First week of classes

We just completed our first week of classes (25 to 29 February).  Yes, it was just our first week.  We started late because the students had to take entrance exams and interviews and, well, we are in Mozambique.  We’re just on a different schedule at the IFP.

This semester I am teaching English classes in Listening and Speaking, and one class on computer literacy or TIC’s (Tecnología da Informação e Comunicação—Information and Communication Technology—a mouthful, I know; just think of it as computer literacy or basic use of the computer—I’m no IT specialist).  The students have finished secondary school, have had 4 to 6 years of English, and 2 years of TICs.  They are training to be English teachers themselves.

My agenda for the first day of Listening/Speaking was as follows:

25 February 2013

Monday

Today we will:

•  Introduce ourselves
• Discuss our goals and objectives for the class
• Discuss what you did over the weekend
• Talk about the rules and expectations in the class

To give the students an example, I introduced myself, told them where I’m from, and where I was or what I was doing last year.  I wrote these three or four points (name, origin/birthplace, work last year) on the board and asked the student to follow them.  There were 30 students, and most were able to follow the self-introduction format I gave, but most also diverged from it.  For instance, many divulged their ages and marital status.  After each student had introduced himself/herself (there are only 6 female students), I discussed the different cultural expectations (American and Mozambican) for self-introductions in professional versus personal or intimate settings.  I explained that usually, age is not offered in professional introductions, and certainly marital status hardly ever.  I explained that this information is personal, and in general Americans like to maintain clear divisions between the personal and the professional realms of their lives.

This talk on cultural expectations is important in a listening/speaking class as culture will mainly be our topic of conversation/interaction (as opposed to grammar, for example, which is the focus of their other classes).  But for the first day of class I really wanted to spend time on expectations because it segued to our objectives, expectations and ground-rules in the class.  Many of the students also said they wanted to be teachers, so I wrote “teacher” on the board as a segue to our main objective.  I pointed out that I am a different teacher from most teachers they have had.  I asked them what they noticed as different.  This took a little while, and then one student, Victor, raised his hand, stood up, and said rather quietly, “behavior, pronunciation, skin.”  I think he jumbled up the beginning of his sentence, but the three differences he stated were clear enough.  I agreed with him, and tackled the second point first, reminding them that I lived in the U.S. for over 20 years and so I am giving them English from the U.S., American, not British.  For “skin,” I pointed out that I am not white, which makes me different from the typical white American they might expect.  For behavior, I asked them to be more specific, and here is where I got a bit stuck.  Realizing that I haven’t given them enough examples of my teaching style, I told them the Mozambican and Cape Verdean teachers I have seen usually just sit in front of class.  We want them to be better teachers, i.e. more like me, I guess, asking for more interaction, more active participation.  I pointed out that we are in an English Speaking/Listening class, and that they are learning a language, lingua, which in Portuguese also means tongue.  I stuck out my tongue and pointed at it.  Then wrote “Practice” and “Use” on the board.  I explained that they need to practice and use English everyday so that they can be strong in it.  This is our main objective, to strengthen their language skills in listening and speaking.  I drew up the following diagram on the board:

Receiving Language

Producing Language

                                      Listening  à Speaking

                                      Listening  ß Speaking

                                        Reading  à  Writing

                                        Reading  ß  Writing

As I drew the arrows, I pointed out that better listeners make for better speakers, and vice versa, that these skills are linked, and that, even though our emphasis in class will be on listening and speaking, we will also do some reading and writing to support the first two skills (I drew arrows pointing up, from reading to listening, and from writing to speaking, but I do not know how to “draw” upward arrows on Word.

We went a bit over time.  I told the students they can take their first break, but most just stayed seated.  I realized that when I said “discuss the goals and objectives of the class” in the agenda this really meant just lecturing to the class.  But this was our first day and we were all just getting warmed up.

When we started the second part of class, I had the students work in small groups of three, asking each other what they did over the weekend.  They struggled with this.  It was good to have them present their findings in front of class, as I saw that they needed more practice with the use of third person pronouns and simple past verbs.  It was challenging for most, but the students had already done individual introductions (I am, I was, etc.), so the natural progression I thought was to introduce others and present what he/she did over the weekend. 

We then took another break and then discussed the ground-rules and expectations in the class.  I had them working in bigger groups (of 5 students), gave each group a sheet of paper and had them write four rules.  I elaborated on the meaning of “expectations,” as some of the students were using the direct translation of “esperar” which is closer to “hope” not “expect.”  I didn’t use any Portuguese, though I also did not prohibit their use of Portuguese.  I gave lots of examples (personal/professional expectations).  The definition I gave them went something like this:  “to expect” involves thinking, reasoning, logic based on evidence; “esperar” or “to hope” involves more feeling, emotion, desire.  I asked them to complete the following sentences:

1.       The class should ______.

2.     We should ______.

3.     I expect the teacher to be _____.

4.    I expect to be _____.

Some of them said they expect to be good teachers, which isn’t incorrect, but it also showed me that they were still conflating “expect” with “hope,” that they were not thinking about expectations as rules in the class.  A couple of other interesting expectations they came up with were:  that students should be obedient and that they expect the teacher to be sympathetic.  I just said okay to obedience—I figured, they are studying a discipline (from the Latin, disciplina, meaning instruction, knowledge), and they as students can be seen as disciples (from discipulus) of English.  So, fine.  I’m their teacher.  I’m to lead them and they are to follow.  I did not simply say okay to being sympathetic, however.  I told them, sometimes I am sympathetic, other times I am not sympathetic.  They were a little surprised by this, and so pressed me for more explanation.  I told them that I must be fair and professional first, and then I can be sympathetic.  If they are not trying, not practicing, not being active students, then I have no sympathy for them.  If they try hard, then I’ll be most sympathetic.

            I collected the sheets of paper (with their names and their completed sentences about their expectations) and gave them H.W. or TPC (Trabalho para casa):  What expectations and rules do your other classes have?

Day 2 of Listening/Speaking

Okay, I don’t mean to give you all the blow-by-blow of my classes, but these reflections I find very helpful in monitoring, organizing, and planning my classes, and I hope other teachers out there will find it helpful as well, at least in generating more ideas for lessons.  Besides, it’s not about sodade, it’s a little different from past blog posts, so hopefully you’ll appreciate that at least.

Here’s the agenda for Day 2 of our class:

27 February 2013

Wednesday

1.      Announcements

2.     Review Rules and Expectations

3.     Collect 10 H.W. assignments

4.    Practice Asking Questions

5.     Elect class leaders

After students had written down the day’s agenda, I announced that we will have English Club.  No one really knew what English Club was about, so I explained that it’s optional, extra English exposure and practice.  They were unsure about “optional,” so I explained that English class is mandatory or obligatory, English Club is NOT obligatory, it’s optional.  It is also for fun.  I then gave them examples of what we would do for English Club:  walks to town, hikes, watching movies.  We then decided on when and where we would meet for English Club.

Next I showed them the list of Rules and Expectations that I wrote up on papel gigante (giant paper, or poster paper), based on their group work from the previous class session.  Here’s the list:

Class Rules and Expecations

1.       Students are to be respectful to each other and to their teacher.

2.     Students are to be professional and disciplined.

3.     All students must participate in class, always using/practicing English.

4.    The teacher will be professional, honest, fair, patient, and sympathetic.

5.     Class lessons are to be clear and organized.

6.     Everyone must be responsible and punctual.

I asked the students to give examples for each rule and gave my own commentary.  I emphasized “no laughing at each other” and “being brave to make mistakes” as examples of #1 and #2, minimal use of Portuguese and other local languages for #3

Next, I asked them what consequences would result if they do not follow the rules or meet the expectations.  I gave them the example:  “If I am not ________, I would ______.”  Or, “If I do not _____, the teacher would _____.”  The students worked in groups of five to complete the sentences, to come up with consequences for each rule/expectation.

This activity was practically impossible for the low-level students, and challenging for most.  Again, I asked each student to offer a response, but I wrote up only some of their responses, and made corrections on the board. 

Only about half of the students presented before we had to take a break.  After break, we continued at a much faster pace, each student offering consequences.  For the groups with the low-level students, I gave a spiel about the need to help each other, to practice before presenting.  The best way to learn something is to teach that something, and since they are training to be teachers, then they ought to practice teaching each other.  I remember I used to get so frustrated about this, about students just being out for themselves, not caring about their colleagues’ learning.  But in this class I was fairly even-tempered about it, I guess because I expected it would happen.  Anyway, I’ll have to remind them about teaching/helping each other—most will want to take the easy route, to just come up with answers and not have to work with others.

At the end of their presentations, I asked them to copy the following agreement:  “If I, _____ (name), do not follow the rules or meet the expectations of the class, the teacher can send me out of the class.”  I had to explain what the agreement meant, that when they are not meeting the expecations, they are not ready for class, not ready to learn, and I am not sympathetic.  I told them I would point to the door and say, “Leave!”  Or “Sai!”  Or “Rua!”   I asked them to sign below their copied agreement.

After that serious activity, we practiced asking yes/no questions by playing the game of “Detectives.”  I chose one student as detective, explained that as detective he will leave the class for a moment while someone “commits a crime,” and when he returns he must ask 10 students individually if he/she committed the crime.  They seemed to love this game, which I took from Penny Ur’s Five-Minute Activities, by the way.  It’s a simple and easy way to practice yes/no questions.  The “detective” comes back to class, asks 10 students, “Did you steal the teacher’s pen?” and then guesses which student actually has the pen/keys/cell-phone, which student looks the most guilty or the most criminal.  You can change the “crime,” of course, and give them “Did you break the window?”, “Did you eat his snack?”, etc.  It was our first time playing this game, and the students seemed to really enjoy it, so we played it again, this time with three detectives, but each with only five guesses. 

Next we were going to practice Wh-questions, but we were running out of time, so instead I gave the activity as H.W.  I listed the Wh-questions (What, Where, Who, Why, Whose, When, Where, How), and asked the students to write as many questions as they can about the following statement:  “Cuamba is the best city in Mozambique.”  On Monday, I will randomly collect 10 H.W. assignments from the other 20 that I did not collect that Wednesday.  This focus on question-asking, by the way, is both pedagogically sound (some Language Learning theorists might even say that learning happens best when students are asking real questions) and designed with an end-goal in mind: to interview guest-speakers. I’ve already asked PCV Colin and my housemate PCV Rich to speak to my class.  I might also be able to schedule a talk with a Malawian woman, Miriam, who works in town and speaks English well.  Next semester, we might practice with mock (job) interviews.

At the end of class, we elected a Chefe de Turma (Class Chief) and Adjunto de Chefe de Turma (Vice-Chief of Class).  One student volunteered (nominated himself), and then, when no one seemed to step up, I just nominated three other students.  I then asked for a show of hands (their votes) for each of the students.  Luckily, the one I nominated and thought most responsible got elected.  I then asked the new Chefe de Turma to nominate three other students as her Adjunto, and we voted using the same open process.

Day 3 for the students of English—Day 1 of TIC’s

I was originally supposed to teach computer classes to students in the regular track, those who want to be teachers of Portuguese, or Math, or Biology, those who do not want to be English teachers.  However, after some negotiation with the main TICs teacher and our pedagogical director, I was able to get the TICs class for my English students, who also need more training in using computers.  Last Tuesday (26 February), I observed the TICs Teacher Trainer conduct one of his classes.  I realized then that, while I may be able to teach basic computer use in Portuguese, it is not strong enough for me to be able to elaborate and expand on the concepts that the TICs teacher (who is Cuban, by the way) presented in his class. 

            

     So I was happy to get my English students, thinking, of course, that I would be able to use some English in TICs class, and how wonderful it would be that they could use English in a very hands-on way with computers, many of which were set in English, not Portuguese, anyway.  The head TICs teacher also gave me his powerpoint presentations, which, you might think, would make my job easier, and they did; however, the presentations are in Portuguese, and so for our first class of TICs I mainly spoke in Portuguese.  I found it difficult to switch to English, since the lesson/base (the powerpoint slides) I was following were in Portuguese.  The night before TICs class I went through all the slides, revised some of them, and made sure I understood what each one said.  Here was our agenda for that first day:

•      A apresentação da disciplina TIC´s e Pesquisa-acção.

•      Estructura Básica do PC.

•      Aplicaçaõ da TIC`s  no processo  de ensino aprendizagem.

• •      Uso de mouse pelo “Paint”

Following the head TICs teacher’s lessons, I get a little weary at rapid pacing of the class.  Next week we are supposed to start using the internet already!  I like to go in-depth; I don’t like to just breeze through topics.  In this initial class, it was probably okay to just briefly cover concepts, most of which the students will not really need.  Concepts like ROM and RAM, for example, will probably have less practical use for them.  So, I spent only about 25 minutes talking about what TICs is, and then the rest of class time (about 75 minutes) on actual use of the computer, practice using the mouse, using the “Paint” program.  I gave them specific instructions:  “Escolhe a ferramenta lapis” (Choose the pencil tool). “Escreva o seu nome com o lapis” (Write your name with the pencil).  “Da um click no circulo, e faça este circulo no documento” (Click on the circle, and make this circle on your document). 

Now, while a few of the students struggled with handling the mouse and maneuvering the pointer on the screen, many seemed to do okay.  They all could use more practice, definitely.  So I think we met the main objective of our first class.  I’m not so sure about the other, future classes, though.  In English classes, I get a better idea of how the students are doing based on the level of interaction and the quality of the language they produce.  In TICs class, there’s not a whole lot of interaction, and we can’t really produce (or print) their work because we don’t have the resources for that.  For next class, I will have students themselves explain and expand on the concepts presented, so that I can get them to be more active.

Also, I still need to decide on how much English to use.  I think the initial, lecture section of the class should be in Portuguese.  But I still think English would help. . . not just me, but the students, as well.  Admittedly, I lack the mastery of teaching TICs.  I told the students this up front.  In the beginning of class, I listed my degrees in literature and in teaching English (in an effort to assert my own status and authority).  I told them I’ve got training in teaching English, but not in teaching TICs.  But, I told them, I’ve been using computers for over 20 years, so I could help them develop skills in using computers.  Then when I proposed the idea of using English in TICs, I recall one low-level English student that did not seem enthused.  Granted, using English may detract from learning TICs, but the students are training to be English teachers, so I’d be foolish not to take advantage of this opportunity to have them wrestle with some English in TICs.  So my plan is to only use Portuguese during the lecture/powerpoint portion of the class, then English when they are actually using the computers so that they would be using English in a very hands-on, (digitally) concrete way, and then with individual students I can still use Portuguese if they are lost.  I’ll propose this again in the next class, and then take a poll or have them vote.

English Club on Sundays

Today we met for English club and went on a hike up the “church hill” (atop the hill at the back of our school compound there is an old ruined church).  Actually, yesterday we were supposed to meet to walk to town, but only four students showed up.  Apparently, most of the students had to do some work, some weeding, as punishment for I guess missing their curfew the night before?  Anyway, students expressed interest in going, so I decided to do a hike with them today and 17 students came.  With such a large group, I was surprised I still got to talk to all of them.  I asked each one what they like or don’t like about the city of Cuamba (many said they didn’t like it).  So that was mainly our conversation as we hiked up the hill, whose name escapes me, but I think the students said Mpocura Mountain?  It’s easier for me to remember things when they are written down.  All I remember from this talk about the “church hill” was me thinking that this mound is too small to be called “mountain.”  It normally takes 40 minutes to get up there, but it took us close to an hour.  We left the school around 8:40am and didn’t get back till 11:30am.

The students here are very respectful and formal.  When they are sitting around waiting for class and a “Formador” (teacher trainer) walks by, they all stand up to greet this teacher.  I wonder if they would keep this up throughout the year.  I kinda’ like it.  In the U.S., I had my share of disrespectful students (who might have even slashed my tires—there’s no way to know).  My students also seem very motivated, asking me lots of questions about grammar.  I intended English Club to be informal and fun, but I do like grammar and think it’s fun, so it’s great that they’re asking me questions (even if they’re still not formulating those questions properly). 

            

For now, it seems English Club is a great idea.  In Cape Verde very few students showed up for English Club—Cape Verdeans in Praia are just too busy doing their own thang.  Even though today was just our first day, it looks like English Club would be a success because the students live in the school compound and we are far from town without much to do on the weekends.