Here's some teaching tips and activities that I was exposed to during QCR520 Aims and Approaches to Teaching Literature. It has been a rather eye-opening experience and invaluable to my development as a future literature teacher.
1. Linking physical actions with a lesson on discrimination (Andrea)
This particular activity which Andrea carried was interesting to me as it allowed me to understand how kinesthetic learning can be carried out. Andrea’s division of students according to the areas where they stayed at—which in turn determined who was able to remain seated on chairs or had to be relegated to the floor—was such a simple but powerful activity. Even now, I still remember vividly the notion of discrimination that she was teaching.
This is due to the fact that the content she was teaching was directly related to a physical action and motion. Her use of tying a lesson to a physical action was the impetus that got me thinking of physical actions and motions that I could incorporate into my own lesson as well. I think there is a lot of value to be had from linking lessons and physical actions in the classroom together. Students might not be able to understand concepts just from reading it on paper. But simple physical practical activities that get them off their seats and onto their feet (or in Andrea’s case off their feet and onto their butts) might serve to teach a particular concept a lot more effectively than just teaching from pen and paper.
Obviously a lot of thought must go into creating a physical activity that is simple enough to carry out in the confines of the classroom but will at the same time concretize the essence of message that the lesson is attempting to communicate.
2. Taking the time to explain, clarify and solidify students’ concerns and questions (Kit and Jiamin)
I found Kit’s and Jiamin’s use of detailed and clear instructions, of interest to myself, as a developing and learning teacher. Kit placed a lot of emphasis and time explaining and laying the proper guidelines for her lesson before she launched into the main activity itself. But her continual return to the material that had been generated earlier ensured a constant flow that made use of existing material while at the same time ensuring students’ knowledge foundations were sturdy and concrete. (This is in reference to the rather detailed mindmap that she came up with at the start of her microteaching session).
This was true as well for Jiamin who taught—what I thought was a rather hefty subject of metaphysics—a very difficult concept but distilled into very manageable and learnable nuggets of wisdom. This goes back to Mark’s lesson earlier today and the use of terms such as “dichotomies” and “social stratification”. While I do agree that there is a place for the use of such terms in the classroom, I think that it should be the other way around. Just as Jiamin taught the concept of metaphysics by first relating it to more mundane and prosaic examples before introducing the term of metaphysics itself, so too do I think that we should first introduce the examples of how a more difficult concept can be construed in more mundane events and ideas before the actual technical term itself is introduced to students. This way, students will not be daunted by grandiose, un-understandable words but will instead be firmly acquainted with the use of the concept before they find out the word itself. After all, I do believe that students do understand the meanings of dichotomies, binaries and social stratification. It is just that they do not use technical terms to understand those concepts.
So I think it is crucial here to provide the necessary scaffolding (ugh I finally used that dirty word) to ensure a student’s understanding of various concepts so that when the term is finally introduced to them, they will not be intimidated by those terms.
3. Role division amongst students (Shu May)
Another useful tip which I attempted to implement into my own microteaching session was Shu May’s use of role division that she carried out in her own lesson. I thought the use of dividing students into various roles was especially clever and innovative. I can see a lot of applications for this sort of task and role division. It could even be possible to make this a constant classroom activity where students must constantly switch roles and fit in to different roles of speakers, presenters, researchers, noise managers and time keepers. This will not only keep the lessons fresh and engaging, it will also allow students to develop different skills (public speaking, presentation skills, getting out of their comfort zones and so on) while at the same time accomplishing the lesson goals and objectives.
This is such a great technique to tackle a number of issues at once and inculcate a more holistic development in our students as we engage and develop not only their academic subject content mastery but soft skills such as leadership, self-discipline and public speaking.
4. Dramatization (Jodee, Pepper and Liz)
Yes I’m well aware the stipulation for this task was for 3 tips but I found the use of dramatization another technique that warranted mention as well. While I still think students must first know the text intimately, once they do, dramatization is very effective to get students to be more critical and reflective about the way they understand the text.
As readers they may be just passive recipients and consumers of the text but when students are forced to dramatize and perform the play, they must make more critical choices about how to perform and dramatize the various texts.
As Jodee, Pepper and Liz microteaching sessions illustrated, by getting students to engage with the text and physically dramatize it, they were able to make their respective texts more relevant and immediate to us as learners. For example, it was only when Pepper got myself, Jodee and Jason to act out the orange peeling scene from Fasting, Feasting that I realized the potential for satire and social commentary that Desai had infused into her text. I think this goes back to the earlier explanation of Andrea’s linkage between lesson content and physical activity.
While you may understand a text theoretically, it is only when you act it out physically that you adopt a more reflective, critical mindset to dissect and understand a text more exhaustively.
