The importance of changing
English teaching: reflections in the today's school
Today is very
necessary to reflect the English teaching - learning process in our schools and
ask ourselves how we teach English today? and show to education community
different ideas was born in the classroom about how can we as teachers rethink
the development of communicative ability in English in our students?.
Today is very necessary to reflect the English teaching - learning process in our schools and ask ourselves how we teach English today? and show to education community different ideas was born in the classroom about how can we as teachers rethink the development of communicative ability in English in our students?.
Ø Other topics to
reflection in this text will be:
1. Learning process evaluation
2.
The development of different children's talents inside and
outside the classroom with the English
Some teachers still teach English
with traditional methods using only the text books, homeworks without feedback
and the most terrible speaking spanish.
Taking into account the colombian
laws about bilingualism are very important, it invite all teachers begin to
create new didactic practices where the English can be considered an important
element in the school and the students can be motivated to have conversations
and real experiences with the language.
Also today in 21st Century the
technology plays an important role in the life of the students because all the
games, the music, the academic information and learning tools like Duolingo,
kahoot are in internet, for this teachers cannot forget use digital strategies
to show the students the possibility of interact in English.
A
short reflection called: Keepers of the flame
It's a video to think in how the voice of the teacher have a big impact
and influence in the children, and the video present us the teacher profession
like a guide, a light in the dark, an opportunity to believe in our dreams and
of course in the learning in all moments.
August 10th / 2019
1. The development of
different children talents: Inside and outside the classroom.
Today it’s very
necessary speak with the parents, other teachers and education community in
general about the arts in the school, the creative thinking and the development
of the students thanks to arts as music, dance and visual arts. In this text,
we are going to try to explain how the arts can help us as teachers in the
English teaching. Obviously, in 21st century, there are many
activities to teach English, but in our opinion all those strategies are
sleeping in the library or maybe in the classrooms desk, that situation it’s so
sad taking account the needs of the students to learn more and more every day
and the interest of learn English as a communicative need.
It is moment to
believe in the word “innovation” it’s moment to create school environments
thinking in the development of the children talents. it’s possible that we feel
scare and we think the dance and music as bored tools and ineffective, even
this reflection have the objective of begin to rethink the school, rethink the
opportunity to teach English through physical activities and begin to change
not only the English learning-process if not all the educational community that
feel the worry of rethink the education.
We found an article very interesting about this topic
called “why dance is just
as important as math in school” and in this text Ken Robinson and Lou Aronica speak us about, how
the dance can help the students to change their lives. However, in our process
of writing we have the idea of think the dance and music as tools for the
development of communicative abilities in the classroom.
Text read:
Dance — and physical activity — should have the same status in schools as math, science and language. Psst: it may even help raise test scores, says Sir Ken Robinson.For several years, I’ve been a patron of the London School of Contemporary Dance. In 2016, I was invited to give the annual lecture in honor of founding principal Robert Cohan, and I decided to talk about the role of dance in schools.Before the lecture, I tweeted the title “Why Dance Is as Important as Math in Education.” I had a lot of positive responses and a number of incredulous ones. One tweet said, “Isn’t that going to be one of the shortest lectures ever?” Another said flatly, “Ken, dance is not as important as math.” One person tweeted, “So what? Telephones are more important than bananas. Ants are not as important as toilet ducks. Paper clips are more important than elbows.” (At least that was a creative response.) Some responses were more pertinent: “Is that so? Important for what and to whom? By the way I’m a math teacher.”
I’m not arguing against mathematics — it’s an indispensable part of the great creative adventure of the human mind. It’s also intimately involved with the dynamics of dance. Instead, this is an argument for equity in educating the whole child. I’m talking about the equal importance of dance with the other arts, languages, mathematics, sciences and the humanities in the general education of every child.Dance can help restore joy and stability in troubled lives and ease the tensions in schools that are disrupted by violence and bullying.What is dance? It is the physical expression through movement and rhythm of relationships, feelings and ideas. Nobody invented dance. It is deep in the heart of every culture throughout history; dance is part of the pulse of humanity. It embraces multiple genres, styles and traditions and is constantly evolving. Its roles range from recreational to sacred and cover every form of social purpose.Some people have long understood that dance is an essential part of life and education. In Dance Education around the World: Perspectives on Dance, Young People and Change, researchers Charlotte Svendler Nielsen and Stephanie Burridge bring together recent studies of the value of dance in all kinds of settings: from Finland to South Africa, from Ghana to Taiwan, from New Zealand to America. The low status of dance in schools is derived in part from the high status of conventional academic work, which associates intelligence mainly with verbal and mathematical reasoning. The studies collected by Nielsen and Burridge explore how a deeper understanding of dance challenges standard conceptions of intelligence and achievement and show the transformative power of movement for people of all ages and backgrounds. Dance can help restore joy and stability in troubled lives and ease the tensions in schools disrupted by violence and bullying.
A number of professional dance
companies offer programs for schools. One of them is Dancing Classrooms, a
nonprofit based in New York City, which brings ballroom dancing into elementary
and middle schools in some of the most challenging districts in the country.
Using dance, the organization aims to improve social relationships especially
among genders and to enrich the culture of the schools by cultivating
collaboration, respect and compassion. Founded in 1994 by the dancer Pierre
Dulaine, the program now offers each school twenty sessions over ten weeks,
culminating in a showcase.Toni Walker, former principal of
Lehigh Elementary School in Florida, shares this story from working with Dancing
Classrooms. “When this young lady first came to Lehigh, the file on her was
probably two inches thick,” Walker recalls. “She felt she needed to prove
herself and make sure everyone knew she was strong and would fight.” The girl
didn’t want to join the ballroom dancing program … but participation wasn’t
optional. Soon, she found she had a natural ability. “In the next lesson, she
had a little bit of a different attitude and we didn’t have to fight with her
to dance,” Walker remembers. “She just got in line.”By the third and fourth lessons,
Walker says, the student was transformed: “She carries herself differently; she
speaks differently; she is kind; she is respectful; she has not had one
[disciplinary notice], not one. Her mother can’t believe what she sees. It’s
amazing. Amazing. The program is far greater than people understand.”In one evaluation, 95 percent of
teachers said that, as a result of dancing together, students’ abilities to
cooperate and collaborate improved.Dance education has important
benefits for students’ social relationships, particularly among genders and age
groups. Many forms of dance, including ballroom, are inherently social. They
involve moving together in synchrony and empathy, with direct physical contact.
In an evaluation of Dancing Classrooms in New York City, 95 percent of teachers
said that as a result of dancing together, there was a demonstrable improvement
in students’ abilities to cooperate and collaborate. In a survey in Los
Angeles, 66 percent of school principals said that after being in the program,
their students showed an increased acceptance of others, and 81 percent of
students said they treated others with more respect. Dance has economic
benefits, too. As well as being a field of employment, dance promotes many of
the personal qualities that employers recognize as essential in a
collaborative, adaptable workforce.
One principal was especially impressed by the improvements in reading and math scores among her fifth-grade students.“There are no ifs, ands, or buts about the program’s impact in the academic lives of our children,” says Lois Habtes of the Emanuel Benjamin Oliver Elementary School in the Virgin Islands. “When I first got here, they were failing scores. Last year — our second year in the program — they got up to 83 percent. This year, our fifth grade scored 85 percent on the reading test, the highest in the school.”Dance and theater are mostly seen as second-class citizens in schools.It’s not just dance, of course. The success of Dancing Classrooms is an example of the well-documented relationship between physical activity and educational achievement. The trend in most US school districts is to cut phys ed and similar programs in favor of increasing time for math, science and English. These measures have simply not improved achievement as so many policy makers assumed they would.
A panel of researchers in
kinesiology and pediatrics conducted a massive review of more than 850 studies
about the effects of physical activity on school-age children. Most of the
studies measured the effects of 30 to 45 minutes of moderate to vigorous
physical activity three to five days a week on many factors — physical factors
such as obesity, cardiovascular fitness, blood pressure and bone density, as
well as depression, anxiety, self-concept and academic performance. Based on
strong evidence in a number of these categories, the panel firmly recommended
that students should participate in one hour (or more) of moderate to vigorous
physical activity a day. Looking specifically at academic performance, the
panel found strong evidence to support the conclusion that “physical activity
has a positive influence on memory, concentration and classroom behavior.”Most children in public schools in
the US receive some education in music and visual arts, patchy though it often
is. But dance and theater are mostly seen as second-class citizens, and
opportunities in the arts, in general, are lowest for students in areas of high
poverty. “There are still millions of students who do not have access to any
arts instruction. Many of them are in our poorer communities where the programs
are arguably needed the most,” says Bob Morrison, the founder and director of
Quadrant Research.
Would it be okay to have millions
of students without access to math or language arts? he asks. “Of course not,
and it should not be tolerated in the arts. There is a persistent myth that
arts education is for the gifted and talented, but we know that the arts
benefit everyone regardless of their vocational pathways,” he says. “We don’t
teach math solely to create mathematicians, and we don’t teach writing solely
to create the next generation of novelists. The same holds true for the arts.
We teach them to create well-rounded citizens who can apply the skills,
knowledge and experience from being involved in the arts to their careers and
lives.”
Video
This
video called the school kills creativity and presented by Sir Ken Robinson
presents an entertaining and deeply moving argument for creating an educational
system that encourages (rather than undermines) creativity.
As
teachers we are called to transform education by changing and exploring other
ways of preparing our students, not only for productivity, but on the contrary
for improving and transforming their own lives. That is why, we have the task
of generating appropriate spaces in the school, where we have the opportunity
to inspire students to develop their talents and abilities, since we should be
guides, who help learners to foster their creativity. Therefore, we should
work with children from what they like and what motivates them, always bearing
in mind that intelligence is diverse, dynamic and unique.
Encourage
yourself to be a critical thinker and a different teacher, who goes beyond,and
therefore, transforms, guides, but also, inspires their students to be creative
and become better human beings.
August 17th
/ 2019
It’s just the
beginning
NOVELTY is a new term in education, teachers are accustomed to the classic
teaching strategies and when we speak about languages we make the same mistakes
of the past, educate memory, pencil and paper as fundamental tools for learning
and also a system that still thinks of good grades and not in the learning. Our
children spend many hours in the school, in the classroom, in the libraries, As
teachers we think obviously is very necessary study a lot to learn many things
about how to save the world, how we can be successful in different professions
and how we can rethink the learning of languages as opportunities to wake up or
talents and our skills at the same time that we learn. We should not think of
school as a place similar to jail but on contrary a place for creativity, for
the development of manual, body and all kinds of arts that in some way or
another develop the brain in each activity.
We believe that
in each class the objectives and goals are met, we could not affirm that this
is really so, in the article we read we found the example of the apple: It is
simply an activity of introduction to the subject and from the beginning the
children repeat the same drawing that the teacher made, did the creativity of
our children die? The invitation is then to leave the past behind (it will be a
good memory but never again another experience in the classroom) Maybe it is
very difficult to accept the idea of following the way of innovation, but if we
do not do it, childhood is in danger.
Multiple intelligences = Many ways to understand
the life
(2017) said “When we ask students for creative
output, too often we are satisfied with a single solution. But with only one
answer — no matter how good — an inventive mind is simply getting warmed up.
The best practice in a classroom is to require students to generate not just
one solution to a creative problem, but many”. And we completely agree with their
arguments because specifically in the subject of English and even Spanish we
must as teachers explore their interests, their needs and demand them new
results every day, but not just anything to win the subject if no a product that
can serve us as an element to continue learning. For that reason we are agree
with the project work in the classroom but this is just the beginning of a big
reflection about the teacher’s reflections.
September 26th / 2019
Nowadays, is very important that in the schools the teachers encourage students to work from their talents, with the objective of empowering their abilities.
As teachers, we are going to find a lot of unique children with multiple capacities, for this reason we have to take advantage of diversity, inspiring our students to be themselves and make the difference. We need to remember that the education has to progress and change the traditional models, we cannot make our students follow the same standardized pathways because we need to give them the opportunity to enjoy their learning process with the purpose of give them significant learnings.
October 16th / 2019
Today is very important that as teachers we reflect on our way of teaching because is necesary that we awaken the joy and motivation of students to learn english and it is possible with the art in the classroom.The children have multiple talents and our task is to teach classes creating environments where they develop these skills, since art allows you to learn in a more fun and significant way.
November 14th / 2019
This
video called the school kills creativity and presented by Sir Ken Robinson
presents an entertaining and deeply moving argument for creating an educational
system that encourages (rather than undermines) creativity.
As
teachers we are called to transform education by changing and exploring other
ways of preparing our students, not only for productivity, but on the contrary
for improving and transforming their own lives. That is why, we have the task
of generating appropriate spaces in the school, where we have the opportunity
to inspire students to develop their talents and abilities, since we should be
guides, who help learners to foster their creativity. Therefore, we should
work with children from what they like and what motivates them, always bearing
in mind that intelligence is diverse, dynamic and unique.
Encourage
yourself to be a critical thinker and a different teacher, who goes beyond,and
therefore, transforms, guides, but also, inspires their students to be creative
and become better human beings.
August 17th
/ 2019
It’s just the
beginning
NOVELTY is a new term in education, teachers are accustomed to the classic
teaching strategies and when we speak about languages we make the same mistakes
of the past, educate memory, pencil and paper as fundamental tools for learning
and also a system that still thinks of good grades and not in the learning. Our
children spend many hours in the school, in the classroom, in the libraries, As
teachers we think obviously is very necessary study a lot to learn many things
about how to save the world, how we can be successful in different professions
and how we can rethink the learning of languages as opportunities to wake up or
talents and our skills at the same time that we learn. We should not think of
school as a place similar to jail but on contrary a place for creativity, for
the development of manual, body and all kinds of arts that in some way or
another develop the brain in each activity.
(2017) said “When we ask students for creative
output, too often we are satisfied with a single solution. But with only one
answer — no matter how good — an inventive mind is simply getting warmed up.
The best practice in a classroom is to require students to generate not just
one solution to a creative problem, but many”. And we completely agree with their
arguments because specifically in the subject of English and even Spanish we
must as teachers explore their interests, their needs and demand them new
results every day, but not just anything to win the subject if no a product that
can serve us as an element to continue learning. For that reason we are agree
with the project work in the classroom but this is just the beginning of a big
reflection about the teacher’s reflections.
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