Initial Reflections on Classroom Practice

The SIT TESOL Certificate Course

Please answer these prompts and questions for each lesson you teach during the course.
Write your responses the first 10 minutes of the feedback session. These reflections are meant
to help prepare you for the discussion and to support you during the discussion. These are
your notes and can be hand-written. Please attach your initial reflections to each lesson plan
and keep them with trainer written feedback in your portfolio.
Name Walter Alvarenga Level of Class Low
beginners
ECRIF Speaking
Grammar
PDP Listening
Reading
Writing Culture
Date April 28th Number of Students
2

My initial feelings on the lesson Ive just taught.
I was very happy to have heard from Emma that my lesson was well-structured in the ECRIF
framework. I had taken my time to plan it trying to put into practice what has been seen in the
workshops so far. However, I was not sure about the students I was going to have and was
afraid of not having any, as we did the last time. Then, when two students arrived, I got happy
and nervous at the same time because it was the first time I saw those students and therefore
was not sure if my lesson was going to meet their needs, as it had been planned based on the
observation done to four different students. Then, as I began the class, I felt it was going well,
but there was some point at the end that made me feel I was not going to fulfill my objective
because what I had planned was too much for my students. By the end of the last activity, I
felt happy to see my students grasped some input from the lesson, but I was not sure if my
objective was accomplished because they could not be fluent in oral production.
KEY MOMENTS
What I planned to do. What actually happened.
(What the students did/said,
what I did/said)
What I was feeling and
thinking at the time.
I planned to do my class
dynamic and let students
learn by doing. My objective
was to have them tell me by
the end of the class their
daily morning routine and
take them to a scaffolded
process that would help them
The class was somehow
dynamic, trying to work with
different language styles. But
in some points, the students
were confused for the amount
of information given to them
and complexity of it. They
could not provide as much
I felt anxious as I saw the
activities did not work the
way I had planned. I felt the
need to add something to
help students grasp more
about the grammatical part so
that they could be more
fluent in the last past of the
do so. Besides, I planned to
inspire their curiosity about
the language and have them
provide more actions to use
in the morning routine.
vocabulary that could help to
give a complement to the
phrases I provided and they
got stuck when wanting to go
beyond because they could
not grasp as much as they
wanted and I had planned.
lesson. I felt I was getting to
the Internalize of the ECRIF
framework, but I felt the need
to go to a clarifying activity
that was not part of my plan
but could help students in the
process.
What did the students learn and how did they show me they learned it?
They learned that there is a difference in the usage of the verbs in simple present tense first and third
person singular. They showed me that in the last activities of the lesson in which they were challenged
to produce the language studied. Besides, they learned that after and then can connect two ideas.
What were the objectives of the lesson?
How well did the students achieve them?
The objective was: SWBAT use 4-7 expressions about their morning routine in order to talk about
their morning daily routine in a mingle activity. And it was achieved in a very limited point because
one student could use 5 expressions and the other one had a hard time trying to use them and to use 4.
But they both got a clear idea of the change in third person singular when using verbs in simple
present tense, which is rewarding.
Things that I think effectively served students learning in this lesson:
One of the things that helped students learning was my attitude in the class. I was always
encouraging them to do the things and modeling how to do them. For example, I went to the
floor to perform the actions together with them. Besides that, this kinesthetic activity was
meaningful for them as they were doing the actions.
Things that are puzzling me from this lesson:
I noticed Gilmar has problems with one of his arms. Therefore, in kinesthetic activities, there
might be some point that he gets uncomfortable.
One more puzzle is that I felt I could have gotten the objective in a more representative way.
Students missed more fluency at the end of the lesson. I would like to have more students to
make my class more interactive.
What Ive learned from this lesson about facilitating learning:
Students need to be connected with the topics to study. They learn by doing, by experimenting
and making meaning of what is being studied.
I need to be careful with the activities I perform in class. I need to observe my students so that
I do not make someone feel uncomfortable because he or she cannot perform an activity due
to a physical problem.
Questions / Issues/ puzzles I would like to get feedback on and/or to discuss and/or think more
about
How can I change the fluency of an activity when I notice it is somehow uncomfortable for a
student?
How can I make my class more interactive with only two students?