OBSERVACIÓN FINAL DEL PROFESOR EXPERTO INGLÉS SECUNDARIA (SEGOVIA)

El pasado 11 de marzo el profesor César Martín (IES María Moliner) tuvo la oportunidad de devolverle la visita a Ana Miguel (IES Catalina de Lancaster) y esto es lo que nos cuenta:

El día 11 de marzo pude acudir finalmente a observar a mi compañera Ana María a Santa M. la Real de Nieva en su centro, el IES Catalina de Lancaster. 

Lo primero que me llamó la atención , fue el tamaño del instituto. Es mucho más pequeñito que el mío, pero la verdad es que está bastante bien dotado de medios digitales para el tamaño que tiene. 

En cuanto a las clases, el hecho de estar en epoca de exámenes y algún que otro cambio de fecha por problemas míos, me impidieron observar más de dos sesiones, pero me bastaron para hacerme una idea del trabajo que realiza Ana y que es muy completo. 

En la primera clase de la mañana, Ana recibió a sus alumnos de 2°de bachillerato (nerviosos por un examen reciente) con una actividad para relajar la tensión antes de comentar las pruebas en cuestión con cada uno de ellos. El ejercicio consistía en pedirse matrimonio y expresar el porqué de tal intención. Se realizó por turnos y resultó muy entretenido y sorprendente por el nivel de algunos alumnos, que a pesar de crecer en un entorno rural y, a priori, poco favorable para la práctica de la lengua inglesa, demostraron un manejo más que satisfactorio del inglés y, estoy seguro, con matrimonios consecuentemente muy felices. 

En la segunda clase, Ana estuvo trabajando con sus alumnos de 2°ESO en un proyecto de centro relacionado con los juegos olímpicos e impulsado por el profesor de Educación Física. Cada asignatura realiza una o varias tareas que tengan que ver con esta temática. En el caso de los alumnos de Ana, estaban trabajando por grupos un comic que mostraba las diferentes pruebas, la historia de los juegos, los datos más sorprendentes de los juegos, etc. Además, me mostraron un proyecto de video titulado "Not only hitting your partner is violence" que habian presentado a un concurso y que tenía como temática principal, la denuncia de los diferentes tipos de violencia de la género que existen, aparte de la meramente física. Resultó muy bonito verles actuar con tanta naturalidad. 

A pesar de que, como dije, no he tenido en mi caso mucha oportunidad de observar más clases de Ana, me consta que la tarea que desempeña, está dando buenos frutos y eso se nota, no solo en los buenos resultados que puedan tener en los exámenes, sino también en el trabajo que yo he podido observar de primera mano. 

TERCERA OBSERVACIÓN INGLÉS SECUNDARIA (SORIA - SEGOVIA)

Y llegó la última observación de Candy Christine Scobling (IES Virgen del Espino) en el aula del profesor experto César Martín (IES María Moliner):

Friday’s observation with César Martín at Segovia’s IES Maria Moliner began bright and early at 8.30am. We met Mariví from the CFPI, another great addition to our team, and headed to class with the first year bilingual group I’d met the day before. 

Today’s class was fantastic and a pleasure to watch. It was surprising to see students so participative at that time on a Friday morning! 

César began by introducing the new reading book - The Twits by Roald Dahl. There were many different versions of the book cover in class so they discussed the different images, what perception they had of the characters and vocabulary they could use to describe them. 

Then, César mixed a series of activities throughout the rest of the class, based on him dictating questions to the group and them copying, then having to answer individually and compare answers as a class orally, discussing opinions and vocabulary as they went along. They talked about physical appearance and personality traits, stereotypes, and even managed to get a pronunciation activity in there, distinguishing between bird, beard, beer and bear. 

Finally, they began to read parts of the book. Firstly Cesar read a bit, then a student would continue. I have to say the read aloud very well and it made me realise that I should probably read more to my own students to give them clues on pace, volume and expression, before letting them continue, as usually I immediately ask for volunteers to read. 

After each excerpt from the book, Cesar continued to ask questions and integrate other knowledge into the conversation. 

Once we’d finished the first class, I attended the department meeting where we discussed the British Council bilingual programme and they filled me in on a few pieces of news about the programme I was unaware of, as well as discussing how everything works in our two schools and comparing ideas. I’m glad I got the opportunity to do this as it was very enlightening, and I’d like to try to create more coordination between departments in my own school.

Finally, we finished the morning with the 2nd Bach BIE class again, where Cesar, Mariví and I all took turns doing some speaking activities with the girls. Mariví showed us a logic puzzle type game where she wrote a clue on the board and the students had to guess what it represented, like CCCCCCC is “the seven seas”. Cesar and I then used the “panel of experts” improv activity I’d introduced him to in my class on the first observation, and he improved it by suggesting I use the “random words”, so we gave  each expert a random word which they had to incorporate into their discourse, and the other students had to later guess what the random words had been. 

All in all, a lovely way to conclude our three day teacher exchange. Although, of course, it doesn’t really feel like a conclusion, but rather a beginning, as we’re going to remain in touch and I’m sure we’ll be sharing ideas and helping each other out for many years to come. 

Thanks Cesar and the English dept from IES María Moliner, Mariví, Javier and the CFPI team, as well as Celia and Pablo from the CFIE in Soria, for all of your help putting this together. And here’s to many more opportunities like this in the future! 

SEGUNDA OBSERVACIÓN INGLÉS SECUNDARIA (SEGOVIA- SORIA)

Candy Christine Scobling (IES Virgen del Espino) comparte con nosotros en qué consistió su segunda observación del profesor experto César Martín (IES María Moliner):

On Thursday I spent the morning in school with César Martín at IES María Moliner. It was an excellent morning and I was able to see various different levels. I also realised just how similar our schools are as the bilingual students reminded me of my own. They had absolute respect for Cesar in class, as he did them, and were motivated by all the activities, which made for a great classroom atmosphere.

In 1st year, they were working on a cross-curricular project about Ancient Gods, worked in groups to piece stories together and learnt vocabulary through Plickers, an excellent resource which Cesar had mentioned to me before and I now plan to use in my classes.

In 2nd year, they completed a vocabulary exam also using Plickers, which is an excellent and ludic way to assess students, and saves time on marking! They also did a murder mystery task, working in groups to piece together clues. 

In 2nd year bachillerato de investigación y excelencia, the language assistant, Jason (who’s much more mature than most assistants and obviously has years of teaching experience under his belt), carried out an activity with Cesar to prep students for Cambridge exams. They had to pretend to be members of the school board, deciding which measures to implement in the event of a coronavirus outbreak.  And after that, they did a short drama activity where a pair was given a situation and had to persuade the other to do something. I’ll be adding this activity to my improv classes. 

Later, as it was a double lesson, I got to chat to the girls about their investigation projects and learnt the differences and similarities between how we work in the BIE and how they work, and while they were working on presentations, Cesar and I discussed the different platforms we use for project work and assessment on the computer. I use Google Classroom and he uses Drive and Additio, which I think I’ll also be using in the future!

All in all a fantastic morning and I couldn’t wait for the following day

OBSERVACIÓN FINAL DEL PROFESOR EXPERTO INGLÉS SECUNDARIA (SEGOVIA)

La profesora experta Raquel Calleja (CEO La Sierra) tuvo la oportunidad de ir al aula de Jessica Church (IES Sierra de Ayllón) y ver como Jessica había adaptado algunas de sus actividades a su centro:

 

Buenas tardes a todos,

Ayer fui mi último día de trabajo en equipo con la adorable Jessica en Ayllón. En este caso, era yo la que visitaba a mi compañera para ver cómo ponía en práctica las cosas que hemos aprendido en EQUIPO.

En primer lugar asistí a una clase de 1º de Bachillerato de ciencias donde los alumnos mostraban una actitud muy buena y positiva ante el idioma. Primero se presentaron y después me explicaron el GRAN Proyecto que han hecho con Jessica en el centro conocido como HIS/HER/THEIR/ OUR STORY. Por medio de este proyecto el centro se ha apuntado al concurso de buenas prácticas educativas convocado por la asociación "Mejora tu Escuela"  promovida por distintos miembros de la comunidad educativa. Los alumnos, una vez recogida toda la información proporcionada por las ancianas de la residencia, harán una exposición en clase usando alguna de las herramientas que la mostré a Jessica cuando estuvo en Prádena:

https://www.genial.ly/es

https://piktochart.com/

Otros tienen libertad para ser creativos y presentarlo por medio de una canción, insertando una línea del tiempo o realizando un "lapbook".

Después, acompañé a Jessica a la reunión de departamento con sus compañeros. Fue muy interesante escuchar los proyectos que tienen en mente y ser partícipe del buen rollo entre ellos. ¡Me gustó mucho estar ahí!

A continuación, fuimos con el grupo de 3º de la ESO. Aquí realizamos una de las tareas que Jessica observó en Prádena: DICTOGLOSS  conectándolo con el "reading book" : ALL ABOUT IRELAND. Asimismo, los alumnos tuvieron su parte activa dirigiendo parte de la clase haciendo el "rol del profe" cuando Jessica les explico que ahora era su turno para trabajar el libro de lectura.

Finalmente, fuimos a la última hora con el grupo más rebelde de Jessica de 2º de la ESO. Primero tenían un pequeño examen de verbos irregulares y después trabajaron el libro de lectura ALL ABOUT USA. Jessica hizo uso de las mini-whiteboards que la enseñe en Pradena para hacer un concurso de preguntas sobre lo que habían leído.

Tras una jornada intensa comimos juntas para charlar sobre todo lo realizado en OBSERVA_ACCIÓN. Ambas coincidimos en lo positivo del mismo y en todo lo que hemos aprendido juntas. Ha sido una experiencia de duro trabajo pero que ha merecido la pena y ¡queremos repetir!

 

 

OBSERVACIÓN DEL PROFESOR EXPERTO AL PROFESOR OBSERVADOR

Candy Christine Scobling (IES Virgen del Espino) nos cuenta qué actividades realizó en el aula durante la visita del profesor experto César Martín (IES María Moliner):

I’ve been lucky enough to be paired up with César Martín from IES María Moliner in Segovia. We both teach at schools which run the British Council programme and the Bachillerato de Investigación y Excelencia en Idiomas, and when we met at the training day for this programme in Valladolid, we asked to set up this interprovincial one to one (thanks CFPI !). 

We originally scheduled my visit to Segovia in January but had to cancel it due to illness. Therefore, César, who’s my expert, came to observe my classes at my school, IES Virgen del Espino in Soria, today, and I’ll be visiting him in Segovia tomorrow and Friday.

We’ve had an intense day due to no breaks between classes, but I’m glad I’ve been able to show César the different levels that I teach. We began with 4ESO bilingual where we were practising improv theatre skills for their oral task, 1ESO bilingual where we were talking about the Sustainable Development Goals and the problems with the world today, 1 Bach BIE in which they were giving TED talk presentations, and 2 Bach BIE where we held a round table discussion about their investigation projects. 

It was great to have César observing and participating, and he’s already given me a whole bunch of great ideas to improve activities and introduce others. 

Looking forward to the next two days observing César in Segovia! 

TERCERA OBSERVACIÓN INGLÉS SECUNDARIA (SEGOVIA)

Y llegó la última observación entre Jessica Church (IES Sierra de Ayllón) y Raquel Calleja (CEO La Sierra), con un día intenso cargado de actividades comunicativas, dinámicas y diferentes.

Hello everyone!

As Maria and Raquel have already mentioned, we had another great morning together--it was extremely productive, as I was able to not only learn from Raquel in-action, but also ask Maria questions throughout our time together.  

As usual, Raquel prepared classes that were dynamic and kept the students engaged with the learning process.  The first group that we saw was 3º E.S.O., and the topic that they were reviewing was "conditionals".  After a quick review of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd conditional, the students watched a short clip of the (fantastic) film The Curious Case of Benjamin Button: the car crash scene.

It was only about three minutes long and allowed Raquel to focus their attention on the 3rd Conditional, which they are having more trouble with.  

The students then worked with a tool that I had never seen before--a video activity from islcollective.com, where they watched the same scene from the film, but the video would stop and in order to continue they needed to answer a multiple-choice grammar question. 

What I liked most about the activity was that students were able to work at their own pace, and that the activity was well-made and on a website that I already use frequently!  I was just unaware that this type of activity is available, and I'm really excited to see what other options there are available.

In the second class, which was 2º E.S.O., as Raquel and Maria have already mentioned, we had some really great Valentine's Day dialogues that the students had prepared, plus a photocall.  My personal favorite was a group of three boys who had taken the creative liberty to include a birth scene--it was pretty hilarious  (c:  

For the second activity the students used Valentine's Day-related words from hearts that they had created using the website "wordart" (another new resource for me! https://wordart.com/) 

 

 

The students chose five words from the hearts (they were already on the wall, as part of the photocalland time expressions to create a story in pairs, which they they read aloud to the class.  

Finally (I don't know how we managed to do so many activities!) Raquel let me lead the students through a really fun process of decoding "text messages" in English.  I was really impressed that the students were able to figure most of them out!

Raquel explained that she had created the activity after students asked in-class about texting in English.  I thought she chose the perfect moment to connect the two ideas!

Thank you to Raquel and all of her fantastic co-workers for everything, and for Maria for all of her additional ideas about organizing materials and getting students involved.  I have learned so much in these visits--I'm excited to have Raquel come to be part of my classroom!  

 

 

 

 

 

SEGUNDA OBSERVACIÓN INGLÉS SECUNDARIA (SEGOVIA)

Ana Miguel (IES Catalina de  Lancaster) nos vuelve a contar cómo fue su segunda observación en el IES María Moliner. El profesor experto César Martín, llevó a cabo una interesante actividad sobre los dioses del Olimpo.

Esto es lo que nos cuenta Ana Miguel de su experiencia:

En esta segunda visita entré en una clase de 1º ESO bilingüe. Como actividad inicial, César propuso a los alumnos que contaran en dos frases acciones que hubieran realizado el fin de semana, pero una de ellas tenía que ser falsa. Después, el resto de compañeros tenía que intentar adivinar cuál de ellas era la verdadera y cuál la falsa. Como actividad principal de la lección de hoy, los alumnos revisan contenido anterior sobre los dioses del Olimpo. Para ello, realizan una actividad muy amena basada en el aprendizaje colaborativo y la gamificación. Los alumnos son distribuidos en grupos y cada grupo recibe un sobre con unas pequeñas reseñas de los dioses griegos que ya han visto anteriormente, y los nombres de esos dioses por otro lado. La tarea del grupo consiste en unir cada dios con su reseña, en el menor tiempo posible ya que el resto de sus compañeros estarán compitiendo a la vez. El grupo ganador recibe una recompensa (subida de nota). Los alumnos se entregan con ganas e ilusión a la tarea, y el grupo ganador lo hace en un tiempo récord. A continuación, como “follow-up activity”, el profesor pide un voluntario cuya tarea consiste en describir con gestos a un dios en concreto, que los compañeros tienen que adivinar. El que adivina sale a la pizarra a escenificar otro dios, y así sucesivamente. Finalmente, sobró tiempo para que los alumnos completen una tabla en la que tienen que escribir el nombre de cada dios, su reino o ámbito, su símbolo y sus características principales. El timbre sonó y la clase se me había pasado muy rápida (supongo que a los alumnos también), porque fue dinámica y ellos estaban motivados.

Un placer, de nuevo, observar a César.

 

SEGUNDA OBSERVACIÓN INGLÉS SECUNDARIA (SEGOVIA)

Jessica Church (IES Sierra de Ayllón) nos cuenta cómo marcha su experiencia dentro del programa de observación. Su compañera experta Raquel Calleja (CEO La Sierra) y ella, han hecho un tándem estupendo, tal y como se desprende de sus palabras:

You can see me on the left, totally absorbed while trying to win Quizziz...

What a fun way to get the students (and any onlooker) absolutely focused on reviewing contents.  Raquel has obviously used the website before, and provided the students with paper to work on (some of the questions were quite difficult, and required multiple responses!) and was ready to answer any questions that they had while logging onto the website.    

What I found REALLY useful was all of the follow-up, once the activity was done.  Quizziz provides you with "game highlights", which includes 1st, 2nd and 3rd place winners, but more importantly shows you the "toughest questions", the question that the students took longest to respond to, and interesting facts.  Raquel had also printed off a full copy of all of the questions for her students to take home, which I thought was a great way to highlight the important of the activity, and the contents that we reviewed.  

Additionally, you can download the results (Raquel immediately saved them to her pendrive) AND you can include standards!  It's awesome.  And the students kept saying "vamos a hacer otro, no, teacher?", "tienes que hacerlo una vez más...." which means that they had as good of a time as I did.

In the same class period we also did speaking pair work, which is the exact same format that they'll be working with on the exam.  

 

 

I liked the variety of contents that were being reviewed, as well as the different types of activities that they were asked to complete.  Raquel had a pair model the activity to the other students, then modeled with an individual student, and when some students had some remaining doubts gave a quick explanation in Spanish--I liked it that she offered them 4 or 5 explanations in English before switching over to Spanish.  Sometimes I'm not as patient!

I also appreciated overhearing her say "If we don't know a word, we try to find a synonym....." and saw students helping each other when they were completing their sentences.  It definitely felt like a team effort!

For the 1º ESO group that we had later in the morning (after the rosquillas...) 

We started with a running dictation, which the students were extremely excited about.  Raquel asked the P.E. teacher if she could use the gym, which meant that we had plenty of space for the desks and tables and students to enjoy the activity without slamming into each other. ....

I have used running dictation before in-class, but I haven't this year, so it was fun to get excited about using it again.  I also liked that Raquel had a specific worksheet for them to use to fill in the sentences.  I also liked to see how flexible she was at different times.  For example, when she told them to get into pairs, several students asked if they could be in a group of three.  I know myself, and I would have said no!  But Raquel allowed them to, and I was reminded that we don't always have to be so strict about certain random rules that we invent.  

After the running dictation we did a Dictogloss/How many words in a minute, which was another new activity for me.... here's the worksheet, if you've never seen one: 

 

Honestly, being with Raquel just makes me want to get my students excited about learning.  And the great thing is that the fun is so structured that they don't even realize all the work that they're doing!  (We teachers really are quite tricky....).

I have to agree with other people who have participated in the forum.... I'm just disappointed that I only have one visit left!

Thank you to Raquel, and thank you CFPI for this great opportunity.  

 

PRIMERA OBSERVACIÓN INGLÉS SECUNDARIA (SEGOVIA)

El pasado lunes 27 de enero, la profesora Ana Miguel (IES Catalina de Lancaster) hizo su primera observación en el IES María Moliner (Segovia), donde el profesor experto César Martín le enseñó el centro y le dio la oportunidad de acudir a dos clases: 2º de Bachillerato de excelencia y otra con 2º de ESO bilingüe.

Esto es lo que nos contaba de su experiencia:

En la observación en 2º de Bach me llamó la atención el reducido número de alumnos (alumnas, más bien, eran 6 chicas) y su nivel de inglés. En este grupo no existe la presión de ir bien preparadas para la EBAU, más bien, como estas chicas ya tienen adquirido ese nivel desde el principio y realizan un proyecto a lo largo del curso, las clases van más encaminadas a mejorar las habilidades orales y a conseguir herramientas que les ayuden en su proyecto. En primer lugar, antes de utilizar PLICKERS para introducir vocabulario nuevo, las alumnas contestaron, por turnos, a una pregunta relacionada con el tema que se está tratando. Las alumnas se expresan con una fluidez y un nivel destacables. Hacia el final de la clase, el profesor insta a las alumnas a que le "vendan un boli" (sell me this pen) y las alumnas lo hacen fenomenal, la actividad resulta muy divertida.

A continuación observé una clase de 2º ESO bilingüe.  En primer lugar, César rompió el hielo pidiendo a los alumnos que enunciaran una frase con un mensaje positivo, muy alegre pero con cara triste; o bien un mensaje triste, mala noticia, con cara y gesto alegre. Algunos alumnos, por turnos, fueron enunciando su frase, con ejemplos muy divertidos. Como segunda actividad, los alumnos tuvieron una prueba de evaluación en la que tenían que identificar y utilizar en contexto diferentes conectores como furthermore, but, nevertheless, so, after, then, though, entre otros. Lo curioso de la prueba es que se realizó a través de PLICKERS. Como sobró algo de tiempo, el profesor aprovechó la última pregunta de la prueba para recordar algunos conceptos previos y retó a los alumnos a que utilizaran en una misma frase las palabras through, tough, thought y though. De nuevo me sorprendió el nivel de los alumnos y su disposición para el trabajo.

A modo de curiosidad, me gustó mucho que en los intercambios entre clase y clase sonara una música bajita por los altavoces de las clases, lo cual resultaba relajante para salir de una clase e ir a otras.

PRIMERA OBSERVACIÓN INGLÉS SECUNDARIA SEGOVIA

El pasado 22 de enero, Jessica Church, profesora del IES SIERRA DE AYLLÓN, estuvo en el CEO LA SIERRA en Prádena (Segovia), en el aula de su compañera Raquel Calleja. Fue un día lleno de experiencias e ideas como ella misma nos cuenta:

This morning I had the opportunity to work alongside Raquel Calleja in Prádena.  What I loved most about the experience was the fact that it reminded me of when I was an "auxiliar de conversación"--it was just so FUN.  Just for a moment I forgot about "finishing the textbook", grading exams, etc. and felt the joy that comes from interacting with students in an interesting, dynamic, fun atmosphere.  

I took home so many new ideas tools (websites, games....) after being in the classroom with Raquel and the ones that stood out for me were:

The website Piktochart (for creating an infographic)

• Individual white boards for the students (they worked on Past Simple irregular verbs, and also pronunciation /t/ /d/ /Id/)
• Using buzzers in the classroom
• The website RubiStar for creating rubrics (so awesome!)
• Brain Box, Conversation Cubes, Story Cubes, Word-Building Dominoes....

Of course, it was a pleasure watching Raquel in action.  I loved seeing the student-teacher dynamic that she has established, the work routines, her care when it comes to students with different needs (attention to diversity).  It was fantastic, and I'm already looking forward to my next visit.  I should also mention that Raquel and all of her coworkers were perfect hosts--so wonderful and kind and open to having a foreign stranger in their teachers' lounge! 

Thank you, Raquel!