Johnny Essays Example

Johnny was the first classmate who took the challenge and decided to be the first teacher in our semester. It is really obvious that Johnny has a lot of self-confidence, and he is a very energetic person. There are so many things to reflect about Johnny's teaching day, but I will just name the most important.
At the beginning of his class, Johnny tried to make the students talk by making fun of himself, his wife and their family life. That is a very brilliant idea, a kind of ice-breaking activity. It helped the students to relax and enjoy his jokes.
When it comes to the activities, Johnny had carefully designed them. For instance, he had a good activity where asked students some questions in form of a puzzle and students had to think about the answers before they spoke. This is a very good activity, because students had some time to think over, organize their ideas, and only then speak. In such a way, Johnny took inti consideration that most of students are not fluent in English. The class was kind of student-centered in which students had enough time to participate, and the teacher used recasting technique to correct students’ mistakes, which is a very good technique to use with beginner and intermediate students. What I really liked in his class is that he was not nervous at all, even when he was not sure of something he simply said: “I do not know. I’ll check it out.” When it comes to speaking skills, Johnny has a clear and great accent that some of the students think that he is an English native speaker.
Also I have noticed some negative points during his class. Johnny spoke fast, that is why some of students had difficulty grabbing what he meant. Also Johnny spent approximately eleven minutes for the attendance, which is considered to be a lot for a fifty minute class. 

Priscilla

Writing a reflection paper is not an easy job, especially when you are writing about you classmate. Priscilla is one of the best and smartest international students/teachers I have ever met. Therefore, it is a challenging task to address negative things on her while in my eyes she is a perfect teacher. During her teaching week, she was like the orchestra conductor who guides the team wisely and intelligently.
Since I am going to teach in week six, observing Priscilla was a great experience for me. I would like to begin with fabulous visual materials, which Priscilla designed in a very professional way; everything was colorful and well-organized. The materials deeply addressed the level of students, although their levels are various. Beside the everyday smile, Priscilla began her class with a discussion of what was learnt during previous lessons. She asked the students some direct questions on which they had to provide logical answers. There is a small negative point here that I noticed during the discussion part. Priscilla did not pay attention to all the students, especially those who sat on the back seats. Regarding her speaking skills, Priscilla has a native-like accent. She has a very excellent articulation, and she speaks with a splendid pace. In addition, her choice of words during her classes was perfect. All the students (beginner, high-advanced) had no difficulty in understanding her. Moreover, Priscilla appeared in the class with a great confidence that made me sometimes feel that she is a professor, not just a teacher. During my observation day, I had good opportunity to gain some teaching skills. Priscilla used content-based approach for most of the time, and sometimes she switched to communicative-language approach in order to stimulate students to participate and it worked very well.
In conclusion, some people say that good teachers are born, not made. Therefore, I think that Priscilla is born to be an excellent teacher, so I believe, she will have a bright future.

Ousmane

Ousmane was the third teacher in our semester. He is one of the few teachers who are multi-lingual. He has many years of teaching experience. Ousmane teaches not only his first or second languages, but also teaching his third and fourth languages, like Arabic. So, he is a very balanced-bilingual. In his teaching week, Ousmane clearly had a good preparation for the class, and it was clear from the professional materials that he had designed.
Regarding the materials, every activity was designed to meet the level of each student, and they were accurately written. In terms of his speaking, Ousmane noticeably has a foreign accent, and it may probably affect what he wants to deliver. I think the instructions he gave were clear, since he did not have any grammatical issues in his pronunciation. The class was basically student-centered. Thus students were participated in most of the activities in small groups or in pairs. Therefore, I think having a foreign accent in the class is not a big problem since the teacher does not have any grammatical issues. The problem that I had noticed in his class is that not all the students were paying attention. I saw one of the students playing with his phone during the class. I don’t always blame the teacher but sometimes a student has no interest in participating. In general, the students were having fun because the topic was about sport, so the students who are into sport were really involved and having fun. The teacher asked the teaching assistant to demonstrate a vocabulary activity on the board before he showed a video that has some of these words. I really like this switching idea between the teacher and the teaching assistant that made students pay special attention on the TA when he started a demonstration. Ousmane used recasting technique to correct mistakes.
In a nutshell, Ousmane did a really good job, and I learnt during his class that a foreign accent does not really have a negative effect in teaching, especially when you teach SLL.