Mayuchan's Blog

My micro teaching

2007-07-09T14:51:00.000+09:00

Last class, I tried to do micro teaching with my partner, Taichi. We taught interrogative of 進行形, "What ~ doing?". It' s for seventh grades. We taught it on 2 stages.
First is doing demonstration with using pictures. After that, we practiced pronunciation. But we had a mistake. We forgot explaining the structure! It' s a big mistake.
Second is playing gesture game. I think it is very interesting game for students. Though it took too much time to explain the game, everyone enjoyed it!

○Strength Point

・Pictures are easy to understand
⇒We used our pictures, so the students feel interesting
・The game is a lot of fun
・Every student could speak target sentence in the game
・Practice pronunciation is enough
・For seventh grades, the class is easy to accept

○Weakness Point
・We didn' t teach its structure
⇒We only thought out enjoying the class, not structure
・It took much time to explain how to play the game
・We didn' t support the students well
⇒Both of us didn' t help the students who couldn' t understand
・Lack of practice
⇒Students would do better to write
・We didn' t confirm that the students could understand
・We were not good to distribute time

Through this micro teaching, I learned that teaching English is very difficult. We need more consideration for students who are poor at English, and think about not only enjoyment but also practical English.
What do you think about our micro teaching? Please give me many advices.

How to be a successful English teacher at Jr. High School

2007-06-26T15:53:00.000+09:00

Last class, I saw a great English teacher. I was very impressed by his words. He said, "Teacher's work is changing students! ". It' s very interesting idea and I think it is more important thing for education. He talked a lot of things about junior high school. I think junior high shcool is most difficult to teach. They have various worries and are awkward age, so we should treat them carefully.
I learned how to be a successful English teacher in his lecture. It is important to understand the students and teaching materials. We can' t teach something without understanding them well. It will makes more wonderful class.
Understanding and using materials are also important. Teaching way affects student' s English skills. If we teach English with interesting, the students would like English. We should think out how to teach it to students.
I think teacher is very interesting job. I need to do more experience to be a teacher. I hove to study about education more, and I want to increase people who like English!

Teaching Vocabulary

2007-05-23T16:27:00.000+09:00

Today we learned about two approaches for teaching vocabulary: the present and learn and the Learning through Input Approach. You can see a PowerPoint presentation of the approaches here. I would like to tell you about the strengths and weaknesses of each approach as well as the approach I would use as a Junior High School English teacher.

The Present and Lean Approach
◇Strength point
・we can understand the goal → easy to learn for students and go smoothly
・we can know what should we do
◇Weakness point
・some students who already learned don't join the class
・it's one pattern, so some students feel boring

The leaning through Input Approach
◇Strength point
・very interesting for students → listening carefully
・easy to memorize naturally
・we can communicate both students and teacher
◇Weakness point
・some students can't keep up this lesson way
・easy to get confused

My opinion
I learned Spanish through Input Approach in last class. It was very interesting for me, and I could memorize naturally. I enjoyed learning it. I think the Approach is very useful in junior high school. Students will be able to get English vocabularies with enjoyment. It is important to enjoy learning in teaching and all student can join the class.

2007-05-15T14:49:00.000+09:00

Today, I am going to review two of the "typical Japanese junior high school"communicative activities presented in ETM 3. The activities I am going to revieware Find someone who... and Using movement. You can view them here.

About 3
I think Find someone who is difficult to find applicable person. So, we have to think of junior high school student' s plan in summer vacation. For example,

Find someone who...
1. wants to visit grandparent' s house
2. wants to go to the sea
3. wants to stay home

These questions are easy to answer, and this activity will　smoothly.

About 7
When we did this activity, I heard this answer before I answerd. I think Half the class is so many. So, my idea is...

We prepare some cards which are written some words of gesture. Half the class of students choose one card, andpretend following the card.

Make pair, and students think out their gestures.

I think students will enjoy playing the English game.

My family

2007-05-04T01:42:00.000+09:00

I saw all members of my family after a long separation. My brothers came home together. I have two brothers, one lives in Morioka and the other lives in Tokyo. We had a good time and talked many things.
I live in Hanamaki with parents and grandmother. My parents are nice husband and wife. They go out somewhere every weekend. I want to be like them in the future. My grandmother needs taking care, so we help her. She sometimes doesn' t understand what I am, but she is always kind to me. My first brother is hairdresser. He seldom comes home because he is very busy for his work. When he came home, he cut my hair. He is very good hairdresser.
I didn' t like my second brother. When we were children, we always quarreled. He criticized about my faults. I wanted him to go far away. Last year, he got sick. He fell into a depression about his work. My parents wanted him come back home, but he didn' t. I worried about him. Then, he didn't talk much more. I wanted to see his smile, so I bought one T-shirt for him as a souvenir from Thailand. He wore it and said to me, "Thank you, Mayuko.". I was very happy to hear that. Now, I like him very much!
Family is very important thing for me. I' m very happy to see them and I want to do something for them from now on. I want to see all member again. My family is my treasure.
What are important things for you?

My stories of studying English in secondary school.

2007-04-23T15:09:00.000+09:00

When I was in junior high, I studied English with a lot of fun. My English teacher taught us many things not only about grammer but also pronunciation. She took practicing pronunciation and reading in her class. She also taught English songs, so I enjoyed studying English.
On the other hand, I almost studied English about grammer in high school. My school is very eager to go to college, so we studied English to get a higher grade on the test.
I think it is important to teach English with fun. If we do so, every students won' t dislike English.
What do you think?

Self Introduction

2007-04-19T15:18:00.000+09:00

Hi ! My name is mayuko. I 'm Iwate University student. My major is Elementary school education. I want to teach English to many children. I like baseball , reading, seeing movies and listening music. I also like traveling. I went to Singapore and Thai land last month. I want to travel around the world !