classroom culture, including flavors from the home cultures of all its members.
Ultimately it is a shared culture between members of the classroom and no one else. The
process of group formation is so difficult for many learners. Students must deal with
others whom they hardly know, and they are uncertain about whether they will like them
or, more importantly, whether they will be liked by them (Zoltan, Group Dynamics in
the Language Classroom, 14). I make my best effort to establish this culture early on, so
that students feel safe in their classroom identity. Forming such a culture during my
internship with my Chinese students greatly relieved them of much of the initial fear and
pressure in the classroom and we moved into the subject matter much smoother and
quicker than we would have otherwise. Furthermore, the joy of learning increased
significantly because everyone who belonged to the group felt more relaxed during
classroom activities and freer to play with the language during collaborative tasks. Our
shared classroom culture provided the perfect environment for magic moments to occur
regularly. Had I not taken the time to establish this classroom culture, my students would
have missed out on a large part of their learning experience.
I believe that my job as a teacher extends beyond the classroom into the outside
world. I enjoy getting to know new people, and I extend my role of the teacher into the
personal realm of friendship and relationship. Not only is this generally healthy for
classroom members, but also an asset to classroom mechanics. Developing appropriate
personal relationships outside of the classroom can help build trust with students and is
an important ingredient in crafting an effective learning environment. Bailey and Nunan
relay a students experience saying, For the last two weeks of my two-month stay in
Mexico, I felt as though I was a good friend of the teachers. I felt more like their friend
than their student, which made me an integral part of the group rather than an outsider
when the whole group was socializing. It also enabled me to have conversations in which
the focus was on content rather than linguistic form (Bailey and Nunan, Voices From the
Language Classroom, 213). Feeling like a core component of the team helps students to
reach levels of linguistic use that may have otherwise not come about. I experienced this
during my practicum with two students in particular. Ali is a Middle Eastern student and
Amos is Chinese. We would occasionally go for lunch after class and our conversation
would extend beyond what we had just covered in the classroom. Topics ranged from
more personal experiences within our lives to religious and political discussions in an
effort to learn more about each others nations and backgrounds. I noticed a significant
difference over the next couple of days in their classroom behavior. Interaction with both
of them was more natural and smoother. Amos, who had trouble keeping focused on
classroom activities, worked harder on assignments and was less distracting to other
members of the class. I believe our conversations and relationship development had a
direct impact on this behavior.
A significant tool in establishing rapport with students and creating a positive
learning environment is humor. Humor has several benefits in language learning
environment [and] is likely to promote understanding and learning of a second
language and enhance retention of the material (Ali Ziyaeemehr, Use and Non-use of
Humor in Academic ESL Classrooms, 117). Discovering cultural standards of humor may
take time and effort but is rewarding because it lowers students affective filter, making
them more adept learners. During my internship, I would use local foods as examples for
nearly everything. The students came to expect me to talk about noodles or watermelon
in even the most mundane grammatical examples and they would laugh. This helped to
lower their affective filters while also helping their recollection of the source material.
The students started to beat me to the punch line using the correct grammatical forms.
Seeing the impact of humor in the classroom, I always try to find a way to incorporate it
into my lessons without it becoming too much of a distraction because it is beneficial for
establishing trust and relationship. By using the resource of humor to help create this type
of environment, I can focus more clearly on teaching the subject material more
effectively and to students who are willing to participate with the group more readily.
I also believe it is necessary to incorporate material and examples that go beyond
language learning mechanics and take students to a higher level of thinking. In other
words, teaching is value laden by nature. Teachers with a critical perspective look
within, around, and beyond educational issues and work toward social equity and
justice as part of their role as language educators (Diaz-Rico, A Course for Teaching
English Learners, 5). I include a moral dimension to my teaching because it promotes
more interesting and deeper learning and also causes students to use language for more
personal reasons. This helps them to better understand and experience language use that
is passionate and deliberate. I had my internship students in China give presentations on
various festivals including Ramadan, a significant holiday among the ethnically Hui
Chinese people who practice Islam. This proceeded into a discussion on the differences
between Han Chinese religious views and Hui Chinese ones, all in English. The language
actually allowed them to express things they wouldnt normally have said and opened up
the doors of communication. They used authentic language, without being prompted from
a textbook, out of their own passions. Using material with a moral component in the
classroom is critical to tying the language to a more personal identity for the students,
which will have the long-term benefit of making them better second language users in the
future.
The most important thing for me as a teacher is the success of my students, not
just in the classroom but also in their lives outside it as well. Seeing my students succeed
in their endeavors brings some of the greatest joy I have known. Being closer to my own
student days, I understand the pressure that students go through and the feelings of
depression or elation that follow after receiving the result of a major assignment. Seeing
my students elated when performing beyond their own perceived competency is a
fantastic feeling. I remember the dread I felt when I first sat down to grade my internship
students final presentations. They were microteaching and had to mirror the techniques
we had used ourselves over the course. I realized that the fear I was feeling was the dread
of my own failure as a teacher. I felt that if these students couldnt perform, then that
reflected on my own ability. It would also have consequences for my students that I
didnt want to think about. As each student taught their ten minutes, I felt each drop of
fear turn into pride and joy, as they were quite successful in their presentations. Student
success is one of the most motivating parts of teaching. Seeing someone else succeed and
knowing that I helped them achieve that is the inner fulfillment that can be so rewarding
when practicing a helping profession. This inner fulfillment is what drives me to treat
teaching as a craft rather than a job. The more I hone my craft, the more I experience
inner fulfillment and the more I experience inner fulfillment, the more I want to hone my
craft. It is this motivation that drives me to continue learning and become a better teacher.
I look forward to engaging with more students to find out more how I can better serve
those under my care.