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Date of Class: 07/28/2014
Day of Class: Monday
Time of Class: Evening
MC: Colin
DJ: Joshua
Assistants: None
Module: Talking with the Boss
How Many Learners: 7
Score: 6+6+7+7+7+7 = 40
What happened (as short or as long as you like, but be specific): This was Colin’s day to teach without a prepared lesson plan. He felt the class went better than he had anticipated and I would agree. We began with the usual warm-ups and moved on to a listen and point with the deck of professions. After that we played “This is an Apple” and then did some dialogues and some pairing off and practicing of the dialogues. There was great group energy and team work. There was laughter and positive connectivity between learners. Learners were helping one another and connecting to support one another. It was focused and engaging. Colin did a great job -especially considering the challenge it is to teach without preparing first!Date of Class: 07/15/2014
Day of Class: Tuesday
Time of Class: Evening
MC: Ashley
DJ: Joshua
Assistants: Mary, Gretta, Bertha, Mark
Module: Maps & Location
How Many Learners: 7
Score: 23
What happened (as short or as long as you like, but be specific): This class went fantastic. This group is really great at fostering a learning environment with lots of group work. We did a few dialogues and some listen and point activities. Ashley did a great job of commanding the class and facilitating activities that the learners were able to grasp. All of the assistants really seem to be on board with the methods and type of classroom energy we work to create. There were lots of smiles and grateful goodbyes. This group is awesome.Date of Class: 07/10/2014
Day of Class: Thurs
Time of Class: Evening
MC: Patrik
DJ: Joshua
Assistants: Gretta, Mary, Yolanda, Bertha,
Module: At The Doctor
How Many Learners: 6
Score: 8+8+8+8+9+7= 48
What happened (as short or as long as you like, but be specific): This class went very smoothly. Though several learners were unable to make it on time, Patrik was able to appropriately adjust his lesson plan to meet the needs of the learners. He offered very effective and precise coaching to the assistants which in turn made them very successful in helping the learners to achieve the goal of the activity. There was great energy among the learners. Lots of positive group work. Definitely one of the better classes I’ve been a part of.Date of Class: 7/08/2014
Day of Class: Tues
Time of Class: Evening
MC: Patrik
DJ: Joshua
Assistants: Ashley, Mary, Yolanda
Module: Maps & Places
How Many Learners: 4
Score: 7+6+8+7+6+5=39
What happened (as short or as long as you like, but be specific): This was the first night at St Andrew’s. Things were a little rocky to start. Some learners were late because of brute luck, but those who were able to make it had a really great time once class finally got into the groove. There was a great deal of coaching of the assistants too. All in all it was successful. The learners left with positive energy.Date of Class: 07/07/2014
Day of Class: Monday
Time of Class: Evening
MC: Joshua
DJ: None
Assistants: None
Module: Talking with the Boss
How Many Learners: 4
Score: 8+8+9+10+10+6=46
What happened (as short or as long as you like, but be specific): This felt like my most successful class taught thus far. After the alphabet, yell n spell warm ups, we did a listen and point with the deck of professions that I had prepared. It was challenging enough, but not overly challenging. After we moved into dialogues that were a little bit more challenging than usual -slightly longer, 4 line dialogues. After that, we worked on “What would you say?” with work related topics. We finished with a “Can you swim” activity.
What made this class feel particularly successful is that there was a high level of engagement and working together. Though there were learners at very different levels, there was plenty of learning taking place. Everyone was appropriately challenged. I also was able to easily help one particular learner to keep up with the rest of the class even though he typically has greater struggles. The class also wanted to engage with questions, humor, and conversations related to culture, language, and the activity at hand. However, we never diverged from the lesson for more than a few moments and we were able to keep pushing through all of the activities with focused, high energy. I was very pleased with this class.Date of Class: 06/30/2014
Day of Class: Monday
Time of Class: 6:00 pm
MC: Ashley
DJ: Joshua
Assistants: Colin
Module: What Do You Do?
How Many Learners: 4
Score: 28
What happened (as short or as long as you like, but be specific): This was Ashley’s dress rehearsal. She did a fantastic job. She came prepared and well rehearsed. The class was engaging and well organized. Ashley did a great job at being assertive and using a confident tone. We worked with the employee/worker graphics and created dialogues with them. “What does ___________________ do?” ” A __________ works in a _______.”
We finished the class with a successful round of 20 questions with the job graphics.Date of Class: 06/02/2014
Day of Class: Monday
Time of Class: Evening
MC: Colin
DJ: Joshua
Assistants:
Module: English for the Workplace: What Do You Do?
How Many Learners: 3
Score: 6+7+8+7+7+8=42
What happened: The class had a very comfortable atmosphere. We worked on vocabulary associated with job positions and where people are employed. We rehearsed a few dialogues with these words. The learners worked well together.Date of Class: 5/21/2014
Day of Class: Weds
Time of Class: 6:30 pm
MC: Joshua
DJ:
Assistants:
Module: Emergency Preparedness
How Many Learners: 2
Score: 6+5+5+5+5+6=32
What happened: Very small class tonight! It was a nice environment with great connection because of the intimacy of the group. We learned first aid vocabulary and built dialogues using the vocabulary and then practiced them. We learned the phrase “Emergency Contact” and filled out emergency contact cards.Date of Class: 05/14/2014
Day of Class: Weds
Time of Class: Evening
MC: Sambones
DJ: Joshua
Assistants: Rodolfo
Module: Emergency Preparedness
How Many Learners: 6
Score: 10+7+7+7+6+10=47
What happened: This was Sambones’ second silent class. Sambones was very creative with her lesson and brought many outside, real-world materials that were all appropriate for the module. I’m very impressed with the consistent improvement each of the learners are making in spelling, pronunciation, confidence, and willingness to try. Despite having suffered personal loss today, Sambones stepped up to the challenge and taught a very productive class. We did several dictations of emergency preparedness vocabulary words and phrases. We went over items contained in an emergency preparedness supply kit. We went through the motions of what to do in an earthquake and a tsunami and learned vocabulary associated with those disasters.Date of Class: 05/07/2014
Day of Class: Wednesday
Time of Class 6:00 pm
MC: Joshua
DJ:
Assistants: Rodolfo
Module: Emergency Preparedness
How Many Learners: 7
Score: 35
What happened This was a really productive class. The participants are making great progress in their language capabilities and also their understanding of the classroom interaction. This class was one of the more rewarding for me. I feel like I’m learning just as much as they are. There are two learners in particular who have dramatic improvement in their communication over the last month or two. This week’s activities were focused on emergency preparedness vocabulary.Date of Class: 04/23/2014
Day of Class: Wednesday
Time of Class 6:30
MC: Sambones
DJ: Joshua
Assistants: Rodolfo
Module: In The Kitchen
How Many Learners: 8
Score: 9+8+8+8+8+10 = 51
What happened (as short or as long as you like, but be specific): This was Sambones’ silent class. It went really well. The best part about the class overall in my opinion is that the learners seemed to really have a lot of fun watching me and Rodolfo try to figure out what Sambones was directing. It made for a really different learning atmosphere that made it VERY ok for everyone to be confused at times. Sambones put a lot of effort into her preparation and a lot of thought into how she would communicate without words. Every week the class gets more engaging, more entertaining, and more successful. I feel like there are some great relationships being cultivated between the learners and the teachers.This topic was modified 3 weeks, 2 days ago by Patrick McDade.
Date of Class: 04-02-14
Day of Class: Weds
Time of Class 6:00 pm
MC: Joshua
DJ:
Assistants:Rodolfo & Benjamin
Module: In the Kitchen
How Many Learners: 6
Score: 5+4+5+6+5+2= 27
What happened (as short or as long as you like, but be specific): The class was really a fun class. Rodolfo was absolutely essential in his gifted ability to connect across cultural barriers and really help the learners who are newest to English language. They also seem to really enjoy connecting with him quite a bit. The smaller class size was nice because it gave me the opportunity to focus a bit more on giving individual attention to the learners. toward the end we played a matching game with different vocabulary words in the kitchen. The game was good fun, but there was too much vocabulary on the table to easily make matches. When folks got a match, they earned a cookie. The learners seemed to really enjoy the game… but making the matches was slow going. In the future I will use this game with a smaller number of matching cards at a time. Otherwise it was a great activity… I just need to hone in the usefulness of it.Date of Class: 03/12/2014
Day of Class: Wednesday
MC: Joshua
DJ:
Assistants: Ben, Quinton
Module: Maps & Location
How Many Learners: 12
Score: 5+5+6+6+5+3 = 30
What happened:
This class was probably the most engaging that I’ve taught thus far. It was great to have such a diverse group of learners. It required a lot more out of me as a teacher and I found that it expanded my capacity to teach as a result -especially with my DJ out sick. The class was intense, but very positive. We focused a great deal on pronunciation of some really hard sounds associated with numbers and ordinals. We also did a “I’m lost and need directions” game with a map on the floor. One new learner. Lots of laughter. New activities. It was a really great class. I was a little overwhelmed at times, but not too much. Unfortunately the lateness of some learners combined with a large class and trying to make sure that everyone’s needs were met led to some disorganization on my part. Next time I will have to manage things a bit differently.Date of Class: 03/06/2014
Day of Class: Wednesday
MC: Joshua
DJ: Rodolfo
Assistants:
Module: Address & Maps
How Many Learners: 8
Score: 7+5+5+5+4+5=31
What happened:
Most learners arrived about 5 minutes late, and there was a little struggle to get the ball rolling with the alphabet point. We kept doing it until we finally had the group focused and fully participating. After we warmed up the class had a nice flow. There was enough laughter and lightheartedness that there was a positive learning environment that was sustained. I was very pleased to see so much helping going on between learners. I’m still trying to figure out the best way to help learners who are a little less advanced to keep up without making them feel pressured to perform at the expense of learning while also keeping the other students who have better language skills engaged in the learning process. In other words, I want all learners at all times to be learning and to milk every minute in the class room.Date of Class: 02/26/2014
Day of Class: Wednesday
MC: Joshua Clark
DJ: Rodolfo
Assistants:
Module: Measurement
How Many Learners: 8
Score: 4+4+5+5+5+5 = 28
What happened (as short or as long as you like, but be specific):
The class went very smoothly. The learners generally seemed at ease and comfortable. There were no moments of discomfort or extreme awkwardness which was good since this was my first unsupervised class. I was most concerned about creating a comfortable and safe learning space and I was very successful at doing that. There was plenty of praise and engagement between learners and the learners and teachers. As a teacher I definitely learned a great deal about order of operations in executing an activity and as soon as I changed up the way that we did the activity I saw instant improvement in speaking confidence, accurate production, and for the learners, it made receiving praise much more rewarding. There was one learner who struggled a bit and was working at a slower pace than the rest. Managing how to keep the learners all engaged at all times while not making the slower student feel overly pressured was a bit of a challenge. However, because there was a safe learning environment with plenty of praise and confidence, the overall class didn’t suffer in the least and there were smiles all around.