My Classroom Experience as a Language Teacher: An Inspiring Story of an Encounter with a Tough Class

Margaret Udo, Nigeria

Margaret Udo is a current Hornby scholar from Nigeria. At present is based at the University of Leeds, UK, and is preparing under the guidance of Rod Bolitho for a presentation at the Aberdeen IATEFL conference. E-mail: samgolden2000@yahoo.com

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The Lesson Presentation
What do we do?
What next?
Outcome

This was a reading comprehension class in Government Girls' Secondary School, Rumuokwuta in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, Nigeria.

The Lesson Presentation

On entering the class I noticed that some of the students were not in the class. I went ahead and ask the following questions:

• How many of you are living in the barracks or have a relative who is a soldier?.
• How many of you have seen soldiers before?
• How many of you have done the assignment I gave on the passage on the next unit?

Few students made some attempts to answer these questions .Some of the students were busy copying notes on other subjects and some others were discovered to be sleeping.
At this point it became quite clear to me that something was wrong. I decided to find out from the students what the problem was .I made them feel very free with the promise that I will not punish or reprimand them. I requested to know why they were not doing assignments generally and particularly reading and writing assignments. They should also say why they are copying other notes or sleeping and why some others out rightly stayed away from the English class. Some of the reasons/excuses given included the following:

• No Textbooks
• No time at home to do the home work
• The passages are not usually interesting to them
• The class is usually boring
• Writing assignments are usually difficult

What do we do?

I then asked the students what could be done to salvage the situation. The students made many suggestions and from their suggestions it was gathered that they were made to read passages that do not appeal to them, and that most of them could not afford the reading text which to them was a bit expensive.(750 Naira) I asked them if they do not want to be studying English Language anymore knowing its importance to them as students. They suggested the book should be changed. While not agreeing the recommended text should be changed, I asked them to suggest a book or short story which will be of interest to majority of them. A short story was suggested The Sugar Girl by Kola Onadipe, 1988, African university press. The price was quite cheap -fifty Naira.
For all the students to be able to buy this book, it became necessary to share the students into ten groups of 12 students each. Each group member had to pay a token of 5 Naira which was used in buying the book. Those who could afford, bought their own copies so at the end of the day, each group had at least 3 copies of the short story.

What next?

To make them write in a relaxed manner and with ease, I asked them to read the book and write a review on it stating the following:

• The name of the author
• The year of publication
• The place of publication
• The publishers.
• The summary of the book identifying the narrative strategy used by the author (flash back or chronological sequence)
• To say what they liked or disliked about the main characters.

Outcome

Each group had more than three copies of the book. In the average, we had over 30 copies of that book.
Each group submitted the assignment on the due date.
The teacher had less assignment notes to mark as opposed to the 120 she use to mark.
Each group collaborated among themselves and every member was active as the group leaders and secretary were ready to submit names of those who were not participating and that meant no marks.
Team and competitive spirit was built as each group tried to outsmart the other.
Those who could not have done it on their own due to some reasons could do it with others as they were carried along.

At the end of the exercise, the four language skills were developed.
Each member wrote their own review and brought it to the group discussion and read it out to others and important points were collated by the secretary of each group.
To be able to summarize, they had to read .They also discussed which elicited speaking as well as listening.
In a way the problem of unavailability of reading materials was solved and two language skills principally, were developed through this exercise, the reading and the writing skills which were not easy to get the students to do.
The English language class became quit exciting as the students were always looking forward to it.
Those who were dodging the class started attending due to the enthusiasm of others.
Above all, a mini library was started with these books which has since increased in number due to other additions and solicited donations by the teacher.

Please check the Skills of Teacher Training course at Pilgrims website.
Please check the Humanising Large Classes course at Pilgrims website.