Title:

Afraid of being a JEC English teacher

Given names and surnames:

Elmer Eliseo Briceo Rodrguez

Job center:

Universidad Privada del Norte

Region:

Cajamarca

Submission date:

July 16th - 2017

E-mail:

acuario_8741@hotmail.com

Telephone Number:

958656096
 By way of introduction, I would like to mention my background as a

Cajamarquino English teacher; I studied at the National University of Cajamarca,

English and French major and after obtained my bachelors degree, I had the

opportunity to work in different educational institutions such as Language Center of

the National University of Cajamarca, in this place I enjoyed working with teens and

undergraduate male and female learners, teaching elementary and Intermediate level

of English, additionally at Universidad Privada del Norte teaching undergraduate

learners from different careers too and working learners, I mean professional learners

that were studying a second career, on top of that at The National University of

Cajamarca teaching general English course in Education, conversation and technical

English in Tourism and Nursing Faculty.

With this in mind, I used to prepare my lessons considering different aspects

such as motivation, necessity of learning English and job opportunities and including

technological tools, I mean internet, projector, speakers and so on. Furthermore all the

enthusiasm of the majority of my learners pushed me every day working in a

satisfactory way because they wanted to learn and practice English all the time.

One day, I felt something was wrong in my professional life and development

because I had no worked yet in any secondary school in my city, sometimes I felt

motivated and wished being a teacher in my secondary school however for fear of the

comments of some friends mentioned about teaching English in government schools I

did not take the government exam to work as a recruited teacher.

All happened in a familiar Marry Christmas dinner in 2015, when some relatives

visited my parents home and asked me if I was an English teacher in a public school, I
told to my cousins, I wanted to have that opportunity however I was afraid of that

experience because there were some colleagues who had unsatisfactory results.

After, dinner finished and my grandmother told me never give up your dreams

before try them, I looked her and said I have never worked, in a secondary school and

the comments are not good of public schools, She said that are experiences of other

not yours go ahead and take the challenges analyze the circumstances, elaborate your

opinions considering and evaluating your own coexistence.

With this in mind, I went to make my registration to take the government exam

to be a recruited teacher, days came and went after two months of my registration, I

took the exam and according to my obtained score, I could choose a Jornada Escolar

Completa (JEC) school, its name is Dos de Mayo.

The first day of Classes arrived, and the yard of the school was full of teens in red

jumpers and grey pants running, playing and laughing here and there some parents

shaking hands with the head master of the school. I was sitting next to one parent, he

asked me, are you a teacher? Yes, I said welcome he told me, I had experience working

in other places however I felt a bit nervous, imaging all the terrible things I have heard

about learners, bullying to new teachers, indiscipline etc.

The school doorbell rang and students make columns, there was a speech in

charge of the head master and a representative of the parents, when this event

finished I went to my classes on Monday, I had Laboratory classes with third grade. I

introduced myself in a serious way observing them and explaining the rules in the class

then I required them to ask some questions, they introduced themselves and we

started the class.

 I was in charge of 5 classrooms in third grade, I could found learners who were

no motivated, because they told me that they only wanted to study at SENATI and in

that place, English was not necessary, on the other hand there were other students

who wanted translation all the time, in other words problems started. I went home

and I talked to my grandmother again, she told me a good teacher is someone who

solve problems, if you consider yourself a good teacher solve your problems face your

challenges now. The next day, I went to face to face classes and learners were no

motivated and told that they were afraid of English and they could not express their

ideas in English.

For this reasons, I decided to elaborate my annual program including other

strategies I mean in terms of oral expression and show them that communication in

English is not a big monster. Added to that I looked for my old speakers that I used

when I was an undergraduate learner during my professional practices in order to

develop a way of motivation using English songs and I investigated about the

advantages of using music in your classes, I considered other aspect such as

collaborative learning involving work in groups and foster learners knowledge

according to our national and local context.

First, I decided to develop oral expression using some strategies including them

in my lesson and activities; I used social-affective strategies which involve learners

affective factors in social contexts, Nonverbal strategies applied while you are talking

using eye contact, gestures, or facial expressions to give hints and to help the listener

guess the intended meaning and Nonverbal strategies while listening which are related
to making use of nonverbal information, such as speakers eye contact, facial

expression, and gestures.

Second, I used to play songs of the favorite artists so in order to have knowledge

of their preferences, I elaborated a short survey related to music, using questions

about their favorite artists, their favorite song, their favorite type of music and what

was their favorite radio station; consequently, this strategy helped me to maintain

discipline because I explained leaners that at the end of a song they must be in a silent

way to start classes or it could be a time for relaxation using its lyrics . Many times we

sang Bruno Mars, Bob Marley and Ed Sheeran songs.

Third, I tried to connect all the content of lesson that JEC provide in our country

with our national context talking about our famous artists and writers, our tourist

places and our delicious food. I remember one day one we talked about a famous Chef

Carlos Camino, all the students reacted in a satisfactory way reading about them and

discovering that this Chef had dishes with names of our cities such as Nazca and Cusco.

On the other hand, there were some parents who visited me and said that this

year their sons felt comfortable learning English, they could notice this because

learners sometimes worked at home elaborating short dialogues in groups or looking

for information to talk about important and famous people in group saying to them,

my group has to be the best one tomorrow at English class.

Finally, I would like to say that being a JEC English teacher, was for me a great

and an unforgettable experience, I could obtain satisfaction in my classes observing my

learners communicating some things in English, enjoying their jokes and friendship,

however I could not finish all this year classes because I had some time inconvenient. I
needed time to end my masters degree and support it, for this reason; I would like to

come back next year and continue working with JEC students. I would like to invite

English teachers to evaluate our teaching role in public schools teaching learners that

learning English is an enjoyable adventure that help you to reinforce friendship and

break the monotonous way of teaching English with translation and boring attitudes.