Melissa N. White CO#3: Speaking

Date: Monday January 11th, 1-1:50pm
Teacher: Candace Warmka
Topic/Skill: Speaking for lower level ESL students
Classroom Management: Candace was warm and inviting, she made sure she was calling on people who spoke little but was not demanding or intimidating. Her classroom was smaller than the others I had observed and seemed more intimate because of it. She kept students on task by walking around and engaging them as they did partner work. She promoted respect of the other students and made sure to pair people up with others they may not have met yet to keep them challenged.
Materials used: Computer, google for images to help them make sense of new words, classroom textbook, white board, a small plushy ball she would throw around the class to get people talking/moving.
Student Participation: Students were happy to be involved and took to their new partners with no problem, they only spoke English with one another and would be polite and attentive when anyone spoke.
Feedback provided: Professor Warmka would write new vocabulary used on the board and allow the students time to develop their own sentences with that word in more than one tense. Their homework assignment from the last class was the draw a map of their home city to bring with them as a conversation topic, during their presentations of it she would ask questions that encouraged their use of new words and organic responses. Professor Warmka would take the opportunity of overhearing a "beautiful mistake" to bring it to light and talk correct it.
Lessons I learned: Since this was a foundational class Professor Warmka spoke clearly and with patience, she also took the opportunity to focus on grammar if a student made a mistake while speaking, she would ask questions like "who feels confident" when requesting volunteers to share their work (this I felt was smart because it gives the students incentive and let's them shine a bit), she was very interested in the maps they drew of their home towns and made it clear that their history/family/experience in their country is valuable information to her and the class.