End of the Line

 New Semester Begins

I kept up with the beginner's class instructor as the semester ended. Both myself and the instructor agreed that observing/helping with the first few weeks of the beginner's class would be a good experience. I was able to spend some time observing a class as they developed routines. This was the biggest take-away for me. Routines. The first week of class was a struggle for the instructor, and it makes sense why she considered quitting during her first week a few years ago. With no experience in ESL, just as a 3rd grade teacher, it must have been difficult. She was not fortunate enough to spend time observing a whole semester of classes and have a game plan going in. She just had to show up, and try to manage a class for 3 hours, which is an eternity in a room where communication is limited (mostly non-existant). What I found for the class was setting a strong routine that is followed to a T helps the class flow. Students understand that when they show up, they will sign in, take a book, and grab the name placard that they made. Once the class has been going for a while they will get rid of the name tags, but it's a lot of students up front. 

The week 1 class understood the basics, but a lot of finger pointing was required to ensure students signed in properly and were settled in. All students had some words or phrases known, but couldn't hold a conversation. The few students that completed the previous semester but wished to remain in beginners helped the new students, but that sort of help was available due to the volume of Spanish speakers. There was 1 Student from Ukraine that had different challenges. She uses a different alphabet. All students began back with letters: while she was learning them, other students learned new vocabulary through them. the instructor had a deck of cards with a letter, word, and a picture on them. It was a built in way to scaffold for all the students. One student learned letters, other students worked on their spelling, as Spanish letters can often be pronounces different than their English counterparts etc. A lot of time was dedicated to basic greeting practice, and activities using pictures to learn words. It seemed to be scaffolded well because everything was a different topic from the previous semester, so everyone was able to learn something. As I came into class the 3rd week, the class had a comfortable rhythm, students were all friendly, and it felt the same as the seasoned bunch from the semester prior (some were the same ones). It's definitely nice to see that it just takes a week or two to get a classroom comfortable. 

Of note in the final week is a good bit of staff drama. The full time faculty had pushed out a notice to all instructors that post class analysis of standards must be done for all students (daily tally of standards met, teacher's notes, etc). While our instructors do a lot of informal assessment, and the state required testing occurs frequently, this is definitely something worthy of time, however it's not ideal. all instructors are paid hourly and are constantly fighting to make more money as the hourly rate is not great. They put in an incredible ammount of work and the wages hardly cover gas and their time. To truly do daily write ups for each student would be another hour of work a day, which would require more pay. I don't believe the school intends to pay them for this time, which raises some hairs on the instructor's necks for sure. We had some long dicussion about making the job worth your time. We're in the profession because we love to teach and love helping others, but at what point is a job not worth the wages?