Over the pass few days, I have learnt that lecturing don't work on them. 15mins into the lecture, these students will start to fall asleep. Activities is the only way to keep them awake thru out the day.However, facilitating for 5 whole days is hard work when I have to "fire fight" and come out with activities instantly to engage them. Thus, I have learnt that planning does go a long way for times like this.
It does help to have a "bag of tricks" available and attending the DACE program does help lot. All the activities that we have gone thru suddenly comes back to live again.
Now I have to dig deeper into the bag to look for new things to do to engage them for another 5 more days.
The following is an account of some of the activities I have done in class:
- Discussion
I did this by asking them about the subject and why we are studying it. And this helps me to bring them into the topic and the slides.
- Crossword puzzle
Instead of giving them tutorials. I made Crossword puzzles for some of the chapters and used it to make them READ the notes and look for the words. This makes learning fun and they actually enjoyed it so much that they asked for more. And I did. With a few trying, I was able to stumble upon this site which is very good at making Jigsaw.
http://www.armoredpenguin.com/crossword/
- Jigsaw
This is a form of cooperative learning which has been used on us a few times during the DACE program and I thought this is a Great way to learn. However,when I tried it out on the class, they are not used to this way of learning. The students said that they are not sure of the things they learn. I stopped using it and switched to the normal group presentation instead.
- Group presentation
I divided the class into 5 although I initially planned for 4. Things worked out fine as most of the chapters could be split very nicely into 5. Each group will learn and discuss over the topic given before they put everything on the chart for presentation to the class later. However, I was kind of stuck to this mode as I ran short of ideas on what else to do with them.
- Constructive Controversy (something like that)
I gave each group a question to work on and they are to present them to the class later. Each group is given a score board to score the ans given base on the content. During the presentation, I started to throw questions to make the groups defend for their points. I also encouraged the other groups to question them before they give score.
The questioning and defending is where the leaning happens.They are forced to think about the points when they asked questions and defend.
- Whirlwind
This is one that I have picked up from Tommy in class. He first used it for Brain storming. Each team is suppose to write their ideas on the chart. Halfway thru the brainstorming, the chart is switched between teams. This give each team a fresh new look at a problem and a chance to come out with new and creative ideas.
I adapted this activity and used it at the end of the day where I give them a question to think about. Ask they are coming out with the points, I will stop them and get them to switch the chart with the neighboring team. This will give each team a go at the each of the question. Thru this exercise, they get to revise the things covered in class that day.
- Post-it pads for Evaluation
I first used the post-it notes as a form of commenting for the class. Everyone is given a chance to put a comment on the charts for the them that has presented.
I later got the class to each think thru about the lesson and what they like and did not like and writ them down. The likes will be posted on the right door while the dislikes are posted on the left door. This was done on the first day and it gave me a constant reminder of my actions and the activities the class liked. It later help me in crafting out the rest of the activities for the next 4 days.
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