Title: Supporting comprehension for lower beginner English language learners

Short Bio:

My name is Dilson Enrique Sarmiento Anaya. I am a student of the Foreign Language major
at University of Cartagena. Currently, I find myself doing the 8th semester in which I am doing
my last stage of my practicum experience. This video is made to report on my practicum
experience during the periods 2019-I and 2019-II in Thematic seminar VIII to the profesor,
Jairo Pedroza.

I have always considered that education is the best gift we can offer. A precept by which I
always lived is that one that goes “there is more happiness in giving than there is in
receiving”. Of course, the happiness gained from giving may be enhanced if the gift is highly
valued by the receiver. That is why it has to be meaningful for them. However, it cannot be
meaningful if students do not even understand what the teacher is trying to teach. For that
matter, supporting comprehension is key for the students to have meaningful learning and
for the teacher to have meaningful experiences.

Contextualization

My practicum experience setting was Centro Educativo Queridos Amigos which has more
than 500 hundred students There are 13 classrooms which go from kindergarten to 11th
grade. From 1st grade to 11th grade, most of the classrooms have more than 40 students
which make classes complicated. There is only one shift which is in the morning from 6:30
am to 12:30 pm, in the case of 10 and 11 grades at 1:00 pm

Centro Educativo Queridos Amigos is newly made school and there are aspects in which
administration has to work on. For example, the amount of the students in one classroom, as
mentioned before, which makes classes complicated. While a part of the students is paying
attention, the other ones is making indiscipline and as the class goes on the entire
classroom ends up behaving badly. That is why, it is also difficult for students to engage in
EFL activities, they have to be carefully planned in order to have all the students working
and to not give them time to distract.

On the other hand, there is lack of resources in terms of didactic materials, technology and
even English teacher which are required for teachers to provide understanding. The
classroom where I mostly applied strategies and my meaningful experience was with
4th grade. They are 39 students who are from 9 to 10 years old. Their classroom is
big enough; however, because of the numbers of students, sometimes the mobility
around the classroom is difficult. Culturally speaking, there’s a sense of familiarity
among the students. However, it is important to also work on the trust and
acceptance among them because most of them do not feel comfortable in the
classroom and this affects their learning process. Students learn better when they
feel a positive environment in the classroom.

Problem

In the second stage I had to identify an issue that was making difficult the language
learning of the students in my practicum setting. Nevertheless, I had identified this
issue from day one because it made me felt down and undermined my confidence. I
started my practicum with the idea that I always had to use the target language in my
lessons with commands, body language, images or even realia for students to
understand. However, the school was lacking these materials and my economic
situation would not help to afford them. Even though, I tried to use commands and
body language to compensate the students’ understanding, they would get distracted
and some of them would feel frustrated because of the disruption.

As a result, the flow of the lessons was interrupted by constant wake-up calls,
repetitive explanations of the same topic, fights between the students, among others.
At the end, lessons were nothing successful. On the other side, beyond of the facts
and the consequences, there are underlying reasons that caused this hindrance to
happen. From last years up to now, primary students have always had a teacher
who teaches all the subjects including English, even though they are not specialized
in teaching English. For example, in 4th grade, their English teacher is a Spanish
one. She did not know any English, because of that she could not make students
practice speaking and not even listening. On account of this, it is normal to see the
students afraid to speak and have difficulties to understand, even for some of them it
was the first time they heard a teacher speaking in English.