Reflection to Team Teaching Project

Gege Li
As I sit in front of my computer, appreciating what our team has accomplished
during the past two months, my mind is suddenly occupied by the flashbacks of the
days when we prepared for this team teaching project. It is quite interesting to look
back at the point when we achieve something, for it is the time when we finally
connect all the dots together to discover how each of these small dots which
seemed to be insignificant back then has led us to where we are now.
I wanted ESL 114 to be my host class was because among all the classes available
for us to choose, ESL114 was the only one whose focus was on speaking rather than
reading and writing. According to my own experience as an English learner, oral
English class had almost always left me with the impression of lightheartedness and
enjoyment, while reading and writing classes were tiring and tedious. My former
experience as an oral English teacher in a Chinese secondary school has also given me
confidence in teaching this type of class, so at the beginning I felt lucky that our team
could teach this class. However, as I learned more about teaching, especially teaching
in an ESL setting, it was not as easy as I imagined. Behind what seems to be a
not-so-hard-to-teach lesson are so many small details which are invisible to students
but should be most salient to teachers.
Right after we chose ESL114 as our host class, we scheduled a day with Brody,
our host teacher, for class observation. During the observation, I was impressed by
Brodys efforts in making every student feel important, regardless of their
nationalities and numbers. He remembered every students name and the place each of

them came from. In order to make everyone learn and feel equal, in one vowel sounds
reading practice, Brody made 5 slides of PPTs, and on each of them were problematic
vowel sounds for one particular countrys English learners. There were altogether
peoples of five different nationalities in the classroom. He would ask students from
the same country to raise their hands before asking them to read the slide prepared for
them. Apparently students liked this strategy. They all read and followed the teacher
with great enthusiasm. They must have felt respected, not only as a person, but also as
a person with a country and culture behind them. When I taught in China, the students
I was faced with were the ones who shared the same culture with me. I knew where
their troubles were and for most of the times, I knew how to solve them because I was
once in their position too. This shared experience as a Chinese English learner had
made me take so many things for granted and had also spared me a lot of extra work
to know my students needs. However, after observing Brodys class I realized that to
be an English teacher in ESL settings is, to some extent, different and more difficult.
Getting to know your students sometimes could mean starting to learn about the
country and culture. Students are not mere knowledge receivers, but they have their
own emotions, values and judgments.
After the observation, our team struggled a little bit about the topic we wanted to
talk about in our team teaching class before we set up a meeting with Brody, hoping
that he could lend us some ideas. When Brody showed us his syllabus to see how our
class could fit in, we found that most of the content he planned to cover was related to
what we were then learning in our Teaching American English Pronunciation class.

This important information reminded us to go back to our Teaching American English

Pronunciation textbook to look for some inspiration, and finally our team reached a
consensus to teach connected speech.
The significance of connected speech is pretty self-evident as the textbook has
devoted a whole chapter to introduce nearly every possible circumstance that it might
take place in native speakers daily conversation. The practicality and teachability
of connected speech are also major reasons why we decided to take it as our topic for
team teaching project. We found our textbook quite useful in guiding us how to
proceed without having to do everything from scratch, so the major part of the first
version of our lesson plan was born.
Our initial plan was to first tell students when and how they should apply
connected speech into their daily conversation (the rules), and then activities. In
Brodys response to our first draft of lesson plan, the suggestion was to simplify our
language for explanation and leave more room for students to practice. In addition, he
seemed a bit confused by some of our activities.
Apparently our excitement about finding the textbook to be our teaching
reference clouded our judgment towards whether it was appropriate to simply
transplant the language and the content from the textbook to our actual lesson. Using
a little bit of empathy, we would have known that no students would want to hear
teacher babbling metalanguage. Teachers should be responsible for making students
learn by using the simplest language. In our team discussion about how to revise the
lesson plan, we also discovered that we had distributed too much time to lecturing the

rules instead of letting students take the lead. We all thought that it was unnecessary
to cover every point in the textbook, and for similar points, we should combine them
into one. Based on Brodys suggestion and our discussion, the time of the lecturing
part was greatly reduced; however, we did not know what to do with our activities.
Until the day of presenting our activities in 493 class, we still had not found
better replacements for our current activities. Though my teammates and I knew that
our presentation was bound to be a failure and would receive much criticism, we still
felt the need to show it in front of the whole class, because we needed the feedback. If
we could not find better activities, the least we could do was to refine them by taking
our classmates and teachers advice.
The result was just as I had imagined. While I was introducing the game, word
blender, I was constantly interrupted by questions and doubts from both students and
teacher. Obviously, we had not thought this game through before we brought it on the
stage. Maybe we had not fully switched to teachers mode yet, for we often forgot to
try to look things from our students perspectives. For us, the game was just like
tic-tac-toe, which everyone should have known and played before. We took it for
granted that without much explanation, students would be able to know how to play it
once they saw it. When our teacher pointed out that what if some of the students in
our host class had never heard of this game before, I was caught off-guard, because I
had never contemplated this question.
Many other problems were identified by our teacher and classmates too, for
example the cooperation within our team. We did not know how other two team

members should do or should position themselves while the third one was lecturing.
Also the originality of the game was called into question. This game was another
unsuccessful transplant from somewhere else to our lesson.
Admittedly, the fiasco did discourage us a little bit, but it was also the turning
point of our team teaching project. Now in retrospect, all three of us are really grateful
for being offered this safe place to fail. The advice and harsh criticism was so
valuable that it made us seriously think about our problems as novice teachers. This
was when I felt the need to talk to my conversation partner as the final teaching day
was impending.
My conversation partner, a student in my host class, offered me a lot of useful
information about her class. She told me that almost everyone in the class was active
and motivated. As long as students understood what they were supposed to do,
participation of the students was not something we should worry about. Also she said
instead of two big games which would last for almost 30 minutes, more smaller
games with each of them lasted for about 5 to 8 minutes would be preferred. I was
inspired by her words, and came up with an idea that since we were about to teach
students rule by rule of the connected speech, why not insert a small game or activity
after the presentation of each rule for students to practice. After discussing this
thought with my teammates, our search for activities was more focused. Very soon we
found five practice activities, each of which could be adapted to go with one situation
of connected speech we were about to cover. After that our lesson plan was once again
experiencing a major change.

With a brand new version of our lesson plan, we were fortunate enough to be
granted a second chance to present our lesson in front of our classmates, only this
time we were not going on the stage empty handed as the first time. I could almost tell
from the expression of my classmates and teacher how impressed they were when our
team was presenting. This second rehearsal meant a lot to our team. It almost gave us
a sure sign that our lesson was going to be a success. With boosted confidence, we did
final revision of our lesson plan, and rehearsed several times before our first formal
debut.
I thought I may be nervous the day when we did the actual teaching; however, on
the contrary, when I entered the ESL114 classroom, I was surprisingly relieved and
excited. I felt relieved maybe because I had been expecting this day for so long. And
my excitement came from the knowledge that all these two months nerve-wracking
and emotional rollercoaster was finally about to mean something. I was curious
about how the students may react during and after this lesson. With a
well-contemplated plan and numerous times of rehearsals, I had had full grasp of the
role I would play; however, what interested me most was the part which I had no way
to predict or to prepare beforehand.
I did not expect the students to be so intrigued by our class as to raise questions;
however, the fact that they did ask several questions both in and after the lesson
surprised us and at the same time brought us huge sense of achievement.
When I was watching the video of our lesson, I am particularly impressed by how
I reacted when I received unexpected questions. When I was about to finish my part

of the lesson, a student suddenly raised his hand and expressed his confusion towards
a specific element which I had mentioned before. To be honest, I was not certain
about the right answer to that question, but I made sure that no one caught the fleeting
nervousness in my face. Whether knowing the answer or not, I did not want my
students to feel that I felt a lack of confidence. I have always believed that confidence
adds huge credibility to a teachers teaching. Instead of answering the student directly,
I quickly organized my thoughts and told the class my understanding towards the
question by showing them examples on the blackboard. I somehow created an
interactive atmosphere to make it like a discussion instead of just me answering the
question. Fortunately, the students were satisfied with my answer. I take this
unforeseen little incident a very good challenge as well as an alert that I should, in my
future teaching, also include predicting possible questions my students would raise as
part of my preparation.
Having our lesson videotaped was indeed a brilliant idea. It exposes even the
slightest or unnoticeable details which need to be refined. For example, I was never
aware that I may have spoken too fast. I could have slowed down when I was
lecturing in order to leave students more time to think. I also should have given
students more time to practice by themselves instead of let them repeat after me all
the time. This video is not merely a souvenir in memory of this team teaching project,
but something for us to constantly go back to and get something new out of it.
The value of this team teaching project lies not in its result but in every step of
the way which have brought us to this result. The whole process makes me have a

more thorough understanding about the essence of teaching. The extent to which a
teacher is willing to truly understand and think for his or her students through various
means largely determines how well this teacher can be. Though this team teaching
project has already ended, I believe it gives me the key to open the door of becoming
a better learner, communicator as well as a teacher.