Rachael CO#3

After spending a morning in lower-level classes, it was a breath of fresh air to step into Andrew Wilson's 4A Listening class. It was a very small class of only 6 people, which facilitated great group discussion. On the board, he had a 5-point agenda. 

Agenda:

1. Word of the Day
2. New vocab
3. Notes on assessment
4. Crime facts & vocab
5. Pompeii by Bastille

To begin the class every day, Andrew writes a word or phrase on the board. This is usually an idiomatic expression, and Wednesday's was "fly on the wall." I was so impressed by how quickly the students seemed to comprehend the meaning. 

Students are asked to keep a list of words that they hear with which they are unfamiliar. Andrew would then write out the word, part of speech, definition and an example sentence. He would provide a lot of support by pointing out the connotation, put the word in its usual context. Andrew really relies on the tone of his voice to convey meaning, which I believe plays an important role in his students' learning. 

He quickly went over a few mistakes he found were common in an exam he recently corrected. These errors were corrected aloud and on the whiteboard. 

Students were given a handout for a listening activity with a crime theme. Before listening to the tape, students were instructed to think about what words would fit the blanks, given the context. Students were then asked to write down the missing words as they heard it as a pleasing voice read each sentence. At the end of the tape, students were encouraged to check with their neighbor to see if they got the same answers. Afterward, students asked vocabulary questions. The new words presented were relatively low-frequence (i.e. embezzlement, white-collar crime, proliferate, and ubiquitous). 

Towards the end of the session, students were given a handout with some incorrect lyrics of Pompeii by Bastille. The students corrected the mistakes as they heard them. I thought this was a really cool exercise! Andrew uses a lot of songs in his listening classes!

Two things I found really interesting about Andrew's class were 1) his bell and 2) his high-octane energy levels. Andrew rung a bell whenever a student made a mistake in speaking. The mistake was calmly addressed and corrected, and the conversation moved on. Also, Andrew, like me, cannot sit still! He is very high energy which makes his class exciting!