My first practicum period: Kindergarten

A great experience, I dare say! Even though I'm used to teaching English to absolute beginners (I work as an EFL teacher in a primary school with children from grades 1-3), the fact that these kids were younger (most of them were only 5) was a challenge to me. Believe me, one year-time, when it comes to cognitive and affective development makes a world of difference.
First of all, I have to face the issue of their short attention-span. Not only did I have to grab their attention, but also maintained them focused and interested on what I had prepared for them. I wasn't able, at the very beginning, to notice when they started to lose interest. However, as time passed by and I got to know them better as a group as well as individuals, it all became easier. 
All the theories, the articles and the bibliography read got to life, at least I felt it that way. And on top of everything, I came to the conclusion that, besides the lexis and functions we may aim to teach our students, rapport is essential to achieve that goal. What do I understand for Rapport? well, the ability to make the other (our students) feel that we take them and respect them as they are, that we value every single attempt they make, no matter if they fail or succeed. That we are there  to support them to be their guide without imposing any path.

Below you will find some pictures, my lesson plans and the material and resources I created or borrowed to comply with my task during this period.



My 41st birthday in "Jardín de Infantes Cardenal Spínola", Lovely!!!


Observation-period before the actual practicum.


As EFL teaching-trainees, we are asked to perform a series of tasks related to our future work either in an educational institution or on our own (running our own language - school, for instance). Since our main concern is to provide our students with what they need, the only way to know exactly what it is by getting to know them.
That is the reason for this observation period: To get in touch with the children's reality. And that includes everything ranging from the kids themselves, the developmental stage, their abilities as individuals as well as a group of students, that the web of social relationships they have built with their mates, their teachers and all the people in the kindergarten they meet on a daily basis.
Thus, in order to carry out this task, I met the course teachers, the principal and the children, of course! Since it was the teachers and the principal's wish that both K-5 groups (morning and afternoon) had the chance to experience learning English, I observed these children during a complete week, from May 11th to May 18th.
Here, some notes I took during that week, along with one of my tutors' comments:


Date: May 11th, 2015
1st Observation- K5 group- Morning shift. Jardín de Infantes “Cardenal Spínola”
Today, from 10:00 to 10:30, I met one of the groups I’m going to work with for the first time.
Since I was a little bit anxious about this, I arrived almost at the same time the teachers and the headmistress did.
It is great to know that they are very excited at the idea of offering their learners the chance to learn English. That was one of the reasons (if not the main) to make the decision of working with both K5 groups, the one in the morning and the other, in the afternoon. After all, according to what I read in the file “Trabajos de Regularización”, I should provide a service to the school that agreed to my request of doing my practicum there, and I think this is the best way to do it. Moreover, it’ll allow me to perceive the main differences between these two groups.
As regards the differences, the headmistress  provided me with the “Diagnóstico Inicial” carried out by the teachers during March and April, on which they based the whole-year curriculum. I read both files last week, and this morning I came back to the one focused on the group I was going to observe. Let me tell you that everything was exactly as it was depicted there! The group behaved really well: they listened to each other as they moved to the board and write their names during an activity in which T aimed to integrate numbers and literacy.
Next Wednesday I’ll be visiting this group again to see how they work on a very specific activity, other than the starting routine I witnessed this morning..
Date: May 13th
2nd Observation- K5 group- Morning shift. Jardín de Infantes “Cardenal Spínola”.
This morning I met this group for the second time. I came to their room right after they had breakfast.
While I was waiting for the teachers and the children to clean up their tables, I took a look at the place. I visited the video-room, big enough so as to gather the 27 children there. The headmistress had already told me that I could use it anytime, only that I should tell her two or three days before, of course. It all has to do with the proper organization of this institution.
As soon as I entered the room, the teacher in charge today, Silvia, provided me with the details on the activity they were about to carry out. The whole day would be devoted to literacy, from the very beginning of the lesson. During the “good morning” routine (circle-time), children had been working on their names, identifying the initial letters and sorting out their name tags by the alphabet (written on the white-board).That was quite a hint since, besides numbers, that is a topic (or should I say “skill”?) both teachers asked me to reinforce during my interventions in the first weeks of June (I hope!).
As regards the activity itself, Ss developed their fine-motor skills by working with plasticine, modelling their names with it. By asking Ss to do that, the teacher connected the first task of the morning with this one.
The most exciting moment was when Miss Silvia asked me to help her distribute the name-tags. It was a great chance to start interacting with the children! I couldn’t help it and I started using the target language. Children were amazed, surprised at the oral exchange started and, even though they couldn’t reply to my “here you are!” when they received their name cards, some of them said “Gracias!”.
Needless to say, Chomsky, the need of contextualised teaching and the connection between meaning and intonation came to my mind.
Next Thursday, that is tomorrow, I’m visiting the other group…. It’s time to go over their Diagnosis report again.
Date: May 14th
1st Observation- K5 group- Afternoon shift. Jardín de Infantes “Cardenal Spínola”.
This afternoon I met the second K5 group. Since I had already read the regular teacher’s diagnostic report I really expected to find a very noisy group, but that was not exactly what happened.
Among the 25 children (although today there were only 24) there are four special cases: two of them dealing with disruptive behaviour, a third one with a sort of cognitive disorder (they’re all followed by a pedagogue), and finally there’s Benjamin, a boy diagnosed with Autism. I had the chance to talk with his companion teacher, Fernanda, who gave me an insight into Benji’s current situation and the improvements he made in the last year.
To tell the truth, having a student with this kind of features is challenging and scary at the same time. I’ve started searching for more information in order to know more about this disorder as well as the possibility for these individuals to learn/acquire a foreign language, considering that they’re still struggling to communicate in their mother tongue.
So far, my research led me to the following sites:






I must keep on reading because, contrary to my initial assumptions, these articles/ papers do not discourage L2 learning. What is more, Fernanda herself told me that Benji could name the primary colours in English, which he learned by watching Doki in Discovery Kids. Something to bear in mind at the time of selecting videos!
Returning to the big group and their starting routine, it was quite similar to the one carried out by the morning group, only that these children required more support from the teachers and resorted to their name-tags to write their names on the board. But, they still seemed to have problems to recognise number figures.
You have provided insightful reflections upon the groups you are about to teach. It will be a challenging and thus enriching teaching experience, which may help you develop personally and professionally.
V. Good work!
Date: May 18th
2nd Observation- K5 group- Afternoon shift. Jardín de Infantes “Cardenal Spínola”.
This afternoon was very quiet since five Ss were absent, among those there were Benji and Franco, two of the most complicated cases so to speak.
Maybe it was for that reason that the topic lesson designed for today went so well. It was all devoted to national history, focusing mainly on this “Semana de mayo”which started today, May 18th celebrating “Día de la escarapela”.
Miss Silvia drew on storytelling to tell her Ss about the situation back in 1810 “when the Spanish King’s very very good friend lived in a very very big house (with many many windows) and never let anyone do what they wanted to do. People were very very sad and decided to get together to tell this man, the Spanish King’s very very good friend (whose name was Virrey Cisneros), that they didn’t want to follow his orders anymore. So these people gathered at the city’s main square and, to help others know they were part of a group, they wore light-blue and white ribbon. That was the very first time people wore an “escarapela”.
Miss Silvia made use of all the strategies we have been taught about storytelling here at Lenguas: She made eye-contact with her Ss. The seating arrangement she employed consisted in having children sit in front of her, not in a circle (as she usually does when working on the carpet). She also promoted eliciting by starting a phrase and waiting for Ss to finish it. Gestures were also very important.
As soon as the story ended, she asked Ss for their help to make the invitations for next Friday’s festival. She showed Ss an “escarapela” blank template and told them they would have to paint it (they used tempera). After Ss agreed both on the colours and the pattern for colouring the template, they were told to move to their work.







By the end of that period, I was able to write the following Diagnostic Report, which was the basis for my teaching experience in this kindergarten:







Designing and delivering lessons

(image taken from http://pablocheesecake.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/Panic.png)

Easier said than done! It has always been that way, but once you are into it, somehow everything starts to flow and you do not have more to do than going with it. 
Something I was certain from the very beginning had to do with making use of a puppet. I had read something about it, and the course teachers had also suggested the inclusion of a pet or something similar so as to help children relate it with the English lesson.
So, I started searching for THE puppet. It had to be an animal (kids love animals and I love them too!). I surfed the most popular buying site in Argentina, www.mercadolibre.com and I found Tiggy!
It was love at first sight!

Tiggy and me...Aren't we lovely? heheh!!


During the week the seller took to send my teaching-companion, I spent some time watching videos (mainly on www.youtube.com) about the "art" of using puppets in the classroom. An art, indeed!! 
Here you can watch, in my opinion, the video that helped me the most:




In the meantime, I also started writing my lesson plans. Since I was going to deliver lessons to two different groups on different dates and times, the first encounter should reflect that feature. For instance, the morning group would have their first lesson on Monday, June 15th as soon as they started their day, which implied that I had to devote a whole lesson to introduce and practice greetings. At the same time,  I was supposed to take atendance. 

After several drafts, this was the final lesson plan for my first week with the morning group:



The remaining four plans dealt with the places in the kindergarten and school objects. They all have Tiggy as the main character who needed the children's help to learn the vocabulary and get his school-bag ready to go to school. An experience these children will face next year.



Moure kinder morning_group_lesson_plans_week2_class3 - 9.5 from Regina Moure


The third lesson required moving the children to the video-room, where they would watch a short video to learn the rooms in the kindergarten.
When designing the video, which basically was a powerpoint presentation saved as a .mov file, I had to decide whether to record the script and add it or to say it myself as the lesson developed. I opted for the second option since it would allow children's contribution to the story, such as finishing my lines or naming items they already knew.
Here's the short video "Tiggy goes to the kindergarten".








The Kinder afternoon-group required me to introduce the lexical set related to school objects in a different way. That was how I had to do it in two lessons so as to avoid overwhelming them with too many new words to learn and process.






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