1. Concrete Experience
If I think about my practicum, I have to confess that it was an atypical experience.
This is my second year in the practicum field, but this time everything was
different from the kindergarten experience. As we know Covid-19 changes the
world that we already know and its context is a new one. For that reason, we as
future teachers had to adapt to this new reality and provide our students a
meaningful learning experience throughout virtual lessons. The main aim was to
develop two didactics units with the following topics: “My House” and “My
Clothes”. These themes were developed integrating the four macro-skills as well
as different learning styles. It is important to highlight the variety of resources
and tools used to develop the lessons.
The first didactic unit’s aim was to identify new vocabulary related with “My House”
and revise the use of verb to be and vocabulary related to toys than students were
working previously. Four classes were developed through different activities and
purposes. The first two weeks we worked with students’ books (New English
Adventure- Starter B) in which they found Disney characters like Mike Wasowski
or his friend Sullivan from Monster Inc movie. They were the main characters in
the unit and I used them to create different resources. The last two weeks we
worked with a real context. I presented the topic through a video showing different
parts of my own house and students did the same with their houses. During the
same week we work collaboratively playing “Hide and Seek” on whatsapp.It was
a funny way to work with the target language and grammatical structures as well.
Besides, this activity encouraged speaking and writing skills. On the other side, as
homework students had to create a “Box house” that they used later in
synchronous lesson. This activity was designed by the Art teacher, Damina
Etcheverry who worked with me in an interdisciplinary way with the purpose to
foster students creativity in an art-craft work.
2. Last week, we met by Zoom. In this opportunity children reviewed one of the
games played through the lessons: “True or False”. They had to read the
sentences and answer if it is true or false which allowed them to use the new
vocabulary naturally while playing. Then we used our “Box Houses” with a small
ball. I had different parts of the house flashcards and when I showed some
students the flashcard, they had to put the ball in that place, shaking the box. The
idea was that children can recognize the places in a visual way and at the same
time tell the rest of the class where his/her ball is. Finally, we played “Hide and
Seek” again, as a closure activity.
The second didactic unit aim was to work with new vocabulary related to clothes.
In the first class activities encouraged listening and reading skills through different
materials. As in the previous unit, students used their books to work with this
topic. In this case, the main character was Rapunzel. Students review the use of
“verb to be” as well as “colours” and “places of the house”. In the second class,
they worked with a new grammatical structure, “Present Continuous” through a
listening activity from their book. In that activity they heard Rapunzel and Flynn’s
clothes description and they had to match the clothes with the character according
to the description. This activity encouraged the revision of vocabulary and the use
of the structure mentioned before. Then, students played a “Memory Game” in
which they found Rapunzel’s characters and their clothes. With the purpose to
foster speaking, the final activity of this week was to create Rapunzel or Flynn’s
outfit. Once they had created his/her outfit children had to send me a picture or a
short video describing what his/ her character was wearing. In the third week, as
in the previous unit, I introduce the topic in a real context through a video. This
time, I integrated the topic “Seasons and Clothes”. Students had to send me a
video or a photo in which they describe their favourite season of the year and their
favourite clothes. This activity encouraged speaking and writing skills because
some students decided to write his/her description instead of speaking. Then, I
created an online game: “Quizziz”. In this opportunity they had to answer
3. questions related to the topic and also students could play with their classmates
because they had to log-in with their names, so they could see other’s scores. Last
activity of this week was collaboratively through a whatsapp game. This time, I
used the same groups as in “Hide and Seek”. Children had to send a photo and
the rest of the group had to describe what he/she was wearing. The purpose was
to consolidate student’s knowledge about the topic and review some structures.
Finally, last week we had a synchronous lesson through Zoom. This time, students
had to wear special clothes. During the third week, I sent an invitation in which
there was a dress code for this meeting. The purpose was to play a game “Clothes-
dice” in which some students had to do different actions according to what they
were wearing. At the beginning of the lesson, we saw the same presentation as in
the first week with the purpose to foster students speaking abilities and review
the target language related to clothes. Then we played the dice-game explained
before and finally as a closure activity we played a game named: “Show me your
clothes”. This final game was with the purpose to focus on working with a real
context like students’ own clothes. I wrote different “Dress code” on small pieces
of paper and put them inside a box, then I took only one paper. Besides, I had
different flashcards upside down. Once that I read the dress code aloud, those
students had to “show me” the clothes according to the flashcard that I showed.
Reflective Observation
As I mentioned before, it was a challenge for me to design the units thinking about
this new context. On the other hand, it was a great experience and definitely a big
learning. When I was planning the units, I had to include the book that my
students used throughout the year. One of the reasons for my choice was because
they were familiar with the material and enjoyed its activities so much. On the
other side, it was useful to introduce the topic as we used to do in an imaginary
context and later work on real context. Therefore, I designed activities including
4. these contexts with the purpose to encourage the four macro-skills through
different and stimulating resources.
If I think in the resources, I can say that there were an interesting variety of them.
At the beginning of each unit, I prepared a powerpoint presentation or a Genially
presentation with the book’s characters to introduce the topic and then they
started to work on the book. The same was with some games like “Memory Game”
from the website Genially or with a “Quiz game” from the educational website
Quizizz. I have to mention that we used whatsapp as another tool to play different
games. This last resource was so useful because children know how to use it and
the activities were so dynamic (they worked in small groups in real-time).
The units were developed during eight weeks, the first three weeks of each unit I
sent the activities through a whatsapp group and the last week of each unit we
had synchronous Zoom meetings of 50 minutes each.
All that I have mentioned before contributed to engaging students with English
language in a meaningful way. They learnt with visual resources, technology and
mainly they learnt enjoying the lessons. When we met in our virtual lessons I
could see those happy faces and how engaged they were, not only with the
activities, they were enjoying the whole experience and their families too.
For me, it was an amazing learning opportunity. I am sure that we will never forget
it. Once upon a time an English teacher worked in a pandemic context with the
purpose to teach but at the same time to make their students happy.
Abstract Conceptualisation
Sometimes, I think about the experience and I am proud of the positive result. On
the other hand, if I have to do it again I will change some things. One of them will
5. be to incorporate more synchronous meetings. Definitively, students enjoyed this
kind of lesson and it is a way to engage them with the activities and at the same
time to work in real-time with them.
Active Experimentation
Teaching during Covid-19 in a primary public school was one of the big challenges
that I have experienced during my short teacher experience. As a result of this
situation, I have to say that I learnt a lot and made me a better teacher. Mainly,
because I understood the importance of putting into practice all the theories and
contents that we have been working on. We as future teachers know that teaching
is not a simple task, in fact sometimes could be challenging. But, are we ready to
face it?
Teachers around the world had to improve their ITC’s knowledge with the purpose
to do their work in a meaningful way. Besides, as teachers, we had to plan our
lessons taking into account this new context and our students’ reality
(socioeconomic). That is, thinking if they were able to use a web tool or even if
they had access to technology devices. After that process, we were able to work
on our lesson plans.
In my experience, I improve so much my lessons because I become a researcher,
looking for different resources, asking my colleagues and learning all the time. I
had to exploit my imagination to create enjoyable lessons with the purpose to give
my students a dynamic experience with the language. Learning L2 for Young
learners outside the classroom is not easy and we know that requires a lot of effort
from students, their families and teachers as well. For that reason, it was hard
work, but it was worth it.
