Teaching Observations and Classroom Observations
Teacher Observation #1
Spanish 1 High School Class
During my observation of a teacher teaching a 90 minute Spanish 1 class in a high school, I was able to become more aware of the importance of not only speaking the target language in the class, but also provide several communicative activities for the students to perform to increase the students’ motivation. I say all of the above, because the teacher that I observed did not speak in the target language and did not provide any opportunities for the students to interact with each other using the target language. In fact the only time the teacher used the target language was when the class was being very disruptive and in order to get the students’ attention the teacher said, “silencio.” The teacher was very affective in obtaining the class’s attention when he spoke in the target language, however; once he got the students’ attention he reverted back immediately to using the native language of the students
In addition to not speaking the target language, the teacher, I felt, discouraged children to even attempt to use the target language. The teacher would always interrupt the students that where using the target language and correct their mistakes immediately without using other strategies that allow the students to try to correct their errors. Therefore the students were afraid, especially with high school students, to use the target language in class in fear of being wrong in front of other peers and friends.
Not only was the teacher creating a stressful environment, but also there was no purpose to what the students were learning, The teacher introduced the regular verbs in the present tense by saying “Ok class today we are going to be learning how to conjugate verbs in Spanish.” First of all there was no theme and secondly the teacher did not use any activities to activate background knowledge. The students immediately had tuned the teacher out and began doing other things such as talking to their friends or doing work from another class. From that point on the teacher was having difficulty trying to teach the class about regular verbs in the present tense. Once the teacher realized that the students were not paying attention he became very frustrated and told the class that they were gong to have a pop quiz on the material he just went over. The students not only became very upset, but also frustrated and blamed the teacher for not understanding the material. I believe that if the teacher had planned a little better and introduced the verbs in a more creative way, most of the students would of stayed focused and interested.
I strongly believe that this Spanish 1 class is uninteresting and non-motivating for the students because their teacher does not take into consideration the interests of the students nor does he use the target language in class. In addition he does not do anything to control his students’ behavior, therefore; the students that want to pay attention and listen are unable to do so.
Observation of a beginning language class
The class I observed took place within a first grade class with the teacher placing emphasis on the students saying their name and the colors in Spanish. The students and the teacher did not interact with one another in a typical “real conversation” manner. The teacher said his name out loud, but in a gentle way. He repeated several times the phrase “my name is” in the target language. Then, he asked some students to say what their name was in Spanish. Most of the students answered correctly. The teacher gave the students immediate praise for doing this particular exercise by saying “Muy bien” and “Excelente”.
The students did not ask the teacher a lot of questions due to the fact that the teacher always modeled what he wanted his students to say. I found this to be very interesting, because the teacher spent about 95 percent of the class using the target language (Spanish). I learned from the teacher that the class had been working on the same topic and instructions for almost three weeks. Due to this aspect, the students were already familiar with most of the commands given to them by the teacher.
When the teacher started to work on the topic of colors, he did not seem to give the students enough time to correct their own errors when responding to the teacher’s question. For example, when he held up a certain color and asked a child what color he was holding and the child did not respond correctly, he immediately asked another student to answer the question. The teacher did not allow much time for the students’ self-correction.
One aspect that particularly called my attention was the inappropriate use of the word “naranja” as direct translation for the color word “orange”. In my opinion, the teacher used inappropriately the word “naranja” (the fruit) instead of using “anaranjado” (the actual color). Perhaps, he decided to choose “naranja” as the color “orange”, because he believes that this word is easier for the students to pronounce at this level than the actual color word “anaranjado”.
I think that, overall, the teacher had a lot of positive aspects. He created a non-stressful environment for the children by playing several activities that they were interested in, such as having to run and stand by the color he said out loud. Also, the teacher used a lot of gestures to help the students remember what he was saying, instead of using the students’ native language. The students had no problems understanding that the teacher was talking about “blue” or “red”, due to the gestures he performed when saying the words out loud. The students also used the same gestures, used by the teacher, when answering a question about a specific color. It was a really nice experience to be able to see most of the children enjoying themselves while learning a second
Child Observation
The novice (child) and the expert (caregiver) started to talk about characters on the children’s television program “Sesame Street”. The caregiver initiates a conversation with the expert by pointing at the television and says, “Elephant”. The novice does not ask any questions to the expert about the characters. The only thing the novice does, is to state the animals or colors of the characters out loud while continuing to point at the television. The novice seems to seek reassurance from the expert in order to be sure that the objects and colors she is saying are indeed correct.
The caregiver becomes involved in the conversation by asking the novice a question regarding the color of the elephant. The expert does not immediately correct the novice when she states a wrong color. The expert, on the other hand, gives the novice two choices to pick from. For example, the expert told the novice that her shirt was red and that the television was gray. Then, the expert asked the novice which object, the shirt or the television, was the same color as the elephant.
The expert was really good about giving praise to the novice when she responded correctly. The expert was very patient and waited until the novice responded. Each time that the child responded incorrectly, the caregiver would still be encouraging and not quick to give the correct answer immediately; however; the novice, on the other hand, appeared frustrated when she did not answer correctly. The novice started to change the topic and argue with the expert. The novice would tell the expert that the program was not fun to watch. During this situation, the expert became impatient since she wanted to continue asking the novice questions about the characters and their colors. I believe the expert could have accommodated the novice by asking the novice to participate in a different activity, but still continue to work on animals and colors.
There was one mistake that I noticed the novice made. The novice said the wrong word order when describing the color of an object. For example, the novice said to the expert, “elephant gray” instead of “gray elephant”. The caregiver does not really focus her attention on the word order used by the child, and therefore the expert fails to correct the novice. The caregiver is more interested in seeing if the child is able to pick the right color of the characters and objects on the television program.
I found this experience to be very interesting. I was able to question and watch carefully how a child and a caregiver communicate and interact with each other. During my observation, I learned that this particular caregiver placed more emphasis on the child saying the correct color rather than focusing the attention on the child’s usage of correct order of nouns and adjectives.