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Published: August 15th 2010
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CELTA - week 3.
I guess this has been the most challenging week so far, with so much going on, that all I could think about at the end of each day was 'Will I ever get my 8 hours of sleep?' That's just because the average sleeping hours have decreased to around 6.5h/night and I honestly cannot function well if I'm sleep-deprived. And to quote Hema, one of the fellow trainees, we should not only work hard on this course, but we should also enjoy it. Anyways, in a nutshell, my group of 6 trainees which taught Pre-Int for 2 weeks are now in charge of Uppr-Int. I had a busy weekend having to do my 2nd Celta assignment, including a lesson plan for a one-to-one class with my case study student and my lesson plan for Upper-Int on Monday.
I was the first one to have a go on Monday, doing a 30 minute lesson on Reading for Gist and Reading for Detail which went ok. I was a bit tense and stressed out as it was a new group and I didn't even know my students' names, but it turned out all right. As soon as
we finished at 5pm, after getting some valuable advice from Richard, out tutor, I rushed home to get my lesson plan ready for Tuesday, as I was teaching Grammar- Indirect Questions for 30 minutes. Wednesday morning I had a tutorial with Richard where we discussed my development and progress. Apparently I'm doing well, which is excellent news!😊 On Thursday we were upgraded to teach 60 minute classes. I did a lesson on grammar again- revision and practice on 3 tenses: Present Perfect Simple, Present Perfect Continuous and Past Tense. It was not an easy lesson, but to be honest I absolutely love how we are being trained to teach and how much we are learning every single day! So I successfully delivered what prior to Celta would have been a burden and a boring lesson to teach!!
But what makes this Celta course so special? Well, to being with, the emphasis is on the student-centred approach, where we try to elicit and get from the students as much knowledge as we can. It doesn't mean we, as teachers do less work, it only means we really put students on the spot, in the most positive way, maximizing their input,
active involvement and participation. I have honest to God never enjoyed teaching grammar so much! Stress is laid so little on rules, and mainly on examples, comparison of meaning (and shades of meaning) and mainly, lots of practice. I am starting to see more and more clearly how grammar can be made fun and not a burden. The perspective I'm getting on teaching is much more different than everything I've ever done or experienced before! I make students use their classroom time efficiently, make them talk, think, react, get involved. I am absolutely loving it.
This course is probably the best thing I've ever done in my life. I am learning new things every single day and nothing is boring. It's really how teaching should be!! Forget the traditional grammar presentation of the rules, reading and translation, it is ll rubbish! Real teaching is making the student alert and involved throughout the lesson. And I am getting better at it with every lesson I teach and every feedback I get! I love all the fun and creative activities, the interesting warmers, learning to deal really well with time management. I am getting a lot out of this course and
loving every minute of it! If only I weren't sooo tired! 😞( Anyways, as I was saying, the essential is that I'm learning a lot and everybody on the course is. You can see all the trainees getting better and better with every lesson they teach, adding something new, trying new, interesting activities that challenge the students and make learning fun. I am personally taking loads out of it and I'm sure I am becoming a better teacher by the day, with each input session and each lesson I plan and teach. I am developing a clear awareness of what education should be in the 21st century, with emphasis on the students and the teacher having so many more roles than rather just the traditional one- that is, just of a teacher who....teaches. In this new age, the teacher is a facilitator, a moderator, a counsellor, an adviser, and sometimes a teacher. Students already know so much and based on their background knowledge we build, create and help develop. I think I have learnt to better cater for different age groups, individual and collective needs, I have learnt how to teach grammar and make it fun, focus on developing skills
and good pronunciation, to basically teach with the student in mind, excluding rules all together, working on meaning and practice. My teaching experience has enriched soo much in the last 3 weeks, that I can hardly believe it myself. I am definitely doing a DELTA next summer, if it's any bit as good as the Celta I'm just doing, I'll be the happiest girl in the world!! 😊
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