OBSERVACIN Y PRCTICA DE LA ENSEANZA II

TYL Observation 2

Student: Juan Pablo Mura

This observation task was carried out in a Youngster 3 course (3 rd year elementary
level) at North Star School. The teacher in charge was Cecilia Armadnage and the group
consisted of 12 students, aged between 7 and 9 years old. In this report I am going to
describe the teachers use of L2, the activities designed, classroom management and my
own learning outcome.
With regard to the teachers use of L2, I was very much surprised to see that she
used English all the time, from the very beginning of the class. She used the L2 when
giving instructions, correcting mistakes, explaining concepts, and when students were on
tasks if they needed any help. The activities students carried out were adequate to their
level of proficiency and ran smoothly to the purpose they fulfilled. First, the teacher made
students sit on the floor in a circle and gave some pictures with different actions. Then, she
named some students to stand up and act the action they got so that the others could guess
what they were doing. The teacher encouraged all students to participate and act out their
actions. She created a very warm atmosphere, where students learnt by having fun. She
also used a lot of variety with regard to classroom management. She organized students in a
circle in the activity described above; then she let students work in pairs, for example, when
students had to tell their partners about their personal routines. She was very clear when
explaining new words and used meaningful contexts so that students could relate the new
words to their background knowledge. For example, when she asked the meaning of
countries she said Whats the name of our country?; then she showed a picture of a
Chinese boy and asked What country do you think he is from?, so when students saw the
picture they immediately recognized the boys place of origin.
In this observation, I learnt many positive aspects the teacher emphasized in the
class. First of all, I noticed that it is possible to speak in English all the time even when the
learners are young elementary level students. The only instance the teacher used Spanish
was when students did not understand one of the instructions. L2 was also the language to
correct mistakes, for example, when dealing with routines, a girl said she is waking up
and the teacher corrected her by saying Not in present continuous. Remember its
routine!. I also noticed the importance of TPR activities as young learners enjoy moving a
lot. As it was sometimes difficult to keep students on task because they are very active and

constantly moving, the teacher had to monitor them all the time and pay attention when
they needed some help when doing the activities. I liked how she ensured participation of
all students in the tasks and I learned some ways to get some troublesome students on task.
In this class, it was difficult to get some of the boys attention and participation but the
teacher successfully managed to get them on task. For example, she wrote a number on the
board and put her hand on it so that students could not see. Then, she asked the troublesome
boys to guess what number she had wrote and when they guessed they had to act out one
action in front of the class, and thus, engage them in the topic. I also noticed the importance
of variety both in classroom management and activities. At the very end of the class, the
teacher made students rap a song a big black bug bit a big black dog on his big black
nose. Then, she asked do you know Doris from Finding Nemo?, and she made students
sing the song and naming the days of the week as if they were Doris (with a slower pace
and lower pitch). With this, I noticed the importance of rhyme and rhythm for children
acquisition, that is, children learnt through musicality, making the song and the names of
the week more memorable. I enjoyed this class very much, since I could draw some links
between what we saw in class and actual practice and I could not avoid imagining myself
teaching that class to young learners.