This observation was once again of the two-hour level 4 advanced communications class (taught virtually). This entry pertains to the first hour. 11 adult students of mixed cultural backgrounds were present. For this hour, the lesson was focused on discussion and comprehension related to a dialogue the students had previously listened to.

The teacher used a warm-up activity to get the students to activate their discussion skills and begin to think about the content in the dialogue. The teacher wanted the students to rank a list of items that contribute to children’s happiness in order of importance. He did not to much talking, and simply displayed the list of items for the students, put them in discussion groups, and let them work together for 10 minutes. Doing this ranking exercise in groups allowed the students to practice the discussion skills of agreeing and disagreeing, as the whole group had to produce a single list. The teacher also had the students practice presentation skills by asking them to present their ranking list to the class and explain their choices.

I believe the majority of the assessment in this class happened in the comprehension exercise. The teacher presented a list of questions about the dialogue the students had listened to asked them to volunteer to answer. The teacher could informally assess how well the students had understood the dialogue and how well they could articulate their responses. I assume some informal assessment also took place in the warm-up activity. The teacher could have been assessing how well the students explained their choices and how prepared they were to share the results of their discussion. There was another opportunity for the teacher to assess the students’ ability to articulate opinions later on, when he presented a poll as a follow-up to the dialogue exercise and asked some students to justify their response.

The ongoing issue of reluctance to participate seemed to be present in this class once again. The teacher asked the students to turn on their cameras when they presented the results of their warm-up discussion, and several students declined. I think there is some important learning being lost every time the students opt out of using their cameras, as they are not practicing the physical aspects of communication, or at least not in a way that the teacher can see and assess. I also noticed in the comprehension exercise that some students took a long time to speak when called on, and only spoke when they had been asked by the teacher multiple times. I wondered if this was a result of reluctance to participate, and they were trying to ignore the teacher by remaining silent, or if they really needed that much time to think of their answer. I am not sure how a teacher would go about finding this out, either.

I liked the warm-up activity in this class very much. I thought it was a great way to lead into the comprehension exercise as well as to practice discussion skills and making compromises in a group. The dialogue the students had listened to involved a discussion about things that are important to a child’s development, and the warm-up activity gave the students an opportunity to consider and share their own opinions about the same topic. This ranking exercise is something I can definitely see myself using.