Monday, September 24, 2007
Interview Lesson Plan
Last Thursday my practicum teacher finally had a humorous lesson pan which got the students laughing and interested. One of the lesson plans from 'History Alive' requires students to role-play and perform skits with teh teacher acting as the t.v. newsperson. Teacher named himself "Jim Shoo" the t.v reporter which many students found humorous. He then proceeeded asking questions to a group of students who were pretending to be the French settlers. The teacher asked many questions but none of the 'French settler' students took the skit seriously. Many of their responses to his questions were "i don't know" or they gave random answers that weren't pertaining to the topic. The second group of students were representing the Iroqious Indians and they did a better job at answering the questions than the first group. When the teacher asked one of the students (who was representing the indians) a question she responded with, "we (Iroqious Indians) are enemies with the French and we all live together". Obviously that doesn't make any sense. I think it was a good opportunity for the students to have engage in a different style of learning but once again I'm not quite sure that it was effective. Some students used their time as a 'social hour' instead of practicing their skit and roles. Next time I think their needs to be discipline during a lesson which involves the students preparing a skit. Otherwise, they'll use their time incorrectly and the lesson plan may once again be ineffective.
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1 comment:
You raise a great point. Humor is such a great tool. Thinking back, the teachers that I liked the most always had a decent sense of humor. They may not have had an add-lib style like Robin Williams, they might not have even been very good joke tellers, but they had an appreciation for humor that was a way to connect with their students.
My pastor uses humor so well, but I think he always ties it back into what he is saying. I might not see it coming. I might in fact wonder what the heck what he is saying has to do with his message, but nevertheless he manages to tie it back in effectively. It's this tying it back in that I think teachers need to do. There's often a purpose for the humor that makes it relevant. If it weren't, we'd likely have a load of trouble keeping kids on task.
Just my 2 cents.
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