Luisa Fernanda Quintero comments Metacognitive Awareness

It is important that, in any class, students understand why they are using the language for, especially when learning a foreign language, since most of them are usually comparing it to their mother tongue. I think this is the purpose of creating a metacognitive awareness, because students are always looking for an explanation about the similarities and especially the differences between their mother tongue and the new language they are learning. From my point of view, although children are always asking for reasons to everything they know, we can develop a metacognitive awareness in a very indirect way, since they do not seem to be interested in understanding the use of the language, and they try to use it without wondering what it is for. On the other hand, when we are talking about teenagers and adults, they need to have a concrete explanation, so, they can use language easily. Although, it is sometimes said that students can learn from deducing from different situations the use of the language, they need an explanation in order to clarify or solve the doubts they have about it. Therefore, we, as teachers, need to be well prepared to give our students good bases, in order for them to become aware of the use of the language in any situation, thus the student become aware of his achievements and the things that need to be improved.

Luisa Fernanda Quintero Correa

On Reflective Teaching: Teacher María del Pilar Rodríguez

I know it is hard to believe but as a teacher I reflect on my teaching everyday, specially with children;after having working with them for 6 years now I can say that sometimes I feel tired of teaching them, it is not the same as it used to be at the beginning, I know there are many external factors that have to do with it, ( children now are not the same as they were before, I'm not the same as I was before, now I have more experience but I also feel tired and they are more hyperactive!)I don't feel the energy I used to feel when I first started teaching them and it is very hard to teach children that don't want to learn.
Teachers as well as children need motivation to learn and when they study English just because their parents tell them to do so, teachers can feel that and we feel discouraged.
I have tried to give them my best, so they can feel excited about English, but with them it is never enough!

On Reflective Teaching: John Alejandro Arias

I consider my classes are done for my students, although it was not like that at the beginning. I remember that a year ago, I was totally concerned about how the students saw my class, about what they say about me. Nowadays, I am completely afraid of my students' learning. If they understand the topics or if they don't. That's why I am always asking them about it.

However, it is just the start of my career, so I know many challenges are coming, and I have to be prepared (it is not just to wait for them to hit me)

On Reflective teaching: Luisa Fernanda Quintero

Well, it’s difficult to write about things I have done in my classes, because I didn’t remember very well. From what I can remember, I like very much doing games, I try to relate the games to the topic; the most successful game has been apple lemon, I’ve used it not only with words, but with sentences, especially related to the topic. As I’ve been teaching only kids, they like to move a lot, so I try to make them move, and I have to become a clown, which has been a bit difficult since I’m very quiet, but it’s one of the things I enjoy about my classes. Referring to grammar explanations, I think it has been difficult, not because they do not understand, but because I have to emphasize a lot on the specific points, and I try to do it indirectly, but they always ask for the “rule”, and I’ve noticed this has helped them. In order to see if they understand, they try to give examples about themselves, but orally. The difficult part is when they have to write, because some of them usually do it as the word sounds, and that is one of the things I need to reinforce.

On the other hand, sometimes when discipline problems come out, it’s difficult for me to keep the students busy, since they are very fast, and no matter how many activities I give them, they finish quickly and sometimes, it becomes a mess. This is one of the things I really need to learn how to control.

I generally like my classes, especially with children, because they have fun with everything, but with pre-teens, it’s a little difficult, because they don’t like anything, not even songs.

I’ve tried to apply different things I’ve read about it, and also what my colleagues do, but things don’t go the same way, because the students are different.

Luisa Fernanda Quintero Correa

On Reflective teaching: Teacher Paola Andrea Cardona

When someone ask me about a “good class” I think about one where all the objectives that I stated from the beginning went just the way I wanted.

My last course was “Kids 2”: a nice group, eleven students between 8-10 years old, different learning styles: a real challenge.
I found out that dealing with kids doesn’t involve all this concentration and patience most of the people say; when you plan your class in a really organized way. This particular class was about animals (environment, behaviors, etc) and we developed role plays (including me), we had a lot of fun and I went back to my “school time”. It was a great class because the students were participating actively and they understood what the lesson was about. For the first time in this year I’ve been teaching I felt like one of my students, I got involved so much that I could really understand them. Something that made my day was when one of my students (a boy who’s really shy) came to me and said: “teacher, thank you, I had a good time here”.


But of course I’ve had classes in which I’ve ended feeling not so good, for instance, I think that dealing with discipline is not easy at all. When you have 3 students misbehaving, you feel frustrated, or that’s what happened to me.

I remember a class in which I explained a topic quite difficult for the kids: “possessive adjectives”, I was making a draft on the board and I could hear the whispers behind me, 3 boys talking about something that didn’t have to do anything with the class. It was annoying because they were not focused on the class and at the same time weren’t allowing their classmates to pay attention. I tried every single strategy to focus them on the topic but they simply didn’t want to pay attention.

At the end of the class I talked with them and explained me that at school they had have an “English journey” so they were tired about English. Of course I understood them but anyway that situation was very annoying and frustrating.

Paola Andrea Cardona Márquez.