Once each semester, we ETAs get observed co-teaching in our schools. Representatives from the Education Bureau and Fulbright along with our adviser come to sit in on one of our classes. There are three advisers, professors from NKNU, who work with us. Each week, we are supposed to send them weekly reports about our lesson plans and daily teaching experiences, and they are also the ones who lead our bimonthly ETA-LET workshops on Wednesday afternoons. My adviser is Professor Lee, and she is lovely. Very sweet, very elegant, very articulate.
I scheduled my observation for a Monday afternoon class, with the lesson about restaurants and Thanksgiving. I discuss this lesson more in my "Thanksgiving" entry, but I wanted to include pictures of my observation here.
Being observed is actually a lot of fun. The kids know they are being watched,
so they are on their best behavior. Never have I seen my kids so attentive. When they were supposed to be quiet, they were dead silent. When they were supposed to answer questions and participate, all hands were in the air. There was no background level of Chinese going on (which there usually is) or kids blatantly zoned out with the thought that sleep is an easier option than focusing their brains on deciphering my English. The whole time, the kids were engaged and fully focused on what I was saying to them (proof yet again, that they CAN understand what I'm saying when they put a little effort into listening).
Everyone was very complimentary about my lesson and impressed with how well the kids behaved and interacted in class (as was I!). I am the first ETA to be placed in a middle school here in Kaohsiung, so I was happy to give them a good first impression of how effective an ETA can be in the middle schools. I clearly love my school and hope that they expand the program to more middle schools in the future. :)
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