Kamile's and Gülcan's classes

Here are the links for Kamile's and Gülcan's classes. https://vimeo.com/53938127 https://vimeo.com/53935103

Kamile: Reflection (20.11.2012)

Kamile: Reflection (20.11.2012)

It was a tiring day. I was with my worse class who were chatting in turkish all the time. This really makes me demotivated. After we covered the reading text in the course book we had a true-false activity about the reading text.Later, we dealt with our new grammar topic ''gerunds& infinitives''. As you all know it is a confusing subject for the students.I provided them with examples to make the topic clear.After I explained the topic clearly I think they understood it. Then, we had a quiz. It was a bit difficult for me to try to attract my students' attention to the lesson because of my terrible toothache:(

ISIK - REFLECTION (19/11/12)

 Today the classes started in a positive way and i can say that it went same all day. I wore red today and my students told me that i looked nice and this created somehow energy in the classroom atmosphere. I felt motivated and they felt inspired, it was weird it was as if the power of red affected all of us :) we did speaking a lot, but i realized that the same activity could work in one class and not work in another class. With my main class, i haven't been able to do speaking a lot, most of them are passive receivers, but with other class, we havew been ablo to speak more. Another interesting thing happened today was that during the break one of the students came totell me that some of the students in class really bother him since they talked a lot and they distract his attention to the lesson, he asked me to warn them more. However, the problem is I warn them almost every 30seconds sometimes and i am not sure what else i can do. i just feel like Fatih Terim, what can i do sometimes? :)

Kamile: Reflection (19.11.2012)

Kamile: Reflection (19.11.2012)

Today was really different. I had a video class today and my students were quite different during the recording. Actually, they asked me the reason why we recorded the class and I told them that as they made me unhappy I wanted a recording and they believed that!! They decided to be hardworking students. They were much more silent and participative than normal so we had a satisfactory lesson. After the video class they continued to be energetic.Of course, I had some students sleeping as normal but it was not a big problem.Actually, today's only problem was by terrible toothache so İt was a difficult day for me.
When it comes to the classes we studied on a reading about which I provided pictures and a video for my students.We had lots of speaking activity about the topic of the reading because the topic was really enjoyable and appropriate for disscussion...

Sedef: Reflection_9

Today I had a problem with one of my students. Actually that was not a big deal but still made me unhappy. The topic was 'appearance' and the vocabulary included some adjectives such as blonde, fat, overweight, slim etc. or some nouns like beard, moustache etc. One student in the classroom always complains of some things. I was trying to teach the vocabulary making the students in the classroom stand up and I showed their hair, eyes etc. (curly, wavy...) I heard him saying what we will do with this information, it doesn't have any use for us. He also wanted me to hear it. This was not the first attitude of him towards me and the lesson. He demotivates both me and the other students in the classroom. I couldn't know how to react. This was the only problem and it was OK for the other lessons.

16.11.12

So... Got a headband, Allison's sunglasses, and a backpack and walked into class. My students flipped! One thumbs up for getting their attention. The unit was Travel Partners, so I taught them some vocab like "backpacker" and stuff, then we studied the comparatives, using some not so much fun travel vocab, comparing transportation, accommodation and what not. Then I gave them some more fun statements to compare (such as "coming to school and going out with your boy/girlfriend) which went quite well. I'd just put on my sunglasses (well, Allison's sunglasses) and shout "HELLO!" to get their attention. Helped a lot really. Aaaaand another really good thing (thanks to Merve) was the coffee ticket competition activity. Merve gave me these statements (like London's population: something something, Paris' population: something something. And there was the adjective the students were supposed to use: crowded), there were 10 of them. We formed 7 groups of 4, each group got 10 statements, and they were supposed to write full sentences with no mistakes for each statement, and stick them on the board. After they were done writing and sticking, we went over the sentences one by one, at each mistake moving onto another group. We had two winner teams. They had so much fun, all of them were taking pictures of the board after we were done going over the grammar points.

The downer of the day was that it's really difficult to keep up with the book and teach all the grammar points, still struggling with that. And the computers in the classes aren't working so well, took ages to do a couple of listening activities. All in all, it wasn't an awful day. And they were in a good mood because their writing exams went well (so they thought at least).

Kamile: Reflection (16.11.2012)

Kamile: Reflection (16.11.2012)

It was a really tiring day. After the exam my students are generally too distracted and it was difficult to keep trying to teach them something.In the first two hours I was with one of my classes and we studied on writing. I provided them with an example of application letter and CV. After they had an idea about an application letter I wanted them to apply for a job by writing an application letter as a homework. In the last three hours I was with my other class who were as distracted as the others.In this class I provided some new vocabularies about relationships and feelings. Then we had a reading text with questions and event-ordering activity. During the whole lessons I had just two students who tried to learn something, which was really annoying.Some of the others were sleeping and some were chatting. I think as they had easy MMTs they started to feel much more relaxed. I really don't know what to do with such careless and unrespectful students. I feel really tired of having such classes...

Sedef: Reflection_8

Today, we covered superlative forms and giving directions. The students were really attentive and interested in the lesson. We could listen to the dialogues in the coursebook. Then we had fun while practising the phrases used when asked 'Can you tell me the way to ...? ' I told them to choose someone in the classroom and then an object. the student gave the directions for the other student to find the object in the classroom. It was really funny because some students changed the activity a little bit and made his/her friend stand up, go around the classroom by giving directions and sit down the same place without making any objects found :)
The computer was working well, my students were participative in the activities so I was content with the lessons today.

Week of November 12th

Hello all!  Sorry I have been a bad blogger, things have been so busy.  I would like to talk about my Monday and Wednesday classes this week which went well although I had to play "mean teacher" a few times.  All in all, Monday went well.  We started a new unit on film and music which are two things very near and dear to me, so I like this unit thus far.  On Monday we focused on reading and it was a very long passage for the students.  It was about the behaviors of British teens when talking about downloading music, movies, going to the cinema and listening to the radio.  Although my students are very bright, they sometimes answer questions simply based on whether or not they see the same words written in the question in the text.  I have been trying to get them to focus more on critical thinking and decided to devote more time to the reading activity than usual.  I think this worked out very well because even though we had to read parts of the text several times, it forced them to find the crucial information.  I have repeat students, and sometimes you can just see the lack of enthusiasm in their faces.  It makes me sad because they are so intelligent, but just frustrated.  Overall, Monday was a successful class.  I am still having trouble with a particularly chatty row in my class, but they facilitate a lot of conversation within the class as a whole so I try to focus their chattiness into productivity.  Wednesday was a good series of classes.  We talked about Glastonbury and Woodstock and completed an activity in which they had to fill in the lyrics for the song "Woodstock."  I showed them pictures of my dad when he was in his "hippie phase" (see attached photo) and they all thought this was hysterical.    I really love the times when I can just talk to my students conversationally.  That sounds redundant, but there is such a difference between talking to them as a teacher and talking to them as a friendly mentor who really has the time and energy to listen about their lives and be able to give them insight into things they are interested in.  Whenever I include personal things like photos of my family or home it really creates a whole new layer to the classroom that I really enjoy.  Anywho, I kind of got off track there, but I enjoyed Wednesdays lesson for this reason is my main point!  I had to take away some break time because of talking, but overall a good day.  Let's see what Friday has in store for me!

13/11/12

Today was also an average day. The only issue was in a writing exercise. Again, we had plenty of time, so we could practice writing for the exam. I had my students write from the DVD portion of the book. They all wrote a paragraph or two and then they corrected their own. I wrote the criteria for corrections on the board. I wanted them to remember to correct their own writings and look at their own previous writing mistakes and remembering their faults so they can check them as they complete the exam. Thinking back, I should have had them complete the "checking" list, but they were writing as I completed the list.

I had them check their own, and then I mixed up their papers and had them check each others . This was a good idea, as I differentiated  or intentionally gave certain papers to certain students. I tried to pair up a weak student with a more advanced one, that way the advanced student could effectively correct the weaker's and the weaker student could see a good example. This worked well with most. I should have insisted that students corrected more. Some didn't correct much, if at all. We just had to complete more of the book than time allowed, so we couldn't fully milk the exercise like I would have wanted. I think it did help, however, and they hopefully will do well on the writing exam.

12/11/12 Allison

Today was an average day. Nothing good, nothing bad... I was observed by Dilek and my "around the world" game went extremely well. The students were good sports. The only issue was timing; it took awhile to complete the lesson today, but we had enough time, so no worries!

Sedef: Reflection_7

There wasn't anything special today. In the first lesson, I announced their last quizzes' results. I indicated that I was not content with them. I somehow warned them about the wrting exam because of the mistakes that I noticed on their papers.
Then we covered DVD part of 6th unit; the students always enjoyed watching these DVDs; however, it was a nightmare today due to the big problems with computer. Despite all the difficulties, we managed to work on the video. Then we started the new unit. The students were interested in the topic which is 'Holidays'. It was an appropriate topic to make the sts talk to each other. the underlying grammar structure was comparative. After practising on the structure, I made them work in pairs and compare their hometowns and Eskişehir. They were eager to make this comparison because they all have some ideas about Eskişehir in their minds. Lastly, they worked in pairs again and prepared a conversation about one of their holidays and they had some questions as guides in their coursebook. They also compared the holiday resort and the city/town in which they live. Then we role played it. The conversations were perfect. I told to the sts sitting and watching to take notes of their friends' mistakes to be shared after each role play. They were really careful not to miss any mistakes.

Kamile: Reflection (14.11.2012)

Today was less tiring than Monday and Tuesday. In the first hour I announced the results of their seventh quiz. After we went over the answers of the quiz and we had a feedback session. We spend time to solve their problems on the grammar subjects ''past simple and present perfect''. Then, we did speaking activity about the jobs. As they had already been presented some job offers in the newspaper, I wanted them to ask for some information about these jobs. Meanwhile, I provided them with the topic of making polite requests. I gave them some information about 'noun clauses'.Later, we had a pair work in which they wrote a dialogue to apply for a job and later on they act out it. Then, we had a writing session as a practice for mid module test 2. I presented them the linkers of sequence, the linkers of addition and the linkers of contrast to be used in their writings.They practised on writing with frequent feedbacks. In the last hour we had a quiz and that was the end of the classes.
In the afternoon we had a meeting with our trainers. It went well. Actually, during these meeting I sometimes felt really unfamiliar with the things spoken because of my 'different' students...

Merve: Reflection #4 (13.11.12)

Today was really tiring because of the technical difficulties : I always had to make quick decisions, change the plan because the software didn't work. It distracted my students attention from the activity and it was difficult to motivate them again and again. I know I should anticipate such problems beforehand, however the server is too moody! It works well one second, and when I turn back it shuts down.

Today in both classes, we covered the third section of unit 6. The section provided us with a lot of opportunity to practice past simple. Yesterday my students were quite succesful in producing written workusing past simple, and today they produced spoken language using past simple. I think only in this unit the coursebook gives detailed activities and explanation about one grammar topic.  Some parts were overlapping and I wasn't successful in adapting them: therefore I felt as I did what the book said to me today. So, I was bored after a while and so were my students. However, today we produced language, and except for some drawbacks, it was a great chance to use the newly learned grammar point.

Sedef: Reflection_6

I want to start today's entry commenting on my video class. To be honest, I didn't like it. However, the reason why I talked that much is that the computer didn't work and I couldn't make the students watch the video that I planned. I had to write the sentences of a conversation on the board. to admit, having a camera in a classroom was more difficult than being observed by another teacher. I guess both the students' and my mood changed and I noticed that when I watched the video:)

When it comes to today's lessons, they were good. It is a good feeling to see that your students are proceeding in their ways dramatically. we had lots of practise activities and exercises about simple past tense. I spared more time to make the students talk using the target structure. The interaction among the students was great.
However, the computer was again problematic; we couldn't have an access to coursebook source in the computer. This caused a problem because the students couldn't have an audial input. There was only me; we couldn't do the listening activities.

Sedef

ISIK Reflection (13/11/12)

Today was a tiring day. We talked about the relative  caluses and students were not so familiar with the topic, so they had some problems comprehending the topic. I gave more examples to  clarify and at the end of the lesson they were better, but still they need some more practice. With other class, we talked about the marathons. We did some listening anf reading on this topic. Actually the topic was interesting  but it was the forth hour and students were very tired, so it was not as efficient as I had expected. Another thing that I realized today was that as there is less time left for the final exam, students are getting more and more anxious and alertive. After the mid module test, some students started to participate the classes more, which is  a good thing i guess.

This week's recorded classes

Hi all, Here are the links for this week's feedback sessions. https://vimeo.com/53413005 https://vimeo.com/53396833 https://vimeo.com/53319703 See you tomorrow...

Kamile: Reflection (13.11.2012)

Today I had five hours with the same class. In the first hour I presented them the topic that ''American teenagers and work''. Also to make it more interesting for my students I wanted them to compare the conditions they have and American teenagers have. We disscussed this topic for minutes then I continued with the textbook. They completed sentences about the article they had read. This part of the lesson was quite successful because they were into the article. In the second hour as I announced their MMT results, we discussed about their marks and the questions in the exam. Of course it wasn't easy to attract their attention to the lesson again. Then, I went on with the book and they learned some new words. Actually, it's really difficult to make my students feel comportable with the english explanation because they always want to know the turkish meaning! They had a fill-in-the-blanks activity in a song. After they filled in the blanks with the given words we were supposed to check their answers but the song was a bit difficult for them so they couldn't fill lots of the spaces.However, it was fun for them to have such an activity. To my surprise one of my students who never participates into the lesson filled all of the spaces correctly when I gave them the chance to listen and complete the song. Then I provided them with two pictures and I asked for their predictions about the pictures.They had a listening avtivity and checked their predictions which were hilarious. Finally, I continued with a speaking activity in which they had some unreal situations to comment on by using this week's first grammar subject ''second conditional''. I'm content with this part of the lesson because it was a good practice for them to understand the second conditional. What I'm not happy with today's class is my students' reluctance in the last hour of the day.Even the most hardworking ones get tired and hungry in the fifth hour so it becomes much more difficult to continue because I have just few students who participate...

Merve: Reflection #3 (12.11.2012)

Hi everyone, I haven't been able to blog for a few days, because there was a problem with my google account. I solved the problem finally, and now let me summarize what happened last week.
On Friday, after MMT; I recorded one of my classes and it was a different experience . Although I was the one who was supposed to be nervous, my students were really stressed out because of the recording. They were all quiet in every second of the lesson, which suprised me a lot. I tried hard to engage them and behave naturally. Nevertheless, everything went perfectly well according to my lesson plan. We had some technical problems with the overhead projectors, but we solved them quickly and quietly thanks to my nervous students! :) In addition, I promise you'll have lots of fun when you watch my recording : there was a big bee in our classroom and you will learn a lot about "bee management." After the recording, I asked my students to write a feedback about the class, and they all said they always liked the extra materials and visuals I used, but most of them didn't like the idea of recording. I am looking forward to your feedback on my video!

12.11.2012

On Monday I introduced a new grammar point: past simple. Before the class, I looked at the book and I didn't like the introduction in the book at all. So, I decided to adapt it for my class and prepared a powerpoint about my childhood. I used my childhood photos, my favorite drinks& snacks& cartoons& toys as a child and I provided sentences with was/ were with the pictures . My students were really into the subject from the very beginning. We had an enjoyable whole class discussion about our childhoods and it was very easy for them to get the meaning of was/were. Then I continued with the book and some extra worksheet as controlled practice. In my other class I introduced regular/irregular verbs using the text TimeTwins in the textbook. I provided them with a love story and it was a fill-in-the-blanks activity-as a controlled practice.Then they had question-answer session about the story. Finally, as free practice, I asked them to write their life story and when they finished we had peer-check.
Monday was productive and funny although we had too much grammar to deal with. Using visuals again saved  my day!

However, nowadays I face a classroom management problems. My students always ask for listening to music or watching a video in the last minutes of the class. Even if I had actitivites or tasks to do to fill time, they keep doing so. They say they are used to watch them in other classes, and they label me as a strict teacher. I am not happy being in this situation but I don't want to give up and let them watch videos.. How can I solve this issue?

Sedef: Reflection_5

I am just content with the things that we did in the classroom today. My students were really participative and they enjoyed the classroom activities of mine. the structure was new, the unit was new and they were just fresh in the morning.
First I started with some wellknown famous people like Cameron Diaz, Jennifer Aniston, Justin Timberlake, Sting etc. I had prepared a ppt using these celebrities. First I elicited students' answers about who these people are and then I asked about their opinions after each famous person what was their job in the past. I listened to their predictions and then I showed the slide on which celbrities' names and some jobs are written. I wanted them to work in pairs and match the names with the jobs. It was fun for the students as the jobs were unexpected such as a bricklayer, a toy shop assitant, or a hospital worker. Then I went on showing the slides on which the sentences like "Sting was a bricklayer in the past." As you already understand, the slides had both 'was/were' sentences and the answers of matching activity at the same time. After practising 'was/were' with some exercises in the book, I delivered to them seperate pieces of a reading passage. The sentences or the paragraphes had sentences written in simple past tense (regular verbs). They put them in order and underlined the verbs in the sentences, which aims to raise the students' awareness on the target structure. Then we worked on the sentences asking and answering lots of questions about them. In that way, sts started to make sentences with regular verbs in the past tense. Then there was another 'putting in order activity', but this time they were pictures and there were only phrases. That's why, the sts needed to make sentences using the phrases given. This enhanced the autonomy in the new structure step by step. They enjoyed all the activities and they were eager to contribute to the lesson.
However, in the other classroom, it wasn't the case. I couldn't apply my activities there as the main teacher covered them in her own way. We also had a quiz, so the students made it difficult to cover the things that I thought. We could only focus on question sentence formation in past tense, and their comments were invaluable for me. They indicated that they had never understood  that well:) The computer was problematic in my classrooms as well, but anyway it was a productive day.
Sedef

Well, hello. Sorry for the delay :) Seeing all the stuff being said about the Monday Syndrome, I feel like I have to say something too. Well, I absolutely love Mondays! I know I moan a lot during the breaks, but I do miss my students over the weekend, and they miss me too, which is a good thing as it makes it easier to get their attention. Anyway...
Pro(s) of the day: I was teaching the past form of the verb "be" today, I didn't just want to go all "Well, here's the rule; singular subject + was, plural subject + were". So I just barged in, yelled "Oh my God! I saw all of you out last night! You were all at a bar at 7!" (We have a no-going-out-after-6 rule at class). They got all defensive trying to explain that they were home last night, using the present tense. A couple students seemed to know about the past tense, so I got them to talk first so that the rest could somehow learn the correct form. I asked them where they were the night before, and they answered (correctly) and I repeated their answers, stressing "was". I asked everyone where they were, after I made sure they could use "I was" properly, I asked their friends to tell me where their classmates were, changing the subjects thus changing the  auxiliary. Well, turns out they were all at home, so they had a good hard laugh, which was awesome. Aaaand, thanks to Merve I did a really fun activity. I had this powerpoint of my favourite childhood cartoons, candies, singers and such (most of my students are my age, so they knew all that stuff). We talked about all that stuff, I asked simple questions with was were, demanded to get full-sentence answers. It was really fun, a couple of them almost cried when the activity came to an end :) I was actually planning to do a "Life in the 1500s and now", but didn't think they'd like it all that much. Once again, thank you sooo much Merve.

Con(s) of the day: 4 hours of past tense is just boring no matter what you do. They started to drift off at some point, and the computer wasn't working that well either which just added to the boredom. The last hours are always a drag. Grammar exercises don't work, pair activities don't work, group activities don't work, games don't work (even coffee ticket games). Nothing works, they just want to get out as soon as they can so they won't have to wait in line to get food. Don't know how to deal with that really.

Gülcan

Kamile: Reflection (12.11.2012)

Kamile: Reflection (12.11.2012)

                                 

After the weekend I had four hours with one of my classes today. There were many absent students in the class. After speaking about their weekend we passed through the book and I wanted my students to read the text they had read on Friday in order to remember what was it about. They went over the text quickly and we focused on the true-false activity. It took time because my students sometimes have their own comments about the sentences they have read. When they insist on making interpretation on the sentences it became really difficult to change their idea. Actually, as a teacher that can be my weakness because I don’t really know how to satisfy them with my explanations in such situations. Then, I presented them the new grammar topic ‘’modal verbs (should, must and have to)’’. Next I provided them with a few example sentences and then I wanted them to make their own sentences and that was the most satisfactory activity of the day for me. Finally, in order to check how well they understood the target grammar topic we did a rewrite activity. I think the activities worked because students completed the activity quite successfully.

Kamile: Reflection (09.11.2012)

After the MMT exam we had yesterday my students were really distracted. The exam was much easier than they expected. I don’t know whether that was the reason or not but they were a bit relaxed. In the first hour we did speaking and we discussed their ideas about the exam. Then, we went through the book and we passed to the new unit which was about the jobs and personal qualities. In the first two hours they learned lots of new vocabularies. Then in the last three hours with my other class we dealt with a reading that’s in the book. First, we studied the unknown words they had in the reading and I made them to understand the passage completely. At the end of the day I thought it wasn’t a totally satisfactory day but I like the activity in which my students wrote down sentences about themselves and their partners by using the adjectives they had learned about their personalities.

9th November, Reflection


Today went well except for a few points. I want to start with what went well. Today ı paid special attention to be clear when ı give the instructions. I gave them in English and ı used very simple sentences. Afterwards, to check the understanding, ı wanted one student to tell what we are doing in Turkish. It worked especially for a pair work activity we did.It was an information gap activity. Student A was supposed to read one text and B another text at the end of the book.First ı arranged the pairs as A and B. Then ı wanted As to raise their hands.Okay you will read the text on this page and answer the questions.Then ı asked Bs to raise their hands. Then ı told them to go to page.... I showed them the text and wanted them to read and answer the questions of this text.  Before ı was expecting students to understand easily what they are supposed to do as they are kind of used to these type of activities. However, I noticed that for each activity ı have to give clear instructions step by step.

We also covered a grammer point, the articles. It was a subject that the studets are already familiar with. So it was very easy to include the students in every stage of the grammer explanation. They like it more when they are fully included in the lesson. Whenever ı talk a little bit more than enough, I lose them. So ı try to keep them alert by eliciting and asking questions even if they yes no questions.

As for the bad points, although ı want them to increase STT as much as possible, when it is their turn to talk, to discuss something for example, I noticed that ı interrup them to help them out whenever they get stuck. I dont think it does them good, though because maybe they are going to express themselves if ı give them enough time. However, this time the other students start talking and it becomes difficult to manage. So ı am not very sure of what to do about it.

Allison - Friday, November 9th

Wow, what a crazy, but ultimately productive day! I’d say my biggest mistake today was not being able to check my e-mail before beginning class. My schedule was changed and this change began today. I had looked at my schedule the night before, but it must have changed because guess who shows up after I begin an activity, but my co teacher! It turns out my Fridays stayed the same, but both my students and I were confused!

                Coming back to class at my scheduled time, the lesson went extremely well. The grammar point (articles) fit in perfectly with the writings I handed back. The students were able to apply their newly learned grammar skill to their own writings. (the articles were horrendous!)

                The students also enjoyed a brainstorming activity which led into the next section of the unit. This unit discussed different types of animals, so I began the section by putting blank pieces of paper on the walls with headings of different types of animals: mammals, birds, reptiles, wild animals, water animals, domestic animals. I took all of these categorizations out of the book and the photobank, so it would be relevant to the book when we completed these sections. The students were put into groups of 3 or 4 and placed at a paper. They had to think of as many animals as possible and write them down. After about a minute or two, they switched. The only catch was, no dictionaries were allowed! Nearly all of the students were focused on the activity and many mentioned their enjoyment. After this, we had a long list of animals. We discussed the new animals, but now I have a large list and can use them in review games and such. The only problem with this activity is that with all of the animal headings, it did take longer than would normally be allowed. However, we are ahead in the book, so it worked very well in our particular situation! A good day!

Allison - Wednesday, November 7th

Well, today went extremely well, considering the students participated in a 7 hour day in two extremely hot classrooms. I was miserable, so I can imagine the same from them, if not more!  I did enjoy the classes, however, and we ended on a good note.  They thoroughly enjoyed the final activity of the day, and all students were awake and no one complained! Score on my part! It was the first creative writing activity that was completely fictional. All of the writings from the book in e-mail or blog format about themselves. Sometimes it is a fictional situation, but always believable. This writing, with the only guidance being “it has to be in an outdoor space and involve an animal,” kept the students much more engaged and was more fun for them. It was also fun for me to read as well!

One do over I wish I could have was in a reading section. It was the second hour of the makeup section, so students had been in class for 6 hours, and some were sleeping, but most were extremely chatty cathys. A reading was next and I had planned to go over some challenging vocabulary before we began, but I was too busy trying to rein them in to mention this. This made the students a little frustrated and I extremely frustrated because I had to go around and answer all of the questions! After they finished reading, we went over the new vocabulary, but things would have gone much more smoothly, had I remembered!

Sedef: Reflection_4

Positive Sides: The focus of today's lesson was ordering in a restaurant. It was an appropriate function to make Ss communicate with each other. First I conveyed the meaning of some words and phrases such as to order, bill, menu, dish, tip, waiter/waitress. I intended to make them watch a video including two customers and a customer, and they were ordering. However, unfortunately because of a technical problem we couldn't watch that. ınstead I built the context in the classroom and by asking Qs to the Ss and eliciting their answers, we composed a dialogue and wrote it on the board. then I focused on how we order, ask for the menu and the bill in a restaurant. having a model conversation in our book was also great to make them expose to one more example. they completed the dialogue with the words in the box. Next I wanted them to practice the conversation in pairs paying attention to the intonation. They were content with the task by exaggerating the intonation. In the next lesson, after we went over the menus given in the coursebook (starter-main course-today's special-dessert), I formed groups of 5 and delivered them some colorful papers in order for them to prepare their own menus. The task motivated them and they had fun while writing some Turkish food on their menus (Turkish Kebap, Ayran... :). Then, I wanted them to role-play at stage using their own menus. they ordered some food or drinks; they complained that the food was expensive; they refused to give a tip or even they couldn't pay the bill and asked to the waiter whether they could wash the dishes or not :)

Negative Sides: I was dissappointed because of the problem with video as it would be really illustrative. I don't know if I could be successful or not only trying to illustrate it on my own. Although there seems to be no problem based on the students' responds, I'm just not satisfied simply because it didn't go on the way that I planned. One other negative side of today is this issue: I make groups and specify the time; OK there is no problem with that. However, the students don't stop as soon as the time is up. For example, if a group couldn't finish the task on time, they tend not to listen to the other groups' performance on the stage and to go on dealing with their own task. It takes some time to attract all the students' attention to the group acting. I don't know how to make them engage in the lesson as soon as the time is up. I appreciate your comments and suggestions. Thanks in advance.

Sedef KONUK

ISIK - REFLECTION 4 (9/11/12)

Today we had the same discussion activity with other class and it worked with this class as well. They were good at expressing their ideas. What's more the two opposite groups were be able to reached the common point in the end. We did listening and speaking for almost three hours. Then we talked about the 'for and against essay' and they were in great attention as i told them that they are going to write this kind of essay and it is probable to be asked to write such kind of essay in the exam. Unfortunately all the students show tendency to give more emphasis on the subject if they are told that the subject is important for the portfolio or the exam. The thing that I didn't like was about the quiz. Actually it was not today's problem. Today, they had the ninth quiz and they were still in panic like the time they had the first quiz. They lost all their attention to the topic and just skimmed the pages to get something in a few minutes. I am not okey with this situation but I don't know what to do, either.

November 7th, Reflection

Positive points: For the vocabulary ı needed to teach, ı had both prepared concept checking questions and questions to help me elicit knowledge from the students. I think it worked very well,both because ı didnt resorted to Turkish  having thought about how to make the vocabulary clear by eliciting and giving the examples, and because it noticably increased STT. They seemed less bored,too.

Negative Points: I couldnt make a smooth connection between the activitiesWhen ı just give instructions for the next activity without connecting one to the another, they seem lost and they dont like it. They want what they are engaged with to make sense. So ı should be more careful about the transitions and come up with some ideas to connect the activities because the book itself doesnt give it.

Sedef: Reflection_3

Positive points: Today was a great chance to practise for the MMT based on my students' reactions and comments. I applied lots of tasks of listening and reading. I made them listen to some exercises from a website first. Then we went on with some reading practises and then we switched into listening practise again. the reason why I mixed them is because I didn't want them to be demotivated due to the same pace going on and on in the classroom. We worked on some strategies for listening and writing. Most of them gave their decisions for a question as soon as they heard a word, for example, in a picture of the question. However, at the end they got the point that they needed to understand the whole speaking to decide on the correct alternative. It was a fruitful day to prepare them for MMT.

Negative points: I wish I had printed out the listening and reading activities because I believe that the students would be more focused on the questions if they had some hard copies in their hands. Besides, although I downloaded the MP3 file of the listening in my memory stick, it didn't work in the classroom. I tried to download it in the classroom; but only a small part of it was downloaded. Finally, we listened to it without downloading via email. We were able to fulfill the task but it took some time for me. I wish I hadn't done the reading activities before the listening task with which I had problem. In that way, they could have been engaged in a task while I was trying to solve the problem. because it was an unexpected situation, I couldn't know how I would engage them in a task in this about ten minute-period of time and what task it would be. I wait for your ideas. Thank you in advance. :)  

Sedef KONUK

ISIK - REFLECTION 3 (7/11/12)

POSITIVE POINTS

Today, in first hour, we did discussion as a whole class. normally it was a peer work, but i adapted it as whole class activity to make a difference.  I divided class into two and formed two groups. I gave some words such as antibiotics, cars, mobile phones, spaceships... and ask group one to think about positive sides and write down their opinions and group two to write negative sides for each term. I also asked them to think about the possible ideas other group may put forward so that they can refute them. This discussion really took their attention, they took it seriously and had a great interaction with each other. I would like to do this kind of activity more often in my classes now.

NEGATIVE POINTS

Tomorrow students will have  MMT and today it affected my class. we did grammar but some students just did some self study on reading and vocabulary since they will have a reading exam tomorrow. I asked them to leave those sheets and participate the activities but they went on studying. At the end, I let them study in last hour since  I covered to the point that I planned. Now, I'm thinking whether it was a good or bad thing, or what could I do to take thier attention to the lesson? I am still confused.

Merve: Reflection #3 (07.11.2012)

Positive Points : Today was a day for general revision in both of my classes. I used the listening-reading-writing test sent by the unit heads; and I used it as a soft copy. At the beginning, the students were really attentive and engaged; because the material was really helpful for the MMT. We did the listening exercises and we also discussed how to do listening effectively. I mentioned the importance of reading and understanding the questions before listening the text. We also disccussed an important strategy :listening for the keywords. At the end of the session; I believe most of them developed certain strategies for listening. In addition hearing "thank you teacher, this session was wonderful." was really motivating for me! I hope tomorrow in the exam they'll show the same performance.

Negative Points: I wish I had printed out the material and distributed it to my students. Using the material just like the classware was fine, but in the second hour most of the students got tired of reading it from the board. As a result; some of them were lost. I tried to adapt some activities in the material, and gave them some cards to write their answers down and I gave them extra time if they wanted to take notes. But it wasn't very effective. Some students really need hard copies to keep up with. I should have thought this before and prepared the hard copies. I feel sorry for those students today.

Merve Bakkal

Kamile: Reflection (07.11.2012)

Kamile: Reflection (07.11.2012)

I had five hours in the morning and two extra hours in the afternoon. In the first two hours I focused on the grammar revision section in the book and I did a listening activity which was quite difficult for my students. Then, in the next three hours we dealt with the readings in the workbook, which was really helpful for the exam they’re going to have tomorrow. Actually, I expected to have more motivated students in the last three hours of the morning session because we were studying on reading comprehension which is the topic of the exam. Unfortunately, they were quite distracted and they were just trying to memorize vocabularies for the exam. They were a bit nervous and it was really tiring to keep them motivated. In the fourth hour we had a quiz, which also made them distracted. As always, in the fifth hour they were hungry and it just passed by trying to attract their attention into the lesson. 

After lunch with my other class I had two hours and we focused on listening as a practice for the exam again. They keep complaining about the make-up lessons that we had just before the exam. However, in my opinion today was really useful because it’s not so easy for the students to practice on reading and listening. On the other hand, today was a bit tiring both for me and for my students. I had difficulty in attracting their attention and motivating them. I don’t know what I could do but it's not really easy to discipline a class just before such an important exam.

Sedef: Reflection_2

November 6th - Lesson Reflection 2

Positive Points: The morning session was really OK. The focus was a grammar topic: 'How much/many'. The reading passage on p.50 was very interesting and I arose the students' attention to fill in the blanks. I listened to most of the students' predictions and then announced the right number. They were shocked with the numbers (e.g a person drinks 60.000 litres of water in a lifetime.) Then I wanted them to work in pairs to ask each other questions about the numbers and I gave an example: How many chickens does a person eat in a lifetime? The students were interested in the questions and their answers.

Negative Points: As you all know we had two more lessons today. This influenced the students both physiologically and psychologically. They resisted doing the task and I tried to motivate them indicating that it would be very useful in terms of reading comprehension. I really don't know what else can be done if your students really don't want to fulfill the task that you planned. Plus, I guess I am not good at turning grammar lectures into enjoyable ones..

Sedef KONUK

Merve: Reflection #2 (06.11.2012)

Positive Sides : Today was very communicative!!.In both of my classes, we practiced ordering food in a restaurant, and we did this by converting our classroom into a restaurant. We prepared the menu together with my students and printed it out for the customers. We did five rounds of the role play. In each round, we had a waiter and five customers. Before we started role playing, we watched sample videos on ordering food, and I clarified the language structured they would use. My students were very productive today and each individual got the opportunity to practice speaking. Actually this was the first time I conducted such an activity, and it turned out to be very useful.

Negative Sides: As you may know, today we had make-up classes today and we had only one unit the schedule. We almost finished Unit5, and I wanted to use some extra materials. However, although I brought extra material into class, I had difficulty in filling time. In the last fifteen minutes, I had nothing to do so I just tried to make up an activity : but it  was a failure! I had to research about last-minute time fillers and keep them in my for such extraordinary cases. Do you guys have any ideas for time-fillers, or do you know any activities which I can use with any topic& grammar point ?? I would appreciate if you share your ideas.


Thank you for reading,
Merve.

November 5th Lesson Reflection

November 5th Lesson Reflection

Although most people think that monday is the worst day of the week (you know monday syndrome), I just think the contrary. ı believe the students are ready more thatn ever for the lessons on the first day of the week. It is most probably because they study at the weekend or they have a chance to rest and refresh their minds. 

That's why, they were motivated and willing. Besides, they were  really creative and good at role play task including two students; one customer and one shop assistant.(asking for different sizes, colors and saying 'yes' or 'no' to the shop assisstant politely) I provided them with all the conditions in the classroom. (e.g I carried the hanger in front of the students as the scene is a clothes shop.) (I asked them first how do you give up buying an item and say 'no' in Turkish while they are shopping.) I forced the students to use the intonation after I modeled the dialogue first. They got prepared first on their seats and then came to the stage and acted it out without their notes. We had really fun as a whole class. I took notes of their mistakes and after each role play I made the class correct them. This reduced the mistakes during the next act outs. The problem is that it took more time than I thought; but I believe that it was really useful for the students. 

The next lesson was 'Favorite Places - (DVD part)'. I tried to make a smooth transition between the lessons by asking this question: "I know most of you enjoy shopping and spending money. What about the others? Is there anyone who saves money? (There are some.) I asked them what do you plan to do with that money? I wanted them to say something about visiting different places or travelling. Which places do you want to see in the world? Then I wrote their answers on the board. This was a good transition, in my opinion, to ask about the pictures on p.44. I continued with the exercises in the book. As it is DVD part, there was a reading information in BBC channel as usual. At the end of the lesson, I asked for their predictions about what BBC stands for. I elicited their answers and lastly announced the answer. It was good to keep them motivated.
The day went on with Unit 5; and I made the transition to the new unit (Food) asking 'Do you want to eat any special food when you go somewhere new?' 'What special food do you have in your hometowns?' 'What do you use while cooking it?  Tomatoes? Onions?' Then we started the exercies in the book.
When we talked about the fridges in the book, I wanted the students to make up stories (two-three sentences) asking why there is a hot dog, who might put the banana there and where is the birthday cake.
Everything seemed allright but there were two students who tended to sleep and not to participate in the lessons during the day. This is also because they are far ahead the other students. I don't know how to solve this problem. I wait for your comments and better suggestions :)

Sedef KONUK

FEEDBACK ON CASSONDRA' CLASS

One thing that I liked with Cassondra’s class was the beginning of the lesson.  She used Turkish- English comparison which makes the topic more comprehensible I think. I am not sure whether it was the first time that she introduced the topic, but I guess students had some knowledge about it beforehand. I also liked the classroom atmosphere, although their teacher is a foreigner, I mean native speaker, the students seemed to feel free to participate in lesson and they seemed motivated as well. If it was the the introduction to the topic, I think 20 minutes is a bit long for introducing the topic.  The thing which made me shocked was that when someone gave the quiz sheet, students just went on listening to the teacher and doing the activity until the teacher distributed quiz sheets to them. They just didn’t lose their focus to the lesson. I  am not sure whether it is because of the recording or they react in the same way all the time. When I get the quiz, my students just get panic, stop doing activities and getting ready for the quiz and I can do nothing at that moment.  Anyway, she seemed friendly and motivating and students seemed happy with the class J

COMMENT ON MY OWN RECORDING

Firstly i can say that normally my students are different. They are not silent as much as in the video, because of the recording, they seem more ‘innocent’ lets say J however, it affects them in a bad way too, because they are more participative in classroom activities actually but in the class time that i recorded, they were not so participative, most probably because of the reason that they didn’t feel comfortable.  Anyway, when come to the activities, the focus was the reading skill. We dealt with reading passage about The Ig Nobel prizes. To see what they know about it and to take their attention to the topic, I prepared a quiz in which there were some sentences about these prizes and students were to decide whether they are true or false. Then I asked students to scan the text to check their answers.  I think this activity worked well. Another thing that I liked was the vocabulary part. In their books, the words are written in an isolated form, and students have to find the meanings. I thought it would be better to give them the definitions and asked them to match the words with the definitions instead of just looking up the dictionary. Therefore, I prepared a matching exercise and they could get the meaning of words with the help of definitions. During all activities, I often asked students whether they know the meaning of a word (which I think they might not know) to be sure that they know it. I often expected them to give me the meaning of the word in Turkish. Since they are intermediate (B.1.2) students, I am not sure whether it is good or not. But anyway, I think it is good to check their understanding. Another thing that I liked was that I asked further questions such as ‘why, where did you get it?’ which is a good technique in my opinion. It makes students think and speak more.  One thing that I didn’t like with my lesson was that I had the more control and most of the time I gave the right answer, I just showed them the true answer. Maybe I should have given them more time to think, or peer helping could be work, instead of just giving the right answer. I need to be more patient I guess. Another thing that I didn’t liked was the classroom atmosphere. Okey, it was a kind of stress free environment, but mostly same students participated the class and others seemed demotivated. Therefore, I could have prepared other activities to make everyone participate in activities. Especially, when I asked them to read loudly one by one, they get bored most of the time as it takes some time. The reason behind this technique is to see their pronunciation and to be sure that they read and comprehend the text, because when I ask them to read silently, most students just pretend as if they are reading.  I can clearly say that I am just at the beginning of the teaching process, and there are so many things to learn not only from my colleagues but also from my students. 

ISIK - REFLECTION 2 (06/11/12)

Today, I had five hours and I did listening, reading and some grammar with my classes. The topic was ‘robots’ as reading, we had an extract from a short story. I tried something new today. Normally I asked my students to read a part the passage one by one, but today I assigned some students with the characters in the reading passage and they read their part in the passage. It was like a role play and it was more enjoyable and attractive for the class. I know it doesn’t work with all reading texts, but if it is a kind of story, if there are speeches, then I advise other teachers to try it. We covered the grammar point causatives ‘have something done. Normally my students are good at grammar since they are repeat students and it isn’t the first time for them.  However, they had some problems with this grammar topic today, maybe because of the reason that it was the first time that they saw it, or maybe it is not a common structure either in English or Turkish. One more thing is that one of my students asked me the difference between this structure and the passives. Some students got confused with these two structures and then I thought whether it is right or not to teacher causatives just after teaching passives. 

ISIK - REFLECTION 1

As always, in the first hour, students felt the Monday syndrome J we did some reading and grammar. We read about The Ig Nobel prizes. What took my attention with this reading was that as a post reading activity, we had small discussion and I asked their opinions about these prizes. I asked them ‘what is your favorite research, or would you like to get a prize like this etc’ I expected them to give me answers like yes, I would like to get. However, they criticized these prizes and like an adult, they shared their opinions freely which I was pleased with. Then I realized that they had the competence to express their ideas on a scientific issue to some extent.  One more thing that I would like to share is about the gap filling activity. If the words are given above or in parantheses, or if it is multiple choice activity, then the students have no problems with it they can easily complete it. When there is no word provided and ask students to complete the blanks with one word, then they have certain difficulty in doing this kind of activity. We have done such kind of activity a few times and students’ reactions was like that ‘teacher it is difficult lets do together’ so I’m not sure whether this kind of activity is appropriate for my students level .

Reflection of the classes on November 6th


Today I introduced a grammer topic (how to talk about present ability/past ability)  to both of my classes. To introduce the subject, ı created a context. I said a few sentences about what ı could do as a child and one sentence about what ı can do now so that they could see the difference. I wrote the sentences on the board. I asked them concept questions to make them discover for themselves how i use could and can. As they are already familiar with this subject, it went smoothly. Then ı asked them if they could tell me any other way to talk about ability. A few students told " able to". I wrote sentences with " be able to " too.(I am able to learn languages easily) First ı wrote them in present tense. I made sure that they knew how to change "be" again by asking questions like "Why did ı write "am" here? " "What if ı say instead of she instead of I?" .
Later ı asked them if ı could describe a past ability with "be able to". I elicited the answer from some of the students. I wrote an example with the past form of "be able to" and checked the understanding of the form too.

Then we did the practice part. Although most of the students answered the questions correctly, we had a confusion understanding the instructions. I give the instructions in English but ı think ı have to make shorter sentences. Or ı should have checked the understanding of the instructions.

Kamile: Reflection (06.11.2012)

Kamile: Reflection (06.11.2012)

Today I had five hours as usual. As always, in the morning my students were sleepy so I spent a little time to announce quiz results to awake them and we discussed about their answers. Actually, today our topics were not so difficult for my students because they just practised the things they had learned before. Generally, they worked in pairs and I wanted them to focus on the usages of making and responding suggestions that is included in this week’s unit. We dealt with writing and speaking activities and a bit of grammar. I prepared some extras for my students beforehand and we focused on linkers of sequence, addition and contrast. From my point of view, it was quite hard for them to understand the difference between these linkers but to my surprise they easily understood. So this made me happy, I felt helpful for my students. Later on I planned to go through the speaking-writing activity and I wanted them to write and act out a conversation. In this activity the topic was making suggestions again and thanks to their age they liked the topic and we had fun. As a teacher, the thing I want to improve for today’s class could be my weakness to make my students write some extra sentences to see if they got the point clearly.

I hope one day as a teacher everything will be better … 

Merve: Reflection #1 (05/11/2012)

On Mondays, I am always energetic and super-ready to do lessons. So today, everything went perfectly well but the grammar point in this unit was very difficult for my A level students.
In the morning, I had four hours with my main class, who i like more than the other class. I planned to go through the first two pages of the unit  (p.48-49) in the four hours and do some extra work in case my students cannot understand the difference between uncountables& countables. I started the class usingout an interesting powerpoint instead of asking questions only. In the powerpoint, there were pictures of Garfield (about monday syndrome, weekend activities), and we had a class discussion about this issues. Then I showed my students the pictures of some famous restaurants and cafes in Eskişehir, we continued discussing on what they ate out at the weekend. Then, I gave each of them a picture of an empty fridge and they drew their favorite food. Using such visuals were very helpful to motivate them. They were all engaged and into our topic. Then we continued with the fridges in coursebook, and after my warm-up session it was very easy to make transition to the activity in the book. My students really enjoy using cards, pictures, colorful pencils and I let them use such materials in the warm up session. I believe such materials are really helpful to wake them up in morning classes and get them into the topic quickly and effectively.
Then, I explained them the difference between countables& uncountables, again using some visuals. They easily understood, and we had several controlled practice acitivities : we categorized the food in photobank. They talked about the food in their own fridges. However, I had difficulty in explaining all the points in English. I had to switch to Turkish for a few minutes to explain the difference. So far, I always explained grammar in English, and they were quite successful to learn. However, this time the topic was very difficult for them and wasn't present in their native language. That was my weakness today. I should have worked on it before the class, and I should have brought more helpful materials : more pictures, realia etc. The case was the same when I was explaining a/an , some, any. I provided them with good sentences on the board, and I tried to explain by underlining and categorizing the nouns. Most of them got what I was trying to say, but a few students were looking were Turkish explanation. I have to learn how to make them understand it in English, and I have to be ready with extra materials to provide further explanation.
In the afternoon, I had two hours with the other class. The subject was very interesting : I taught them the contaiers ( bar, bag, cup etc.),, I exploited the visuals as much as possible and they easily figured out the usages. I believe using visuals and conducting English-medium classes is very funny in low- level classes. They are quite successful, but there are always students who are not as quick as others. As a teacher, what I should improve is to anticipate problems and have solution in my mind beforehand.
To sum up, today was a great and tiring day for my students. I felt as I achieved my goals, but it was also good to see my weaknesses while explaining the grammar points.
Thank you for reading, have a nice class tomorrow!
Merve.

November 5th Lesson Reflection

Today my classes went very well.  I don't know if it was the post-Bayram excitement or what, but last week my students were difficult to manage.  Today we started a unit on living a heathy lifestyle and I love the unit so far.  We started by playing a game in which all students stood and had to say a body part.  If they repeated another student or couldn't think of a body part, they had to sit down and were out of the game.  With 32 students we ranged from simple parts like "head" to the very specific, "thumb nail."  Afterwards, I taught them "Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes" which they thoroughly enjoyed.  It was a great introduction into the lesson and got them up and moving which is something I think is really important in the classroom.  The first 2 blocks of class went very well.  We had a reading lesson about things that are healthy and unhealthy and I used a technique called "popcorn reading" to ensure everyone read the text.  In popcorn reading, a student starts reading and when I clap my hands they choose another student to continue reading.  Because anyone could be called at any moment, it forces students to focus on the material and follow along (plus it is just a lot of fun).  The grammar section is where things got a little more tiring.  I find that when we have grammar units in the 3rd or 4th block of class, it is hard to make the students complete the activities.  Despite this, we completed the grammar rules (taking a little bit more time than I had anticipated) and used the conditional tense to discuss what could happen if you engage in certain habits.  The students enjoyed this because they love talking about themselves and their own lives.  Similarly, I enjoy hearing about their interests and habits, so it was a great discussion for the entire class.  Hopefully, by using the grammar to engage in conversations about themselves, the material will resonate a little more with them.
Overall, I think today went very well.  I had a little difficulty with students chatting and failing to complete activities, but for the most part they were very well-behaved.  I tried to keep my energy extra high today because they always respond better when I'm more animated.  I definitely think that is my strong point in the classroom.  I move around the whole room and interact with every single student.  I still think I need to slow down when I speak, and repeat directions very slowly and concisely.  I also feel a little boring when going over the answers to different activities in the book.  Can anybody give me some insight/advice for livening up the activity/checking answer portion of units?

CP Lesson Reflection 5/11

Monday 5 November: Unit 5 Lesson 2

Positive points: Created an engaging team-game to review prepositions of location and vocabulary; prepared original PPT successfully illustrating and clarifying differences between types of containers and quantifiers; organized group work activity that engaged all Ss speaking and writing skills (usually I have difficulty creating group activities); managed classroom such that only Ss who raised hands gave answers

Need to improve: After I explained the directions to an activity, some Ss turned to their friends to repeat the directions or waited for me to give them directions individually--I need to give more clear direction and use instruction-checking questions so that the whole class understands the activity from the start. Also, at certain points when we were checking activity answers I felt that the lesson became boring and students were not engaged.

Overall impression: I made a successful effort to bring different engaging games/activities into the lesson. However, I need to keep improving direction-giving and need to find ways to make drilling and checking answers interesting and engaging for all Ss.

Reflection # 1: Monday, Nov 5th

Today the heat and Monday jitters got the best of my class. They were extremely responsive, but extra chatty. I had a hard time reigning them in. I have had this problem in the past, when I student taught middle schoolers, so I need to think back into the depths of my memory to conjure up some solutions. I also had difficulty with pacing. I knew we had plenty of time to get though the needed material, so I added in some activities or expanded some from the book, but I couldn't stop thinking about time. For some reason I felt the need to rush through these things. I believe this anxiety created a more talkative and somewhat confused classroom environment. Lesson noted, I just need to chill a bit. Welcome to Monday.

On the plus side, nearly all of my students were attentive to the lessons, although near the end the heat got the better of some. They enjoy doing things a little differently than the book states and enjoy moving around the room. I always like adding this in as well. It's less boring for them and fun for me as well.

Today I had lectures with my ‘better class’ so it wasn’t so much tiring.In fact, in the first hour it was difficult to call their attention to the lecture because they were sleeping.In the next hours it went on well especially I’ve been happy about vocabulary teaching section where we paid attention to the meanings and pronunciations of the new words.The part I am not perfectly pleased is the one where I want my students to write questions for the given answers.It was really difficult for them I guess because they couldn’t write correct questions to the answers.The thing I am not satisfied is that  I didn’t give them any extra examples, which could be better for them to make the activity clear. Actually, it was just the last activity before the quiz so it was difficult to do something extra while they were thinking about the quiz.