2nd Self-Critique

Unfortunately, The technology is not available in Costa Rica to videotape myself. During our final meeting before departure, we were told that it was permissible to not videotape ourselves abroad if the equipment was not available. Because recording my lesson was not an option, I instead asked my cooperating teacher to give me a detailed list of good and bad aspects of my lesson from his point of view. I also tried to remain aware of my behavior throughout the lesson. The lesson I chose to critique was on the topic of job interviews. It was approximately three hours long, and I am very proud of the structure and progression of the lesson. I have had to learn to adjust to the school schedule here at INA, which is very different from my student teaching experience in Missoula. I teach the same group all day, from 8:00a.m. to 3:30p.m. Planning such a long lesson that has a clear connective thread running through it was difficult for me at first, but I have become better and better as Ive become more comfortable here. During my first self-critique, one aspect of my teaching I noticed and wanted to improve was my use of informal language in the classroom. Since coming to Costa Rica, I believe this aspect of my teaching has necessarily improved. I am teaching ESL here, and classes are conducted completely in English. Because English is my students second language, it is important that I avoid using slang and speak clearly so that they can understand me and participate in class. I hope that this decrease in slang usage follows me when I return to the United States to teach.

Another aspect that I wanted to improve upon was fidgeting and playing with my hair while I observed and listened to students. This is still something that I struggle with, unfortunately. Ive done it for years, and Im still trying to break myself of the habit. I think I do it less frequently, but it still happens every time Im teaching. I know its not an extremely large problem, but I would still like to stop doing it completely. The last aspect that I wanted to improve upon is engaging the whole class while I teach. However, Ive come to learn in Costa Rica student involvement has much less to do with an interesting lesson plan and much more to do with the temperature and time of day. Our classroom gets extremely hot, sometimes upwards of ninety degrees, and its simply impossible to get all the students engaged across a three-hour lesson in that heat. I have gotten better at noticing students who are not on-task and obliging them to participate. My cooperating teacher called my attention to several other aspects of my teaching that I could improve. The first of these is my whiteboard management. In the United States, my classroom was equipped with four whiteboards and a smart board, but here we have only one whiteboard, and INA has a very strict procedure for utilizing the whiteboard. The information needs to be ordered in a certain way, and I am still learning how to best utilize this very important classroom tool. Another weakness that my cooperating teacher called to my attention is that I sometimes walk in front of the projector when I teach. The projector is the one piece of technology that we have in our classroom, and it has proved very valuable to me. However, I forget and pass in front of it from time to time, interrupting the

image, which Will says can be very distracting for learners. I have been more conscious of the projector since, and I believe I have greatly reduced the number of times I do this. Self-examination and reflection is very useful as I continue to grow as an educator, and I feel like Ive learned a lot about the way I teach through these selfcritiques. This is a practice I intend on continuing as I enter the professional world. It can only serve to make me more self-aware and stronger as a teacher.