By Jeff Puccini
In “The Observational Practicum: A Stepping-Stone to Praxis in TESOL,” Ayaka Ihara describes her practicum experience as an MA student at San Francisco State and makes a case to “practice seeing teaching before intensively doing teaching.” One of her main arguments is that people new to teaching often feel a lot of anxiety about getting in front of a group of students. I agree that this fear can be a big hurdle for many who consider trying to teach. However, I wonder if observation is the most effective way to deal with it. One of the distinguishing features of the most respected TESOL Certificate Courses in the world (CELTA and SIT, for instance) is that participants have a chance to do real practice teaching and get feedback from skilled trainers. I believe that part of what Ihara is arguing against in her article is the fact that student teachers can feel like they are being thrown to the wolves by being expected to “teach” without proper scaffolding. This sink or swim approach may be what alienates many rookie teachers. In addition, it can be unfair to paying students who get substandard lessons. What is the relationship between observation and practice? How can practice teaching be scaffolded in ways that set participants up for success? On the SIT TESOL Course in Berkeley we have scaffolded the practice teaching process in a way that I believe does set participants up for success. There are five distinctive features of how we scaffold the process. The Teaching Game First, we begin with the 10-minuteTeaching Game. I understand that some SIT courses have abandoned this activity, but there are several reasons why we have kept it. Primarily, it helps Ps (participants) encounter and wrestle with the idea of student learning objectives. For instance, Ss (students) can follow the student teacher’s fifteen step instructions for folding an origami crane, but have they “learned” it? Can they do it on their own without following the teacher? By the same token, the Teaching Game impresses upon Ps the fact that they cannot just talk for the entire time. Meeting Students for the First Time From the Teaching Game, the next step is the initial meeting with the real ESL students, and this has been a real innovation. Our ESL students come for two-hours, and trainers take control of the logistics on this first night. In the first hour, Ps sit and survey Ss (Ex. How long have you been studying English? What are your hobbies? I.e. needs analysis). This one-on-one interaction is important because Ps are immediately introduced to the idea of considering Ss as individuals, as opposed to the classroom as a “monolithic entity,” which is how new teachers often first experience Ss. Also, Ps get a feel for what the Ss can say/understand (i.e. some diagnostic assessment). Working with Small Groups of Students: Bag of Questions After interviewing the ESL Ss, Ps are responsible for facilitating a Bag of Questions activity (see link for instructions and examples). During this time, Ps work in small groups with 2—4 ESL students, facilitating conversations. Trainers monitor and control the time. One highlight for me as the trainer with this activity is that after the first round, we ask the Ss to stay in their groups and pull the Ps out in the hallway for a quick debrief. We ask them to share how they set up the turn taking (Ex. did Ss pull the questions out of the bag, did you read the question aloud, etc.). Then we tell them to experiment. For instance, if they were the one reading the question, for the next round, get the Ss to read the question. The point being that there isn’t necessarily one “right” way to facilitate this activity, and we want Ps to experience some of the ways different approaches can help/hinder. In addition, Ps engage with factors that can affect communication (Ex. modeling, arrangement, structure of interaction, teacher talk, freedom/control). The main objective is to get the Ss speaking, and Ps are always (to some degree) successful. In short, this first meeting with the ESL students is always an energetic, positive, and fun introduction. Furthermore, by sleight of hand, we have given the Ps their first experience of “practicing teaching” with real students for an hour, in a safe, controlled environment. Communicative Task “lesson” The third step Ps take in practice teaching is to facilitate a 20-minute communicative task, for instance Two Truths and a Lie, 20 Questions, etc. (see sample list of Communicative tasks). During this practice teaching, each of the Ps run their communicative task for either the upper or lower level ESL Ss. The main things for Ps to focus on with this step include setting up pair/group work, thinking about arrangement, giving clear instructions, grading language, handling materials, and providing a motivating communicative task that gets Ss talking. Obviously, with all practice teaching, feedback afterwards is a crucial component for identifying and synthesizing key learnings. In sum, communicative tasks are a foundational part of both productive and receptive lessons. If Ps can work on these skills first, they can later on have more bandwidth for thinking about language-focused activities, receptive tasks, etc. The issue of cognitive overload is a key one for teachers who are thrust into teaching a 50-minute language lesson right away. Through this scaffolding of practice teaching on our course, we aim to reduce that load while providing deliberate, focused practice on essential skills for student-centered teaching. The First Full Lesson The fourth step requires Ps to teach a 50-minute speaking lesson, with a focus on vocabulary. However, the anchor of this lesson is the communicative task, which by now they are well acquainted with, having facilitated one of their own in the previous PT, as well as having observed their peers do the same. In addition, we strongly suggest that Ps begin their speaking lessons with an activity that requires some initial burst of fluency from the Ss, which can also be considered a sort of mini-communicative task. Thus, Ps are familiar with what Ss need to be doing at the beginning and the end of their lesson, so the challenge is limited to planning for 20 or 30 minutes of encountering/clarifying some target vocabulary and an opportunity (or two) to practice with it. In addition, Ps are now starting to think about the form, meaning, and use of language while practicing the classroom management skills that they have already started to develop through the earlier communicative task “lessons.” The Remaining Lessons The remaining steps in the process are to teach a listening PDP, grammar (twice), reading PDP, and the final lesson is Ps choice. Teaching grammar is often a big hurdle for Ps, so doing it later in the course makes sense. Also, PDP (Pre, During, Post) seems to be a more intuitive framework for Ps to grasp and implement, so it works well to introduce it after vocabulary and before grammar. Conclusion We know that observation is crucial to learning. “Human brains are wired to learn by observing others. The brain shows similar patterns of activation when people observe others as when acting themselves” (Schwartz, Tsang, and Blair). On the other hand, research from the science of learning has emphasized the importance of practice. Anders Ericsson writes, “the basic blueprint for getting better in any pursuit: get as close to deliberate practice as you can…” and this “involves building on or modifying previously acquired skills by focusing on particular aspects of those skills and working to improve them.” So what is the ideal balance between observation and practice? Is there a place, or an argument, for more observations on the SIT courses? What conditions make lesson observation meaningful? What do you do on your courses to scaffold practice teaching? References Ericsson, Anders and Robert Pool. Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016. Ihara, Ayaka. The Observational Practicum: A Stepping-Stone to Praxis in TESOL. The CATESOL Journal 29.2. 2017. Schwartz, Daniel L., Jessica M. Tsang, and Kristen P. Blair. The ABCs of How We Learn: 26 Scientifically Proven Approaches, How They Work, and When to Use Them. New York, NY: W.W. Norton &, 2016.
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