First Week of Teaching Practice

The first week spent at Haderslev Kristnefriskole was about watching, observing and getting to know each other.
We have seen English classes in the 3rd, 4rth, 5th, 8th and 9th grade.

What surprised us in:

• The Third Class:nearly all class was taught in English and pupils could understand the instructions without difficulties. Else used a lot of gestures and mimics to intensify what she was saying. All the activities were playfull and very funny and children enjoyed them thoroughly. Else uses a lot of songs, chants, poems and games to make children engaged in the class.
• The Fourth Class: It was very similar to the Third Class. Else also uses games, chants and songs when teaching English to this class. Moreover, the pupils are used to working on computers during the class. They use webpage www.manythings.org with plenty of games and excercises focused on English grammar, vocabulary, spelling and listening. It was quite shocking for me that each child has got a notebook. It is quite unusual in the Czech Republic.
• The Fifth Class: This class is taught by Rebekka, who is not a qualified English Teacher. She does not use English a lot when she talks to her pupils, although her level of English is pretty good. The majority of the lesson is in Danish. She does not use a lot of warm-up activities and there was also no summary in the end. Therefore her classes were not very beneficial for me.
• The Eight Class: Else is really great with small children but she seems to me a bit hopeless with teenage pupils. She is extremely kind but when teaching English to older pupils, she should me more strict and energetic. I also suggest that she use more activities to make pupils busy. When they are busy with taks they have no time to be naughty and loud.
• The Ninth Class: Surprisingly, there are only girls in this class. The ninth class is supposed to take a major English exam. Therefore, the classes we saw were focused on practising for the exam.
  

To sum up: I really like Else's teaching style when she teaches English to children. She knows a range of different activities to make her classes interesting and funny for children. However, when it comes to teaching teenagers, she is not energetic enough to make pupils work properly.
Rebekka is a nice teacher too, but she should use English more in her classes. When 80 % of a class is in Danish, you cannot call it an English lesson.