Motivation and commitment: I start my class by asking my students why they choose to take this lesson and what is there motivation. It is a great opportunity for me to motivate the students and the explain to them the importance of learning a language and the impact of that on their future career.
The syllabus: explaining the syllabus is very important for the student to discover the learning outcomes and the way we assess those outcomes, the grading policy, and to discover the weekly course work. This an opportunity for the students to know their part of responsibility and to know also that the syllabus is a kind of contract between them and the instructor.
The textbook: Most students have skipped buying a college textbook because they’re expensive (French program for example) for them or simply they don’t think that the textbook is important for them to learn a new language (Arabic program). I explain to my students that the textbook is a key component in most language programs for different pedagogical reasons. So, I will continue to convince students of the importance of the textbook in their learning, and, at the same time, to look for an affordable one without compromising the objectives and the goals of the language program.
Homework: Doing homework is another issue to be addressed and I’m devoting a considerable time to teach my students the importance of example problems in the Textbook and class notes to test themselves. A collaborative learning is another aspect to emphasize on it: teaching students how they can work together in pairs or group, etc.
Prior Knowledge: During my teaching experience in NYCCT I noticed that my students suffered from insufficient prior linguistic knowledge: they can’t for example, recognize the main grammatical categories, verb, noun, adjective and preposition. So, I realized that before starting teaching my French and Arabic programs I have first to address gaps in their prior knowledge.
Feedback: To provide helpful feedback about practicing, I have realized that it is important to focus on specific expectations for performance, and to communicate to students how they are performing relative to the stated goals, and what they need to do to improve. So, I will continue to design new assignments with specific goals, and design opportunities to give feedback.
Metacognition learning: To create a real motivation and to increase students’ success, I’m teaching my students how to preview before coming to class. Most of my students are first year student and still not feel the transition they are experiencing between high school and College. Also teaching them how to get prepared for active reading and how to take notes.
Using Bloom’s Taxonomy: I explicitly introduce this Taxonomy to my students in individual consultation or to a group by taking in consideration a four-step procedure described in McGuire (2018), namely: Knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation. Teaching this Taxonomy is a great opportunity for me to teach my students the difference between learning and studying, and it is a great opportunity also for students to begin to have learning goals instead of GPA goals.
