Building Community
Maintaining Foundations
After collecting and reviewing the student questionnaires, I will make it my mission to get to know each of my students on a more personal level. By knowing each student individually and taking the time to talk and interact with them, I can better understand their strengths, needs, and personal goals for the class. I imagine it could be difficult to differentiate instruction for different learning styles and background knowledge that students may have if I do not take the time to know who they are outside of my classroom. Although this idea seems like a lot of work, it wouldn’t hurt to have a document on my computer where I could record personal data and background information for each student, just to make sure I am organized in my endeavors to know my students better. A fun way to get to know my students outside of the classroom is to interact with them outside of the classroom; one possibility is to maybe establish a weekly or bi-weekly lunch group where I can eat with students and chat about things other than learning a language.
Students’ Expectations
The exit slips from the first day will help in creating a list of expectations that my students may have for the course. By seeing what my students want from the class, I could better tailor my lessons to meet the needs they may have in learning a second language. I anticipate students taking my class as an elective, but I also understand that students may be in the class to complete criteria for a particular diploma or other academic requirement. Throughout the year, I will have a running list of reasons why learning Spanish is relevant and important to my students. It would be a large piece of butcher paper on the wall and updated often by the students because the whole purpose of this is to acknowledge student contributions and focus on being relevant to them in my instruction. This poster would serve as a constant reminder to my students the benefits of learning a second language.
Knowing and understanding students’ expectations of the class will be helpful, but it would also be useful to have students define what they expect from one another in the classroom. I will ask, in the form of open discussion, what my students want from one another when working on group projects or deciding what direction we should head in next in terms of curriculum and topics to explore. I want my students to be able to work easily among their peers. By creating a low affective filter, I hope to provide for my students a space where they feel comfortable to be themselves and express who they are more freely.