FIRST IMPRESSIONS AND FIRST DAY AT SCHOOL




   For my integral development as a student of the Bachelor of Arts in the Teaching of Modern Languages, I am currently taking a subject which is called Second Language Teaching at Pontificia Universidad Javeriana. In this subject I have to make an ethnographic observation at a school located in Bogotá. Right now it has been 3 weeks since I started working with first graders. In the following entry I will give certain information about the teacher and the classroom I am observing, what kind of observer have I been in the past 3 weeks and most important, general information about the school. 

A   The school was founded in July 1955. To choose the character for the school they wanted a character with principles, values, honesty, intelligence, persistence and constancy. That is why the chose Abraham Lincoln. What I really like about the school, and actually, they people from the school made it very clear since the first day, is that the school is a corporation, which means that every parent is a co-owner of the school. That is why when I am at school, I get the feeling that there is a very familiar environment, which is nice for the people working there and most important, the students. 

       Right now I would like to mention certain aspects about the school in general, the mission, vision, objectives, philosophy, and pedagogical approach. I will first start by talking about the mission of the school. In general terms, these are the most important aspects they stand out. Before I mention them, it is important to add that the following information was taken from their web site and I took the liberty of translating it in order to use it for this class.  

                    a) Promote human and multicultural development of the educational community.

                    b) Better standard of living based on respect. 

                    c) Integral development.

                    d) Capacity to create, socially and individually, knowledge and harmonious coexsitence. 

          Regarding the vision of the school, they want to consolidate and develop an own pedagogical model and approach which will guide 5 dimension. These are:

                                         1) Cognitive

                                         2) Motor

                                         3) Socio-affective

                                         4) Ethical and moral

                                         5) Esthetics 

          All the above will entale the renewal and actualization of the curriculum where these aspects will be taken into account:

•                      Bilingualism
•                      High academic quality
•                      Ethics and moral

           These aspects are of paramount importance to achieve the positioning of the school in a national and regional level, as well as the acknowledgement in the educational and social area as one of the most important ans successful educational institution of the century. 

            Taking a look at the web site I was able to fin about the objectives of the school. There are 5 main objectives:

                     1) To favor and satisfy the integral development and educational Spanish/English             bilingual necessities of the students. 

                     2) Succeed making the practice and pedagogical relationship an objective of permanent reflection and innovation. 

                     3) Strengthen the personality, character and intellect of the students throughout the creation of pedagogical and formative processes that will allow the development of all vital dimensions of the human being. 

                     4) Incorporation of research and innovation of the daily duties of the school as the basis of the academic development throughout the creation of knowledge and exploitation of the scientific and technological advances. 

                     5) Promote respect, responsibility and honesty. 

Although we might find differences in pre-school and high-school, the pedagogical approach of the school, as a whole is in one hand, that the individuals are the main characters in their educational process and on the other hand, knowledge is not acquired passively, instead it is something that is elaborated and re-elaborated constantly by knowledgeable individuals. 

Finally, but not least, the philosophy of the school, in general terms, is to transform the institution into a truly, educative community throughout the learning and the constant transformation by the whole school community. 

There is 1 headmaster, 3 coordinators and 40 teachers in the school. Between those 40 teachers, there is one self-contained teacher. She is the in-service teacher I am "assisting" for these 6 months. By self-contained teacher I mean that she teaches Science, Math and English to the kids from first grade. Furthermore, she is their homeroom teacher, which means that she is in charge of making sure that the kids are well dressed, that they have signed their agendas, that there are no notes from parents, among other stuff. She graduated from the Pontifica Universidad Javeriana at Bogotá where she studied Bachelor of Arts in the Teaching of Modern Languages, which is the same major that I am studying right now. Before starting to work at the school I am observing, she had a job at other very important school in Bogotá, which is also private. She has been working at the school I am observing for 3 years and she even decided for her child to study there. On our little chat that we had, I asked her about publications, but she told me she did not have the chance to do it apart from her thesis at the University. (In-service teacher, 2013. Personal Interview).  

As I have mentioned, this subject is about an ethnographic work. As we have seen in our classes and as we have read in the text "Ethnography in ESL: Defining the Essentials" by Karen Ann Watson-Gegeo (1988), "ethnography is the study of people's behavior in naturally ongoing settings with a focus on the cultural interpretation of behavior". And its goal is "to provide a descriptive and interpretative, explanatory account of people's behavior in a given setting". This is our main goal for the course, be able to perform this in the classroom and then share it in this blog and with our classmates to see the different results from each other. 

Having mentioned all the above, I will start by saying how my first day was. I was very nervous because I did not know what to expect, I was not very sure of what being an observer meant. I was very afraid of doing things in the wrong way and even worst, finding out that being a teacher was not the right thing for me to do. I got to know the teacher that I am "assisting" and she was very nice to me, she treated me with respect and she let me know that if there was anything she could do for me, she was glad to help. Since that moment, I got a bit more relaxed and my fears kind of disappeared. She was glad to know that there was a document that expressed the things that I was able to do as an observer because she did not want to abuse or to not push enough. 

I did not want to be a passive observer completely, I wanted to take part into the learning process of the kids. There first day I was not able to do that, I only observed how the class went, the dynamics, arrangement of the classroom, all in all, a general view of a class in first grade. In English class I was able to notice that the 21 students understood eveything that the teacher said with no problem, the thing was that when it came the time for them to speak in English they did not do it. They felt uncomfortable and sometimes they did not know how to say what they wanted to say. In those cases the teacher said "Show me your magic" that is a school policy when kids do not speak English when they are supposed to. The kids inmediately know they are making a mistake and, sometimes, they try to correct themselves. 

Apart from asking the teacher about herself, her major and publications, she gave me the agenda to follow in English class which contained the goals for English class in first grade. There are four general goals for the children to achieve. These are:

             1) To illustrate given directions through picture dictation.

             2) To re-create stories read using the vocabulary and expressions learnt.

             3) To identify the beginning, middle and end of a short story. 

            4) To write a simple descriptive paragraph using there is/are, articles, prepositions, capitalization and punctuation properly. 

In a more general view, the English goals for primary school are that students are expected to have A1 level; this according to the CEFR. In the different skills, the following are the goals:

                 a) Reading skills: to identify characters, to develop argumentation, and to follow sequences.

                 b) Listening skills: to identify the number of speakers in a conversation.

                 c) Speaking skills: to express their ideas and to present general topics.

                 d) Writing skills: to write texts around 25 sentences. 

                       

On the next days, I was able to be an active observer, helping some kids with explanations and giving them feedback on a role-play they did on the "Three little pigs". It was very nice, that day I really had the chance to feel what was it like to have control, to have the attention from the kids. It is a sort of respect towards older people. It is something completely different to be just sitting in a chair without doing anything else than taking notes. I do not mean that this is not useful, of course it is, the thing is that I first thought that maybe things in class were going to change because of my presence, and they actually did. Some kids were very restless and they looked at me, asked me questions and sadly, it is something that no one can avoid. In the end we are some sort of intruders.

REFERENCES

• In-Service teacher (2013, January 30) Interviewed by Rodríguez Carolina. Bogotá.
• Watson-Gegeo, K. (1988). Ethnography in ESL: Defining the Essentials. TESOL Quarterly, Vol. 22, No. 4, December 1988.