Being a Teacher #2 (Indonesia Day 6)

Day 2 of Observations was another hectic day of interacting with students. My mentor Mr. Kurniawan, appearing in picture 2 at the front, continued with my introduction to all the 7th grade classes. Although this was initially meant to be an observation week, I was allowed to have the task of giving a short lesson by myself, again. In fact, I was allowed to hold this impromptu lesson for each class in the day.

The English Class Mr. Kurniawan taught is currently on the chapter of Descriptive Texts, or how to use English to describe a person, place, or thing. For that, an introduction about myself became the perfect example to use. Students were interested in my background as a Chinese-American, as well as an international student. The general Lesson Flow is as follows:

1. Introduce myself by having students think about the difference between Nationality and Ethnicity.
2. Briefly describe my experience living in California, while engaging students in conversation about what their preceding ideas of the US are.
3. Ask them to tell me about what they know about Bandung under the guise of me wanting to know what to do while I’m here. The conversation can go in any direction, but generally can be guided into topics such as food and locations. When a student says something the others also agree with, it becomes a TEACHING OPPORTUNITY where I ask many questions to try to make the students use descriptive language about that topic. Focuses include visual aspect, taste, smells, and personal preferences.
4. Ask students to WRITE a short composition about where they live where they describe their neighborhood, house, or housing complex. This will be presented either at the end of class or in the next class.

Whiteboard usage was generally frantic as I strove to write down student’s thinking as a way to motivate their wish to speak in English.

As this is still an introductory lesson, no lesson plans were made ahead of time. However, over the reiteration of the same lesson flow over multiple classes, I was able to refine the directives and entertainment value for the students. The students also seemed to enjoy the class a lot.