David_Tillotson_CO#1

For my first class room observation, I sat in on Mrs. Candace Walters 9:00am grammar class for level 2 students. The reason I chose this class in particular was because of the time. As a student I knew how hard it was for our teachers to get us to talk in the morning, and I wanted to see how this was accomplished. The first thing I noticed was how the students seemed to like her more as a friend then as a teacher. It was a light atmosphere, and the students were free in talking to her about things like movies they saw and plans they had. This energy carried over into the class. The class started with Mrs. Walters writing a list of beautiful mistakes on the board. These mistakes were made in the last class, and she had the students add them to a list she was making them keep, and then correct them. She went over each one in turn to make sure they understood them. As we moved into the body of the class, she split the class in to three groups, and had them play a beard game that incorporated the grammar point which they were covering today. In this case, the points were various prepositions. As each student worked on the game, she walked around to each group in turn, and answered questions, and addressed issues they were having. After the game, she went over each aspect of the game, and had the students explain it. She also asked questions to the students to make sure that they understood the grammar, not just reading what they saw in the text book.  After this, she gave handouts that would help the students with what they covered, and gave the agenda for the upcoming class. Here are some of the bullet points I took away from class. You can be a coach to your students and still keep them in order.  Find creative ways to use American idioms and explain them. One student answering is better than five. All things considered a very impressive teaching style.