If you could be a brick....




The Great Pyramid of Giza.



"If you could be a brick, what building would you want to be part of?"  I asked my class.

Thus began my very last class that I taught at Meyna School on Holhudhoo Island in the Maldives.

 

After posing the question to my class, I gave them some "think time" before going around the room and asking them what building they'd want to be part of.

"Meyna School" one student noted, another "A hospital" and yet another... "My parent's house."

"The sports complex," noted one boy.  "The mosque," another remarked.  "The national museum," but yet another.

All had excellent reasons for why they chose the building they did.

"I would want to be the top stone on the Great Pyramid of Giza.................."

I explained when it came my turn to tell the class what stone I would want to be.

Why?

"The Great Pyramid of Giza is one of the 8 Wonders of the World with millions of people visiting it every year!"

George's excellent lesson format....



George's lesson centered around a very touching story about a father's desire to instill the love of music in his son.


In the anticipatory set of the lesson, George drew upon his student's background knowledge of music.  "Do any of you play a musical instrument?"  George asked.  This brought out an animated discussion with the students.



After having the students read the title of the article, George asked a series of questions about the father, using the father's picture in the article.

As the students listened and followed along, George read the story to his students.  "What struck you about this story?"  George asked when he'd finished reading.

The students got the message of the story immediately.... and accurately too.  Great comprehension!

The students really got into this story as George read it to them. 


The story was read a second time, by students who moved to the front of the class.  It was during the second reading that George asked students to underline any vocabulary words they did not know.

The first reading, in other words, was for the students to listen to the fluency of the story as they also listened with comprehension in mind.



Any word the students found difficult or new, they were asked to underline.





With the reading done, George asked the students how many words they'd found per paragraph.





"Look for the clues in the sentence, for the meaning to the word."  George encouraged his students to look for context clues, in the sentences, so that the students themselves defined the new vocabulary words. 

George had a gentile style of asking probing and clarifying questions, so that the students had to dig for the meaning of the new words.

Nearing the end of the lesson, George had students come to the board to write summary sentences.  Once these were written, he reviewed each sentence with the whole class, to make sure they understood what was written and that they agreed with what was written too.



Throughout the lesson, George checked for understanding through a series of comprehension questions.  George is a bit of a master at not giving the students the answer.... rather.... asking those guiding questions that help students arrive at their own answers.

This is a fantastic way to teach!  George is a living example of my motto.... "Whoever talks, learns!"

George asks the questions..... the students talk.





Reflective Conversation

Following my observation of George's lesson, I held a reflective conversation with him.  As we talked, the conversation grew to include Aravindan, the English Department Head. 

I first had George review with me, his lesson, step-by-step.  As we moved into the grit of the lesson, the concern that was raised by George and Aravindan, was the student's writing skills.  This is a definately an area where the students could use help.



Since basic sentence structure and verb tense seems to be some of the problem, I suggested the English Department go back to the basics if need be.  By this I explained, after students have read an article, have them go sentence by sentence and underline the subject, verb and direct object. 

In other words.... make the sentence as basic as possible.  Help the students understand the most basic structure of the sentence, then slowly show them how to add all those flowery words, that make reading so enjoyable!



African elephant Bubble Map - graphic organizer

Once a week, students go to the listening lab where a Cambridge CD is played and they are to respond to questions.

Chinchu monitoring the students and providing assistance to the listening activity worksheet.

Earlier in the week, Chinchu had used a Bubble Map graphic organizer and was very proud of the student's work!  As she noted to me, students were totally engaged in the lesson while completing the Bubble Map.  Chinchu found the Bubble Map to be a much more effective strategy to help students take notes on a article, as compared to the traditional note taking process.

Raibin - Putting it all together in the lesson

Beginning of the lesson, Raibin opens with some small talk as he moved into the learning objectives for the day.

Randomly calling on students, using the roll sheets and student numbers ...... for groups to present the projects they'd been working on.

The first group explaining to the class their project regarding Global Warming.


Using all of the learning modalities is an excellent instructional strategy.... here with the auditory componet, building on the writing and illustrations.



Very creative and professional presentation by this group of young ladies!

  

How about a new energy drink!!!!!!

Keeping a good pace to the lesson, Raibin next had students engage in a review of the previous day's vocabulary.

Following the individual responses to the vocabulary assignment, the whole class worked together to give the correct answers.

At the end of the period, before moving the class to the listening lab, Raibin brought closures to the day's lesson.

What with the various activities within the lesson, the pace was excellent.  Students were actively engaged in the learning process, throughout the period.

Good job Raibin!

Okay Pooh Bear.....

"You don't recognize me Father?  I'm your son!"

These were the first words out of Pooh Bear, the first time I met him.  Okay... Pooh Bear (nickname) whatever you say!

Pooh Bear, like most all of the students at Meyna School, had a great sense of humor.  This is what made my volunteer assignment so enjoyable on the island.

So many fun, fantastic characters!

Lessons worth applauding!

The secondary English teachers at Meyna School have really taken the professional development workshops I presented to heart.

Here Anil, made some of my instructional strategies his own.

Anil took the little boats I'd brought from Thailand, and rather than using the numbers I'd placed on the back, he put the student's names.

In the classroom, Anil learned to first ask the question, pause, and then pull one of the boats.  This process keeps all the students on the toes.... not knowing who might be called on to answer the question.

"You've got 30 seconds!" 

 Use of the timer, one I brought along from the States, too is a great way to keep the lesson moving and the students engaged.

The "Starter Activity" was a series of true of false statements.  Anil randomly called on students to state whether a statement was true or false.  Student stand, when answering a question.

Rather than just leaving it at asking one student, Anil would randomly call on additional students, to see if they agreed with what the first student had said.

In this case.... three students said the statement was true, before the fourth student answered correctly.... the statement was false.  "Why is it false?"  asked Anil.... again a great extension of the lesson... so that the student now had to give details to support what they'd said.

As soon as Anil passed out this reading assignment, the students, on their own, numbered the paragraphs, and drew a box around the title.  Another instructional strategy straight from my workshop!

New vocabulary.... randomly calling on students to identify key new vocabulary words, paragraph by paragraph.

Writing the definitions of the new words on the board, for the students to copy.

I'm seeing this throughout the English classes, where the teachers have taken what I taught them during the professional development sessons, and have begun incorporating these new strategies into their daily lesson plans.

Releaving the stress

"Teaching can be stressful!"  I noted to the teachers at Meyna School on Holhudhoo Island.  "When you use this little hand massage from Thailand, you will have no more stress!"

I also noted to the teachers, as I gave them this small token of appreciation..... that when I was in the classroom, I'd have one of these in my mind as I taught.  If I noticed a student who might be having a bad day, I'd just place the hand massage on that student's desk.... and let them play with it for awhile.

I bought a bunch of these wooden hand massagers in Chiang Mai before I came to the Maldives, to give as gifts.

Now... the other big job...... writing the 5 Year Strategic Planning Workshop's Final Report!





The 5 year strategic planning workshop I facilitated is now history!  Success!  Time to celebrate!  Let the good times roll.......!!!!!

So how am I going to celebrate?  By writing the final report of the Meyna School's Five Year Strategic Plan.  Exciting..... right?

I'm a real party animal.....



Hey.... I've got an e-idea - from the Maldives to California!

  Mellow Milan.... you are good at writing strategic plan final reports.  How about you and I getting e-connected?  I can e-give you all the data from the workshop and you can e-send me the final report!

If you don't mind, once you've written the report, could you go to BabbleFish, or one of those online translators, and have the report e-translated into Dhivehi?

You're the e-man.... Mellow Milan!



Victory Circle to Current Reality to Commitment and Strategic Directions to Calendar and Assignments - the afternoon was one big blur of activities!





Before we get too far ahead of ourselves, let's recap what we did in the Practical Vision!



A facilitator's dream.... blank wall space ... just waiting to be covered over with the Victory Circle, The Current Reality, Strategic Directions, a Calendar..... and ultimately lots and lots of half sheets of paper!



Then it was off to the races with the Victory Circle!  Anil, my Co-Facilitator did a great job capturing what the particpants saw themselves celebrating one year into their strategic plan.

As I walked the participants through The Current Reality part of the workshop, again, Anil captured on paper the participant's comments.

Yikes! The Dangers of Success!

Okay... so here's what we said we'd be celebrating a year from now.... and here's what we were our Current Internal Strengths and Current Internal Weaknesses; our External Opportunities and our External Threats; and the Benefits of Success as well as the Dangers of Sucess...

with that said.....



What's our Commitment and Strategic Directions?



Here's our first year calendar with the three strategic directions and quarterly action plan.

The struggle.... who is going to be responsible for making sure these things get done?

The group really struggled with deciding who would be responsible for insuring the action plan was implemented.  In the end, the Head of the School, was named as the individual responsible for the action plan.

Footnote:  the school is waiting for a Principal to be named.  The position has been vacant for sometime now, and the two Deputy Principals serve as the Acting Principal.

One last activity the group wanted to add to their action plan.  With the six rows from the Practical Vision, the group wanted to identify, by year, when each of the items in that row would be implemented.

 Row by row from the Practical Vision wall, we took the half sheets down, and placed them on a new calendar indicating if they would be done in year 2, year 3, year 4 or year 5.