Reflections Day 1
Today was the first day of the English For Journalists class. Everyone participated well and asked interesting questions. I had anticipated that there would be many new words related to learning and teaching, but there were also words like “handout” which, although they had had many of these in previous classes, they did not know. I learned that I can never assume that I know what my students know, or don’t know. This is why I use inquiry as a primary teaching method – to find out what people already know as well as what they do not know. Then I can better tailor my teaching to their needs.
- Ani
- Ani
Reflections Day 2
The big word for today was “grammaring” which is a relatively new word in the field of second language acquisition. Not everyone knows what it means or uses it. But it is an important concept. It refers to the ability to use grammar to communicate what you want to say meaningfully, appropriately, and accurately. The truth is that many people can talk a lot without being able to use the grammatical structures of a language well. They trust that the person listening to them will be able to “figure out” what they mean and, sometimes they can. For example, when my taxi driver in Rwanda said, “me pick up 5 pm” I knew he meant that he would pick me up a 5. But doesn’t it sound much better to say “I’ll pick you up at 5?” The taxi driver can speak, but he can’t “grammar” well. Yes, “grammar” is now a verb when used in this sense. So now, as a teacher, I can say to a student who grammars well something like: "Wow, you just grammared that sentence very well.”
This is an interesting feature of English - we can use nouns as verbs without much difficulty: I sat in a chair and chaired the meeting. We we sitting around a table when we decided to table the discussion for later. The head of the college headed the ceremony and then he headed off to have dinner with a friend. (Here, the verb “to head” has two different meanings!)
One fun thing we did was to see how many words we could derive from the word “create”. We came up with “creative”, “creatively”, “creativity”, “creator”, “recreate”, “creation”, “uncreative”. Someone brought up “recreation” and someone else “creature”. I said that I thought they probably came from the same root in Latin so I looked them up after class. Indeed, “recreation” does come from the Latin word “recreare” which, in turn, comes from “creare” (create). And “creature” als comes from the Latin word “creare” and means “something created”. I think I am going to try to find a new word for us to play with in this way in every class.
I think people are still a little shocked at how differently I teach from what they are used to, but they appear to be very open and willing to try new things. This will guarantee their success in their professional lives whatever they do. As long as we are willing to learn new things, we will always keep getting better at whatever it is we choose to do.
- Ani
This is an interesting feature of English - we can use nouns as verbs without much difficulty: I sat in a chair and chaired the meeting. We we sitting around a table when we decided to table the discussion for later. The head of the college headed the ceremony and then he headed off to have dinner with a friend. (Here, the verb “to head” has two different meanings!)
One fun thing we did was to see how many words we could derive from the word “create”. We came up with “creative”, “creatively”, “creativity”, “creator”, “recreate”, “creation”, “uncreative”. Someone brought up “recreation” and someone else “creature”. I said that I thought they probably came from the same root in Latin so I looked them up after class. Indeed, “recreation” does come from the Latin word “recreare” which, in turn, comes from “creare” (create). And “creature” als comes from the Latin word “creare” and means “something created”. I think I am going to try to find a new word for us to play with in this way in every class.
I think people are still a little shocked at how differently I teach from what they are used to, but they appear to be very open and willing to try new things. This will guarantee their success in their professional lives whatever they do. As long as we are willing to learn new things, we will always keep getting better at whatever it is we choose to do.
- Ani
Reflections Day 3
So far, different students have come to each class. Today five people who attended on Wednesday were not there, and a few who missed Wednesday came instead. There seems to be a core of “regulars” with others coming and going with less regularity. I am not sure what the implications of this will be for completing various projects, but it seems to be characteristic of a class comprised of working professionals whose jobs sometimes prevent them from finishing work in time to get to class. I am hoping that the website will help people stay up-to-date on what has happened in classes which they miss.
Writing personal statements is unusual in the context of a traditional Tajik classroom, I think. I gave out a sample of my personal learning goal statement for Tajik, but I won’t know whether seeing a model has improved everyone’s understanding of a personal learning statement until I see what they write over the weekend. I feel like I have just put a new cake in the oven, made with what I hope are the right ingredients, and am now waiting to see what pops out on Monday. Will a fully baked cake appear, or will it still be soft in the middle, or perhaps it will still be gooey? Only time will tell.
Discussing the nuts and bolts of any course is never particularly interesting or entertaining. But if it isn’t done, then misunderstandings arise later, or expectations are not met on the part of both students and teachers.
Many words needed to be introduced and explained in order to have some of the conversations that we are having because in their previous textbook-based class, conversations about how students learn and how teachers teach were not done, so they don’t have the vocabulary already on board for participating in them now. For example, I couldn’t talk about a cumulative evaluation without explaining “cumulative" and its sister word “accumulation”. Time and time again, I opened my mouth to say something and realized, in that moment, that I needed to somehow first explain the word that I was about to use. I think perhaps my tutoring lessons in Tajik have helped make me more aware of how much of what I say is going to be uninterpretable. I can understand so little Tajik, I know what it is like when my tutor uses words that I don’t know.
My greatest hope for the website is that it will give students opportunities to read how the experiences that they have are perceived and described by a native speaker. That is, they won’t be reading something about someone else, as is the case in most textbooks. Instead they will be reading about things that they have experienced themselves. I would like to see if, and if so how, this affects their acquisition of English over time.
- Ani
Writing personal statements is unusual in the context of a traditional Tajik classroom, I think. I gave out a sample of my personal learning goal statement for Tajik, but I won’t know whether seeing a model has improved everyone’s understanding of a personal learning statement until I see what they write over the weekend. I feel like I have just put a new cake in the oven, made with what I hope are the right ingredients, and am now waiting to see what pops out on Monday. Will a fully baked cake appear, or will it still be soft in the middle, or perhaps it will still be gooey? Only time will tell.
Discussing the nuts and bolts of any course is never particularly interesting or entertaining. But if it isn’t done, then misunderstandings arise later, or expectations are not met on the part of both students and teachers.
Many words needed to be introduced and explained in order to have some of the conversations that we are having because in their previous textbook-based class, conversations about how students learn and how teachers teach were not done, so they don’t have the vocabulary already on board for participating in them now. For example, I couldn’t talk about a cumulative evaluation without explaining “cumulative" and its sister word “accumulation”. Time and time again, I opened my mouth to say something and realized, in that moment, that I needed to somehow first explain the word that I was about to use. I think perhaps my tutoring lessons in Tajik have helped make me more aware of how much of what I say is going to be uninterpretable. I can understand so little Tajik, I know what it is like when my tutor uses words that I don’t know.
My greatest hope for the website is that it will give students opportunities to read how the experiences that they have are perceived and described by a native speaker. That is, they won’t be reading something about someone else, as is the case in most textbooks. Instead they will be reading about things that they have experienced themselves. I would like to see if, and if so how, this affects their acquisition of English over time.
- Ani
Reflections Day 4
The idea of writing a new draft without looking at a previous one was new to everyone. Some fear that they will just keep writing the same thing in the same way. I am hoping that they will discover for themselves that if you write something, put it aside, and then write it again from a different vantage, different ideas begin to flow and later drafts are usually better than earlier ones. Writing can be a developmental process, one where you discover ideas from trying to write down your thoughts. It does not have to be simply putting down thoughts that you already have on paper. Writing can actually create new perspectives about things that you know in one way but which can be seen in other ways.
- Ani
- Ani
The lesson started by distributing the sentences to the participants where they need to put them in order to have a complete paragraph. Personally, I really liked this activity because the attendees worked collaboratively and discussed it in detail. The instructor asked some questions and simultaneously explained why a sentence is appropriate in that place. She pointed out that they needed to pay a close attention to some key words, like next, another reason because doing this, they can easily put the supporting ideas in order.
I have learnt that the first sentence in a paragraph shows the purpose and main ideas of the whole paragraph as well as the reason of why we are writing. After writing the topic sentence, we need to support it with details. I have also understood that there should be a strong logical connection between all sentences. One way of making our writing more coherent is using transition words. The concluding sentence can be a kind of restating the main points of the paragraph using paraphrasing.
Another subtopic of that implemented topic was the introduction to differentiated instruction. In order to understand it better, some handouts were delivered for reviewing. The instructor asked those journalists who had written their first draft to sit together and to share their written paragraphs. Those who have missed the class on Friday, they were asked to write their paragraphs during the class. In order to make the activity more interactive, she asked them to look at the questions and discuss their writings.
What I really enjoyed about the class was that every learner had done independent learning, and everyone was engaged in completing different tasks. After providing individual feedback, she switched to the group of journalists who have written their paragraphs. I think although the activity was challenging and hard to manage, she could do it.
The instructors have also talked about the organization of the paragraph and mentioned some of the ways what attracts the reader’s attention most. She also told the participants how to easily put the details. The instructor pointed out that they will be assessed based on delivering their assignments. As part of the lesson, a word game was conducted where the word interpret was widely discussed. By the help of the instructor and other journalists a lot of words were written on the board which I think is a great way of expanding vocabulary bank.
- Bakhtiyor
I have learnt that the first sentence in a paragraph shows the purpose and main ideas of the whole paragraph as well as the reason of why we are writing. After writing the topic sentence, we need to support it with details. I have also understood that there should be a strong logical connection between all sentences. One way of making our writing more coherent is using transition words. The concluding sentence can be a kind of restating the main points of the paragraph using paraphrasing.
Another subtopic of that implemented topic was the introduction to differentiated instruction. In order to understand it better, some handouts were delivered for reviewing. The instructor asked those journalists who had written their first draft to sit together and to share their written paragraphs. Those who have missed the class on Friday, they were asked to write their paragraphs during the class. In order to make the activity more interactive, she asked them to look at the questions and discuss their writings.
What I really enjoyed about the class was that every learner had done independent learning, and everyone was engaged in completing different tasks. After providing individual feedback, she switched to the group of journalists who have written their paragraphs. I think although the activity was challenging and hard to manage, she could do it.
The instructors have also talked about the organization of the paragraph and mentioned some of the ways what attracts the reader’s attention most. She also told the participants how to easily put the details. The instructor pointed out that they will be assessed based on delivering their assignments. As part of the lesson, a word game was conducted where the word interpret was widely discussed. By the help of the instructor and other journalists a lot of words were written on the board which I think is a great way of expanding vocabulary bank.
- Bakhtiyor
Reflections Day 5
The challenge for everyone seems to be how to juggle work and navigate in a classroom environment where they are expected to actively be generating language to be used as the basis for study. While the idea of improving one’s English skills is appealing to everyone, taking the time to produce material upon which learning can be based is an unusual expectation in this educational environment which is predominantly teacher-centered with teachers providing language and telling students what to do with it. My co-teacher remarked “you need to change the educational system in Tajikistan” and while I would never presume to change the way an entire country educates its people, I do feel it is my job to offer an approach to education that addresses the actual needs of a particular group of students, in this case working professionals who want to improve their ability to contribute professionally in the global media community and interact with their peers in a manner appropriate to their profession.