Week 9 Classtime reflection: I enjoy classtime and this turns out to be my longest entry ever! =)

First, I greatly enjoyed Stephanie and Chris's presentation, which clearly showed careful preparation and great efforts. I like the way they organized and carried out all the activities in a well-connected, smooth and lively way, which in itself is a good model of flexible and thorough lesson plan. One more good thing is that they two cooperated perfectly during the whole presentation, which somehow puts me under some kind of pressure since next week Kizuna and i are going to do our presentation on the same topic.

Also, Thea's sharing on her own experience in having students do the multi-genre research project was really interesting to me. Seeing the products made by Thea's students did help me visualize and understand better how diverse and creative the genres can be. Added to this, it was useful to know how Thea and other students in the class as well as my teacher would deal with plagiarism in the follow-up discussion. Every teacher obviously has his/her own way of handling students' misbehaviours, but here a common feature that can be seen is that tolerance and understanding play very important roles. From this i learn a good teaching philosophy: Don't ever push your students too hard and don't say to them: "You are NOT able enough to do this/that".

Additionally, the brief touch on "teachable moments" really attracted my attention. That was the first time i heard of the term and it sure is very much interesting. This, in my opinion, affirms the flexible nature of lesson planning and how being able to realize and utilize teachable moments can help language teachers arouse students' motivation and guide them towards a higher level of performance based on their personal interests. However, this ability undoubtedly does not come naturally. A lot of sensitivities, good observation and quick reactions on the part of teachers are surely needed.

What's more, i think the peer review session is really fruitful. Our group got a chance to have our works reviewed and commented by another group, which is an excellent way for us to look at our product from a less biased perspective. We were glad to receive a lot of constructive comments from Stephanie, Aaron and Adib and i think we'll be able to improve a lot on our genres based on their review. Apart from that, to me it was a great experience to read and review on the genres of Chris, Rachel, Mitch and Thea, who are working on the topic of Humor in TESL, which i find really interesting. Due to the lack of background knowledge, it was difficult at first for me to understand the humor presented in the products, but after listening to Brian's explanations, both Kizuna and I were very excited. However, as Chris pointed out to us, the most important thing about the genre is not the jokes themselves, but more significantly, they are able to prove that there is a close relationship between humor and the outcome of classroom interaction. One thing about this topic that just crossed my mind when i am writing this entry is: Does the teacher have to be a humourous kind of person to incorporate humor into his/her teaching? The reason i am asking this question is because i am not the person who are good at telling jokes or making other people laugh. A good sense of humor is just not a part of my personality and i wonder whether there are any rules/techniques that can be used. I know this sounds like a wild idea but i just can't help wondering. =)

One last comment I would like to make is that I really like the way the class gets more interesting with time and I am able to learn a lot from my teacher and my classmates. Also, one thing i can feel and enjoy is that as the course proceeds everyone in the class seems to loosen themselves a little more. All of this makes learning a much more non-threatening experience.