Internship Reflection

Shuting Shen

Colorado State University

 Internship Reflection

In the summer of 2018 I chose to work as a teacher assistant in an international

kindergarten for 200 hours in total from July 2nd, 2018 to August 3rd, 2018. I chose to do this

internship because when I was in China, my university major was in education of children. Also,

I received kindergarten teacher qualification certification in college. I hope I can go back to

China to teach young children English after graduating from CSU.

As a teacher’s assistant, I worked from 9:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. every day. I helped the

teacher to determine the specific time frame and contents of each class before the next class and

ensured that the teacher wrote down the teaching plan for next time. In addition, I assisted the

teacher in cultivating children's interest in English through game activities and helped train

children to communicate in English in their daily life. Also, I taught students how to remember

the English names of themselves and their companions. I worked with them on pronunciation of

simple words and phrases, such as the English names of common animals and food. After the

class, I needed to record the children’s performance and parents’ questions and then tidied up the

classroom.

Through this internship, I got a lot of teaching experience. First, it is not difficult to help

students to like English. Confidence and interest are main components. To establish confidence

and develop strong interest will play a positive role in promoting English learning. One way to

eliminate this psychological barrier to learning language is to teach students correct learning

methods. For example, when memorizing words, students can use multiple strategies to combine

learning and grasp the rules, so that students can follow rules instead of memorizing a certain

knowledge point mechanically. Second, cultivating students’ good habits can help a person

improve learning efficiency. Through the accumulation of good habits in regular study, many
practices can gradually form. The most effective time for students to cultivate good habits is at

the beginning of learning English. Otherwise, some bad habits will be hard to change once they

are formed. For example, when practicing writing words and sentences, students should pay

attention to punctuation, case and writing clearly. Further, I enjoyed my experience because I’m

now able to communicate with different students and give them advice on learning. If I have

strong communication skills and maintain a positive attitude toward communicating with parents

and students, I can facilitate an enjoyable atmosphere to learn together.

Overall, I have accumulated practical experience. In addition, I have learned how to be

better at overall planning and coordinating relationships between various aspects. I learned how

important it is to get along with colleagues and how to be a good foreign teacher assistant. I also

learned how to express myself in my work. I believe all this will help me with my career. No

matter what difficulties I encounter in my future work, I will try my best to continuously learn,

handle interpersonal relationships, take responsibility and take an active part in various activities

to increase my experience.