In my readings for this week I read a lot of new information. In Chapter 2 of Teaching by Principles I learned about many teaching methods that had been used in the past and how they changes through time. Also, I learned about some methods of teaching that are still used today. In my past experiences with learning a foreign language, I experienced the use of the Direct Method and Community Language Learning. It appears that each teacher I had used his or her own methods. I learned that each method has its strengths and its shortcomings. Nevertheless, each method may work differently for different students.
One method that I found very interesting was the Suggestopedia method. This method appears to be centered around students being relaxed and in a comfortable environment to maximize learning potential. This method seems to have its own faults too. One example, some teachers do not have access to comfortable chairs or easy listening music therefore defeating the whole purpose of the method.
Chapter 1 was a scenario based Chapter and it gave an example of a teacher's lesson plan and how she executed it in her classroom. I thought the observation was very beneficial and the questions about the lesson were very insightful also.
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3 comments:
You've definitely hit on a kernel of truth - teachers teach out of their belief systems. For example, if a teacher does not believe in Communicative Language Teaching, that teacher will not use CLT even if encouraged/mandated to do so.
I appreciated your including your own thoughts and opinions about what you read. I'm looking forward to reading more and deeper reflections/opinions!
I also take interest in the Suggestopedia method. Though it has its drawbacks as indicated in your entry, as a language learner (and i think this is true to many students too),qw i always love to study in a relaxed, comfortable classroom atmosphere in which i feel my classmates are my friends, not my competitors or rivals. I believe teachers who use Suggestopedia method are those who are most likely to achieve this.
You're right, there was a lot of new information in the reading. Who would have thought there were so many different, detailed schools of thought on how to teach a language? I found it quite interesting how teaching methods evolved throughout the years.
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