I rediscovered the fact that I even had a blog thanks to the online course I'm taking on Social Media for Education. I had completely forgotten about this. It's kind of like discovering an old journal tucked in the back of a closet. It seems appropriate to continue using this blog rather than starting a new one because the purpose of the original blog had been to work through some of the challenges when I first started teaching, as an English teacher in French elementary school in 2005.
My mission now, in 2017, is to continue improving my teaching but from a much more established place than ten years ago. I've been teaching French and Spanish in the same district for almost ten years. It's been challenging of course, but ultimately rewarding and I can't imagine doing anything else. Well, that's not completely true. I can imagine doing a lot of other things, but for the moment I'm established and committed to working towards helping students learn how to learn foreign languages.
I'm in the process of rethinking and redesigning how I teach and assess my students, moving towards proficiency, performance-based assessment and authentic resources. I'll use this blog to document some of the work and thinking that goes into this process. To add to the challenge, I'll be teaching Spanish next year after a two-year French exclusive break, and I'll need to update the entire curriculum. My French curriculum has gone mostly proficiency-based, but my Spanish materials predate my language learning awakening, so it will need to be rebuilt from the ground up.
Authentic resources and proficiency, here we come!
My mission now, in 2017, is to continue improving my teaching but from a much more established place than ten years ago. I've been teaching French and Spanish in the same district for almost ten years. It's been challenging of course, but ultimately rewarding and I can't imagine doing anything else. Well, that's not completely true. I can imagine doing a lot of other things, but for the moment I'm established and committed to working towards helping students learn how to learn foreign languages.
I'm in the process of rethinking and redesigning how I teach and assess my students, moving towards proficiency, performance-based assessment and authentic resources. I'll use this blog to document some of the work and thinking that goes into this process. To add to the challenge, I'll be teaching Spanish next year after a two-year French exclusive break, and I'll need to update the entire curriculum. My French curriculum has gone mostly proficiency-based, but my Spanish materials predate my language learning awakening, so it will need to be rebuilt from the ground up.
Authentic resources and proficiency, here we come!
Comments
As you & others have said, it's crazy to think about what kind of teacher we were 10 years ago.
PS: I love your picture! THOSE CURLS!!!