Tuesday 22 September 2009

Teacher's Decisions: What about the options we do not opt for?

In this report, following an excellent observation task provided by Jim Scrivener in his book Learning Teaching, I tried to analyse several actions taken by the teacher I observed both in terms of the decision taken and the other available options that, for some reason, the teacher did not choose.
I found it really interesting to start thinking about the decisions we take and the reasons why we go for a certain option and not another. Managing and organising a classroom is such a challenging task that the best way of approaching it is by means of starting to reflect upon the decisions we take and if they were the most appropriate ones at that moment in that context. It is important, of course, to ask ourselves why we choose a certain option; but, what is even more intriguing is to reflect upon the reasons why we did not opt for te other available options.

Thanks to a very enabling teacher trainer I realised that, in this report, I sounded a bit too judgemental. I would like to let you know that I never meant to write as if I were "crying over spilt milk". I just followed the task and it seems that I sound far too critical. That was never my intention. With regard to the conclusion, I must admit that I did not even think of including one. I thought there was no need for one. But now that I thought about it, it would have been a great idea to include one so as to explain what my intentions were when writing the report. I am in no position to judge any teacher and I never wanted to do so. I guess that when trying to show what my beliefs are, I unwillingly did so by means of comparing them with the teacher's development of the lesson. I am really aware of the fact that every classroom, and within that classroom, each of the lessons is a whole world and it is by no means a valid proof of what actually happens in this classroom.

5th Report / Alejandra de Antoni / Classroom Observation / Methods 2 2009

2 comments:

  1. Hi once again, Alez!

    The best thing about considering options available is that it helps us remember we always have alternatives in class, right? And the more aware we are of our choices, the better decisions we can make, I believe!

    I wonder why, when discussing student's participation in the lesson why you say the teacher's choice fostered T-st interaction, while you also say sts kept talking to their closer partner(s). Wouldn't that mean st-st interaction actually took place all along?

    Looking forward to reading more from you soon,
    Gladys

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hi Gladys!
    That was the most valuable outcome of this report, I think: becoming aware of the fact that there are always other options available apart from the ones we choose!
    As regards st-st interaction, I thought there wasn't any because students talk to each other without listening to the ones that were talking (to the whole class) and simply because they did so in Spanish. They weren't using the target language and, therefore, I thought it was not st-st interaction.
    Please do let me know if I'm wrong! (:
    Hugs,
    Ale

    ReplyDelete