Workshop: Body Language & Stage Fright

The last two weeks of this course we had the chance to attend to a workshop where we had the opportunity to learn about our body language and how to deal with stage fright. I must say that I really enjoyed these activities, and I found them extremely useful.

On the first day we learned how to walk properly around the classroom. I had never thought about it, and that is because we do not really think about walking, we just do it mechanically, however I realized that many of us walk without confidence and we were not aware that we were not moving correctly around the classroom. Moreover, we did an activity in which we had to talk in front of our classmates, and the instructor let us know the areas that we can improve in order to express ourselves in a better way. We also learned how to project our voice. All of this activities are going to be useful at the moment that we teach a class to our students.

On the second workshop we worked a little bit more on the things we were discussing on the first one, but we also learned that it is important to relax and have fun sometimes. Again, we had to present a story in front of our classmates trying to avoid the mistakes we identified on the first session. Personally, I saw a great improvement in all of us. However, sometimes we made the same mistakes unconsciously, but Giovanni helped us to work on that.

In conclusion, I found this two workshop sessions very useful and funny. I will definitely remember the things I learned there at the moment of teaching my classes.

Materials

In the last class, we had the opportunity to share with our classmates different ideas of materials that we can use with our classmates in order to support our lessons. Some of the materials that were presented are:

• Flash Cards:

In my opinion, flash cards are one of the best materials teachers can use in their classes, since they can be used in many different ways, at any stage. Moreover, the colors and images on them can help teachers to get the attention of their students.

• Modeling Clay:

With this material teachers can help their students to develop their fine and gross motor skills. Moreover, while creating figures with modeling clay students show their creativity, and teachers can use those moments to practice the language while reviewing colors, or shapes.

• Grouping Techniques:

We also learned about the different grouping techniques that teachers can use in the classroom. We learned that they all have some advantages and disadvantages, and teachers must learn how to use these techniques appropriately,

• Puppets:

Puppets can be used to get students attention, and they can be used at any moment of the lessons. Moreover, it results very easy and cheap for students to create them.

• Musical Instruments:

Learning with music is one of the techniques that teachers love to use, and musical instruments are essential for this, In our class we learned different ideas to use them, and even ideas to create our own instruments.

To conclude, this was a very useful workshop because we learned several ideas on what materials we can use and create, and how to use them to support our lessons.

Songs and Chants

During this workshop, we learned how we can use songs and chants in our lessons. They can be used to get our students' attention, to make the class more dinamic, and more importantly, to practice the language and the contents we are teaching.

The first things I learned is that songs and chants are different. Chants are more repetitive, with few and similar sentences. Songs, on the other hand, have more complex phrases and melodies.

It is important for us to know the stage and the ages in which we are going to use a song or a chant, we need to think carefullty on how it will help our students.

Here are the two examples of songs that I shared with my classmates: