together as a community; everyone has a role in this process. I have taught my students the importance of working as a community. I have observed that children learn better by socializing; they share their feelings and thougts about "X" topic with their classmates, so everybody contributes in learning process. I play a very important role in here; I have to be checking if they really work, and if it is necessary, give them help in order to fulfill the activities I asked for. Talking about grouping the children, they are sitting on desks formed by 6 children each one. This helps me because, as I mentioned before, I like children work in groups or communities. They really like being sititing in that way; they enjoy when I give them activities for working together. They try to help each other if they can, and if they can't do something they ask for my help.

My tutor says that I have done a very good job with my kids, but I consider that I need to improve in some things, such as creativity for doing charts, flashcards, and other things that can help me to develop my classes in a better way, to be firmer on my decisions, and trying to apply different techniques for solving problems that sometimes are hard to handle. If I work hard on those things, I will enhance my teaching style; therefore, the results of my students will be better than now are. I believe that I can do it.

I have already set my short and long term goals as an ELT practitioner. My short term goal is to get experience teaching chiefly. On the other hand, my long term goals are: finish my major having acquired different skills and tools to perfom teaching in an appropriate way and putting into practice what I have learned during it, and go ahead no matter what taking into account that I have to keep on learning something new every day.

Here you have some profitable links for ELT practitioners

http://www.english-4kids.com/

Here you will find different games, activities, songs, worksheets, and some other helpful materials

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joqVklnnPoY

This video gives some tips for ETL practitioners

http://www.teachertrainingvideos.com/miscellaneous/elt-podcasts.html

Here you will find different podcasts, vocabulary, acitivities, dialogues etc.

Class Management and Atmosphere

Me and my English students

Adapting my own style of teaching to accommodate to the needs and motivations of young learners

There are different methods or strategies that could be used availing myself of the skills that children possess. At the time of imparting classes, I observed that some children possessed optimal qualities in terms of drawing, painting, cutting, pasting and memorizing. Others were uncomfortable at the time of doing the activities I had for them. All had certain deficiencies or needs, but the main was in writing. To express my style in teaching, I made them see the importance of being able to write, because of that, my activities were based on writing, drawing and coloring to enhance their motor skills and to wake up in them the habit of writing, even simple things like their names.

Being dynamic, cheerful, patient and understanding helps a lot to the needs of children and in turn, they feel comfortable doing the things I ask.

Areas that I need to improve

Two of the areas that I need to improve and learn are "Abilities" and "Grouping". 

The first is related with me sometimes not knowing how to address children and to implement control techniques against an unexpected situation that is presented by the children in the development of the class. 

The second is because sometimes i didn't know how to group them for them to work effectively. Some children were more anxious than others and because of that i looked for grouping them in a way in which i could keep an eye on them the entire time, but sometimes I didn't know how to handle that.

My goals

My short term goals are very basic because what I hope is to get the experience and eventually to feel comfortable in the classroom environment. Also I want to finish all my teaching practicums in the different schools levels in an efficient way and to acquire skills that now I do not possess.

My long term goals are a little more complex because I want to end my career being a good teacher and staying in the area, I mean working as an English teacher and put into practice what I have learned along the different subjects. To achieve these goals I must give my best, keep studying and never stop learning.

Class Management and Atmosphere

Teaching is as hard as learning

As future teachers we have to make the compromise of looking for the best for your students, and as students we have to make our best to learn. In these past weeks I have learned how hard is to be in both places, sitting in front on the teacher and standing in front of a whole class, but something I have learned is that you need to feel confident and secure in both.

My style of teaching is very reciprocal. I like to talk and being listened, and when a student wants to talk I like to listen to him or her as well; I like to respect and being respected, and I’m not going to ask back anything I haven’t given to my students back. I think a can take a real advantage of this by expressing my feelings and desires for the class and asking my students to talk back at me. If I ask them to tell me what they want to do in my class and the do, I can take their pieces of advice and apply them in the next class. In that way, my job is going to be easier because I’m going to know what students want and they are going to feel comfortable by knowing that I listened to them.

I think I have to learn something about grouping because as a beginner in teaching, I’m always concerned about the order in the classroom, and I think that if I do pair or group work, it is going to be a disorganized class. I don’t know yet how to handle a group of 20 or 30 five-year-old and it is always scaring to think that my class is going to be a mess and everyone is going to be out of control. Also I have to work a little bit on my classroom atmosphere, learn more ways to make my class fun and interesting.

My long and short term goals as an ELT practitioner are based on my weaknesses previously mentioned. One of my short term goals is to learn more children songs and to put into practice some fun activities in the classroom, for these, I’m going to use internet and look for them. My long term goal is to become a better teacher by studying hard and looking for extra material like vocabulary, grammar exceptions and children teaching related books.

Here you have some material that might be helpful:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAlX1V3lK5s 

In here you can find some very helpful and easy songs.

http://englishgrammarpass.com/exercises/chapters/5.html

In here you can find a lot of English vocabulary

http://www.pinterest.com/teachpreschool/children-s-books-with-activities/

Here you can find a lot of children's books with activities

http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/genre/childrens

And in here you can find children's podcasts.

The young learner

To be a young learner is to acquire knowledge in the first stages of our lives. Talking about the classroom, our young learners are between the ages of 4 to 10, wich are the most vital years in children development. Children at this age are natural learners; they are trying to know what life is about, and when you take them to the classroom, you can take advantage of it.

Centro Escolar Francisco Ignacio Cordero's first grade students

We as future tachers have to know that all children are different, some of them develop early, others later; some children develop gradually and others in leaps and bounds. It is impossible to say that they develop at the same age and go through the same stages, so we have to take a general view of our students and take out some similar characteristics of them to be able to understand their needs.

In our teaching practicum, we were in charge of teaching English to four, five, six and seven-year-old children; we must know that every single one of them has different needs. At this age is really important to use the things they have learned in their mother tonge and adapt them to what we are trying to teach them in English. They can already talk about what they are doing, have done or heard, so you can put this into practice by doing oral activities, making them tell a story or just describing something. A very important thing that we have to take into account is that the most powerful tool that children have is their imagination, so you can use that to make them participate, feel important and secure during classes.

Five-year-old English students

With kids of these ages, the physical world is dominant at all times. They discover things with their eyes, hands, and ears; everything has to be explained. As an example, Children know that the world is governed by rules; they may not always understand them, but they know that they are there to be obedient. Why do they understand that? They do it because an adult told them; maybe they heard someone saying that, and they took it for them.

Something important is to wear children's shoes; you have to understand them, despite them being so different from adults. We have to ask children as many questions as we can; we also have to find out what  they want and need. Children can be very enthusiastic about learning; we have to take advantage of it, so we have to help them to have fun while learning and encourage them to do their best in order to get better results in learning process.

Five-year-old students carrying out an activity

Introduction

This e-folio has been created with the aim of share our TVYL (Teaching Very Young Learners) experiences. Here, we are going to supply different entries about our teaching practicum in kindergarten and primary school level. We are going to explain and show you how has been this process, and the different adventures we as teachers, our tutors and our students have faced during it .

We also are going to give you our viewpoints about some aspects related to teaching, such as 'What's to a young learner', 'Class management and atmosphere', 'Listening, Oral work, Reading and Writing', 'When things go wrong in class', 'The tools of the trade', 'Comparison between traditional teaching and 21st century teaching', and 'Self-assessment, evaluation of our learning and some recommendations'.

We hope you enjoy and learn something different from our experiences, and you can take into account what can be useful for you to improve the learning process while you teach.

"In learning you will teach, and in teaching you will learn". 

-Phil Collins

Reasoning the name chosen to this E-folio

"Our first steps into teaching: learning through teaching young minds", would you like to know why we have chosen this name for this Efolio? Okay, first let us tell you what does being a teacher mean for us. Being a teacher means being there for our students, giving everything we can, making sure we are as knowledgeable as we can be about our subject matter and about our students. It means sacrifice for the sake of helping kids, giving them one precious thing: knowledge. It also means caring about students unconditionally. Being a teacher is exciting, enjoyable, and rewarding. 

During our teaching practicum we have realized that teaching children is not easy as we thought. For teaching, we have been planning what to do in each class, how we can do it, what resources we can use in order to have better learning process, which methodologies, approaches, techniques and strategies we should use, etc. As you can see, teaching involves many things in it. We have faced many problems during this process, but we have gotten enough knowledge to solve them easily. Furthermore, each time we have gone to teach our kids, we have learnt something from them. We consider that we are not teachers for us, we are teachers for our students; because they learn from us, but we learn from them as well.

 It have been our first time teaching; we have given our fist steps into it. Now, we can say that teaching it's outstanding; anything can be compared with this experience.We really have enjoyed it!