WEEK 8 AT EOI ELX

Hello, my readers!

I am so sorry to announce you some bad news, this week I have just attended EOI on Tuesday 28th, March due to health problems I have had. My bronchitis did not allow me to talk at all and participate at any activity.

Next week I hope to come back completely recovered.

My best wishes, 

Miss Bacaicoa

WEEK 7 AT EOI ELX

Hello, my readers!

Monday 20th, March

On Monday I was busy upstairs preparing my lesson plan and so on.

Tuesday 21st, March

Group 09B (B2.2):
Room 15. This is the only group that Ramón Antón, EOI headmaster, teaches during this academic year. I was observing this class for my very first time and here is what it happened. My master's colleague Begoña Lavale is mentored by Ramón and so, part of today's teaching was carried out by her.

Group 11B: 

My lesson plan (16/24 SS.) / DAY 1 (2h) / Pages 98-

First of all, I had planned several warming-up questions to ask to my ss. about their sports habits. For instance: 

• Do you do any sport?
• How do you feel afterwards?
• How many times a week?
• Do you prefer to do it indoors or outdoors?

As they had already met me, we connected pretty much and a nice speaking time was shared about their experiencies beyond the classroom. Also, to contrast their personal opinions to someone else's, I asked for a volunteer to read the quotation by Stuart Heritage, a British journalist (p. 98):

"Runners run because they like running, joggers jog because they like cake." 

I wanted to lead them to a brief debate on motivation and activate their previous knowledge.

Then, I guided them to focus on the lesson's title: "A good sport" and we discussed together about its meaning (a person who is cheerful and pleasant, especially in a difficult situation). 

Taking into account only the headlines of the text "Battle of Workouts", we could practise pronunciation of the most fashionable sports nowadays: circuits, pilates, spinning, squash, step, tennis, weights, and yoga.

Without reading, just looking at the pictures and ss. tried to guess whether the statements from activity b) on page 99 were true or false. The results were highly positive in general terms.

The second part of my session was dedicated to grammar. As I decided to approach to it deductively, I told my ss. to explain what they alredy knew about relative clauses in English and complete the exercise a) on page 100. After 5 minutes of individual thinking and a couple of them more of pair "cheating" (comparison in couples), we checked it aloud and I taught them further. The following aspects had never been introduce at B2.2 level, so they were complete new for them:

• WHICH to refer to a whole preceding clause, adding more information.
• Quantifiers, numbers, superlatives + OF + Which / whom / whose [NON-DEFINING RELATIVE CLAUSES]4
• WHAT used as a relative pronoun to mean 'the thing' or 'things which'.

We read together the examples on page 159 and activities a) and b) were mandatory homework for next day with me. 

The closing activity was aimed at improving their writing, patience, and promote their creativity. In order to have everything prepared in advance, I went to the classroom much earlier than ss. and moved the tables in groups of four. Furthermore, I had printed six famous paintings the day before and I left them in the middle of each team with a post-it on them with two relative pronouns. 

Ss. had to make up a story about the painting and introduce it to the audience as if they were guides in a museum. I took us between 15 and 20 minutes and they created really good stories.  

These were the pictures I gave them, all of them taken from Creative Commons:

  

 

To conclude, I let 5 minutes left for doubts.

Thursday 23rd, March

After greeting my ss., we started the session correcting the exercises they had as homework about relative clauses and completing the article (a) on the worksheet I photocopied and handed in as an extra practice paper (p. 181 from the Teacher's book). 

On the one hand, we worked on word building: adjectives - nouns - verbs related to sports and health on page 99, activities a, b, and c.

On the second hand, ss. were requiered to read the information box about homographs on page 100 and match the suitable pronunciation to their corresponding definition at the exercise below (a).

When we were about to finish, Roge suggested that they watch or read the news during the weekend and then, next Tuesday retell the others an interesting or shocking piece of news.

Miss Bacaicoa

WEEK 6 AT EOI ELX

Hello, my readers!

Monday, 13th & Wednesday, 15th March

As I had been already told about the didactic unit I was going to teach on the following week, I decided to spend some extra time working on it at the PC ROOM upstairs. 

Tuesday, 14th March & Thursday, 16th March

On these days, I attended only B2.2 level (Group 11B) to closely see their improvement and learn about their learning styles for next sessions in which I will be in charge of them. Here, I am going to summarise what Roge did on both days.

READING: "How I stay calm" (p. 63)

Ss. watched a short VIDEO about giving presentations, and then completed the sentences on the exercise "Can you understand this film?"

THEORY: Distancing, also called hedging, appears fully explained on page 148, but the teacher decided to introduce this topic differently. Internet access was requiered on their mobile phones in order to play KAHOOT (8 multiple-choice sentences to fill in with the appropiate structures expressing distance from the given information). E.g. "there are believed to be many..." "It appears that there is..." 

#WOW: BRAIN BREAK 👀

Each student has to write in capital letters on recycled sheet the following heading TELL US ABOUT... and then add some original statement, wrap it into a ball, toss it to a classmate three times, take one, and open it up. Think about your own experience and share it aloud with the person in front of you. 

TEXTBOOK: A discoursive essay (p. 118). Speaking time in groups about the topic "Do smartphones really improve our lives?" Ss. were asked for argumenting some advantages and disadvantages in a balanced manner. To do so, they also read aloud two examples in favour an against from the book, at the end Roge corrected their pronunciation errors. Next exercises were aimed at differenciating between expression for adding supportive information and weighing up an argument. 

As homework, ss. will have a week to hand in a composition on this topic. Thursday's session finished talking about rules introduced by the expression "I (do not) think..."

Friday, 17th March

TUTORÍA 9:10h-10h: An A2.1 level student came to see her February exam and understand her mistakes.

Undoubtely, observing a department meeting was one of the best and most was an exciting moments from the whole insternship period and from which a training teacher is able to understand better how a school works from inside. 

Besides, I could learn about the importance of coworking, and sharing ideas. The English Deptarment at EOI in Elche is composed by 21 teachers, half of the school staff. As you can imagine, there is a variety of different ages, favourite methods and personal opinions that do not always match at all. 

I would like you to know the list of items on the head of department's agenda (Klara Seheult):

• Approval of the previous minutes (aprobación del acta anterior)
• February examination results (exámenes de febrero)
• Final examination dates (fechas exámenes de mayo)
• Official certificates (exámenes de certificación)
• Complaints, suggestions, etc. (quejas o sugerencias)

Miss Bacaicoa

WEEK 5 AT EOI ELX

Hello, my readers!

Monday, 6th March

I was studying at the PC ROOM because they continued with EOI EXAMS.

Tuesday, 7th March

Today, I was attending and grading oral exams from Group 11B (B2.2). I asked Roge for his personal template to attach it to this post and show you how we were grading our ss. 

Thursday, 9th March

Group 9B:

Brief activity on the modal verb CAN/CAN'T.

#EMPATHYISTHEKEY ✌

"Are you happy with your exam?"

The teacher handed in their corrected exams, and also answered and commented aloud some repeated mistakes he had observed when marking. (15')

Those people not able to come to class today and want to see their exams must go to Tutoría any Friday (9.10AM to 10AM), it is not necessary to make an appointment. Otherwise, in case they ask for it during the following class, the teacher only will tell them their grades on each skill. 

TEAM WORK: 4 people worksheet in Spanish. 

• "Dile a tu compañero que..."
• "Pregúntale a tu compañero si..."
• "Pregúntale a tu compañero..." + WH- words (when, who, why, where, how, what)

Roge was walking around and checking grammar mistakes. Next day, ss. will have to translate into the target language all their proposals.

Group 11B:

Today's session was divided into two sections mainly aimed at working on their enhancing their knowledge on common money issues orally. On the one hand, throughout the classbook, but also activating their previous contact with slang and English-speaking cultures.

As you already know, a huge number of PROVERBS are shared with this group and collected in a document in personal Drive. 

TEXTBOOK - Vocabulary about money (page 106): budget, fare, fee, grant, savings, loan, instalment, deposit, will, lumpsum, etc.

SPEAKING. There is a section about money in today's society, where some expressions are marked in bold and the teacher motivated them to define on their own words: consumer society, standard of living, inflation, cost of living, in debt, mortgage, shares, stock market.

They read aloud the following opposite terms from a Thesaurus, including samples in  context.

1. Rich > affluent, wealthy, loaded, well-off
2. Poor > broke, penniless (literary), hard up

And also, they discussed about slang used in the USA and the UK in order to refer to banknotes.

• Bucks: dollars.
• Quid: pound/s.
• Five grand: 5,000 pounds.

Miss Bacaicoa

WEEK 4 AT EOI ELX

Hello, my readers!

😐Confidentiality notice! I am not allowed to write about the exam contents. Therefore, my work this week will be limited to the tests' description and timing.

Monday, 27th February

The first thing I did in the morning was reading the PEC (Proyecto Educativo de Centro), at the computers room, in order to analyse it and to reach a closer knowledge of the school organisation. It is considered to be a part of the PRACTICUM II. But, until the time to go downstairs for the Group 11A (A2.1) arrived, I also surfed on Conselleria’s website.

EOI EXAMS TODAY: Reading, and listening comprehension. Writing expression.

At 11:10h, the everyday starting time, our students started to arrive. However, the back door was not locked until 11:30h, then they had to begin with the reading exercise (T/F statements), and listening (consisting of 2 parts that they could listen 3 times each, all of them with a 30 seconds break in between). 

Exactly at 11:50h, the teacher announced they had to hand in their exams so to continue with their compositions on the second half of the session. The finish time establish was 12:55h. During this period of exams all the A2 levels at the school are given extra time to do the exams, if it is compared to official certifications in May/June. 

Also, was correcting 6 compositions from another group (9A), afterwards, Roge revised my checking and gave me some piece of advice and guides.

#WOW 👀

The evaluation criteria concerning the minimum grade considered so to pass is set as follows: 6/10, that is to say, ss. need at least a 6 over 10. It might seem restrictive or unfair, but Cambridge or Trinity official exams are graded from 70% (7) upwards.  

Tuesday, 28th February

Group 11B:

EOI EXAM TODAY: Reading comprehension (evaluated over 28 points, min. 17 to pass). 

11:15h We waited for 30’ until the listening was played twice). There were two texts with their corresponding tasks (on the one hand, to match headings to paragraphs, and on the other hand, to complete the missing phrases into gaps).

12:15h Listening comprehension (correction over 12/20).
Instructions were heared from the class' laptop, not from the teacher. Ss. had 1 minute and 30 seconds to read the statements, then the listening was repeated twice. They had 2 more minutes to review. As well as the previous skill, there were also 2 short tasks in order to check their level of understanding (statements T/F, 5 multiple-choice questions).

Wednesday, 1st March

For the first hour, as well as the last, I was at the PC room upstairs working on my blog. 

Group 11A:

11:15h EOI EXAM TODAY: Oral expression (monologues). Monologues based on a description. Mainly, ss. were requiered to make basic short sentences, and to use connectors studied such as "and", "but" or "because". Roge and I gave them a card prepared and laminated in advance in which there was a photo and listed information about a person. For 10 minutes they were isolated and able to prepare a brief mind index, it was not permited at all to take notes or write anything. When we called them in pairs, they could have their cards in front of them just in case but under no circumstance go and read it literally.

Thursday, 2nd March

Today, I also decided to be on the computers room making a summary of the activities observed so far. 

Group 11B:

11:10h EOI EXAM TODAY: Written expression.
Prompt: “Choose one of the following options (A or B). Write 180-210 words. Write only the specified number of words (+/- 10%). Otherwise, you will be penalised.” 

I met my tutor individually for the last half an hour to share my impressions on the exams week.

Miss Bacaicoa