Images (general or specific, location if known): Video of me introducing myself in Place de Comedie or some other places in Montpellier that is significant to me

Design (background color, font style, special effects):  N/A

Audio (music, sound effects): N/A

Narration (the actual text that you would record to accompany this slide): My name is Kenady Duesterhaus, I am a Sophomore at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities.  I am majoring in Elementary Education and minoring in Teaching English as a Second Language (TESL) and Spanish. For the past semester, I have had the wonderful opportunity to complete my first teaching practicum in Montpellier, France. (Say some of this in French). 

Images (general or specific, location if known): Image of Montpellier on a map and other images of its main places

Design (background color, font style, special effects): Arrow pointing to place on the map and zooming in to relevant areas of the picture

Audio (music, sound effects): probably a soft instrumental piece

Narration (the actual text that you would record to accompany this slide): Montpellier is a scenic city in the south of France that is about three kilometers from the Mediterranean Sea.  While it is considered a college town, it has all the charm and elegance associated with the old world.  It is home to people from far and wide — with people from all over the world wanting to live in this idyllic little city.

Images (general or specific, location if known): Picture of the school from the outside and the classroom where we taught

Design (background color, font style, special effects): zoom in

Audio (music, sound effects): Probably continuing with the instrumental piece from above

Narration (the actual text that you would record to accompany this slide): For this teaching practicum, I was placed in the school Eugene Poutier in a CM II classroom, which is the equivalent to a fifth-grade classroom in America.  I worked with kids who were in a specific international section of their grade, so for seven hours a week, they worked on improving their English skills using Content-Based Instruction.

Images (general or specific, location if known): Video of me saying this

Design (background color, font style, special effects): N/A

Audio (music, sound effects): N/A

Narration (the actual text that you would record to accompany this slide): Choosing this program I wanted to broaden my horizons in both personal and professional contexts.  I knew that if I didn’t take this chance, I would probably never get another opportunity like this later in life.

Images (general or specific, location if known): A picture of something maybe just a classroom

Design (background color, font style, special effects):

Audio (music, sound effects): Instrumental

Narration (the actual text that you would record to accompany this slide): Taking what I have learned while living and teaching in France I hope to implement that into my future classroom and pedagogical approach.

 

Images (general or specific, location if known): Pictures of our lesson plans and worksheets that we have created

Design (background color, font style, special effects):

Audio (music, sound effects): Instrumental

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Narration (the actual text that you would record to accompany this slide): Because the English program focused on Content-Based Instruction I was able to integrate English lessons into other subjects like writing, art history, and physical education.  Each week for one or two lessons my teaching partner and I would create lessons on these different subjects

Images (general or specific, location if known): part of the baseball video

Design (background color, font style, special effects): N/A

Audio (music, sound effects): N/A

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Narration (the actual text that you would record to accompany this slide): just recently we started a unit in physical education surrounding baseball. On the days that we weren’t teaching a lesson, we would work with the kids if they had small group activities and answer any questions they might have.

Images (general or specific, location if known): Video of me 

Design (background color, font style, special effects): N/A

Audio (music, sound effects): N/A

Narration (the actual text that you would record to accompany this slide): Teaching in this school it was interesting to see the similarities and differences in the organization of the school.  In French schools, it was interesting to see the difference in the way that they arrange the school day and week — it was also interesting to see the similarities in the curriculum and values that want to be transmitted to the kids.  I was surprised to see how similar the goals were for either country in education, but they each took different paths to achieve it.

 

Images (general or specific, location if known): Picture of me and all the kids

Design (background color, font style, special effects):

Audio (music, sound effects): Instrumental

Narration (the actual text that you would record to accompany this slide): Throughout this experience, I have loved getting to know the kids and working with them.  While it has been difficult sometimes breaking through the language barrier and getting them to understand me, learning how to work through cultural and language barriers have taught me so much about being a teacher.

 

Images (general or specific, location if known): Picture of me traveling/having fun with the group

Design (background color, font style, special effects):

Audio (music, sound effects): Instrumental

Narration (the actual text that you would record to accompany this slide): The experience of teaching and living in France has changed me, I believe for the better, making me more independent, confident, and empathetic not only as a person but also a teacher.  I have gained invaluable experience teaching in a foreign country and seeing education through a novel perspective — that allows me to critically analyze my own perspectives on education and the role of a teacher.

 

Images (general or specific, location if known): Another picture of me having fun

Design (background color, font style, special effects):

Audio (music, sound effects): Instrumental

Narration (the actual text that you would record to accompany this slide): I hope to use the experience of living and teaching in a culture wholly different from my own and building relationships with my students in my own classroom where kids from all cultures will be.

 

Images (general or specific, location if known): Video of me waving goodbye

Design (background color, font style, special effects): N/A

Audio (music, sound effects):    N/A

Narration (the actual text that you would record to accompany this slide): This has made me a better teacher and I will forever be grateful that I was given the opportunity to have this experience.

My name is Kenady Duesterhaus, I am a Sophomore at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities.  I am majoring in Elementary Education and minoring in Teaching English as a Second Language (TESL) and Spanish.  For the past semester, I have had the wonderful opportunity to complete my first teaching practicum in Montepellier, France.  Montpellier is a scenic city in the south of France that is about three kilometers from the Mediterranean Sea.  While it is considered a college town, it has all the charm and elegance associated with the old world.  It is home to people from far and wide — with people from all over the world wanting to live in this idyllic little city.  For this teaching practicum, I was placed in the school Eugene Potier in a CM II classroom, which is the equivalent to a fifth-grade classroom in America.  I worked with kids who were in a specific international section of their grade, so for seven hours a week, they worked on improving their English skills using Content-Based Instruction.  Choosing this program I wanted to broaden my horizons in both personal and professional contexts.  I knew that if I didn’t take this chance I would probably never get another opportunity like this later in life.  Taking what I have learned while living and teaching in France I hope to implement that into my future classroom and pedagogical approach.

Because the English program focused on Content-Based Instruction I was able to integrate English lessons into other subjects like writing, art history, and physical education.  Each week for one or two lessons my teaching partner and I would create lessons on these different subjects — just recently we started a unit in physical education surrounding baseball.  On the days that we weren’t teaching a lesson, we would work with the kids if they had small group activities and answer any questions they might have.  Teaching in this school it was interesting to see the similarities and differences in the organization of the school.  In French schools, it was interesting to see the difference in the way that they arrange the school day and week — it was also interesting to see the similarities in the curriculum and values that want to be transmitted to the kids.  I was surprised to see how similar the goals were for either country in education, but they each took different paths to achieve it.  Throughout this experience, I have loved getting to know the kids and working with them.  While it has been difficult sometimes breaking through the language barrier and getting them to understand me, learning how to work through cultural and language barriers have taught me so much about being a teacher.

The experience of teaching and living in France has changed me, I believe for the better, making me more independent, confident, and empathetic not only as a person but also a teacher.  I have gained invaluable experience teaching in a foreign country and seeing education through a novel perspective — that allows me to critically analyze my own perspectives on education and the role of a teacher.  I hope to use the experience of living and teaching in a culture wholly different from my own and building relationships with my students in my own classroom where kids from all cultures will be.  This has made me a better teacher and I will forever be grateful that I was given the opportunity to have this experience.

I pretty much always assumed as a new teacher that I would be awkward in front of the classroom and you can definitely see that in the video.  I tend to shift positions and postures — moving from standing with arms at my side to my hands on my hips.  Comparing myself to other teachers, while everyone has awkward moments, I think the confidence in front of a classroom that you find in good teachers comes from experience.  Hopefully, as I progress through the teaching program at the UMN I’ll continue to gain confidence and experience.

Listening to myself was a little strange — I know that I tend to be monotone when speaking, but just listening to it just showed me how much my voice and intonation do not change when I’m speaking.  I definitely need to work on this, I’ve been trying to put more emotion in my voice, but usually, I only think about it when doing a read aloud with kids.  I don’t know if older elementary kids are affected by this as much as younger ones, but I think a lot of times kids feed off of the mood of the teacher, so if I sound disinterested to the kids, how will they feel?  I want them to hear me be excited and feel excited themselves.

The classroom environment and activities are largely focused on group work and peer interaction.  Generally, for every activity or subject Sabine will start with a lecture and then transition into either letting them work with their table pods or pairing them together.  I think this helps keep participation up because they are able to interact with one another and see things from another perspective — this keeps them engaged and they are able to learn more effectively by working through problems on their own versus just being lectured at.  It helps that the students get really into working together, I think this style might not work for all classrooms, but these students are highly motivated and eager to engage and learn.

In relation to me as a trainee helping create an effective learning environment, I think it’s difficult to say how I actually do that?  I don’t really have any pedagogical or stylistic approaches or reasonings that I use to shape lessons and engage learners.  I just try and create lessons that are fun and exciting, so they’ll get engaged and get a chance to relax a little while doing an easy going activity.

I would really like to implement the pod-style seating arrangement that is in this classroom.  I really like the ideas surrounding student lead learning and its emphasis on group engagement and cooperation.  It’s so different from my own learning in a more traditional classroom, that I just find it a nice change of pace.

During the second week, we had the opportunity to continue helping out in a CM II classroom at Eugene Potier.  To get the students ready for their big English test in a couple months the teacher wanted us to interview them to get them ready.  Laurel and I decided to play Two Truths and A Lie with them.  We didn’t get through many of them but it was nice getting to know the several kids and talking to them.  For the most part, we haven’t had the opportunity to interact with them one on one and make connections and relationships with them.  The kids really got into the game and were definitely excited to learn how to play the game.  They seemed to like the change of pace it brought to their school day.

I think it might be difficult finding time in their busy day to teach larger lessons because they have this tight schedule of getting ready for their English exam.  We’ll definitely have the opportunity to lead smaller lessons, but I’m just excited to get the chance to lead some games for them to play.  It’s really interesting the dynamic that we have — it isn’t our classroom, but we are coming in to teach them just for a small portion of the day and then leaving.  You don’t get that too often in the US unless you’re a specialty teacher, so the fact that we can plan these fun little activities for them is really nice.  I think a major thing that we can help with is allowing them to practice speaking English with a native speaker.  Many of them haven’t had a great number of experiences talking one on one with someone in English, so just having us be there in their classroom will hopefully booster their conversational English.

Starting on January 28, 2019, I was placed in a CM II classroom in the school Eugene Potier.  The residing teacher is Sabine Nicolle.  When first meeting the teacher, she was very nice to me and my co-teacher.  We haven’t had too much of an opportunity to talk in depth about the specifics of what she would like us to do over the semester, however, it is a pretty hectic job, so it’s understandable.  My co-teacher and I know that for the upcoming week she would like us to create a game where the students practice asking and answering personal questions.  This is in preparation for the exam in 2 months where they are seeing who is staying in the International track, it is apparently super competitive and there are only like 52 spots for the next cycle.  There are 27 students in total with 8 boys and 19 girls in the classroom — they are all around the age of 10.  They generally sit in pods with 5 to 6 students in each pod.

These students were chosen specifically during their earlier years at the school for a special International track, where they would have an increased focus on English and its immersion into the classroom and different subjects.  Because of this most of these kids have been taking English for about 4 to 5 years — 7 hours each week.  Most of these children are proficient in their usage and understanding of the English language.  During my time there, there has only been some confusion about specific words like “lightning bolt” and “studio.”  Overall the students have a great grasp of the language.

During their time at this school, these students have had around 5 main teachers, however, I don’t know about any other teachers that they have had for supplementary English lessons.  Generally, their English lessons are integrated into another subject, or game designed to enforce grammar, vocab, and skills.  These subjects have been writing questionnaires, president’s day in America, and miming.  The games that they have played have included charades, word box, and other team games centered around expanding their understanding of the language.

The kids’ impression during our powerpoint presentation the first day was overall good.  They really liked the sections and pictures about our pets and the section talking about cultural practices.  When talking about Black Friday though they were a little bit confused about why we call it that and why we only have huge sales one day a year and honestly I didn’t really know the answers to their questions, so maybe that would be something interesting to look into.  I really liked the classroom environment — it was so open — both figuratively and literally.  In the classroom itself, there were so many windows that the kids were able to constantly see nature and feel the sun.  It also seemed like a really open environment for the kids to come and learn.

I think one of the resounding differences between US and French classrooms is their ideas on lunch breaks and recess.  In France, it’s expected that kids will have at least a 2-hour break for lunch and 2 other breaks where they are able to go outside, socialize, and play.  In America, lunch is 30 to 45 minutes and there are usually 2 other 15 minute breaks in the day.  There is just so much less break time for kids to relax in America, I would be really interested in the principles behind each country operating this way.