Friday, March 9, 2012

I am thankful for: inspiration

I'm not the kind of person who is always very well prepared. I don't plan well ahead and I don't spend hours planning and plotting my teaching. I have come to trust my inspiration. And no, it's not a good idea, I know, and I can see how it may seem as though I'm just covering for being lazy and setting myself up for stress and chaos, and it's all true, but the problem is that so far, it has always worked.

When I was a health teacher in the US I went to the supermarket before going to school, and as I was paying (and rushing to school as I was not completely prepared for that day's classes), I noticed the newspapers for sale. I grabbed three of them and decided I was going to make my students read the paper that day. I divided the class into three, gave them each a paper (one was a local one, one was a regional one and the third one was a national paper) and asked them to find at least one article for each of the five areas of health (physical, emotional, mental, social and spiritual). They went through the newspapers and found rather creative solutions to compensate for the lack of actual information (death announcements which relate to mental or social health). The unfortunate part about being spontaneous that day was that when I arrived in class, I had actually not read any of the papers and didn't now what to expect. Needless to say that having three classes give a presentation on a two page spread dealing with bunions was not my idea of an uplifting lesson plan, but it worked. I got the students to read the paper, I got them to think of health in as more than a subject at school, and I got them to discuss issues that we had talked about before, but that were brought up again in real-life situations.

Today I had the same experience. I came up with a lesson plan in one of the classes I'm subbing for that got all the students involved and excited. We had read and see Of Mice And Men so I divide the class in four groups and each group had to come up with a type quizz or excercise that tested the other students' knowledge or analysis of the novel. They came up with very good questions or quizzes and had a lot of fun competing to see who got the most answers right. I did almost nothing except give them the instructions and direct traffic, they did all the rest.

And before that I had my Spanish class, where students are to find a restaurant in a Spanish-speaking country, look at the meny, decide what they would want to order and describe the dishes. Then they have to calculate the bill and convert it to Norwegian Kroners. One of my groups called me over and told me there were no prices on the menu, so I told them there was only one thing they could do. I saw from the pleading look in their eyes that they were thinking and hoping I would tell them they could just hop over that part of the assignment, but instead I just had this idea pop in my head and said: "you have to e-mail the restaurant and ask them!!!"  "WHAT?????  IN SPANISH????  ARE YOU SERIOUS????  WE HAVE TO WRITE A REAL E-MAIL????" was their reaction. It was so hard not to laugh, but I stayed serious and told them that yes, absolutely, they had to write an e-mail and I was looking forward to getting the answer! Not only did they write the e-mail and send it, but another group was inspired and also sent an e-mail to the restaurant they were working with!  Spontaneous authentic learning! 

I just love being inspired. For me it beats planning every time!! 

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