Video+Critique+Assessment+MEGE

 I filmed the French 2 lesson on Tuesday, November 15th. They just started a new unit (Childhood/Imperfect) the day before. Tuesday was a review of the imperfect and vocabulary they learned the day before and also included new vocabulary and an oral activity so they could practice speaking in the imperfect. I expected the students to be able to understand how the imperfect is translated by the end of the second day. Students were not aware of my expectation. To improve that, I could inform them at the beginning of class what their goal is and use that as a password out the door.

 We started off with a warm up in which students had to converse with a partner. I then asked them to remind me what verb tense we learned the day before. Many of them answered either the imperfect or past tense. Most of the class already had a firm grasp on the imperfect conjugations and translations from what they learned on that Monday.

 The oral activity was a formative assessment. While circulating the room, I listened in on their conversations and would look at their written answers. They were supposed to write in complete sentences stating their partner’s answer using il/elle. This requires them to use a different conjugation of the imperfect. A few students were conjugating the il/elle forms with the “je/tu” endings. I would point out to the verb and the subject and would ask them what needs to be fixed. Every student understood what they did wrong and would fix their mistake. This assessment helped me evaluate whether or not the students understood the learning objective: the proper usage of the imperfect. There were a good chunk of terms that I falsely assumed they had learned before, so some time was spent helping them understand the sentences. This was the second section of French 2 that I taught that day, so I made note of the problem words first hour had and wrote them on the board for third hour to see.

 Procedures for the oral activity were given verbally. I should have written instructions on the board or on the activity itself so that it was reinforced. This activity was effective because it asked questions that students had an emotional tie to because it dealt with things they did in the past. Due to the fact that it used real life examples, students should be able to retain the information more efficiently and feel more involved in the conversation.

 I used a PowerPoint in my lesson that reviewed the imperfect and vocabulary. It was similar to Monday’s presentation, except this time students had to verbally conjugate the verbs. I realize that the PowerPoint was too long and should have been broken up into smaller chunks. If I were to do it differently, students would work on their oral activity during the “breaks” from the PowerPoint. This would give them more of an opportunity to communicate in French instead of just repeating after me. I would have them ask their partner the first few questions after we went over it as a class. This would ensure that everyone understands the vocabulary in the question. The Smart Board never seems to want to work, so we had a slight technological problem. We were prepared and turned it on ahead of time, but it has a mind of its own and automatically shuts off. In the time it took to reboot, I reviewed the imperfect on the white board. On the student survey, a lot of students said that the PowerPoint helped them learn the imperfect, so it proved to be effective. However, I would still break it into smaller portions as to not overwhelm or bore the students.

 There are a lot of things I would like to change about the layout of Mrs. Palmer’s classroom that I believe would enhance the learning environment. I would implement a seating chart and rearrange the desks so that the students are all facing the same direction. This would prevent me from having my back turned to half the class and it would also make it so that students would not have to move every time the Smart Board is being used. When I first started teaching in that classroom, I felt a little overwhelmed by the layout. I did begin to get used to it the more I was in front of the class, but I could not help but constantly think of how it needs to be fixed.

 Due to the fact that there is no seating chart, students sit by their friends and chat during the hour. I know that proper classroom management is one thing I really need to improve on and I strongly believe that having a seating chart is the first step. If there were still problems after the seating chart, the students would need verbal warnings. They do not have to be verbally disciplined in front of the class, instead I could go up to them individually and ask them to stop being disruptive.

 Mrs. Palmer is a very nice person but I do not agree with anything she does in her classroom. You could say that we have a good rapport as people but not as educators. On the other side, I really enjoyed working with her students. Her French 1 group in fourth hour was easily my favorite group to work and joke around with. They had great class chemistry and the students were hard working. They would joke around but they always completed their tasks and understood what they were learning.

 Watching this video helped me notice some annoying habits I have as well. One that really stood out to me is how I am constantly playing with a marker and swinging my hands around. I know that I tend to do that in any situation; I always want something to be in my hands. In the future, I will try to tone it down a little or at least put the marker or clicky pen down. I also need to start using a word other than “bien” when speaking. I don’t know if the students even notice how often I say it, but I noticed it right away in the video and would like to change that. dt