This class was the one in which I added more vocabulary than any other time. Either because students asked for meaning of new words or for flascard/topic content, there were many new words. In order not to give students the Spanish translation, I would give them synonyms, examples or explanations. In some cases, I would mention a synonym that was more similar to a Spanish equivalent (meaning an English word that was adopted from Latin, or romance languages). Example: Advertisement - Publicity (from French - publicité) Ad. So, it's important to take advantage of the influence English has received from lexicon we are familiar with.
I tried out a new way of making students participate, going line by line. I would ask only one line of students to come up with "wh" questions related to the picture they were seeing, giving them cues like "place", "object", "subject", etc.
The grammar explanation was not so simple, as I had to explain when to use the list of questions I wrote on the board, but fortunately there were no inconveniences, and they got the idea. There was improvement on my grade, and that motivates me to keep it up, although I know it won't be easy. In fact, I know it's very likely that it decreases from time to time. However, maybe you should consider my life philosophy of "It will pass", it works like a charm for me, it never fails (just kidding). I have taken some of your advice into account, so thank you all! I'm eager to hear everybody's anecdotes next wednesday.
I like that you try to find ways to make students understand the meaning of the words. That gives them more opportunities to practice and learn more vocabulary. I am sure your teacher is giving you great pieces of advice on how to manage the class and activities you can use for the different structures.
ResponderEliminarAgain, grammar is not easy, but you ara able to do it!
woww.. so glad to hear that you have done great class by class. I agree on what you said that grammar is not easy to be taught, but we can succeed..very nice the different ways on how you explained the meaning of new words, and I think that is easy for you beause you have lots of vocabulary.
ResponderEliminarcongrats then because you are improving day after day!!!!!!!!
That is great Jonathan. I did the same as you because i used the flashcards in the warm-up and it was okay. Another thing i really like is that you gave students more vocabulary and students enjoy knowing new words. the only and simple problem is that they are lazy and they do not like to use a dictionary and find new words, or to investigate new words on internet.
ResponderEliminarI enjoyed reading your anecdote!... thanks for sharing your philosophy of "it will pass", it really got me thinking, and you´re so right.
ResponderEliminarIt is so nice the way you teach vocabulary because you know a lot of it! That´s a great advantage you have. Congratulations Jonathan it seems you are doing awesome :)