On Syllabi

The syllabus is a small place to start bringing students and faculty members back together... If students could be persuaded that we are really interested in their understanding the materials we offer, that we support their efforts to master it, and that we take their intellectual struggles seriously, they might respond by becoming involved in our courses, by trying to live up to our expectations, and by appreciating our concern.

 - Rubin, “Professors, Students, and the Syllabus,” Chronicle of Higher Education

http://www1.umn.edu/ohr/teachlearn/tutorials/syllabus/ 

I like this resource from the University of Minnesota that I found on line. It says that a syllabus tacitly records and transmits your teaching philosophy. I like the inclusion of the word “tacitly”, because when I look at a syllabus (and I have seen many in the course of my studies) I not only look at what it says, but also at how it is saying it, and even at what it is not saying.

I have noticed for example that many times the syllabi are very stiff, as if mass produced, repeating the same things in the same ways, as if they were more a routine requirement than an opportunity to start getting closer to the students.  

I prefer  the syllabus that reflects the personality of the teacher in the way information is being presented, and in the choice of material that is included. I look forward to courses that seem attractive because of the challenges they present, the interesting methodology, or opportunity to learn something new.

On the other hand, it is discouraging when you read a syllabus about, for example methodology, and the way the syllabus is written clashes with the subject contents. Or, the syllabus says that we are going to learn about student centered methodologies, and the teacher divides students into groups so they can lecture their classmates on the topics contained in the text book with miserably written power point presentations.

I found the questions the tutorial poses to help guide the process of creating the syllabus quite useful. I also liked the encouragement if offers to bring the teacher closer to the students, to help show him or her as a person with interests and cares, not an impersonal entity like most syllabi show. Perhaps because they are not written with that purpose in mind, but with the theory that authority is created through respect that cannot exist except through distance.

In the school level, respect is gained because students know you care about them, and you are knowledgeable, and consistent. I think at university level it is the same. It is not the suit, or the aloofness, or the fear that you can make life complicated, which gains you the respect and desire to collaborate of the students.

I check my syllabi every year, and I adjust them according to the characteristics of each of the groups that are coming up to the next grade level. I incorporate things I learned in the previous year, and different resources that might be better suited for the groups. Sometimes I even cut things out from a previous program. 

In a way, for me, syllabi are like plants that you prune and shape in a way that they reflect who you are and what you want to do, as clearly as a picture.

Planning a Lesson: Books a Heaven Sent, or a Trap?

When you start working as a teacher in a new school, you usually come to a system that is already in place. They give you the books you will use, possibly some previously elaborated annual plan, and depending when you come on board, you may have to create your lesson plan, or you will inherit one done by your predecessor.

If you are a beginner, or someone who strictly follows specialists’ advice, your lesson plan will be highly detailed in order to show that you know what you are doing, make sure that you have everything that you need, and don’t forget any important steps due to nervousness.

This kind of planning is very good. Many times it is not even that difficult because nowadays, books and their accompanying resources have everything you need for planning. It is just a matter of using the format preferred by the school you are working in.  It just takes time to “fill in the blanks”.

So… books and the resources that accompany them seem to be a heaven sent for teachers, but are they really? What happens when things do not work out as you anticipated they would? You have to think fast on your feet, and improvise, have a plan B, or even C, for just in case. If you have gotten used to depend on what the book says you should do, you might run into trouble because, creativity breeds creativity, but dependency does the same.

Another drawback of letting books dictate your plans is that books are not always well matched to the learners’ needs and to their  socio-cultural context. Books can be like a pleasant house: it helps organize things, has everything that it should, and protects you from the unknown but, can it can also limit you (and your students). As teachers, we can never forget that books are tools to attain a goal. They are not the only path.

Since there is an economic aspect attached to the issue of books, for both the editorial house (through the schools), and the learners and their families (who are asked to buy and trust in them), the decision of which books to use can be a really tricky one. Teachers, often times, have little control over the final decision, but are asked to create their lessons based on them.

I’m always very saddened when I hear teachers say that they didn’t have time to do anything else than to “complete” the exercises listed, to “finish” the book. In this circumstances, the book becomes a tyrant that has snipped off the creativity of the learning process.

To have a model, guidance, resources, is important. But, we cannot forget that books were part of the methodologies created to service the needs of societies based on paper technology. As we provide more and better professional development for our educators, and take work ethics to a higher level, we will have to insure teachers become more self-sufficient, critic, and less dependent on readymade tools. Instead, they will have to become more dexterous in their capacity to use many different kinds of tools, or even create their own, to better adapt to their learner’s needs, interests,  capacities, and learning styles in our fast changing world.

When planning our lessons, besides the more immediate objectives, we also have to think about what it means to be part of the information (or knowledge) society; its paradigms, the skills and competences needed to be successful in such world; then we can set our teaching goals, and then we may choose the best pathway and tools to reach them.

So what are we to do in the mean time? Use the books provided, design your lesson plans creatively,  and don’t let them rule over the learning process that takes place in the classroom. 

Be the rider, not the horse!

About goals and methods

I liked the distinction the author of week 7's reading makes between the ability to communicate competently (I’d say effectively), and communicating like a native speaker. 

 First of all, not all native speakers can communicate effectively in their mother tong. In second place, and with regards specifically to the English language, we can say that its use is so broad all over the world that, both for reasons of phonetic interference of native languages, and due to necessary respect for local culture, it would be impossible to have everyone talking like a British or an American (even if that were desirable).

It has been by now sufficiently established that to learn a language is a lot more than to learn vocabulary and structure; many authors also call attention to the importance of the learner’s capacity to connect with the context in which the language is used.

This means, that learners will be able to make more sense and use the language with greater effectiveness if they are familiar with, and have a certain appreciation for, the culture.  For example, it would be a lot easier for learners to connect with the contents of a book like Interchange from Cambridge University Press, if they were not only young adults, but from a mid to high socioeconomic status, living in San José, because they could connect better to the urban, yuppyish atmosphere of the pictures, situations and dialogs used.  In an economically depressed, rural environment, the effect wouldn’t be quite the same.

When teaching students English, my goal is for them to be effective communicators. In order to achieve this goal, I take into consideration cultural aspect such as the ones I mentioned above, as well as other personal and institutional ones, but most important of all, I take a really close look at the students that are supposed to achieve greater communication competence.

In the private high school levels where I have taught, and that my children have gone to, I often see the same kind of trouble. When students have reached a certain level of proficiency in the understanding and use of the language, many of them do not want to make the effort to go any further. For them it is enough just “to be understood.”

When attempting to analyze the different elements that might help overcome this setback, or those that tend to make it harder, in order to redirect my teaching strategies, I looked at the following:

·         What motivation do the students have to improve their English?

According to their responses:

o   They have to get a good grade because their parents want them to do well in school.

o   They can understand the lyrics of the songs they like, or sing them, better.

o   They can chat and communicate with English speakers in Facebook better.

o   If they travel to the US they can be more independent of their parents, or even act as translators for them.

·         And…What hinders their advance?

o   They have better things to do than to study English (including other subjects such as math, or to chat through Messenger or Facebook, or just play “Farmville”, or another game) until late hours of the night.

o   They don’t want to be considered “nerds”

o   Their role models are “tough guys” from MTV and other music TV stations that do not talk “pretty”.

o   They aren’t able to distinguish between slang and proper English, or they just think proper English is not relevant in their context, since all the young people they know talk in the same way.

o   Boys don’t care if girls can use the language with increased efficacy, but how easily they can get under their skirts. They devote a great deal of time and energy to this subject.

o   Most girls prefer “bad boys” over the “nerds”. They are more fashionable, and fun.

o   Many kids are very impatient, and get easily discouraged when they make a mistake.

o   A lot of them incur in similar mistakes when using their mother tong (clipped sentences, vague expressions, syntax errors).

o   They have reached a period of rebelliousness and project their resistance to adult “guidance” onto the relationship with the English teacher and the learning of the language. Or more specifically, they are mad with one or both of their parents and project those feelings onto the class environment and teachers.

o   They consider that they have a lot of time, and “later on” they will apply themselves to improving their communication capacities. For example, once they are at the university.

I probably haven’t covered all the issues, and I have also left by side the few students that one may consider self motivated; but overall, what I have just mentioned is not a product of my imagination, but of conversations I’ve had over the course of several years with different students in various schools contexts, most of them attending private schools in middle to upper class urban areas.

Once you enter the schools in rural areas and/or marginalized neighborhoods, the things that disrupt advancement get much more complicated. However, the motivation to do better also increases since, for many of them, the advantages that effective English communication offers when getting a job are a lot more clear.

Now, having said all that about the students, I have to also look at the conditions and resources that I have to work with. The conditions include personal ones, as well as others linked to the institution, such as infrastructure, equipment, books, policies and regulations.  All of them have an input on the methodologies I can use to help students reach effective communication. They also have a bearing on my emotional state and my motivation, which in turn have a very important impact on the students and their learning processes.

With the understanding that I have general and specific objectives that are set for each level every year, and at the risk of sounding a bit chaotic, I must confess that the methodologies I use are in a permanent state of flux. The heart of the reason why they constantly vary is due to their being “student centered”. I am constantly studying my students, individually and collectively, and adapt the methods I use accordingly,

I may have a lesson plan established, but if I sense that their mood is in turmoil, I may vary the method or the activity all together. If something goes well, I may decide to try it on another group, or to repeat it with the same group, but with another topic. I use a combination of inductive and deductive methods, also depending on the subject matter, and the feel of the class.

Sometimes the students provide the explanations and games for their classmates, others, we watch a video and I ask analytical questions; every so often they work individually in their workbooks; they take turns reading, or listen to native speaker’s recordings; we have oral presentations on a variety of topics, but we also do dramatizations, and play clue; we may play grammar related internet games, but I have also asked them to design their own web quests, and to choose  what they want to work on.

As to the results, they are not everything that I would like, but they are very close to what I think can be achieve given the variables I have to work with. Student’s grades reflect the work they have done, and the improvements they have experienced because they are the combination of various types of assessments of their class work, homework, special projects, short tests, partial and trimester exams. Assessments, for me, are not just administrative requirements that have to be fulfilled. I always tell students that they are like pictures of their state of achievement in relation to the goals set.

A positive aspect I’d like to highlight from my methodologies is that I am always looking for new and better ways of doing things, and that I have gained the trust and respect not just of my colleagues, but of most of my students, who may even disagree with me at times, but know I’m always looking for their best interest.