David_CO#3

I observed Mrs. Davis’s lesson for group 2C listening. I really enjoyed this lesson, because it was a perfect example of mixing culture with learning. The main subject of the class was Baseball. Not just the sport, but the different things that Americans say every day that are referenced from the sport, but not having to do with it. She started by building some schema on the subject. She explained what baseball was, and used the board to draw a picture of the diamond, and explained in a basic manner the rules and what the general idea was. She then talked a little about the classic phrases to “look out for.” Phrases like: “He struck out,” “He hit a home run,” “You are so far off, you are not even in the same ball park” and others like them. I should note that while all this is going on, there is a steady stream of student involvement. She is asking them questions, and keeping them involved so as to not become a teacher centered class. She them moved on to a sound clip of a woman explaining all the phases she had mentioned earlier, and a few more. She gave the students a handout that told them the key words to listen for, and then fill in the blanks. The blanks were for missing information that would be provided by the audio clip. She assured them that they would listen to the audio at least 4 times, so just to take it easy, and fill in what they easily heard, and then as it got played more and more, to start focusing on the stuff they were not hearing. After each audio, she would ask the students what they got, and would talk about it. What struck me about this class was the organization. From the surface, it seemed like she had not really planned a lot for this class, and was only doing one thing for the hour. This was true, but what also was true, is that there were a lot of things going on. Over ten new phrases to learn, along with a lot on comprehending, and when the class was over, the students had been given a wealth of information to work on outside of class, and use (and more importantly, understand) in the day to day.