Friday, June 7, 2013

Classroom things.

so a few days have passed now. 

I want to return to a previous issue: reading scores out loud to classes.

Since I have last written, I have closed my jaw - and reflected more to take in the classroom dynamic in a deeper way.  Turns out,  it isn't that uncommon of a practice among multiple teachers. Okay, and, the students aren't as affected by it. Here are some main differences as why it works different in this school as opposed to schools in the US:

  • Students have been together for four years, in the same group (more or less)
  • Students own their classroom and teachers visit to teach.
    • So, with this comes this interesting dynamic that the students feel socially comfortable in a classroom, it isn't designed by the teacher. And maybe in this way, it isn't focused on the teachers demands of grades or what have you.
    • [highlight] seeing different classrooms means seeing different ways students express themselves! There are often pieces of arts, collages, and various individual expressions that aren't always hung up assignments - rather voluntarily made decorations.
    • Students are also responsible for cleaning the floors, blackboards, and picking up the trash/sorting it into special bins.
      • Oh, yeah in Europe they actually separate their garbage and recycle it. It's brilliant. Except for on the streets, they don't have separated recycling/food waste bin.
  •  Grades don't seem to be an emotional experience. 
  • Students are used to bringing every grade report home and having their parents sign it, sometimes even homework assignments. 
  • There isn't a competitive environment between the students for the highest mark.
    • Instead, students celebrate each other when they pass.
    • Sure, this may seem like they are setting a "low bar" but really, I do think it's kind of nice that students can be more united by grades than rewarded. Imagine if these students worked together to not only pass, but excel. Unfortunately, school doesn't seem to be too relevant to their lives.
Okay, so there's a lot present here in observations. I know it's all over the place. And,  I still need to talk about the daily schedule. I'll have to post that separately. It's fascinating though.

Also, I was reading through an English textbook and found the section on America.  I think I will try to Xerox the pages and articles because there's just too many observations on how Americans and American culture are represented to possibly list here thoroughly.

The main takeaway points  from this chapter are:

-The Statue of Liberty is a unifying monument to America, which is rarely contested or degraded. In contradiction to the flag, which can often be burned or dragged in the mud as a symbol of protest/disregard for the government.
 
-There is a lot of differences in opinions toward the US - mainly political. However, there is a general positive acceptance of American influence on technology, food, and entertainment. Literally, there were published sections of articles from Reuters and The Guardian discussing opinion polls, policy, etc. I think it's kind of interesting that students are taught to situate American politics separately from American influence. That's a fairly sophisticated distinction, and an important one.

-Assimilation is an important concept in American culture. Generally, we think it's really important to consider assimilation a positive thing, and we need to make it our objective. There were multiple perspectives on this, but again a pretty sophisticated discussion for English learners. Maybe a bit paradoxical, as they learn English as a result of the global marketplace demanding it as "the language of power." Not sure if that is inherent in the definition of globalization that we have to assimilate to some uniform type of expression, but that seems to be how it's popularized (especially in the States).  But, it's also more efficient this way, which is really important in capitalist economics... so... [anyway]

listening activities:
- American songs: "God Bless America," and "The Star-Spangled Banner"
-Bush's inaugural address: And then the follow up was to list his points made in his speech and than make comparisons to his policies. What a challenging and profound exercise for ESL classrooms... Maybe even more rigorous that some American exercises.... But, not relevant to compare the two in this post.

i'm going to try and get a copy of this section... the more I reflect the more interested I become in doing a deeper analysis of how German students learn about America through standardized materials...
[end]

Another repeated theme, education is deeply contextual.

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