I've been engaging my students in and out of the classroom consistently, even if it's as simple as a "Good Morning, _____!" when passing in the hallway. I'm amazed at how many of them are shocked that I know their names. Please, please, my professional colleague readers, learn your kids' names!
I haven't been planning much of the lessons on my own; my mentor teacher and I are collaborating on most classroom activity together. We attempted to pre-assess and enter into our study of China through self-selection of mini-research topics and some low-stakes public speaking. My mentor is a debate coach and public speaking enthusiast, and so he insists on speeches being involved in the course. Immediate issues with unscaffolded speeches and unscaffolded research as pre-assessment should be obvious: we have now spread many misconceptions. We asked plenty of probing questions in order to plant the seeds of critical analysis in their heads, and we'll be debunking the misconceptions as we go. It's good that we know these misconceptions exist, but perhaps we should not have let them spread so virally.
Our vocabulary studies have not gone quite as I would have liked. It's been more "teacher-as-deliverer" than "student-as-worker," and I think there is a lack of provided context for the words. This is proving to cause our ELL students (almost half of one class) significant difficulty. I have some thoughts on ways to fix this in the future, including an arts/crafts assignment that will create a bookmark with the vocab word roots on them. The kids will record words that derive from their roots in their bookmarks as they read, and share out. Also, points given for the use (and recognition of) word roots in their journal entries.
Soon we will be entering into our study of China as an entry point to imperialism in the Pacific Rim Region. Monday's lesson (if not more) is on me, and a week later the class will be turned over to me entirely. Exciting!
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