WHY TEACHING SHADOWING IS A MUST FOR TEACHERS!

Hi there, again!

You all know me well, don't you? As an English teacher, I am always looking for new ways to improve my teaching skills and learn from others, and I have been lucky enough: At @eoi_pontevedra I have always had the opportunity to thrive thanks to our "Teaching Shadowing Scheme". We have been working on it for years now!

However, earlier this year we were given the chance to take that school project the extra mile when being accepted by the "Observa_accion" programme, endorsed by the Consellería de Educación in Xunta de Galicia. A more structured way of teaching development was coming into play!

This official action plan involves teachers at schools observing each other's classes and providing invaluable feedback and unrelenting support, indeed. So, we took part in training sessions on what classroom observation is and learned a lot about how to provide effective peer-to-peer feedback.

As you may all know, there are numerous benefits to peer observation. Here are some I have identified as a wrap-up of the programme:

Firstly, I have discovered different teaching styles. The experience has allowed me to see different classroom practices and techniques that I have already incorporated into my own teaching routines. For example, I had never played Jenga in class before! Have you?

Secondly, I have received constructive feedback on my own teaching and have been able to identify areas for improvement. I undoubtedly need to speak less in class and let my students take over! 

Moreover, I have also been involved in a culture of collaboration and professional development within my own language school. I have definitely built upon my own trust and respect for my colleagues. If that does not lead to a positive work environment, what does?

All in all, teaching shadowing is an essential tool for language teachers struggling to improve their teaching abilities and learn from their colleagues. It is a win-win situation for both, the teacher who observes and the teacher being observed, and leads to a more effective school community.

If you have not tried it yet, you should definitely give it a go. The initiative has been enriching and I hope my school carries on with it in the future. Just in case you don't take my word for it... watch the video below. It won´t leave you indifferent!

AI IN THE CLASSROOM: GIVE CHATGPT A TRY AND YOU´LL NEVER REGRET IT!

No wonder why #ChatGPT is all the rage among ESL teachers right now! It is becoming increasingly popular due to its ability to generate human-like text and assist various teaching tasks such as creating content, generating dialogues in English, providing language exercises and quizzes and even helping with pronunciation and grammar. You name it!

I have been trying it lately to enhance my teaching practice and provide my students with rich language-learning experiences. In fact, I have noticed that I am slowly adopting it as a great new tool to obtain quick accurate responses to a great number of queries, among other interesting ideas that I am also exploring!

My last attempt was aimed at my C1 students, as we were about to wrap up a unit on consumerism and fast fashion. I asked Chat GPT to come up with a list of five short advantages and disadvantages of built-in obsolescence. For me, this should be a practice that we might tend to avoid when it comes to production. That was why I found it really hard to make up some real advantages!  As Chat GPT did the trick for me, I eventually gathered ten wonderful statements that I have used to create a #Genially presentation where students will be asked to drag and drop the prompts into the right column (for or against), trying to reach an agreement first. Just as easy as pie!

Hopefully, it will spark discussion in class as I will definitely ask the group to take a clear position on the issue using the vocabulary presented and also some other expressions we have already learned, once they have completed the columns. 

I hope you find this board useful! Enjoy!