1. What did you learn from the design of the CALL lesson?                                  

Teaching CALL lesson requires computer, screen and other interactive activities. The purpose of CALL is to get students to be more engaged and focused in the class to reach the goal of ther learning objective. In the era of post-pandemic, it is even more urgent to design classes that include the using of computer in the class to meet the demand of those students who cannot attend the school. In CALL lesson, we learned to use a lot of online tools  such as Jamboard, Kahoot, and so on. However, the most important skill in online teaching is not just about how to use these tools. We have to be good at managing the class. Though CALL is interesting and engaging, students need to be more disciplined in front of the screen in order not to get carried away by the computer games or youtube videos. One way to keep students paying attention is asking them questions. Either by answering through microphone or by texting, students will be needing to pay more attention to follow up the teacher’s question. What’s more, students can also log onto Jamboard and use the sticky notes to share their anwer. The second way to keep students focused in class is playing games. Teachers can use word cards, Kahoot and Jamboard and assist with the award system, so students can compete in one another either in groups or individually and be more willing to join the class and say something online. By providing the gifts like chocolate or coupons and asking students to record their own scores, it is easier for teachers to manage the classroom atmosphere and motivate them to study. The third way to get students to focus is to require them to use some functions on the online meeting room, like the emoji and camera, and tell them that they can get extra points by turnnig on the camera, so the teacher can be more to students’ learning and learning environment. Moreover, the teacher can also tell students that those who has no camera on will be asked more questions, so students might get more chances to engage; while the teacher has more control over students to see if they are focused. The fourth tips for students’ attention in ESL online classroom is to read the article out loud in group first and then individually. They need to pass on reading like in a relay race, so they can always be engaged. This is a method called shadowing, which can get students more chances to learn from the native. With the above tips, including asking questions, playing games, using award systeem, online meeting room functions like emojis and camera and the reading relay race, students can be more enaged and be less distracted in the online class. In my own online class of the individual teaching project, the most efficient way to get students engage and talk online is to ask them questions. I did tried to adopt other tips like the awarding system and camera for extra points, however, they didn’t work because of the small number of students and lack of games and the duration of the program. If it lasts more than 5 times and happens more frequently, more tips might be seen as helpful for ESL students in online CALL teaching.

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2. How did the design of the CALL lesson enrich your professional knowledge?  Before designing the CALL lesson, we learned the etymology of the current online teaching, including the platforms that the teachers use (zoom), the assisting hardware like digitizer (for online blackboard and better handwriting), camera (camo), screen share( iphone), microphone(yeti), the resources for preparing the online teaching materials (連老師都知道, 王永福字卡, 張忘形, 林長楊簡報, Anki字卡), and some tips for managing the classroom and class atmosphere (rollcall by students’ nick name, seat number, celebrity’s name, name plus their hops or dream). Then, we started to design the CALL lesson. Some of us go online, while others go to the real classroom. For me, the most beneficial skill I have acquired during this semester is the classmanagement online. To be honest, my class was a small class, so I didn’t find some of the tips useful, however, I am more familiar with the students’ learning process in the small class (only three students). It would be useful for my future online tutor teaching.

 

At the FIRST stage, the analysis, I learned that two out of my three students were excellent in English. One of them was insecure in learning English. The other of them was not the best but hardworking. I learned to build up the relationship with them and learned the importance of pre-test that help knowing how to design the class and take care of every students in the class.

 

At the SECOND stage of the CALL individual teaching project, which is planning the lesson, I put a lot of content in one class of 45 minutes. I planned the class according to students’ grammar level and using a lot of question and answer activity. The three classes were about hobbies and habits, nations and landmarks (place preposition) and housework (imperative sentence). However, I didn’t carry out everything I had planned. The reason was that when it came to the THIRD stage, the implementation, I found the content might be too much. So right before the class started, I cut down the size of the first lesson by minimizing the vocabulary to 8 new words and one question and answer. I also deleted the habit part in case that students felt too much and got confused. After the first lesson had been adjusted, I changed the topic of the second lesson from nation and landmarks into celebrity. It was because that I tought students could have more things to talk about when it came to their idols comparing to the countries. For the topic of the last lesson, it went from housework to asking time because teaching housework and imperative sentence requires more vocabulary and grammar knowledge; however, my students had already forgotten some of the vocabulary and sentence pattern of the first lesson. That’s why I combined the vocabulary of the first lesson (which is about hobbies) with asking time to get them review while learning the new sentence pattern to lower their stress and anxiety.

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At the final stage, which is the evaluation, I learned that keeping a record of the teaching process and students’ learning is important. No matter the form of the record is in paper or a video, we teachers need the record to be professional, that is, to adjust our teaching to students’ real needs, and to better ourself in the aspect of speech and content. After watching my own teaching video, I learned that sometimes I did too much free talking that students had no clue of what to say. Instead, for students who are at their level, it is always better to provide more structure for students to use. Besides the record of my teaching, I also realized that writing down the reflection was also important. Only when I was writing the reflection paper, I realized that there were some things to adjust. For example, I had little words shown on my ppt slides, which were mostly pictures. It was hard for students to remember the new contents purely from the pictures. They needed the letters to memorize the sounds of the words. All in all, I found the teaching project beneficial to my future teaching career. I learned that one tips cannot suits every students’; however, it is always worth a try to make the class more interesting to learn.