Session 13: Reflection

Time flies! I can't believe it was the last session of the course. We've all have had a very busy semester. September to December are always the busiest months of all teachers. Here I would like to thank Paul for teaching us and always encouraging us. I feel so lucky to be able to be your student again! In 2012-13, when I was studying in PGDP, you taught us how to be a good English teacher. Four years later, you make me reflect on my teaching and even make me more passionate about teaching English! :-)

 

In this session, we have tried to play a Kahoot game and a Quizlet Live game. All of us were crazy about the games and we became very motivated to answer the questions! I thought of my P.5 kids at that time and told Yvonne that I must try it with my P.5 kids! What a coincidence! I tried to use Socrative with my P.5 kids that morning! It was the first time I used Ipad with them. (Last time I tried to use Ipads with my P.3 class) Socrative is a really useful app but I was not sure if my P.5 kids would like it or not because the interface was not so attractive to students. :-P Yet, they liked Socrative a lot. I designed some questions testing them how to use tenses correctly. Two of them shared one Ipad and took turns to answer the questions. When they answered the questions on Socrative, I heard them discussing with their partner, saying something like 'Choose past tense! The sentence mentioned last night!' At that moment, I knew they were really into the practice! At the end of the lesson, I asked them if they wanted to use Ipads in the English lessons again, they all said yes. I am determined to use Kahoot next time and I am sure they will go crazy! Haha!

(This is the result of Socrative task. It is shown on an Excel file.)

 I have been very happy since I took this course because I keep trying something new in my English lessons. I don't just rely on Powerpoints anymore. Now I am thinking about having a class blog with my P.5 kids. I would like to share my feelings with them (and forcing them to read more English, haha!) and post some practice and games for them. I know that not all of them have computers or are able to access to the Internet every day, but I really want to do more for them. They are in a less able class and my aim is to make them fall in love in English. I really hope that after two years, when they graduate, they will look back and think they have learnt a lot and had fun in English lessons and become more interested in English. As the course is coming to an end, I promise I will not stop trying to make my lessons more interesting by using IT! Thanks Paul again! :-)

 

Session 13: GoFormative quiz sheet

It is a GoFormative quiz sheet designed for my P.3 class. They are going to complete a reading comprehension containing five questions.

Session 13: Google Form

It is a questionnaire about your work situation. Please complete all the questions! :-)

Session 12: Reflection

In this session, Zoe and Paul shared their experience of their flipped classroom project for a P.4 class with us. Their sharing inspired me a lot. It motivated me to try to teach English by using e-learning tools in class. I would like to thank Zoe for using her precious Friday night to share her experience with us. It really means a lot to me.

After Zoe and Paul's sharing, we tried to create a Nearpod lesson. Nearpod is very useful to all of us. It is very easy to use. The advantage is that we can add activities like polls, open-ended questions and memory tests to the lessons very easily. It really saves teachers'  time! We can also add some Powerpoint slides to it. Paul also showed us that the lesson can be teacher-paced. That is really important because sometimes teachers do need to take control of the lessons! The disadvantage is that there are just few layouts for us to choose and we cannot change the font size or font colour. It has some limitations because the tool is free. I do want to try a Nearpod lesson at school as the school has bought 30 Ipads recently. All of the teachers are encouraged to use Ipads. That is a good news to me! Yet, I took 8 Ipads to my P.3 class last Wednesday as I wanted to try using Socrative with them. 4 Ipads could not be connected to the Internet so I could not use Ipads that day. I could not find anyone for help at that moment! (My students were so disappointed!) I promised them to bring Ipads again on the next day and luckily they all worked. I am interested in trying all the tools but I really hope my school has a stable network. Otherwise, all the things prepared cannot be done. :'( 

Session 12: Nearpod lesson

This is the Nearpod lesson I've made for my P.5 students. They are learning to read notices. It is more interesting to test their understanding of the texts by using Nearpod than doing worksheets.

Session 11: reflection

In this session, we have tried to create a Padlet wall and a prezi. Padlet is one of the tools that I like the most and I found that Padlet is very useful in lots of ways. Besides asking students to brainstorm ideas and post them on the wall, creating a Padlet wall which contains a lot of files is quite useful for teachers as teachers can show what students are going to do in that unit clearly. It is very important for students to have a clear picture about what they are going to learn and do in lessons. 

Wix also attracts me a lot. I've never known that creating a website can be so easy! When Paul said some teachers are 'forced' by school to create one website for their own classes, I do think that I am so lucky that I don't have to do it! :-P (But I do have a thought to create a class blog for my P.5 class and I am not 'forced' to do it!) Yet, if I have to create a website in the future, I can try Wix or Adobe Page. I am so glad to know there are such useful tools!

Prezi is also very useful. I admit that I am very 'outdated' because I just use Powerpoints as a presenting tool when I am teaching. While I was trying to create a Prezi in this session, I kept thinking how my students would react when they see Prezi. I guess they will be very excited to see a teacher using something new to teach them. As I am teaching in a primary school, it is hard for the young learners to make a Prezi to present some ideas by themselves. That may be more suitable for secondary school students because they have to do projects and presentations. If I teach P.6 students and time is enough, I may ask them to present their writing ideas in Prezi as a pre-writing task. But now, I may use Prezi to explain something to my students instead of asking them to make one. 

 P.S. Sorry, Paul. I haven't tried to use Nearpod in my lessons yet because I didn't have enough time to finish it before I taught that reading text. Hope I can have a chance to use Nearpod very soon! (As exam is coming after the Christmas holiday, I have to rush to do many things in class!!  :'( It's very sad!)

 

Session 11: Prezi

This is the first Prezi that I've made! 
I tried to make a simple one about how people use present perfect tense!