Class: March 10th and March 14th

Welcome!

This week has been a long one. One of the reflections I have thought is that what went well and wrong will help me thinking on how to change and analyse how those activities will affect the students, how they will react and what types of responses I expect from them. 

I will start describing what activities I consider went well on Monday :

1. I liked how they were able to write a small paragraph about their partners. I was really happy when they started to use What is your name? Where are you from? How old are you? and How are you?. After this, they started writing it individually. I was helping them with those words they  have not learned yet, like Salvadorian. Though, they are still struggling with the use of complete sentence structures... They showed me the paragraph and I was really content. 
2. Students also liked the power point presentation. It was a different way to project the activities and the topic. Their faces expressions were full of joy and they focused in the slides and my explanation.
3. The Board Game: at the moment I started to give the die and the buttons, they had a big smile and they say they liked board games. Since the activity was to be played in teams, I just thought that girls were going to be one team and the three boys the other. They played and asked me questions about the cards (penalties) and they did as required. 

I will attach the lesson plan, so you can see the activities. 

Teacher’s name: Ingrid Tatiana Giron S.                                       Date:  Monday, March, 10^th, 2014     Module: 1

Unit:  2 “My Stuff   “             

                                                                                                              Lesson: 5    

OBJECTIVES:

-Students can use the possessive adjectives in sentences.

-Students can read the given texts and recognize the possessive adjectives.

-Students can use adjectives to describe their own objects and others.

Writing
Time	Stage	Procedure	Details
5-8”	Warm up	T will hand in a strip of paper which has a secret message in it. The alphabet appears with numbers, so students are going to decode and find the words and the topic of the lesson.	Aim of the activity: to encounter new vocabulary of the topic; and to know the topic of the lesson. Type of learner: V, T Interaction: T-S, S-S Materials: the worksheet of codes and the message hidden.
10”	Pre- (writing)	I will give students a text in a chart. They will be in groups of 3 sitting on their desk and they will help each other to develop this activity. Next, I will ask them to circle: ·          Country ·          Nationality ·          Age ·          Feeling Then, I will ask them to underline the subject pronouns that will appear in the same text.	Aim of the activity:  To get students encounter vocabulary and remember it. Type of learner: V, T Interaction: T-S, S-S Materials:   their notebooks, board, text.
10”	During (writing)	Students will be in pairs (three pairs and one trio). They use a chart like the following below to fill in the information the partner will respond.   For example: Name: Country: Age: Feelings right now:   ·       First, teacher will model how this activity will be done, so that they do not feel confused. Then, teacher will ask students to stand up and do the activity with their team. They have to use the appropriate questions to gather the information.  ·       “What is your name? Where are you from? How old are you? How are you? I am sad, hot, angry” ·       T will choose which students are going to ask first, the rest will only respond. Then, the other will ask to his/ her peer later. ·       T will monitor if they miss something that did not ask to her/his partner.	Aim of the activity: To use questions with “Be” to find the information from the partner. Type of learner: V,A, T Interaction: Ss-Ss Materials:  Chart in a piece of paper, pencil.
10”	After (writing)	Now, after all students have gathered the information they will go back to their desk and start writing on their notebooks about that person. They have to include as many elements as in the text on the board as possible. ·          Students will be monitored to see how much they have learned from lesson one. ·          To add something fun, students will read (just two students) what they have found. They will read that text using the adverb teacher says, e.g.: fast, angry, sad, thirsty, happy and so on.	Aim of the activity: To get students shared and read their text. Type of learner: V,A, K Interaction:  S-S Materials: The text used before as an example, their notebooks.

                                                                                      

Reading
Time	Stage	Procedure	Details
5”	Warm up	Students will be in trios. They will receive three conversations. T will ask them to stand up and they have to order the dialog at the same time. They will also have masking tape in short strips to use them and past the strips of conversations on the board. For example: Nice to meet you, too! How are you? Hello. I am Vecky. I am great. She is Leo. This dialog will be in strips of papers. The team that completes first the dialog will win!	Aim of the activity: to get them reviewed the last class’s vocabulary.  Type of learner: V,T, Interaction: S-S Materials: dialog will be in strips of papers, Masking tape
10”	Presentation	1. T will introduce the topic using a power point presentation, which will describe objects using adjectives. Eight adjectives will be presented with these objects. T will also emphasize the pronunciation of these adjectives. I will not present the words, so I can check if they know the content or not.  I will ask them how they describe the objects pointing at the objects in the presentation, only if they do not know what adjectives are correct for the objects, I will say and show them.	Aim of the activity: To get students encounter the topic and vocabulary. Type of learner: V,A Interaction: T-S, Materials: Power point presentation number 1 “Unit two, My stuff presentation”.
10”	Explanation	Students will see on a power point presentation people describing their own things with their picture. Also, I will highlight the words they have not been introduced in a text. For example, “but”, “and” and “thing”. ·   My name’s Raquel. My favorite thing is my mp3 player. It is small and black. It is old, but it is nice. My favorite music is on it. ·   My name’s Bryan and my sister’s name is Rosa. Our favorite thing is our laptop. It’s new and expensive, and it’s on my desk! ·   My name is Lupita and my brother’s name is Gustavo. His favorite thing is his skateboard. It is short and red. It is cheap, but it is cool! My skateboard is pink and long. ·   I am Rene. Mireya is my friend. Her cell phone is her favorite thing. It is big and black. It’s expensive. The adjective and the possessives words will be in a different color. I will use them to clarify any doubt from the presentation stage. Since I want them to read the four slides, I will read one line, and then they will read the other and so on until we finish the slides. 2. I want to ask them using the readings in the slides, some questions. For example: ·          Mireya’s cell phone is small and cheap. ·          Students will have to say the answer orally. They have to correct the sentence when we read each sentence. ·          There are five sentences after the readings.	Aim of the activity: To recognize adjectives and the possessives in the texts. Type of learner: V,A Interaction: T-S Materials: Power point presentation number 2 “Reading part, my stuff”
15”	Practice	1. “The Possessive Adjectives Game” Students will work in their desk. I will place the students not the same way they are accustomed, I will choose the skilled students with less skilled. Each pair of students, (one trio) will have the cards to place in one desk. They will put the cards face down on the desk, in rows and columns. They will decide who will be the first and the second (third) to play. They will take turns to pick up two cards, one at a time. If the cards are a pair, that student will keep them. For example: the boy- His Mp3 player is new. They will see the cards like that above. They have to read and get the message right, so it is a cognitive game as well, because it involves reading and understanding the message of the card. If the cards are not a pair, the other student has a turn. The player with the most pairs at the end of the game is the winner. 2. Students will use their notebook to write some of the sentences they remember from the game. They have to at least write 4 sentences. These sentences have to have the possessive adjectives. Students will read them and Teacher will write them on board. Then, one student will point where the possessive adjective is and the subject pronoun is. This will help students to again, recognize the possessive adjectives and internalize what they explain later.	Aim of the activity: To get students recognize and practice possessive adjectives. Type of learner: V, A Interaction: T-S, S-S Materials:  one card pack of playing cards for each pair of students.
15”	Production	“Board Game” I will put students in trios. They will be chosen at random and they will get the button pieces to participate in the game. I will be monitoring them and modeling some of the questions and activities the cards have in. Most of the activities are about grammar part, review of the first unit and the topic of today’s lesson. They will use a dice for trio to play in the board game. They will take turns, roll the dice and they will move the piece. If they fall in a box where they are asked to do something, they have to do it. If they fall in a special box, they will find three types of cards; these cards ask the student to resolve a special activity. If they are ask to do something like reading, they have to read the text aloud to his/ her partners from that special card.	Aim of the activity: To practice the reading and review topics from the current lesson and previous ones. Type of learner: V,A,T, Interaction:  S-S Materials: board game, dice, pieces of buttons, and special cards for the board game.
5”	Wrap up	I will walk around the students’ stuff, so that I can grab one object from them. For example, I grab a ruler. I will say: This is Raquel’s ruler. The ruler is…? They have to say something like: The ruler is cheap. Then, a cell phone: The cell phone is expensive/ old/ new…
Assignments and Announcements:   ·          Tuesday and Thursday Homework Assignments are going to be explained. Also, I will ask students about the Oral Exam due to this Friday and what things they have come up with so far.

Activities that went  well and bad on Friday:

Something that I liked is that the students paid attention to what I put on the power point presentation. It was dynamic, colorful and the content was just minimal. I just presented the exact number of senteces that they had to know. something that I did not liked from that moment was that I felt that I did not constructed the slides so that it was not confusing or too much for their level. 

My friend Mercy told me one way of doing it (the presentation and the sentences) and I agree, the content was sort of easy to handle but there was that gap between how I explained the topic and how they were going to react to such amount of information. I also noticed that two girls were doing something on their notebooks and I called their attention many times, but it did not worked out. They felt, from my point of view, that the topic was a bit confusing and for that reason they did not pay the enough attention to it. 

  

Something that I blame myself from is that I chose the wrong songs for this activity. The first song was too fast, even though I thought they were familiar with it. The problem also was that I assumed many things. Though, I also had expected these problems to come up. Since they are beginners in the target language, they needed a song that was appropriate for their level, such as a romantic song that had a normal rate of speed so that at the end they can cope with my expectations. I have to be very carefull and not let things slip this way. 

I believe they need more reinforcement on this topic. They showed a slow progress on using the possessives adjectives when I showed two pictures and they had to use his, her and an adjective to describe a person's object. Though, some of them were catching the idea of the uses and how to apply it on a sentence, but they need to see the same topic again so that it becomes a little bit clear. 

I also had the opportunity to evaluate them! This was my favorite part. I had just to hear and take notes on how they develop the task. I was happy because this group is young and they are sometimes shy when I ask them to participate, but that it is what I want them to get rid of. That feeling of not wanting to participate or not able to do it. Those feelings affect students and has a big impact of them. So, the first try out they were very enthusiastic (only three of them did the evaluation, the other two students did not come on Monday and did not bring the prompts) to do the presentation. The first one was nervous but happy to do it. They missed to say and use the complete sentence structure, but they are close to manage them. After the three students presented the last time, I gave them feedback on the points they did not do well and also I congratulate them for the great work and effort on the presentation. They showed me that they emerging in the target language. To tell you the truth, I knew that they were going to miss some parts but they remember how to use each part and how to say the information. 

This the Friday's lesson plan:

Teacher’s name: Ingrid Tatiana Giron S.                                  Date:  Friday, March, 14^th, 2014     Module: 1

Unit:  2 “My Stuff “                                                                            Lesson(s): 6     

Objectives:

-Students can recognize the possessive adjectives and possessive’s in sentences.

-Students can make sentences using the possessive adjectives.

-Students can complete a short lyric part using the possessive adjectives

Grammar
Time	Stage	Procedure	Details
5”	Warm up	I will paste the papers which have the adjectives and objects we saw last class. Then, I will divide the students into groups. After they are in groups, I will line them up in front of the board and give to the first students a fly swatter. Then, I will say a description of the image and the first student to swat the correct image wins a point for the team and they pass they swatter to the next students until we have winner team.	Aim of the activity: To review the previous topic. Type of learner: A, V Interaction: T-S, S-S Materials: fly swatter and the words in colored pages.
10”	Pre-teaching	I will use a power point presentation is this stage. Students will see nine slides, which contain the example for each possessive adjective. This examples are explained along with an image and the possessive adjectives are bolded and with another color. In the presentation, it will be a sentence with a subject pronoun and next to it, the possessive adjective example. This will enable students to identify each of them and at first to have an idea of the main topic. Students will also see two examples using the possessive in names. For example: “Marie’s school bag is expensive”.	Aim of the activity:  To get students the main idea of the topic in study. Type of learner: V,A, Interaction: T-S, S-S Materials:   power point presentation of the grammar point, projector, laptop.
15”	During	1. Students will see a power point presentation, which has lyrics of songs. These songs have some of the possessive adjectives that I want them to continue practicing. The lyric will have gaps to fill in. ·         I will play one time the song, without them to see the slide. ·         Next, I will allow them to see the slides along with the song. ·         After the song is over, I will ask them to come to the board and fill in the gap, and then if the answer is correct, I will praise the student. If not, I will ask someone else to come to the board to try again.  In the slides are only an extract of the whole lyric, so we can complete at least three lyrics. ·         When students complete the lyric, I will show the slides and will explain how the possessive adjective works in the sentence. 2. The next exercise will be in the same power point presentation. This text will have the possessives adjectives (in a different color) and the vocabulary we saw last Monday. They will only circle the possessives adjectives. Example: At the School! Hello. My name is Maria. I am eleven years old. I am American. My friend is Pablo. His pencils are short. His school bag is old and black. Hi!  I am Carla. My friends are Elena and Jose. Their MP3 player is big and new. Their computer is old, but it is nice. Our skateboard is fantastic! It is red and short.   3. Students will see two different images. These images will have just a hint for them to construct the sentence. First, I will ask everybody to do it at the same time (if I see that they are eager to do it at the same time). If not, I will ask a student to stand up and come to the board to complete the task using a marker.	Aim of the activity: To present the target topic in lyrics and other exercises. Type of learner: V,A,K Interaction: T-S, S-S Materials:  laptop, projector and a power point presentation, which has lyrics and the activities.
10”	After	1. T will give them the first grammar worksheets about the possessives adjectives/possessive. They will have about 5 to 7 minutes to complete it. I will monitor them as they are completing the exercises. 2. T will ask students one object of theirs. I will say: “Please, pay close attention to the objects your classmates are giving me”. Each of the objects is going to be in the desk. Then, I will say and grab one of the objects: “Xiomara’s ruler is cheap and red”. So, you are going to use the name of the owner of the object and an adjective. If they do not understand how it is I will use the board to write the sentence. After this, each of the students will come to the front and grab one object and say the sentence.	Aim of the activity: To practice individually by doing the exercises and using them in sentences orally. Type of learner: V, K Interaction: S-S Materials: 1 grammar worksheet, desk

 

As I said at the begining, this week's lesson planning has been so far the the most exhausting for me. There are many reasons, but I am not giving up. 

I am eager to see my students' progress throught out the ten weeks! 

Fighting!