'What a Difference a Day Makes'

Friday, September 16th, 2011

Yesterday I was lamenting the decline in my ability to connect with my grade 3 students. Today provided evidence to the contrary. I used the exact same lesson today as I did yesterday and yet today’s classes embraced it wholeheartedly and completed the activities in good spirits.

There are essentially 4 parts to the lesson; small talk/introduction, the ‘Tune In’ part from the textbook, a ‘post card’ exercise and then a 5 minute song activity to close the lesson.

1. Introduction and small talk. Again I employed roughly the same series of open questions framed as class wide invitations to reply as yesterday. Again the same middling results. I altered the technique a little this time. I chose a couple of specific students who answered an initial question and asked them a follow up. This represented a fuller application of the IRF cycle and I tried to encourage some elaboration using the ‘F’ turn. I need to experiment some more with this but it is good to have started trying. Next week I think I will turn small talk on it head for grade 3. Instead of asking them questions I will just say ‘Hello everyone. Do you have anything you would like to ask me today?’ If there are no questions I will proceed with the lesson. I wonder what will happen.

2. ‘Tune In’. After yesterday’s debacle with the computer I made sure to arrive to each class a good 10 minutes early to get everything set up. There were no significant issues today. I believe the ‘Tune In’ activities actually represent something of a contradiction. Throughout the past year it has been made clear time after time that my main purpose is to get the students speaking. However, the ‘Tune In’ activities do exactly the opposite. They are listening activities. In the terms of this week’s reading they are entirely monologic; the textbook and I speak with one voice. There is one answer to each question which the students must ascertain by listening to dialogue on the CD-ROM. Still, this is what I am asked to do. I have not thought to question their logic in asking me to this. I worry if I do they will think I am crossing a line, challenging their authority and experience without having any real right.

3. The third activity is one entirely of my choosing. It is completely different from the preceding activity. I call it the ‘Postcard’ activity. I tell students they are going to write a postcard (I have a photocopied template I give them). First we do an example on the board. I explain there must be 4 pieces of information – Who are they on holiday with? Where are they on holiday? What are they doing on holiday? and one additional piece of information of their choosing. I made a deliberate attempt to fully exploit the IRF structure at this point in the lessons. It went pretty well. The classes all generated all the information for the example on the board with minimal prodding from me. Then they made their own postcard, delivered it to the student they wrote it to and read it to them.

4. Last 5 minutes were given over to a song game/exercise. It went well. In one class half the kids were boogeying to Daft Punk. A heart lifting moment.

Today was a win. I’ll take it.