Go out with a...HIGH PASS lesson! (aka, bang)

I always knew Audrey Hepburn was the right choice.

Eliza Doolittle, the flower girl

Eliza Doolittle...lady?

We teach who we are, and I am an Audrey Hepburn fan. She hasn't failed me yet. :)

Thursday was my final teaching lesson, and I received the grand prize package: the first two-hour lesson in the advanced class, and the "honor" (read: pressure) of teaching in front of the SIT TESOL course assessor, Jill.

The previous Tuesday's lesson had been reviewed by our trainer, Elías, something like this:

"Well, you did theez, and that vas good, but...

...and that was also very good, up to a point...

...and then, here. Your lesson, which had been like theez, *draws slant of hand upwards in the air like a mountain incline,* suddenly *draws hand downwards like a crashing airplane.*"

I had planned my first "PDP" lesson on Tuesday using "I Won't Back Down" by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. PDP is a format designed for receptive lessons such as listening, viewing, reading, or writing. This was the first lesson of mine that Elías had observed, and when the class was over, I looked up to see him with an expression of huge upset on his face. Now, this shorter Ecuadorian native of 65 years has a natural default expression lacking in excitement, but the look on his face after Tom Petty turned off was positively dismal.

Raed, sporting something akin to the terrible expression
on Elías's face, during my final lesson ;)

The next morning, I felt it in evaluations. Generally speaking, Elías awarded me great comments and a "high pass" (the best kind of lesson!) for 75% of my teaching. When my class got stuck in their fluency activity, which then inhibited my ability to lead them into the final activity, I had to make on-the-spot modifications that crammed the lesson into an awkward, less-than-productive finish. 


It cost me. Of course, as John says, it's always easy to win the game on Monday morning - after the lesson ended, I had many other alternatives rushing through my head that could have led to more success for my students. But, I didn't make those choices in the moment. I made the one that caused Elías to turn his hand downwards and crash it into the desk with a downgraded "pass plus."


Well, I knew I only had one more shot at this thing before my official evaluation hours were up. The stakes were high. And I wanted nothing less than a high pass to walk out with.

Repeat after me: "High Pass."

Well, go big or go home, right? It was time to introduce my students to the all-inclusive package: British English, a song listening, a video clip viewing or two, archaic slang, pronunciation emphasis and practice, a story about a girl transformed by her pronunciation of the English language and the crotchety, exigente professor that transformed her, a culture lesson, a reading lesson, writing practice, a speaking lesson, and the chance to end up as stars.

Lesson Plan topic: My Fair Lady.

By the end of the lesson, students will be able to (SWBAT):

Show understanding of clips from My Fair Lady

By summarizing Eliza's language learning between three scenes

So that they can predict the next scene and rewrite the story, in pairs, to be acted out.

In a nutshell, the lesson flew. It was fun, funny, and highly successful in achieving its goals from beginning to end. I took the most useful pieces of feedback I had received throughout the course, as well as my own personal criticisms (of course), and put them all into action in the lesson. We moved from pre-teaching pictures of Eliza's transformation and archaic British vocabulary to the video clips, with different goals for each viewing and the students making predictions about what was to come next in between. After the last video scene, we whipped out the accompanying script from George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion and gave it a read-through. It was the all-inclusive teaching package, as well.

My proudest, happiest moment as a teacher in this course came at the very end, when it was time for the students to perform, in pairs, the scripts they had written under these conditions:

1 teacher

1 student

"What was the professor teaching Eliza in the movie? How to speak English correctly. Good.

Was she getting it all perfectly, or did she keep making mistakes?

Good."

Each pair nailed it in their own unique way, but every single one of them was laugh-out-loud funny. "Teachers" overemphasized the stress of the words in a way that showed great understanding of the true pronunciation stress, they quit on their students who wouldn't learn, and they had their roles reversed. "Students" misunderstood or were misunderstood with perfect comedic timing, they negated the phrases to reverse the intent of their teachers, and they never got it right the first time.

pre-teaching

Vamonos!

Hands like an Italian while teaching!

We weren't actually in the classic "U"-shape...more of an experimental "J." (The TV's on the left, yes?)

Teacher in action!

Good to know I'm able to be so expressive for my students...

Monitoring for the task, as per use.

There you can see Elías watching on the left...check out some of his comments below. :)

MY first classroom :)

And there would be Jill, SIT assessor, back and center!

It's sometimes an on-your-knees kind of job.

Script read-through of Shaw

Anticipating some great final products!

At the end of our lesson, which passed perfectly on time, I had the chance to congratulate my students on their awesome performances and give them some sincere parting words:

You are all stars! I will recommend you to Hollywood when I go back to California. I have completely enjoyed our last time together. Thank you so much for being my marvelous students.

The next morning for my evaluation, I received some pretty good last-lesson parting words from my peers. However, the best, and the ones that I have written down in the official record, are from my final lesson evaluation from Elías:

A HIGH PASS LESSON.

Teacher has a both lovely and professional presence in class. 

Maestro of elicitation.

Teacher has ability to convey tasks clearly, her CCQs are useful...Students know what to do exactly. 

Teacher's attitude is supportive and engaging. Maintaining the class alive. Caring about students' learning.

And many more wonderful commentarios :)

After Thursday's teaching, I still had to complete an 11-page Extended Reflection essay for Saturday morning, complete a course evaluation with Jill, and plan a last adventurous weekend for Otavalo and Volcan Cotopaxi. Despite the 15,000 ft altitude on Ecuador's second-largest volcano, I've been breathing easy and enjoying every moment in Quito and the surrounding areas since Thursday evening.

Stay posted! There's still time for a few more good updates before that plane lifts off next Saturday :)