Wednesday, 29 February 2012
Teaching is best when...
Week 3
Tuesday, 28 February 2012
Khalid Allouba's Reflection
Second Week
LBP Week 2
Our start of the day was quite problematic. Firstly we did not have access to the room in which we were supposed to be teaching. Secondly as a result of miscommunication, the company was not aware that they were supposed to be sending their students here to the CMU campus. Anyhow, thankfully with the help of Silvia and Julie, these obstacles were overcome. You cannot expect things to go always as planned and this was certainly the case.
Moving ahead, the students eventually arrived and they were simply amazed by Education City as a whole. They told us how much they liked it and how privileged they felt to be here. It was a great day and we took quite a lot of pictures.
We began our class as usual and came up with another obstacle. The computer was not functional, this prevented us from taking proper attendance and also use media to enhance their experience.
But no matter we were ready, we had prepared beforehand by going over the lesson plan and thankfully, not much media use was required. As for the attendance we used some improvisation and were able to confirm who was present and who was not. The class went great, we were actually able to finally pinpoint the break point where some students could be considered intermediate and others beginners. The students were intent and active in learning and they really enjoyed being here at the campus. All in all we achieved what we were aiming for.
Monday, 27 February 2012
Aisha's Third Class Thoughts
Monday, 20 February 2012
Teaching at CMU
We first guided them to the classroom and got them settled. We then asked them about how they felt coming to our building. A lot of them preferred coming here than having the classes at their camp. Personally, I think having them at our building is much more beneficial for the learners. This is because they would get the chance to feel like "real students", which would hopefully encourage them to put in a greater effort and take the classes more seriously.
As we were quite behind schedule, we instantly started doing the intermediate material. The listening exercise was the most challenging. We had to repeat the dialogue around 4 times. Yet most of them still didn't manage to do the exercise properly. At that point, it became clear to us that the intermediate material was too hard for them to do. Therefore, next class, we would like to use exercises from the basic material and see how it goes from there.
Aisha
Sunday, 19 February 2012
The First Week at the UDC Camp
Friday, 17 February 2012
Labor Camp Experience
I really miss my learners especially after the first class. I was really enthusiastic and I could not wait for the next class. I had so much energy and I was well prepared to teach the next class. The next class meant so much for me, because it is the chance to fix the previous mistakes. The next class was the chance to start the real teaching, with the actual content we were developing. The next class was next big step, because our journey with these learners is quite short and every class is a big step for both of us. However, we missed a big step due to the sudden changes enforced by the CMU administration. The changes suggest that we are no longer going to teach in the labor camps, instead we are teaching in CMU. I was not happy with changes, and the way it have been done. I felt that I am missing big part of the teaching experience due to these new changes. I am not resisting change here but I am really missing something big.
When we used to teach in the labor camps, it was more challenging and interesting. The interesting and challenging part starts with the resources. In the labor camp the available resources were very basic, in comparison to what we have here in CMU. We as students are used to these advanced resources such as power point, projectors and internet, however the story is different for us when we go there and we do not have any of that. This fact was my major concern when I took this class in the beginning. Because when I am teaching anything, I always think in terms of technology, what sort of technology I am going to use and how I am going to use it. These are the questions I always to try to find an answer for. Power point and a project were vital tools that I always make the assumption they were there. Now I go the labor camp I only have a small white board and few small printed papers with me. Here there is a huge gap, of what I am used to have and what I have there. This gap in fact is one of the greatest aspects of this experience and personally I can relate to this because my previous teaching experience in Rwanda.
Last summer when I was in Rwanda I never thought I will be able to teach the basics of programming to kids, without a projector. It was something almost impossible to do because how I am going to show them how to add something to the program? It is a very hard question to answer. Yet, I was able to answer this question in a way I did not imagine. I was teaching kids programming on software that they have never seen in their lives, without a projector, and they were able to do everything I taught them to do. The results were surprisingly amazing. Now if we try to apply the same principle in our teaching in the labor camps, I think each of us, as students, will have his own creative way addressing this issue. Because each of us is facing this issue and have to address it to make his learners understand what he says. I believe each of us will be a better teacher than what he/she thinks. I believe that if you are a good teacher with basic resources then you can be great teachers with advanced resources.
In a brief, what I talked about is just one aspect of the labor camp experience. I did not talk about how the labor camp experience could make us appreciate what we have, makes us humble people and create adaptable individuals. I think the labor camp experience specifically and what we do in this class aligns with what CMU wants us to do and it helps in creating the person CMU wants to see.
The First Week
Tuesday, 14 February 2012
Obstacles - New Location
First Impression
AL Hanouf
Monday, 13 February 2012
Reflection on Saturday Class
We embarked onto our first class for Spring '12 on Saturday the 11th at CDC in the Industrial Area. As was the case in the previous year, our group comprised of Fawwaz and I though Ahmed served as the new entrant after we had lost Aveed to a multitude of university courses and, ostensibly, lack of interest, though he never agreed to the latter assessment. Though drowsy-eyed, we were elated with expectant spirits at the prospect of meeting a few of our older students and at the idea of getting free apple juice from the nice manager who spoiled us in Spring '11.
The following pictures chronicle the same morning ritual of quick revisions and teaching strategies we followed last year, albeit with Aveed:
This picture shows Ahmed going through the lesson plans for the day, while contemplating a blog entry. Of course, he was not able to get through the said entry because his laptop is a piece of junk. (sorry bro)
This picture shows my arrival and bafflement at the sheer amount of paper on the table, while considering stealing a croissant or a scone from the breakfast provided for the CS4Qatar high-school students.
This is a picture Fawwaz forced me to take, chastising most of my attempts for not getting his 'good side'. And, of course, he is sitting in his usual conceited stance, intoning delusional verses of self-supremacy while Ahmed and I struggled to stay awake.
After we had gone through the routine of organizing the material for the class, we made our way to the main parking lot to embark on our journey. Our designated driver had arrived before time, so all of us felt guilty for making him wait. Once we were on our way, however, a little of the guilt faded with every pot-hole we hit along the Industrial Area road. It was not a long journey though, we reached CDC in about 20 minutes, not as drowsy anymore and ready to begin our lessons.
The picture on the left shows our van. As is clear, Ahmed and I are almost asleep.
The gentlemen at the back were part of our class for the day.
We were pleased to find out that we would have a much larger class this time around. We would be teaching about 19 students, as compared to just 11 in the previous semester. Sadly though, only one of our previous students, Suresh, would be returning for the class this year. We briefly re-kindled fond memories of the year past, while we waited for our class to be cleaned and made ready for the teaching session ahead.
We began the session in 15 minutes following our arrival, the following photos chronicle the session:
Here, we can see Ahmed endowing our students with a plethora of scholarly concepts. Since the students seemed to know a lot more than he did, he stopped midway to continue with general introductions as planned.
Our students listen patiently as we describe the extension to our first activity, a slightly more advanced version of introductions now including more variables such as: nature of work, work-hours, and level of satisfaction with work.
Fawwaz writes down the different variables involved in the said activity. The students seemed to grasp these concepts with quite some ease, something we had not expected.
We then asked the students to introduce themselves to each other, further reinforcing a general understanding of English.
Our students complete their pre-test. We waited till the end of our first activity before handing them out, hoping introductions would serve as a warm-up towards their English skills.
Here I debrief our students on the activities about to follow. Most of them reacted with joy at the prospect of group-work, some seemed indifferent. Fawwaz seemed fidgety as usual because he has some unusual form of OCD.
Here, Ahmed described our group activity to the students in much more detail. Explaining how students will be grouped in 4's, each given a set of images, and they are required to work through the images in their groups and name each image.
The activity went on pretty well, with a good amount of participation within each group. Nearly every one got every image right, which reinforced a sense of stronger expectation within us. Maybe next week, we will work them a little harder. We did notice some disparity within the knowledge of English between the students; most students struggled with concepts we tested them on but about four or five students seem to have a strong grasp of the language. One of the students even asked us, after we were done with class, whether we would like to give routine classes because he felt that, although he had a bachelors degree, lack of experience with English put him at a severe disadvantage. Although, we would have been happy to comply with his request, we had to politely decline due to lack of time and grueling academics.
We had one more photo of our students working in groups but, apparently, this blog wont allow us to post it up. Therefore, I am forced to end here, and not because I have run out of interesting things to say, because I haven't, you know?