Week 2

June 26th - July 2nd 

From feedbacks from last week, I believed that while kindergarten children may prefer some easier contents, primary school kids can try some more radical stuff. So, I decided to teach them some reading skills from a children book in original English. Although I was only being able to read that book in my high school years, I was optimistic about their abilities then. It turned out that I was blinded by my success in week 1. The classes for primary school students were really dull during the week, as I tried to push forward the chapter with them, despite the fact that I have revised materials several times during the week to decrease the level of difficulty. As the chapter contains a handful of new words and long sentences, many children quickly lost interest and refused to perform even the simplest tasks, such as finding characters’ names. Perhaps I should be more cautious next time. 

Classes for kindergarten children went much better. Topic for them was “Time and Season”. I filled the class materials with examples and pictures and went very slowly, and the effect was much better than last week. Although one or two youngest kids were still not very focused during the class, most kids were paying attention and arguably learning something. At least, the oldest ones should have mastered the contents well, as they were quite enthusiastic in answering the questions. 

Lessons for this week is self-awareness. Over-confidence in my teaching ability and judgment has let me pay the price, I need to be more modest and communicate more with site managers and other teachers in the coming weeks.