ENGLISH PEDAGOGY

STUDENT TEACHING PRACTICE

OBSERVATION STAGE

Task 1: The School and Learning Environment

Name of student: Pablo Ponce Santibañez

Name of School: Colegio Adventista de Valparaíso.

Number of students: 8º grade (40), 7º grade (43) and 5º grade (43)

Date: 11/08/10 and 17/08/10 Class:8º, 7º and 5º

Briefly describe the following aspects:

1. The school:

Describe the general background of the school including the physical

location, organisation, student population, philosophy and educational
and behavioural policies.

Colegio Adventista of Valparaiso is located in Las Camelias 301, Barrio

O’higgins. It is a school with support of the Goverment. In terms of infrastrucure
it is a small school, there are only 8 grades, which go from 1º grade of primary
school to 8º grade of primary school. It is a 3-floor building with 4 rooms in each
one, and there is a court. The staff working there consists on around 20 people
(among teachers and assistans). Students Population is about 300 students.
Colegio Adventista’s philosophy is to be recognized as a educative entity which
provide to its students a solid moral and intelectual education. Counting with
suitable staff which is engaged with spiritual education in order to guide kids in
a noble spirite of service, and guiding them to face successfully the life
challenges.

2. The classroom

Describe the atmosphere of the room and the levels of engagement in the
room. Make notes on seating, sight lines, space, air, light, whiteboard,
equipment, etc.
We are provided with a wide room, big windows, thus enough light, whiteboard,
tv set, dvd, and we can even request the data show and notebooks to use them
in the lessons. Students make a good use of the walls, by sticking schedules,
maps, calendar, quotes and some extra information.

3. The activities & resources

a) Make notes on the kind of activities used, the nature of student

involvement, balance of student doing things and teacher doing
things.
 The teacher bases his lessons basically on the book Travelers. He leads the
class talking aloud most of the time, and encouraging them to follow ther
activities. 8º and 7º grade are similar in terms of behavour, they constantly need
to be scolded to pay attention, their concentration is weak, even in dinamic
activities as listening. However, The teacher can manage to keep students
working.

b) Describe the resources used and the materials available within the
school. How are the resources used in the classroom?
The teacher is provided by a dvd, in which he play the audio of the book.
Also He uses the data show activities and presentation in Power point to
teach the contents in a more dinamic way. Students appreciate those
stimulous, avoiding keep stuck in a conventional lesson of just writing down.

Task 2: Student´s learning

In this second observation task, you should focus on the things that help
to create conditions for effective learning and on the aspects that play a
part in preventing learning.

1. The learners
How motivated are the learners? Why? To what extent are they taking
part in their own learning? To what extent are they expecting the teacher
to do the work for them?
Most of learner of 13 age average suffer a kind of crisis in terms of
motivation, they lose their cocnentration easily and the need permaneent
motivation. If we can not encourage them, either giving feedback and
going to their seat to offer help, their attitude toward learning disappears.
I have to say that students’ own demand is low, maybe they underrate
some subjects, and in the case of English it is noticeable. But of course,
there are almost 10 students who contribute and participate significantly
in the class.

2. Behaviour during classroom activities

Describe the ways students are encouraged to participate in activities.
Are there any particular strategies for managing issues and motivating
students? Are there any students with special needs?
Unfortunalety the motivation centres on the mark, so if the activity is
evaluated students make and extra effort, but otherwise they often
interrupt their process on working. When the teacher is explaining some
topic, I realized that students pay more attention if the issues are close to
their reality, their likes. (sports, music, clothes, etc). Finally, there are not
students with special needs, just typical kids needed of constant
motivation.

3. Discuss the learning styles and levels of English in the classroom.

 The teacher talks most of the time in english, but in some cases he has to
adapt himself and talk in spanish to give instruction for example. Few
students dare to talk in english aloud, as in 7º as in 8º grade. The level in
English in the classroom is not high, they could improve, of course if they
want to be taught and participate actively in this process of learning.

Note: If you want to clarify what it is requested in this task, read “Steps to
Writing an Observation Paper” by Nick Pell.

IVV/RGS
2010
TEAM TEACHING STAGE

Name of student: Pablo Ponce Santibañez.

Name of School: Colegio Adventista de Valparaiso.

Date: 11/08/10 and 17/08/10

Task Nº1: Collaboration activities

For the following questions describe as accurately as you can how you
have collaborated in school assigned:

1. What kind of activity did you perform the first time you were asked
for help? How long did it take?
In 7º grade I brought some handout related to the grammar topic
(superlatives). A I explained the activity which was evaluated with an
acumulative mark, and students work in pair for 30 minutes doing that. In 8º
and 5º grade, basically the same, even in 5º grade I improvised an activity
with candies. I sent out some students individually, I hid the candies in
different places of the classroom, then students were allowed to get in, and I
gave them the instruction in English using the preposition of place. So they
had to understand it and find the candies. That activity worked quiet well,
and the most important is that student learned.

2. What were the students doing before you started helping out?

Listenig to the teacher, or just hanging around. But anyway, they were so
kind and respectful.

3. How did the students react? Describe the atmosphere of the room
and the levels of engagement in the room.

They reacted kindly as I said before, in all the classes students offered to
help me to give the handouts to the rest of their classmates. Although I have
to say that students had tendecy to talk more which is the typical reaction
when they work with a young new teacher.

4. What other assignments were asked you to do? How often?

Assigment related to explain the activities to each students, but anyway it
was a voluntary assigment to help the teacher to lead the class.

5. Were you asked to prepare any kind of special audio visual material
learning material for the students? Were they used? How effective
were they? No, I was not in this stage, because it just lasted 1 week.
Since the second week I started to lead the lesson myself, and then I had
to prepare new material, handouts with grammar activities, and activities
in the Computer Lab where students were asked to design a power point
 presentation about their favourite sportspeople. I showed them my own
power point in order to guiding in the activity.

Task 2: Lesson Planning

Answer the following questions and explain how you planned the learning
activities for your students. Be as precise as you can.

1. How did you get the information for planning the lessons for your
students?
I requested to the guide teacher.

2. Did your guide teacher give you any suggestions for planning?
Yes, but basically how to organize the structure of the class, and the factor
of timing.

3. How long did it take to you to prepare learning material for your first
lesson?
1 hour, because I was trying to design an eye-catching material, not only
word thrown on the paper.

IVV/RGS
2010