Professional Documents
Culture Documents
ESL 6963
Final Reflection
During the last two and a half years studying Teaching English as a Second Language
(TESL) at The University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA), I have started to develop a
foundation off which I will and have tried to create my approach to teaching English language
learners (ELLs). I have found that combining multiple approaches may be the best way to serve
the diverse needs of my students in most classroom settings. These approaches include elements
from communicative language learning, task-based learning, and whole language. Language
draw on aspects of the importance of interaction which includes Canale & Swain’s (1980) further
within students’ Zones of Proximal Development (ZPD) and remembering the importance of
scaffolding appropriately (Brown & Lee, 2015, p. 79-80; Mitchell, Myles, & Marsden, 2013).
As I approached writing my 7 lesson plans for the accelerated 13 week session for a 1A
Grammar class I helped teach at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), I
kept the previous approaches to teaching in mind. Something I struggled with was finding ways
to make grammar learning interactive and engaging without falling into a routine of doing the
same things over and over again. An example of falling into these kinds of routines could have
been observed when I would do read alouds using the text books reading. I would always either
have the students take turns reading out loud or I would read it to them followed by inquiry to
determine their level of understanding of the content. One way that I could have improved this
protocol would have been to use group activities that asked them comprehension questions. The
problem with trying to do such an approach in this setting was this class was a fast paced class in
Mariah Jessen
ESL 6963
order to meet all the objectives laid out by UNAM for that course. They met 3 days a week and
they were learning up to 5 different kinds or aspects of grammar which did not leave much time
to spend on each one; Therefore, the focus was on trying to insure they understood and could
apply the grammar in order to pass the end of semester test. If I were to work for UNAM, I
would take time to discuss the structure of the class and objectives with the director to try and
better serve my students the next time I would: (1) focus more on the grammar that will be on
their exit exams for that level; and (2) focus on the grammar, whole language wise, that would be
more important as they move forward. One way that I succeeded in making grammar learning
more engaging was by using the multiple choice and unscramble the sentence games on Kahoot!
The students loved this activity and it took the pressure off of them as individuals as we weren’t
Normally, when teaching grammar, I prefer to take the inductive approach to teaching;
however, with such a low level class and with the time constraints, I found it was better to use
the deductive approach when first presenting it (Thornbury, 1999, p. 29). Thornbury (1999)
states that two of the advantages of using a deductive approach is “it gets straight to the point and
can therefore be time saving...this will allow more time for practice and application,” and “it
respects the intelligence and maturity of many -- especially adult -- students” (p. 30). With this in
mind, after the students had learned the rule(s) and were working on homework, if they got stuck
or applied a rule wrong, I would try to elicit the correct response by taking the inductive
approach. In my video self-evaluation of this class, you will see an example of me trying to
achieve this while helping a student revise sentences for a project-based learning exercise I
assigned. The issue at hand was the improper use of the preposition “in” when she needed “at.”
Mariah Jessen
ESL 6963
Instead of directly telling her how to correct this error, I questioned her choice by using “in
correctly and then asked which one we should use for this context. She was able to come to the
correct preposition, “on,” without further help. The greatest problem I had with taking an
(Thornbury, 1999, p. 30) instead of a “teacher as co-learner” classroom that I would have
preferred to see (Richards & Rogers, 2014, p. 107). I hope to continue to try and find ways to
make grammar learning, even at lower levels, less teacher fronted and more of a co-learner
environment.
The project that I assigned my students was probably the best example and aligned the
best with my approaches and goals for teaching. For this assignment, the students were to write
four questions about either a holiday or activity using the present progressive. In retrospect, this
activity would have been better reserved for using the future progressive which was covered the
following week. Once they had written the sentences (it was assigned as homework) they were to
bring them to class for me to check for any major grammar issues. After their sentences were
approved, they were then to record their questions using either powerpoint or some other media
and then present it to the class the following Monday. The purpose of recording them asking the
questions in advance was that many of the students appeared to have high affective filters when
speaking and this allowed them to be in front of the class without having to feel overwhelmed
with trying to produce the language. I found that by allowing this, they spoke not only to respond
to the questions, but to ask comprehension questions and even try and make jokes. By allowing
them to record their questions, it seemed to led to a more authentic use of language than had I
Overall, teaching the 1A grammar course has taught me that I still have a lot to learn
when it comes to creating lesson plans and enacting them in class. I do feel that I could have
better prepared for teaching this class had I been responsible for teaching the whole class and
could have discussed any questions or issues with the director of the program. One of the
greatest problems I found was that only half of the grammar we had rushed to try and teach our
students was actually tested on the exit exam. Had I known in advance what was present on the
References
approach to language pedagogy. (4th ed.). White Plains, NY: Pearson Education.
Mitchell, R., Myles, F., & Marsden, E. (2013). Second language learning theories (3rd ed.).
Richards, Jack C, and Rodgers, Theodore S. (2014). Approaches and methods in language