Wow. Where do I begin? Up until this week, teaching the Grammar Lab has been phenomenal. There have been few technical issues, full class sizes with great participation and classes have mostly finished on time. However, for me, there could not have been a worse day!
First off, none of my three computers were working as they were either frozen or there was no access to the microphone or video. I started the Grammar lesson by using my phone and quickly found out this was not going to work, as the screen was so small and I couldn’t see the chatbox, create breakout rooms, or see the lesson material on the PowerPoint slides. Thankfully, I had my teaching partner Kaitlin to take the lead at the beginning of class. After a few minutes, I was able to successfully log in to one of my computers and I was able to join the conversation through a microphone only, as my video camera was not working on the computer that I logged in with. I sincerely apologized to my students for this technical issue. Creating the breakout rooms was more time consuming than usual as a result of the heavy snowfall this morning which severely interrupted my internet connection. However, Kaitlin was there to communicate with the students to fill in the time.
Aside from all those technical issues on my end, the rest of the lesson went very well. Students participated in station rotations. In groups of four, students worked through three different stations working on verb tenses, filling in the blanks, and matching clauses. Students found activity B, the conjugation of verbs to create a sentence to be particularly challenging. Kaitlin and I were in and out of the breakout rooms supporting the students answering any questions they may have. We went over the answers together and some students got 100% on the activities. I loved doing station rotations as I was able to work with the students in small groups and we were able to effectively communicate with one another. It was great to see communication and teamwork within the groups. Even though class went a few minutes overtime, I think the students were ok with it as each one stayed until they were dismissed. The students were very respectful and patient with me today while I worked through the technical issues on my end, I was very thankful for my student’s being so patient and for the help of my teaching partner, Kaitlin.