1.1 Teaching methods
During the first week I observed Mr. Stephan’s classes. I entered every class that he teaches. There are 16 classes in total from Monday to Friday. He is not a Thai teacher, but he is a foreign teacher coming from South Africa. In general, he applies interactive and participative lecturing methods in class. He attempts to encourage students to participate in the learning process. He starts teaching by clearly explaining the lessons that will be discussed. Then, he introduces some vocabularies related to the topic to the students and asks them to pronounce the vocabularies after him about three up to five times. To make sure the students understand the vocabularies, he requests them to write the meaning of each word in Thai in the white board. He told me that the steduents can better grasp the new vocabularies if they know the meaning in their mother tongue. At last, to evaluate the students’ understanding toward the lessons given, he handed out the worksheet to the students and assigned them to do it.
1.2 Learning materials and innovation
There are two kinds of English that Mr. Stephan teaches. They are general English and English for communication. For the former, he employs the materials which are based on the government-based curriculum applied by the school. The students are given two books, class books and workbook. For the latter, he uses materials and worksheet made by himself because there is no book availabe and it’s all up to him. He makes the materials as interesting as possible by using pictures, stories, etc. so that the students can more easily comprehend the materials and not get bored.
1.3 Sources of learning and technology
The teacher mostly uses books and other printed materials as the sources of learning In some conditions, the teacher also uses concrete objects such as things which are related to the topic being discussed. For example, when the topic is about ‘invention’, the teacher will bring some stuffs like laptop, flashdisk, and such that correspond to the materials.
Given the fact that the teachers are recommended to use various media such as projector, LCD, and computer, Mr. Stephan does not use them because he said that he prefers to use printed materials and writes things in the whiteboard even if the media are readily available in every class. This sometimes makes the students bored and do not listen to him.
1.4 Authentic assessment
I asked Mr. Stephan about the assessment and he told me that the assesssment lies on two major components. They are exams and students’ performance. The exams consist of mid-term and final exam and the students’s performance consists of assignment, students’ participation in the class and their worksheet. The exams account for 70 % while the students’ performance only accounts for 30 % for the assessment. It can be concluded that the teacher assesses the students based on their ability to apply what they have learned in the class.
1.5 What I have learned and what can be applied
Having observed the Mr. Stephan classes, I come to the conclusion that I should involve the students to actively participate in the learning process. Otherwise, they will ignore what I will teach so that I cannot achieve my teaching objectives. They seem not to enjoy the learning when they just listen to the teacher. They love it when they can give contribution. I can see this because when the teacher asks them to do something, for example like writing the meaning of the word in Thai, they will be scrambling forward to do it. Thus, I will apply the teacher’s method. However, I will use the media instead of just using the printed materials so that it can be more interactive and interesting. Also, I will ask the students to dance at the beginning to attract the student’s attention and focus.