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Valerie CO #2

On January 16, 2019 I completed my second class observation for Reading 3. The class read an article about FSU parking and transportation. It was interesting to note that one of the students picked up on the fact that the article was outdated because he found out the stats were not up-to-date. There were several characters in the class who had quite extroverted personalities. This class had more students than the Grammar 4 class, and I felt like the skill level varied more, but this could also be because there were more introverted students who didn't participate. The class went over the reading and students explained what the highlighted words meant in context. I thought this was appropriate, especially at this level, because students can use context clues to figure out what the words mean, instead of having the teacher explain everything. This can definitely help them as test-taking skills when they go to take the TOEFL. The teacher also encouraged students to use tools, such as Google and dictionaries. I think this is a good idea because students should learn how to learn, not just what to learn. Students worked in groups to write the definitions. For example, in the article, the word nightmare was used. The students know that nightmare means a bad dream, however, based on context clues, they realized that nightmare in this context referred to bad situation. I talked to the instructor Mrs. James after the class ended and she told me how she thinks reading is the most difficult part of English to teach, because students need to have motivation and do a lot of reading on their own if they want to improve. I agree because I am an avid reader and I attribute my obsession with reading everyday with my very high score on my grammar section of the ACT in high school. The more you read, the more you pick up subconsciously grammatical patterns. The students seemed very conformable with the teacher, making jokes and even trying to persuade her to change the vocabulary test day to another day. I hope to be a teacher students feel comfortable with, but also respect.

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