Guidelines for Teachers
1) Every class should start with a short prayer and devotion time. I found last year that this helps everyone get settled in and more importantly helps to unify the nightly worship times with the classroom. Each day we will have a memory verse to be assigned for the next day of class, and this would be a good time to read and briefly discuss the verse for the day. This verse is also the theme of the day, so any classroom activities that could be tailored around the verse serves to reinforce the meaning of it even further. Refer to the outline and verses sheets included here.
2) As
far as the rest of class goes, it’s mostly up to you. But to give
you a better idea of what worked for me and others who taught last year,
here are a few guidelines:
There are three 45 minute
class sessions each morning. Try to include time for at least these
activities:
1. Vocabulary. We’ll have a few good dictionaries that you can refer to, and you should choose as many or as few words as you’d like per day to be assigned, but be sure to include some time for this. You could assign a few words each day and give quizzes, or give a test at the end of the week on the words that you assign. You don’t have to use vocabulary from the Bible. If you would like to include words that seem to fit with the verse or craft for the day, by all means, do so, but don’t feel restricted to those words.
2. Speaking. This is the most important activity that you will do in class, and the one that will be the easiest for you. In every class, you will be speaking to the students, giving them instructions, carrying on normal conversation, etc. This is the best practice that you can offer your students, and they will show marked improvement in their conversation skills as the week goes on. There are many things you can do to stimulate conversation, but the most obvious and easiest thing is to ask good questions. Allow time to ask about where your students live, what their schools are like, if they attend church, what pets they have, what their interests are, etc. This will allow you to build your relationship with your students and give them good practice speaking.
3. Reading. There are several ways to use this in the classroom, so I’ll give a few suggestions according to what I did last year. We will have access to SRA reading activities, which test reading comprehension, so you should take advantage of these according to the reading level of your students. For intermediate and advanced students, these activities should be very doable. Last year, I taught an advanced class and I read “The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe” to them each day. I would strongly suggest that you spend a little time reading from a book of your choice, although I wouldn't use “The Lion…”---I ran into a lot of British words that I had to explain. Other ideas: Read an adapted Bible story (make sure the language is simple and to the point), Have a student read a passage aloud, Read the lyrics to a favorite song that means something to you…Be creative!
4. Writing. Creative writing is a great way for your students to practice their skills while writing on a topic that is interesting or relevant to them. Last year, I had my students in Poland write a page on what Poland was like before 1989 (the year communism ended in Poland), and I got some incredible responses. Be ready to challenge your class even if they complain about it at first. My students whined about their assignment at first but then entered into a long conversation about what they remembered, so don’t let them intimidate you out of doing something. But I would suggest asking at the beginning of the week what they need the most work with. Their answers will give you a good idea of what to concentrate on, but don’t stray away from something creative that you have planned just because they don’t act interested. Each student will have a journal to do homework assignments in, so you can assign a writing assignment for the night if you choose to. Along with creative writing, you should be sure to assign sentences to write throughout class time. Last year, after we worked on vocabulary, had a reading assignment, or learned new grammar, I would ask them to write a few sentences using what they had learned. This is a good way to monitor individual students’ comprehension of the material, and should give you an idea of which students need more time to understand something.
5. Grammar. This will probably be the area the students will say they need the most help in, so be sure that you ask them what topics they need to practice. The main area that my advanced students had trouble with was sentence structure, so it might be a good idea to start out the week with a review of the parts of speech and where they fall in a sentence. This will give you a foundation to build upon, and will help when it comes time for assigning a writing assignment. Don’t worry if at the beginning of the week your students fly through the worksheets that you give them. This will give you an idea of what level they are on, and you can adjust your curriculum as necessary. Grammar is the area that you need to be the most flexible with, because some worksheets are better than others, and you have a limited time-frame to cover an extremely complex language with many exceptions. Just focus on a few topics and teach them the best you can. There’s no way to cover everything, so pace yourself and don’t get discouraged if something doesn’t work.
6. Games. Be sure to include time at the end of each period (or whenever you see fit) for games. By this I mean crosswords, word searches, hangman, bingo, etc. This is where you can be the most creative!!! Something that worked well last year was the introduction game. I made up a worksheet the night before that asked them to find someone who….has brown eyes, is from Warsaw, has two brothers, etc. I’m sure you know the game. It worked great and it gave the students a chance to get to know each other a little better. This year we’ll have at least 18 returning campers, so a lot of them may already know each other, but it’s still a good idea to have some sort of introduction game.
7. Idioms. This is something fun and interesting to teach, and is an area where most students are lacking. Phrases like “to keep track of something,” “to take something for granted,” or “to be out of the question” are examples of idioms that you might teach.
8. Pronunciation. This is an area in which the Polish students will have trouble, especially with “th” and “w” sounds. You might want to make a simple chart to put up in your classroom with the basic sounds of the English language. Any good dictionary will have a pronunciation chart that you can copy directly. You should spend a few minutes every day working on this with your class.
Hopefully these guidelines will be helpful, but remember, they are only guidelines. Feel free to be creative and use whatever resources you might choose to bring into the classroom. One last important thing: If you ever get into a great conversation about spiritual things (as a result of the devotion time or anything else), go with it!! By all means, don’t worry about the time you might lose for other activities. The gospel is the reason we are going to Istebna, and it takes priority over everything! I would caution you to stay away from controversial issues that might bring division among your students, and if this ever happens, just move on to your lesson plan. But if the discussion has anything to do with the gospel, let them talk about it. Not only are they talking about something wonderful, but they are practicing their English, and this should be the emphasis of all the class time. So be flexible and spend much time in prayer before your class begins. You’ll have a 15 minute period to be in your classroom before anyone comes in, so you can set everything up and pray. Again, thanks for giving a piece of your life to this camp! It means the world to me, and it will mean everything to the people you will meet in Poland. May God bless you!
--Joey