Time for Action!

I had arranged with my tutor to have our second meeting today before the break so that we could continue speaking about how we will be carrying out the practicum. Once more, this meeting with her has been very useful to me. As I have been so many years out of the educational system, I need to get adapted to the new situation, this new educational system and, of course, to the daily life in this Secondary School. Afterwards, I felt like having a cigarette. So, I went outside the school building to smoke. One minute later, the concierge came to me and let me know I was not allowed to smoke even on the playground of the school, so I have had to go out of the enclosure. I was impressed. I expected they had applied in the schools the new 2006 Law about smoking in public indoor spaces, but I had never imagined smoking outdoors would be forbidden too. When I was a student we were even allowed to smoke on the corridors. And today, si ut us, at least, in IES Bernat el Ferrer. Then the bell has rung. The break had finished. It was time to follow my tutor to her next class. Five minutes later, the bell rang again. It was time to be in the classroom and ready to start the lesson: my first observation class.
The course I have first observed is group B1 in 3rd of ESO. According to my tutor, these are the students with a lower level of English comparing to the other groups in 3rd of ESO. My tutor seems to be very punctual. When the bell rang, we were already in class and she had already closed the door of the classroom too. Her students seem to know about this, so they all have tried to take out their book, their notebooks and their pens before my tutor started the lesson. Her first words have been to call for silence. She has moved away the tables of a couple of boys who were speaking non-stop and then she has started to call roll. At the same time she has called attendance she has asked to the student if they had made their homework. The students of this group reply in Spanish or Catalan, rarely in English. There are only 13 students and they interact with one another only in Spanish or Catalan. In the process of calling roll, one student has stood up and asked if he could go to wash his hands. My tutor has refused, as the class had already started.
The classroom is Aula 28, on the second floor. Three rows of two tables organized in 5 lines. There were approximately 20ºC in the class, it is maybe a bit cold. A couple of students have still their coats on, today is cold and cloudy outside too. The lighting is correct. Not only the natural light coming through the windows, wide open, but also the lamplight is the appropriate. The class has two computers, one on the teacher´s desk and one at the back. The one at the teacher´s table is connected to an overhead projector. There is a 2 squared-metre screen next to the blackboard. Next to the teacher´s desk, a CD player and a printer machine. On the ceiling, a couple of small loudspeakers. There is a map of the world on one left side of the class, under the corridor windows. On the light side, the exterior windows. There are greenish tones all over the classroom, from the blackboard to the painted walls. The class looks ideal for an English lesson.
They have started correcting exercises about the past simple and the past continous. The class has been in English, but my tutor had to speak in Catalan often so that the students could understand what she was saying. Translations were made constantly. She has used a lot of non-verbal language to clarify the meaning of some words. She has always been standing and moving from the right to the left side of the class, approaching to the students’ desks. She has spoken loud and clear, smiling all the time. She has been asking for the answers in general to the class. One reply, one “thanks”.
All of a sudden, one student was almost to tears. My tutor has noticed this and has asked her if she was feeling ok. She has taken the girl out of the class to speak to her. One minute later, my tutor came in. She has left her speaking with the teacher on duty. Five minutes later, the students came in, picked up her things and gone out of the class. They had called her parents and the student was going home.
The class has continued with the correction of exercises. When the students were wrong, she has corrected them. When the same student was right for a second time, sentences such as “you are brilliant today!” have encouraged the student to continue participating in class. If any question, the students have always asked and spoken in Catalan or Spanish. Nevertheless, my tutor has always made the effort of translating their words into English with a smile, as a way to encourage them to use the English language as much as possible in class. She has used titles or famous sentences of songs, examples of the daily lives of the students to explain the meaning of words … Despite the dynamism of my tutor, some students were sometimes lost and needed reconfirmation in Spanish or Catalan of what was being done. A couple of girls got distracted touching their hair, another student playing with his pen, some students not sitting appropriately… Wherever she has seen distraction, she has called their attention and tried to make them follow and participate in class. Whenever it was required, she has used her authority asking for discipline. The students have always done what she has asked to this respect, and she has never had a replay against it.
Finally, a student has asked in Spanish about the marks of the pre-evaluation exam and my tutor has replied she is not allowed to provide them, following the instructions of the school. One students has then told her they would not tell anyone and my tutor has answered that what they have to do is studying, specially now they are studying the present simple and the verbs are learned by heart because this way they would be able to show their parents they can pass English. And joking, she has told them that if they pass she wants a commission! This sense of humour has made the students smile and have looks of complicity in general. After this, the students have paid attention to her words and she has been able to encourage them again offering a “positive” because their behaviour , despite the usual interruptions and calls of attention to stop talking or to sit correctly, has been appropriate today.
Then the bell has rung again. The 60 minutes of class were over. The students have started to collect their books and have started asking my tutor questions at the same time. As the students were leaving, she has said goodbye to most of the students one by one.
After this class, the students of the group D2 of 1st of ESO came into classroom 28. Today, the group was to be divided into two: one would go with my tutor to the library for a conversation class and the other will stay in classroom 28 with another English teacher. In the library, they have all sat in circle around one big table. Today’s class was about directions and they all had to explain how to go from their homes to the school. There are only 13 students. Their level of English is good. They are able to create sentences and their communication language with my tutor is usually in English. They ask for the meaning of words in English, they ask for translations of words into English. After having B1 group of third of ESO, I am surprised these students in 1st of ESO have a better level of English than the previous group! Or at least, this is what it seems! They dare to use what they have learnt...
After these two classes, I know now how it feels to be back to school after so long. There have been many changes, but I am sure I will adapt very easily. Once more I feel very happy with the assignment of my tutor and my school. Only by observing her today I have already noticed and learnt some strategies which I am sure will be very useful for me in the near future.
I have agreed with her next Monday I will continue visiting all the other groups she is teaching English this year (5 in total). After the two classes of today, I am now very curious to know the level and the attitude of her three other groups and, especially, of those two groups I will be following more closely, which are groups B2 and D2.

Oooh Yes! Things have changed!

Following my CAP teacher’s instructions, I contacted via email the tutor I have been assigned for the CAP practicum experience and we arranged to meet today at 12pm. Just arriving, it has not taken me long to realize things have changed considerably since my old times at Secondary School: the school was locked, obviously for safety reasons. I had heard a lot about this on the news some years ago, but I had never had the chance to check if this was certain. So, I have had to ring a bell and after a short while waiting for the door to be opened, they let me in. I have parked my motorbike in the parking area, then, I have started to look for the main entrance. Wrong all the time. I would have imagined it would be located next the parking area, but the school has two totally different access roads: the one I used for vehicles, up the hill, at the back side of the school, and then the pedestrian access too, facing Molins de Rei and the Llobregat valley.
When I have arrived to the main entrance thanks to the indications of one of the teachers I have found on my way, the door was locked again. I have had to ring another bell and the concierge has opened it for me. I have informed him I had a meeting with my tutor and, while he was calling her, I made my way to the toilette. They were locked too. I have had to go back to the concierge to ask for the key without making any making any comment or question and then I have headed for my tutor´s department, on the first corridor to left. There I have met my tutor. She was waiting for me, working on the department's computer.
We have had a meeting for around one hour more or less, we have introduced ourselves and then we have started speaking about the Foreign Languages Department, about IES Bernat el Ferrer, the curriculum and the courses and levels of her students.
The Foreign Language Department is located inside the Language Department, together with other language teachers such as Spanish and Catalan. They are in total 18 teachers there. In the Foreign Language Department there are five teachers: four of them are teaching English and one of them is teaching French. The Head of the Department rotates every year between my tutor and a colleague of her. She is not the Head of the Department this year.
Oh yes, things have changed a lot since I was a Secondary School student, back in year 1993! When my tutor has started explaining me the different courses and levels of her students, we have both soon noticed there was a piece of missing information there for me. I had heard about the LOGSE and the LOE and the introduction of the compulsory Secondary School education until the age of 16. But I didn’t know the old division of the students into Arts and Science from the age of 14, as it was in the times I was a secondary school student, had disappeared. My tutor has explained me there are now what they call “instrumental subjects” such as Spanish, Catalan, Mathematics and English, which are taught in flexible groups organized by the different existing levels in each course of ESO. Therefore, there are not only classified per year of ESO (groups 11, 12, 13 for 1st of ESO, 21, 22, 23 for 2nd of ESO, 31, 32, 33 for 3rd of ESO and 41, 42, 43 for 4th of ESO), but they are also organized in flexible groups for these “instrumental subjects” according to their level. This is B1, B2, D1, D2, where B1 has the lowest level and D2 the highest level of English. They all have 3 hours of English per week. My tutor is basically teaching in 3rd year of ESO this year: she teaches the four above mentioned levels in 3rd of ESO and only group D2 in 1st of ESO. She has also explained me this first semester finishes on the 5th of December. The assessment meeting will take place on the 11th and 12th of December, then my tutor has to leave on an inspection trip. Therefore, as we have only 6 weeks to carry out the practicum, we have agreed I will first attend, observe and assist in one class of each of her groups and afterwards I will follow two groups instead of one: B2 and D2 of 3rd of ESO. Then, I will attend to the assessment meetings of these two groups too. As the tutor of group 31, I will attend a tutorship classes. Then, a department’s meeting, a tutors’ meeting and a teachers’ meeting too. Half of group D2 goes once per week with an English speaking teacher too. She is an Erasmus student and she is studying Spanish and Catalan in England. My tutor has introduced her to me and we have arranged to attend to one of her classes. She has introduced me a couple more of colleagues of the Foreign Languages’ Department. So, I have been able to arrange to be present in a couple of their Batxillerat classes too. IES Bernat el Ferrer has a Newcomers Welcome Program too, has my tutor explained me. I will try to do my best to attend to one of these meetings too.
To finish our meeting today, my tutor has informed me she is using two didactic units in 3rd of ESO. Oxford Spotlight 3 for the B2 group and English Alive 3 for group D2, both by the Oxford University Press. My tutor has provided me with a copy of each of them to check at home and have arranged to meet next Thursday the 30th for the first observation class. This has been my first approach to my CAP Practicum and I am very satisfied. My tutor seems to be very active and dynamic, a great professional, always a smile on her face…. I am sure I will be able to learn a lot from her. I must admit I have been lucky with this assignment.