Month: January 2021

by

Upper Intermediate Italian Lesson 2

I am on time, first to arrive again. 2 others are on time too and arrive soon after. Warm up chitchat is about Covid.

Io non sono un complottista – I am not a conspiracy theorist

Rendersi conto di – realise.

Our disappearing weaker student has arrived 5 mins late. “x’s iPad” no video like the rest of us. I hope she is ok. Silence when addressed by the teacher…

Talking about Covid for quite a while. Then link into review of congiuntivo. Se tu fossi Boris Johnson, cosa faresti?

Per evitare la diffusione del virus…

I am boiling! Don’t want to go away from the class/video but am wearing thermal vest and fluffy jumper and turns out the heating makes it warm in here in the evening! (By day when I work in here, heating is off, I am dressed for that, oops…) = environmental factors sure do influence ability to concentrate!  

… Finally I switched off video to go and put something more suitable on. Phew. Switching off video/audio to do something seems to be acceptable. Not something I have experience with from teaching point of view because we have classes of 18-21 students so they don’t have their video on a lot of the time (and could therefore nip away to do something quite easily!)

No way!!! We are going to repeat the fridge thing from last time! Can we just not…. Haiiya. Flogging a dead horse comes to mind…

At least this time I know not to reply for the “What is the nickname of your fridge?” bit!

Soppranome: Miele

5 aggietivi: Grande, alto, fresco, pulito, pieno

2 pensieri del frigorifero:

  • Mangi un sacco di verdure, no?
  • Perché tante foglie?

Here we go again <copy paste>. Wonder if the connection between tasks will be clearer,

Oh now it’s changed to 3 adjectives of physical description and 3 adjectives of character description. 

Era una notte nera e tempestuosa e Miele stava nella cucina che parlava con il forno.

Doing it differently this time, we have to send the line of the story to the teacher rather than to another student. Teacher sends the sentence to someone who adds a new sentence and sends it back. I think the nickname and adjectives was supposed to “get the creative juices flowing”.

Era una notte nera e tempestosa e Fede il frigo era irritato. “Smettila di fare uscire il freddo!”  Ma non c’era nessuno a cui parlare.

Era una notte nera e tempestosa e Miele stava nella cucina che parlava con il forno, chiedeva al forno “ma perche mi rubano sempre e danno il mio cibo a te” Ma perché lo chiedi a me? Che ne so Io? Non voglio nemmeno questo cibo né il calore che mi fanno entrare.

Era una notte nera e tempestosa e Fede il frigo era irritato. “Smettila di fare uscire il freddo!”  Ma non c’era nessuno con cui parlare. il cibo all’interno del frigo ha iniziato a ballare. “Lasciamo uscire, abbiamo freddo” cantavano insieme.

I have the course book now, so I can look through it while waiting after each time I send my line through, which is nice.

Era una notte nera e tempestosa e Miele stava nella cucina che parlava con il forno, chiedeva al forno “ma perche mi rubano sempre e danno il mio cibo a te”. “io sono il prescelto” ha detto forno, “rispettami!” il forno non sapeva che Miele aveva poteri speciali. il giorno successivo il forno non era più caldo, e il forno non rubò più il cibo… Il forno se n’è andò via ma poi tutto il cibo di Miele alla fine imputridii.

We end up with three stories this time. <I forgot to copy paste them all> We had to each take a turn to read one aloud and then say which one we liked best.

Oooo we get a break again tonight despite no tech issues, phewww. So break time is A Thing not just a response to tech issues, good to know. Very helpful in a 2hr class when you are staring at a screen after having stared at a screen all day!

<Break>

Silent student has gone (having not said anything up the point of leaving), student no3 has also gone, we are down to 2 again. Wonder if student 3 will arrive late again like last time or just not appear again?

p69

editori – publishing houses

sono pago’a di qualcosa… sono sodisfatto,a di qualcosa

una iattura – una sfortuna

ripiegare – fall back

Reading aloud a written text, sentence by sentence. Hard. No time to read it silently first and as soon as we have taken our turn to read aloud, we are quizzed on vocabulary. No time to process the text meaning. Then, trying to read while the other person reads aloud. This also interferes with actual understanding.

We then had to make up two comprehension questions for each other.

  • Cosa succederebbe se non ce n’era più  ci fosse più la stampa tradizionale, se ciascuno stampava stampasse il suo quotidiano da solo? (Dohhh, I missed that here I should have used the structure we did last week!)
  • Lo scrittore pensa sì or non che la stampa fatta a casa sarebbe una cosa positiva?

I am so tired and my eyes hurt (Cos work all day at the computer too). Makes it really hard to come up with words/phrases/sentences. Soooo tempted to do like the others and leave!

We had to argue a given point of view.

E’ meglio RIMANERE con il giornalismo perché COSI l’informazione c’è e dobbiamo solo trovarlo and leggerlo con criticità per sapere cosa succede nel mondo. Senza il giornalismo, sapremmo solo quello che i politici vogliono che sappiamo.

He asked the other student to respond to me but didn’t let me give my final line. I am too tired to argue. Bad student!

Ooo we had a small wrap-up this time – the teacher mentioned the stories we wrote in the repeat from last week activity…After starting a new activity, which we did orally, with 3 minutes of lesson time left. Whyyyy.  Neither of us students were thrilled about that.

What I learnt about being a student in this session:

  • It’s really hard to understand a text if you aren’t given time to read and process it quietly before being expected to do things with it. Oooo. I have an idea. I will read ahead in the course book. I don’t know which activities we will do or how we will do them but if I read any texts in advance then reading aloud will be less difficult.
  • seeking feedback is important. The language centre sent a feedback form this morning, so I mentioned that I find reading aloud without time to process silently first difficult and that I thought clearer lessons objectives (as in made clear to us) and opportunities for pair and groupwork would enhance the lessons. I also said the teacher is good at giving us feedback on what we say (didn’t want to only give “to improve” feedback!). It’s difficult to give feedback unless invited to do so. I will give my students a feedback form at the end of this week, I think!
  • If you are going to repeat an activity from a previous lesson, specially one which takes up a large amount of time (it took a good half an hour in the end!), have a really good justification for it and make that clear to the students. The activity didn’t work as planned last time, but we did it and had the freer practice it offered despite ending up one story down. It would have been nice to do some thing different this week.
  • Unconscious bias is a thing. Male teacher assumed male student had understood the activity last week and that it was me who had messed up. This came through clearly in the way the activity was explained this week. He’s a nice dude, I don’t for a moment think it was deliberate but it is interesting. I think as teachers we need to try and be self-aware in this and question our assumptions about things.
  • Fatigue is a thing. I know one of my students is doing school lessons by China day and our (the college) lessons by China night until 1-2a.m. (cos of the time difference) – she must be exhausted. This was one of the useful things I learnt during my tutorials with my students which took place last Friday. Learning on top of other commitments is difficult. Learning when tired is very difficult and frustrating. For the slot where I do one half of the class then the other, I will make sure she is in the first half.
  • Guidance regarding how to improve between lessons is helpful and students don’t know it for themselves without the teacher helping. For all we can search for websites, we have no way of knowing which are good or less good and are likely to miss good ones because searching is like that, it’s hit and miss. For autonomous learning to succeed, students need knowledge of resources as well as to know how to learn. I want something like the Experimenting with English handout I made for my learners in Sicily!
  • Don’t start a new activity 3 minutes before the lesson is due to end. Lesson plan timing going south is a thing but adapting to that is important. Being clear about what the key goal of the lesson is, and what activity(ies) need to be done in order for it to be achieved, is crucial as that informs choices about how long to spend on activities (both at the planning stage and in the lesson), what to skip if skipping is required etc. I’m not sure what the key goal of the lesson was. Perhaps using the congiuntivo imperfetto part 2? Not sure where the text fitted in with that – my comprehension question involved the structure but it was accidental and it was the only question that did. It was a 2hr lesson, ½ hr was spent chatting about covid (with some congiuntivo imperfetto worked in eventually), ½ hr (perhaps a bit more actually) spent on repeating the story, 10 minutes was break time. I think we had about 45 minutes on the reading text, approx. Which was reading aloud, sentence by sentence, vocabulary, “comprehension” questions and then the writing and then reading what we wrote activity about defending a given point of view relating to the text.
  • Italian coursebooks  (or at least this one) aren’t like English coursebooks. Rather than lead in/intro to a topic, texts, language work, oral/written production kind of flows, this one goes text, fill in grammar from memory, grammar focus, other random speaking and writing tasks and different texts. It’s confusing! And interesting! I read the introduction to the course book and apparently it assumes you have already used the previous coursebook where a given character does this and that and now the character is going to do the other. And it’s very much teaching culture too (hence the text at the start of each chapter), which it makes explicit in the introduction too. I’ve got the teacher book too. So that I can do the units I’ve missed (which I guess they did in the previous course) and have the answers. It may also shed some light on how the course book works, not had a chance to look yet!

I’m learning a lot from being a student again, it has to be said! A most excellent form of CPD! Hope this is of interest to some of you, apologies if not – it is a useful way for me to process the lessons and to store all my reflections and learnings!

by

Cambridge Assessment English – Resilience: Teaching in tough times webinar

Here is the link to this webinar. It was delivered by Pablo Toledo and Alberto Costa. The link has links to related handouts too. I recommend checking those out! I was alerted to the existence of this webinar by the ELTC TD team (of which I am no longer part as I stepped down at the end of last academic year!), thanks guys! While watching the webinar, I made the notes here below and also reflected on the webinar content (at the end of this post). Hope someone finds this interesting/useful!

What is your life like now? is the first question asked. There has been lots of change with Covid and the shift to online teaching and learning. There are many strategies teachers are using to adapt to our new reality and there have been lots of articles about this. One such article has a headline “Teachers reinvent themselves to teach online” Teachers mentioned improvisation, getting used to new tech, learning from the experience and drawing conclusions from it. During another webinar by CAE, they used a poll to survey the teachers about the platforms being used – Zoom, Google Hangouts, Microsoft Teams, other. Zoom was the majority choice by a big margin. In the current webinar, the speakers give us a different poll relating to the initial question, What is your life like now?

  1. in full lockdown, without teaching?
  2. teaching online from your institutional platform?
  3. teaching online using your own online tools (e.g. Skype, Zoom, Hangouts)
  4. a combination of 2 and 3 above?
  5. teaching face-to-face in an ordinary classoom?

For me, the answer is 2. We use Blackboard VLE including Collaborate for online lessons and Google Hangouts and chat for working with colleagues. In a previous delivery (the previous day) of the webinar, most of the participants selected 2, while in the current delivery 3 and 4 were more common. The fact that Covid and lockdowns just happened with no warning means that there was no time to prepare, which had an impact of stress and resilience.

What is resilience?

The speaker quotes Nelson Mandela “Do not judge me by my success, judge me by how many times I fell down and got back up again.” and defines resilience as the ability to be happy, successful etc. again after something difficult or bad has happened. Definition taken from Cambridge Advanced Learner’s Dictionary. The relevance to current times is clear. Psychologists define resilience as the process of adapting well in the face of adversity, trauma, tragedy or significant stress. It involves bouncing back and can also involve profound personal growth. This is according to the American Psychology Association. It is a good thing but feels messy. It doesn’t mean that you will not experience difficult or distress. If something difficult happens and you feel bad, that is normal, you are not doing anything wrong and it doesn’t mean you won’t recover. It is not a personality trait that only some people possess, it can be developed by anyone. It isn’t a fixed quantity, you can’t use up all your resilience. There is always more, you can always develop more. To do that we need to take into consideration what resilience is about and how to build it.

How to build resilience.

This is very important for teachers. It’s a difficult time both in the home sphere and the work sphere, and it is a difficult time for our students and for society at large. We have responsibility for ourselves personally and professionally but also for our students as we are leaders in their learning so we need to support them through this too. The seven Cs of resiliences are as follows:

C1 – Control

The most disempowering feeling we can have is that something bad is having and we can have no effect on it. We need to provide ourselves and students to feel a sense of control. Offer students choices, things that they can manage. Let them make some decisions. Also about realising that we can take an active role in our emotional health.

C2 – Competence

We have the skills to get through this. Teaching online happened, it is difficult and stressful but we have our competence and skills as teachers to bring to it, which will help us get through. We can help students identify how they are handling the challenges of the situation and what strengths they are bringing to it and this will help them too.

C3 – Coping

Managing. How do we manage the situation? When something difficult happens, we respond to it in different ways. Distraction for example – shifting attention away from something difficult on to something else. Withdrawal – I cannot deal with this today – and denial – No no not happening! These aren’t positive strategies but they are strategies. An example of a positive strategy is positive reframing. Good idea to talk to students about coping strategies, different options they could use.

C4 – Confidence

Feeling confident in yourself and your ability to manage the situation is important. We can praise students for overcoming obstacles and help them realise it isn’t luck but agency.

C5 – Connection

We are at home but not alone. We feel emotionally secure when we are connecting with other people. Staying in touch is very important. Developing that connection and empathy is important. The most important question to ask students in a class is “how are you? how are you feeling? how are you doing with your school work?”. Not an activity to do and move on. Spend time with it. The teacher-learner relationship is more important now than ever. Not a book/explanation/platform etc that is doing the teaching, it is the relationship between the teacher and the learner.

C6 – Character

Need to develop character. We have to strengthen our characters, our personalities. We should talk to students about their values, about who they are, their identity, what makes them who they are. The things that they believe in and which re important and strong for them.

C7 – Contribution

You have to acknowledge the contribution you are making for the situation. How can we help students with this? Talk about the ways in which they are contributing e.g. at home – making the bed, cleaning the house, staying in your room and trying not to make noise while your parents were working in the living room. These are all positive contributions.

Teacher resilience checklist

  • look after yourself
  • be true to yourself
  • be realistic
  • keep in touch
  • trust
  • focus on the essentials

If you are not ok, you cannot teach well. Look after your mental health, your body, work on your resilience. You are your key tool.

Be you. YOU can do this.

Don’t set crazy expectations. If you feel that it is too much, pull back. Don’t try to be normal. You almost certainly can’t do as much as before, don’t judge yourself by past metrics.

Connect, connect, connect.

Trust yourself, your colleagues, your learners, that things will get better. How do we know students are telling the truth? We just have to trust.

Focus on the basics. Don’t try and be fancy.

“Keep calm and carry on” was a WW2 poster but the message for resilience is “Keep calm and adapt” – nothing is normal/the same. We need to adapt.

Embracing change

When we are struggling with new platforms, resources, environment, we are doing our best to make learning effective. There is a lot of trial and reflection. Lots of new tools and terminology to deal with it, very different from before. We need a computer with a camera, a headset, stable internet connection and a platform for teaching live. But we also need staples like a whiteboard, pictures, puppets, realia. There is a vast array of online resources. Your students also need to get used to them. Think about context and learners:

  • What is the actual learning environment like?
  • How can I engage my students?
  • What can technology offer me?

Are you teaching synchronously or asynchronously? Both? How about the families? Are they ready to deal with the new reality? How much access to online resources do you and your learners have? How old are your students? How expert are they at using technology – their own and that which you provide? Students are at home and may be interrupted by other family members doing housework. playing, using band-width?

To engage students, you need empathy. See the situation through the other person’s eyes rather than your own. Withhold judgement and provide as much support as you can. Try to understand students’ feelings and communicate that to students. Allow for short breaks when you are teaching. Make sure things are clear. Clear instructions and task steps. Help students learn how to study in this way, to organise their learning etc. Where relevant, advise family on their role in this.

Technology offers variety and flexibility. Flexibility is very important. We can’t reproduce classroom teaching exactly, there have to be lots of adjustments. Tech offers creative language practice, opportunities to develop learner autonomy. You need to teach them how to be autonomous. What kind of resources can they make use of for this? Online dictionaries? Make sure you allow for self-assessment. Ask them how did you feel after completing this task? How did you like this handout, did it help you? What do you think about this way of using online dictionaries, did it help? Set up collaborative projects e.g. doing research together, short presentations, recording videos of it. You can also use a flipped classroom approach. Tech also allows for lots of professional development – learning how to teach remotely and make use of resources is a good opportunity for development.

Points of reference are helpful. E.g. https://thedigitalteacher.com One of things this portal allows is to do self-assessment of where you are at technologically and suggestions for moving from the level where you are now to the next level. There is also a review section which has reviews about different online views. Along with the reviews there also strategies for using the tools and short courses in using them. A good go-to place for developing digital skills.

Choosing digital tools for language learning

There are 3 things to consider when choosing online tools.

  1. user experience
  2. language learning
  3. technical information

It’s very important to establish clear criteria and we can use the above categories.

  1. Is the content presented clearly? Is it aesthetically pleasing? Is navigation easy?

2. What skills can learners practice through the resource? How much control do learners have over pace of learning. This goes back to learner autonomy and giving learners control. How helpful is the tool for teaching large classes? Can learners set their own learning goals? Are there self-assessment opportunities? Does it allow students to reflect on their completion of the task? Can teachers observe learners’ strengths and weaknesses? What opportunities are there for communication between learners? What collaborative opportunities are there? E.g. using breakout rooms in an online platform. Padlet and Flipgrid are other tools which enable this. What kind of communities can develop? What opportunities are there for developing intercultural skills (essential in today’s world). How can learners use language to build knowledge in school subjects? What critical thinking skills can learners develop?

3. What devices and internet connections are needed? Ones that require a lot of bandwidth can create difficulty. How will the product company use your data? What user support does the product company provide?

Cambridge Assessment English has put together “Supporting every teacher” which is a one-stop shop for many things such as webinars for teachers, activities for learners and lots of different things to help you and your students. Cambridge Assessment International Education also has a support pack that can help you keep abreast with this new reality. You can also find a playlist of all the webinars that have been delivered (there are 3 or 4 every week). CUP has World of Better Learning which has great blog posts from teachers, course book writers etc. You can also download a number of resources which help you extend your repertoire of ideas.

Recap

As we apply these principles and start teaching in new ways, there are 4 fundamental questions that we should take away and use:

  • What really matters? What are the key things that learners should take away?
  • How much structure does it need? There is a tendency to over-plan. Sometimes a very structured lesson is exactly what you need, sometimes you need to go in with a few questions and just let things happen.
  • Should I try new approaches today? You are using an LMS and video conferencing. Don’t try to do everything new all at once, innovate step by step.
  • What I have learned so far? Keep being reflective, reflection is very important now. Talk to your class, talk to colleagues, keep a journal.

Today’s takeaways

This is new, this isn’t normal, but we are still teachers and we are still teaching students, who are people first and students second. So, do what you know. Make use of your pedagogical skills. You can do this. Good enough is good enough. What you are doing right now is making a difference – so celebrate instead of feeling guilty.

“I can be changed by what happens to me but I refuse to be reduced by it.” – Maya Angelou

My reflections:

I actually found this webinar to be a bit disjointed (BUT got a lot out of it never the less!). The blurb focused on resilience so I was surprised by the switch to the focus on technological tools. I had thought the tools it referred to in the blurb (“the tools that can help us make sense of tough times”) would relate to resilience.

Nevertheless, my favourite part of the webinar was the bit about the seven C’s and how to help our students with them. The timing of when I watched that part (I couldn’t watch the recording in one sitting as time didn’t allow) meant it influenced the shape of my tutorials with my new group of students this morning and I think in a beneficial way. It has also helped me think of ideas for asynchronous content to include in my Class Noticeboard padlet. Firstly, a column for “getting to know you” in which so far I will add a new question each week for students to respond to, so that the group continues to get to know each other in the background of the lessons. (My context is EAP and the duration of the lessons and course in combination with the assessment demands means that there is limited space for personalisation as speaking activities tend to be focused on topics that require research and evidence to support ideas etc.) Secondly, a Wellbeing column, to share links about maintaining mental health and wellbeing generally and in trying times. I am hoping by making it a part of the Noticeboard, and therefore students’ daily life, it will emphasise the importance of it and normalise talking about it and asking for help when things are difficult.

Otherwise, it is always helpful to hear the need to look after oneself be reiterated. It is the foundation of everything else but it is so easy to either let it slip or feel guilty for doing it! And while the bit on technological tools was nothing new to me, it still has given me food for thought.

by

Upper Intermediate Italian Lesson 1

I have just started doing a ten-week upper intermediate online course in Italian. My first lesson was on Monday evening. Here are my notes and reflections from that evening. It is fun being a language learner again!

—

I am so nervous!! Now I know how my students this morning felt, but luckily for me I am not trying to get to university off the back of this course! There are supposed to be 5 of us students.  I arrived first so asked about this.

We started with icebreakery chit chat, which turned into an impromptu teaching using the whiteboard about ci as a pronoun, based on something someone said that needed correcting. Spent a lot of time on this. Is this the objective for today’s class? Pronouns?

We eventually end up with 4 students.

Se avessi più tempo libero, che cosa facessi? (last bit of discussion, this structure turned out to somewhat be the topic)

Ma gli obiettivi…cosa sono?

The dicussion is all through the teacher, asking us questions one by one.

The teacher (Italiano) speaks in English! Haiyaaa! I want to hear ITALIAN!!!

Il tempo è limitato.

Half an hour.

Then, we move on to grammar – indication that the lesson proper is beginning now. Review? I am the only newbie to this course, the rest did the previous level…

Ohhh the topic of our chat was for the topic of a listening in the coursebook!

….which we didn’t listen to.

We had to read aloud the rubric… and bits of task (not sure why).

The COURSEBOOK has English in too. Upper Intermediate. Whyyyyy. Or does it? Perhaps the grammar info comes from a grammar book that has English in it. I’ll find out when I have the coursebook (told to wait til after the first lesson to purchase it – this was in the pre-course bumpf so a general rule)!

T isn’t nominating, confused whether to reply or not!

I eventually chip in. Sometimes I am right to, sometimes not.

Congiuntivo imperfetto

There’s even a powerpoint now, it just didn’t involve objectives. I guess so far the objective is to talk about hypothetical situations, unreal if-clauses.

Grammar activity joys

Fill in the table, t asks us each in turn for the answers but no time to do the activity first. Doing it lockstep item by item.

I am sleeeepy.

We then had to say aloud in turn what was in the table already for the irregular verb Essere not pictured above.

Then some sentence completions but again not doing it ourselves first.

I got If I could eat anything for dinner,  I would… and I said I already ate dinner, sorry teacher.

One of the students seemed much weaker than everyone else but had done previous course so was in this one.

p.68

I was to have a photo of the book but he talkin about it and I don’t have it yet ayyyy tech. Apparently it has a fumetto. Not sure what one of them is. A cartoon? Would help if I could see the page!

BREAK TIME!! Poor teacher called it to get some time to fix the tech issue!

We haven’t used breakout rooms yet, all communication goes via the teacher, no direct communication between students. When asked to define things I circomlocuted in Italiano to explain then got asked for English definition haha

Tech worked after break, I now have a picture, well, it is being shared on screen, though not entirely clear round the edges. Fumetto is indeed a cartoon.

Write a couple of sentences about how the world would be if run by kids. Had to ask to see the book page again, hah.

Se la societa fosse governate da bambini e ragazzi, cambierebbero molte cose. Per esempio, l’ambiente sarebbe prioritizzato quando delle legge nuovo fossero creato. Ma anche il cibo alla scuola sarebbe meglio.

Avrebbe  la precedenza (yay, language upgrade!)

I thought upper intermediates would be better at speaking and answering questions, communicating, based on my experience of teaching upper ints!

Non peggiorerebbe

Se il frigo potesse parlare

If fridges could talk…

2 ss have now disappeared, me and 1 other left.  One of those who have disappeared is the weakest one.

“Writing competition” about the fridges

We have to write a story about a fridge, about OUR fridge.

Un soprannome.  I made a mistake, didn’t know we had to keep info til later and spoke out of turn with my nickname, oops.

Soppranome: Miele

5 aggietivi: Grande, alto, fresco, pulito, pieno

2 pensieri del frigorifero:

  • Mangi un sacco di verdure, no?
  • Perché tante foglie?

Then suddenly he said if you prefer write it in English first. NO!!

(Edit: we never came back to this, which also contributed to confusion in the next stage…we didn’t do the “writing competition” that we had to read aloud through a sentence each in turn…oh wait we did the chain story was it…)

He then said dieci sentences and it confused me. I want him to speak all in Italian so I could have my  brain fully in Italian mode rather than be constantly switching.

“Era una notte buia e tempestosa, quando…” ‘ opening line.

Chain story using private chat, nice activity actually. Write a sentence and “pass it on” using direct message option to the designated “person sitting next to you”.

One of the missing students returned (not the weakest one). Teacher asked her to do the activity by herself because we had already started.

Difficulties: Private chat and everyone chat go in the same box, just labelled differently. Total communication breakdown.

Turns out I had understood the task but boy oh boy were we all confused. Including a phase of I thought I had misunderstood the task following the second explanation and so on and so forth. Poor teacher, he got quite flustered. I wanted to say, it’s ok, things going thoroughly tits up from time to time is a thing, don’t worry. Maybe try having written instructions for the activity next time, it might help.

We ended up with two stories instead of 3. Definitely without 10 sentences apiece.

Era una notte buia e tempestosa, quando uno strano rumore mi svegliò, come un rumore di rane. “Che cos’è?” mi chiedevo con il cuore che batteva velocissimi. Avevo tanto paura…

Era una notte buia e tempestosa, quando il mio frigo dice ad alta voce “Non sono trattato bene”. La sedia gli risponde: “ Cosa vuoi? Anch’io vedi sono vecchia e fragile e il padrone è pesante come una montagna” Giusto ma io devo contenere tutto il cibo e ce n’è un sacco.

My remaining active classmate had still not understood the activity. In fairness, I mainly had because of having done similar activities as a teacher before! The late-returning student was asked to judge which story was better.

Lesson then ended, very abruptly, no homework set, no wrapping up. Still no group work/talking directly to other students.

What I learnt from being a student again:

  • Lesson objectives are really helpful.
  • Understanding the purpose of an activity is helpful.
  • Clear linking between stages is helpful.
  • Being consistent in use of target language is helpful.
  • Being given time to complete an activity before feedback is helpful.
  • Clear instructions, which online means with visual support, are helpful.
  • Absence of the above can be a mixture of confusing and frustrating, not helpful.
  • Reading aloud for the sake of reading aloud is not helpful.
  • Every last bit of communication going through the teacher is tedious (hoping this will change!).
  • Ending abruptly is a bit confusing and disconcerting, not helpful.
  • Language upgrades are welcome!

The good news is, I kept up easily enough, phew (I thought I was being ambitious taking upper int as I consider myself more an intermediate really. 9 more lessons to go. I guess if each course is only 9 lessons and you go up a level after each course, it might not be enough for people to really change level. Not sure how their levelling/course progression works, ‘spose I will find out at some point! Anyway, Now that I know what the lessons are like, what to expect, I can set about making the most of it in terms of what I learn (Italian AND what it’s like being a student – what works and doesn’t so much)! For a start, I need to up my game in the note-taking department, so they they are useful rather than a stream of consciousness!