Inquiry into experience reading reaction

I have just finished reading the chapter "Inquiry into experience; Teachers' personal and professional growth" from Paula R. Golombek and Karen E. Johnson, and found it fascinating. The article deals most broadly with the shifting and sharing of knowledge, narrative inquiry and narrative inquiry as professional development.

To review, a bare-bones overview of narrative inquiry is necessary. Its NOT the telling of fun fiction stories to teach English to a classroom (unfortunately!)

It is a model of learning and knowledge development that draws from the storytelling and restorying of personal experiences and opinions. This is considered helpful, especially in the arena of teaching theories, because it allows each teacher to not only relive their experiences in coherent detail, but to learn from said experiences, and also to learn from the experiences of other teachers and use them to make connections, inferences and developments to their own style.

The idea of narrative inquiry allays a lot of discomfort with the idea of "learning to teach" that I have been having. I have always understood the need to be adequately prepared for the task of teaching, but have also always been confused by the idea of teaching teaching theories. Teaching, or any kind of knowledge sharing, is a negotiated experience. No two classrooms are equal in that no two students have the same experiences at home, at work, in the classroom, no two students think and learn alike, and no two students share the exact same level of proficiency in any subject. Likewise, no two teachers view their jobs the same, have the same life experiences, or are effected equally by the trials, tribulations and successes of the classroom. Therefore, no one theory regarding the act of teaching can be effectively applied to every classroom. Because of the unique value and environment of a classroom setting, I found it a little absurd that I was trying to learn to teach from books, or from broad theories and assumptions made by teachers, or worse yet, those who study teachers. It all seemed a little sterile and difficult to digest, as if I were learning how to create the ideal classroom, knowing that the feat was impossible before I even began.

Why I am so fascinated by the idea of narrative inquiry is because it is so simple, yet so perfect. As the chapter mentions, every conversation, be it student to teacher, teacher to teacher or student to student, is negotiated. Certain words and ideas uttered by one person evoke certain memories or feelings in the other, and so forth. Thus, the model of learning and developing through narrative inquiry is quite brilliant, because it is the fullest way to incorporate your own development with the development of others in order to facilitate a more complete understanding of the direction in which these developments are moving. It is also useful simply because one learns best from their own mistakes by relating those mistakes to the mistakes of others, as well as by reliving their mistakes to learn what went wrong and where changes must be made to affect efficient improvement.

Wrapping up, I loved this article. It appealed to my sense of community learning and specified teaching so nicely, I may read it a few more times.

Until next time,

Jessica Annett

Burns and Joyce Course Framework

For this assignment, I was instructed to read the first two chapters of a text called Genre and the Language Learning Classroom by Brian Paltridge. These chapters discuss and define genres as a Language Learning method for TESL classes. Our assignment is to mimic a course framework provided by Burns and Joyce using genre "as an organizing principle for language learning programs."

The theme which I have chosen for my framework is Professional Development, or more simply, a course designed to prepare students to enter the job market using English.

A Course for Students Entering the Job Market

1. Overall Context

Professional Development: course focus is preparing students to enter the job market using English as a Second Language

2. Aim

To develop writing, reading, telephone and interviewing skills that will adequately prepare students to find job openings, write resumes and professional letters, writing professional emails, schedule interviews over the phone, prepare for interviews and conduct interviews.

3. The Language Event Sequence Within the Context

• conducting internet searches for job openings in specialized fields
• browsing newspapers or other media for job openings
• conducting professional phone calls to request information or schedule interviews
• resume writing and editing
• writing professional documents (acceptance letters, letters of intent, personal statements etc.)
• proper etiquette and appropriate dress for interviews and the place of employment
• interview preparation (discussion of popular questions and adequate responses)
• conducting interviews (from the employer's perspective)
• mock interviews and role playing for common work situations

4. Texts Arising from the Sequence

• newspapers (classified ads)
• internet job sites (www.monster.com, etc.)
• internet search engines
• telephone transcripts and recordings
• sample resumes
• sample professional documents
• photos of appropriate dress
• videos and audio recordings of successful and unsuccessful interviews
• samples of appropriate work conversation and overall workplace etiquette
• genres within the workplace (anecdotes from personal experience and the experiences of many)

5. The Sociocultural Knowledge Students Need

• professional companies
• interview expectations
• expectations in the workplace
• the role of the employee in a typical professional environment
• my personal experiences with hiring and interviewing

6. Sample Texts

• written texts - samples of many (including my own) resume and professional letters (pre- and post- editing), expectations of prospective employees from company websites and literature, samples of professional emails and faxes (with focus on language moreso than format)
• spoken texts - recordings of interviews (authentic if possible, scripted if not), anecdotal information from personal interview experience, guest speaker(s) responsible or involved in hiring at a professional company, scripted dialogue exercises and role playing

7. Units of Work Related to the Texts and Learning Objectives to be Achieved

• specific and useful input
• practical activities exercising guidelines provided by teacher for job searching
• producing professional writing samples guided by teacher input and sample documents
• independent performance (in the forms of both writing and speaking)

This is my framework, the topic I chose was a combination of a few suggestions offered in class, and is something that not only interests me as a teacher but as an L2 learner myself. I find the availability of classes provided to ESL learners wanting to enter the job market are either few and far between, or do not have a broad enough focus to fully prepare a student for their dive into the job market. I realize that the goals presented in my framework are broad and perhaps too ambitious, but if time allowed, I believe a class based on such a framework would be useful not only to ESL students, but to any L2 learner who aims to find work in the country to which his/her L2 belongs.

Thoughts? Ideas? Suggestions? Questions?

Jessica Annett

Welcome!

Hello, bloggers and blog readers!

This blog is in part a class assignment and in part a way for me to keep the ideas and theories that strike me in an organized place.

This, my internship journal, will include responses to readings, reflections from conversation events we do with students, and observations from the classes we will be sitting in on. I will also include any observations I find noteworthy.

Comments and opinions are welcome from the world, especially my professor, Paula Golombek!

Enjoy!

Jessica Annett