Faculty of Education - umac.mo Issue 4... · FED NEWSLETTER Special Issue on Student Activities 6, 2009 Issue 4 2 2. What are the differences between this English “oral class”

Faculty of Education

Newsletter (Issue 4)

SpecialSpecialSpecialSpecial IssueIssueIssueIssue onononon StudentStudentStudentStudent ActivitiesActivitiesActivitiesActivities

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Year 4 Students Sharing Teaching Experiences:

“English Oral” Class

Organized by the Macao Daily News Readers

Charity Fund

Report by Sandra U, Glyceria Lok, and Vincent Cheong

FED NEWSLETTER Special Issue on Student Activities

6, 2009 Issue 4

1

FED Newsletter No 4: Special Issue on Student Activities

Year 4 Students Sharing Teaching Experiences: “English Oral” Class

organized by the Macao Daily News Readers Charity Fund

Report by Sandra U, Glyceria Lok, and Vincent Cheong

It is a great pleasure for us to share our experiences teaching an “English Oral

Class”. Let us share our great teaching and learning experiences with you by

answering a few questions.

1. Who runs this

interesting class?

Who teaches the

class? Where do

students come from?

What is special

about this class?

And what is the

objective?

Recommended by

Prof. Sylvia S. L.

Ieong, Faculty of Education University of Macau, and with her enthusiastic

and constant support, we, Sandra U, Glyceria Lok, and Vincent Cheong,

Year-4 students majoring in English at FED, together with some Year-3

students, have been teaching an “English Oral” class organized by the Macao

Daily News Readers Charity Fund for nearly two years. This oral class is free

and open to all Form/Secondary 1 and 2 students studying in various

secondary schools in Macao. There are two lessons per week. These students

are not required to make any preparations before the lesson, nor are they given

any homework after the lesson. The purpose is that they enjoy the fun of

learning and speaking English under no pressure.


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2. What are the differences between this English “oral class” and the formal

English class in Macao schools?

1) Class Size

First, there is a big

different in class size.

Unlike some schools

in Macao, where large

classes are the norm

rather than exception,

this is a small class,

with only sixteen to

eighteen students in

one class. Teachers

can take care of each

student; they can

easily find out what they need in order to help them. For the weaker students,

we provide individual help; we’ll encourage them and take more care of them.

Thanks to the small class size, in our first lesson we’ve already helped them to

get to know one another well, they already feel like ‘We’re family’. It really

works! Since they’re very close to each other like one family, they have no

fear when engaging themselves in various activities, nor do they feel shy or

afraid of making mistakes when answering questions or practicing speaking

English with their classmates.

2) Teaching &

Learning Activities

Students come to us

for “oral English”

twice a week, on

Wednesday and

Saturday afternoon

after school.

Usually, we teach,

present or discuss


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useful everyday language items/functions/topics for the first half of the lesson,

about 45 minutes and then engage the students in various activities relating to

the language items/functions/topics that we’ve just taught in the rest of the

lesson so that they can use what they have learned in communicative activities.

For example, if today’s topic is about giving directions, then in the first part,

we’ll give the students the words and expressions used for showing

directions and some sample sentences about how to ask directions. Then, in

the second part, we’ll have them engage in pair work practice. While they are

practice asking directions and showing directions, we walk around the groups

as facilitators, to see whether they have difficulties in expressing themselves

and give them the help they need. The purpose of having activities is to apply

the knowledge to real-life communication and encourage them to use what

they have learnt. We believe that ‘learning is using and experiencing’, and

once they have experienced the form/meaning/function and use of the

language, such as asking directions, they not only remember the words and

knowledge better through use but also improve their communication skills

through activities and then they’ll have more interest and confidence in

speaking English. In turn, better motivation leads to better learning, and the

cycle of successful learning will go on.

3) Textbooks and Homework

Unlike regular or formal classroom teaching, there are no textbooks for this

class. Instead, we only give necessary printed material, such as handouts, for

students to refer to. The handouts are prepared by the teachers, tailor-made to

the actual needs of students. The reason is that we can teach students flexibly,

in consideration of their varying aptitude. And we can also choose some most

up-to-date or up-to-the hour topics or ideas or events or incidents that they are

most interested in so as to stimulate or motivate them to learn better. There is

no homework because this class is intended to arouse students’ interest in

learning English, especially to enhance their English communication skills,

and to make them enjoy the fun of learning without extra load or burden to

them. With no homework, students will not be under much pressure as they

are already burdened by school work. In addition, we do not believe that

“more homework means more learning”. Our experience has proved that

students do enjoy the fun of learning. Their attendance rate is high and they

like to come to this class and are more eager to learn.


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4) Learner Differences

One of the greatest challenges for us is that our students come from different

schools. When we have heterogeneous learners, with different education

backgrounds and levels of English proficiency, it is very hard for us to decide

what to teach and how to teach. If we only use English in class, some weaker

students may feel lost as they don’t know what we are talking about. And then

they may feel frustrated, give up and stop coming to class. In all sincerity, we

don’t want them to feel frustrated; we don’t want them to give up; and we

don’t want them to stop coming to us! If they have tasted the bitterness of

failure in the formal classroom, we want them to taste the sweetness of success

in our class. Therefore, we make every effort and word very hard to prepare

and equip ourselves with more teaching materials and learning resources, to

choose more suitable and interesting materials so that each and everyone of

them has a chance to be involved in class and make progress in speaking

English.

.

5) More Demands on Teachers

As mentioned above, learner differences pose greater demands on teachers,

especially on us – we are still novice student teachers. However, we like the

challenges and want to take this opportunity to learn more and prepare us

better for future demands. As we don’t have a fixed textbook, we need to

spend lots of time preparing teaching and learning materials, in the form of

handouts. Also, we need to spend much time thinking about a variety of topics

and themes that will attract the students’ interest, engage their attention and

stimulate their imagination. We have to consider whether the topics are

suitable for their age and language proficiency levels. Preparing lessons and

finding suitable materials is an important part of our work and has helped us to

have a better understanding of what makes a good teacher. And we have more

confidence in becoming good teachers.

3. What have we learned from this teaching experience?

We feel lucky that we have the opportunity to teach this interesting class. We


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have really learnt a lot from teaching this oral class.

First, teaching this class has not only enabled us to develop teaching skills but

also classroom management. We have not learned much about how to manage

a class from our university courses but we can learn classroom management

by managing a heterogeneous oral class with students from different schools.

Second, as we are not burdened with the task of preparing students for any

tests or examinations, we can afford to teach and learn for the pure fun of

learning. We find ourselves enjoying teaching and learning happily, and we

feel free to experiment, innovate and teach creatively.

Thirdly, we can never forget the “Bilingual Camp” experience. Indeed, we feel

most fortunate to lead the “Bilingual Camp” held a couple of months ago. It

was our first time

to act as leaders

taking care of

forty students –

our younger

brothers and

sisters – on an

English &

Chinese

Putonghua

bilingual camp.

The purpose of

this camp is to

encourage the

students to speak

more English and

Chinese

Putonghua and

use what they

have learnt in

social life of the

real world. We

designed and


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prepared many interesting activities for the students. For example, one of the

activities was to ask them to “interview” some foreigners on Hac Sa Beach. At

first, we were a bit worried that they might too shy and did not dare to speak to

the foreigners. Out of our expectations, to our great surprise, they were only

too glad and willing! They were happy to work on this given task within the

specified time. limit. How happy we were, when witnessing these youngsters,

who were too shy to utter a single English word not long before, now taking

the initiative to speak to English speakers, using what they had just learned,

with their happy faces and the sense of success!

4. A Great Experience to Share: The “Bilingual Camp”

The Macao Daily News Readers’ Charity Fund sponsored a two-day English

& Chinese Putonghua bilingual camp for Form 1/Secondary 1 students who

are currently studying in their oral English class run by The Macao Daily

News Readers’ Charity Fund. It was held at the Hac-Sa Youth Hostel during

14th

-15th

February 2009. This camp not only aimed to maximize opportunities

for students to use English in real life, but also to develop their attitude and

personality, their self-esteem as well as co-operation. Before the camp, as their

teachers, we (Sandra, Vincent and Glyceria) had prepared several meaningful

and stimulating activities for students to take part in.

After doing some

warm-up exercises,

we quickly jumped

to our first activity.

In order to make

full use of the great

natural environment,

we adopted the

“common sense”

approach to our first

activity, i.e. to take

students out onto

the beach and play in the open air. We had already designed a questionnaire


6, 2009 Issue 4

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with a purpose -- students should start using the English they had learned by

completing the questionnaire. The questionnaire was divided into two parts:

the first part included questions for students to find out such things as the

colours of the flags, the numbers of water taps and even the lowest price for a

chicken wing, etc. The second part required students to have an interview with

some English speaking tourists. These questions required the students to ask

questions clearly and politely, listen to the interviewees carefully, understand

what they said, and responded to the foreigners, in short, both listening skills

and speaking skills. Students had to use what they have learned, e.g. greetings,

introducing themselves, asking questions, etc. At first, we were a bit afraid that

students could not finish their interviews because they were too shy or nervous.

To our surprise, they could all talk to the foreigners confidently and completed

their tasks within

the specified short

time! Although

there was still a

lot of room for

improvement,

students have

tried their best

and have had their

first taste of

success. We, as

teachers, have

also had our first

taste of success

and satisfaction

and look forward

to more such

experiences.

Our main activity

was the “Survival

on the Desert”

Game that

happened on the


6, 2009 Issue 4

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second day. The objective was to let students express their ideas in discussions

by using phrases like “I think…” and “I’m afraid I can’t agree with you

because…” etc. Students were told that they had landed on a desert because of

an air-crash. They could find 15 items including a parachute, an electric torch,

sunglasses, etc., on the airplane and they had to prioritize them from the most

important one to the least important one after their discussion. According to

the theory and practice of the Communicative Approach to ELT/ELL, students

should be encouraged to use English during discussions. Since they were only

Form 1/Secondary 1 students, it was quite difficult for them to do so. However,

with the help of teachers as facilitators, most of the students were able to use

roughly 70% of English during the discussion, which was already a great

success for Chinese-medium school students.

In the Bilingual Camp, students get out of the close, four-walled classrooms

and apply English in real learning environment. The flexible activities in the

workshop create chances and the mood for students to use English and

enhance the learning effectiveness. Students can express their opinions in a

relaxing way, thus boosting their confidence in speaking English and their

English proficiency. Furthermore, students voluntarily participate in the

activities and willingly and naturally apply the knowledge they have learnt.

A Word of Thanks

We would like to thank the Macao Daily News Readers Charity Fund for

running this English

class, which has

started many a

youngster on the

way to success in

learning English. At

the same time,

while sharing our

joys and sense of

satisfaction and

success, we don’t

think we can ever


6, 2009 Issue 4

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forget our teacher, Dr. Sylvia Ieong, FED, UM. Over the past three years, she

has been giving whole-hearted and consistent support to the English class run

by the Macao Daily News Readers Fund. Indeed, it was Prof. Ieong Sao Leng,

who recommended us to teach this class, and has inspired us with confidence

and courage ever since. And we would like to take this opportunity to thank

her for introducing us to teach this interesting class and preparing us for the

future. We shall carry on our teaching ideals by using what we have learned at

the University of Macau.

Documents

Faculty of Education - umac.mo Issue 4... · FED NEWSLETTER Special Issue on Student Activities 6, 2009 Issue 4 2 2. What are the differences between this English “oral class”