Allyce_CO3

               The third class I observed this term was Natalie Upshaw's Group 1B speaking class in the afternoon.  The class had a lot of the same students from the previous class I observed so I felt very comfortable joining the class and all of them remembered me.  Luckily the topic yesterday was clothing, a subject I am quite enthusiastic about! Natalie split us up into 2 groups, boys and girls. She wrote 3 questions on the board for us to discuss. 

1. How do people dress in your country?

2. Is it different from the way people dress here?

3. What are some traditional clothes that people wear in your country?

                She made sure everyone had a picture dictionary and basically unleashed us. At first the girls were reluctant to talk and seemed rather nervous. Luckily, Ruth broke the ice and agreed to go first. We instantly had to go over a new vocabulary word, "Tank Top." Natalie explained the difference between a sleeveless shirt and a tank top, I think everyone understood but it was hard for the French speakers to pronounce.  Miriam happened to be wearing traditional garb that day so we spent a lot of time looking at her elaborate dress, it was a gorgeous purple color with a lot of silver embroidery. We had a really great mix of cultures at the table, 1 girl from Mali, 1 from the Ivory coast and 2 from Saudi Arabia. We all spent time pulling up pictures on an Ipad showing traditional gowns from our countries and they girls even wanted me to participate! Once we got the ball rolling, discussion was hard to stop. Natalie allowed time at the end for each student to give a brief 2-3 minute presentation about their cultures clothing and she helped clear up any minor grammatical mistakes. 

A pretty jalibya shown to me by one the Saudi Arabian students-She said they often wear these inside the home

                I thought that Natalie had great discussion questions which were really open ended and allowed the students to create a broad range of conversation. She was also diligent about making sure that the students only spoke in English, particularly since the students would often back slide into their native language out of frustration.  I do think that there was a noted lack of enthusiasm from the instructor (although I think anyone would pale in comparison to Vicky's upbeat personality) but I do think it rubbed off on the students, particularly at the beginning of class however, I'm sure there were a number of circumstances that could have influenced this, we can't all be peppy all the time! Other than that, the class was great and a real joy to participate in. Out of all the classes I think a speaking class would be the most fun to teach.