Today we had our second orientation at teh Centro Regional de Invocación y Formación 'Las Acacias.' It started at 3:30 p.m., so we got to get out of school an hour early in order to have enough time to get lunch and make it there on time! We ended up having lunch at a little cafeteria across the street from the Centro. The director of the Auxiliares de Conversación Program and the assistant director were having lunch at the same place, so we knew we made a good choice!!! : )
The orientation was really informative. We had two sessions; the first was about online resources and the second was about oral presentations. During the first presentation, a teacher passed along a list of great websites for teaching English as a second language:
- SMART exchange
- www.topmarks.co.uk
- www.eslpartyland.com
- One Stop English
He also suggested "The Annoying Orange" YouTube videos as a reward for good behavior. The internet is great and there are a lot of wonderful resources out there, but there are so many that it takes a lot of time to sift through the garbage websites to find the gems. So it was really helpful that they gave us a list of sites they have already found to be useful.
The second presentation was about oral presentations, an idea that is still very new in Spain. The presentation was wonderful and incredibly inspiring! I walked out of class thinking, Oral presentations are exactly what my kids need to do! It makes complete sense. Oral presentations involve all four of the destrezas comunitivas: listening, speaking, reading, and writing. She showed us an example of an oral presentation that she did with third graders about "My Favorite Book" and it was great. First, the students begin by answering some simple questions such as, Title, Author, Has it got pictures or photos? Is it a short or long story? working up to more difficult things such as a description of the characters and plot. She showed us the outline for the project and the various steps and stressed the importance of providing the students with a framework for on-going work. She also revealed a little secret to insure that the audience is paying attention--have the listeners complete a table with information about the presentations, such as the presenter's name, characters in the book, the type of book (fiction/non-fiction), and then grade the performance. It makes complete sense and hopefully would help the students be good audience members, something that is hard for young Spaniards to do.
When Rosa finished the presentation about oral presentations, she shared some of the material that she had prepared for the first orientation sessions in September, but had run out of time to share! She gave us ideas about routines (taking attendance, the weather, and the calendar), ways to get their attention, and also lots of ways to use flashcards to learn vocabulary. You could tell just by sitting in on her presentation that she is an amazing teacher. I was so intrigued and inspired by all of her ideas! When she was finished, I stuck around and asked her if she had any recommendations to get students to do their homework. I explained that in our third grade class of 25 students, at times 12 weren't doing their homework. She suggested merits for good behavior. She said one day, bring in candy for the students who have done their homework. If students haven't done their homework, they don't get candy. The next day, if they ask for candy, you say sorry, not today; life is a surprise and you always have to be ready. She also suggested perhaps the class can work toward some reward when everyone does their homework--such as a sincere round of applause or maybe an Annoying Orange YouTube video. She also said she has a Merit Board in her classroom where children earn stickers for doing their homework and for good behavior.
After tonight, I am excited to return to school with lots of new ideas and activities! And I hope that someday I can be as good of a teacher as Rosa.
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