February 2015 TaLK Orientation

I just finished up the February 2015 TaLK orientation. We were at a new location at, 부산외국어대학교. It was a very nice and new campus but up on a tall hill… my legs did not appreciate that. The orientation was great. As usual the staff were fantastic and the food was partially better than previous orientations. The weather was pretty ok too. It was sunny at least but still cold! Thank goodness there was no snow.

This year I did the Giving Feedback and Assignments and Tests/ Assessment lectures. Both went well overall despite a lot of modifications that had to be done at the last minute. These were two new lectures that TaLK hasn’t done before. The participants were enthusiastic and like every year the quality of participants goes up. I thoroughly enjoyed their insights and the challenge of training new and passionate teachers. As I walked around and listened to their conversations during a group activity I could hear them, despite their exhaustion, trying to questions their methods and challenging their decisions. This is something they will have to do on their own now and I could see the process starting to mature. I also noticed a sense of comradery that I hadn’t seen much before at these types of orientations. Most groups seemed really tight knit and seemed to really care about each other. All of this from just a week and half of being together and starting out as strangers from around the world. It’s pretty cool to see this and it never ceases to amaze me how this seams to happen during these orientations. Thank you all for letting me be a part of your teaching lives and professional development. I always love doing these orientations. I learn so much, get to develop as a teacher, and re-affermate my passion for teaching. I wish you all the best of luck. If you have any comments, tips, or suggestions please leave them below. Please look back at previous posts for more materials, links and tips.  I am truly excited to have you all here as my peers.

P.S. If you are looking for the rubric materials that were missing from lecture book they are in the file labeled “Daniel Moonasar_Assignments and Tests” Also here is link to Casey’s blog. It has a ton of great info for teaching in Korea. 

Casey’s Blog

Assignmetns, Tests, and Assessment Materials 

Daniel Moonasar_Assignment and Tests

Assignment Testing

Giving Feedback Materials 

Giving Feedback

Daniel Moonasar_Giving Feedback

Daegu EPIK/ UCC Training

Just finished up two weekends worth of training with the UCC center in Daegu. WOW was it a long 2 weekends. Despite the long long weekends and many trials and tribulations, we all made it through alive. The participants were fantastic and had so many great things to share. I love in-service trainings. This is where we as educators get to practice critical thinking, reflection, and professional development. Additionally it was a mixed training. Both KETs and NETs were there. It was my first time training them together. I had always hoped for this but no one has really done it. It turned out fantastic. I got to meet so many teachers and heard from both sides of the cultural perspective on teaching in Korea. It was amazing seeing teachers that shared one passion for teaching our students work, talk, and build relationships together to further strenghten ourselves as educators.  I always come away from inservice trainings with so many new ideas and a reaffirmation of my love of teaching. Thank you my fellow educators for this. Thank you for letting me help in your classrooms and your growth as an educator. Most of all thank you for helping me grow. Below are the links to all of my training materials. Please leave a comment, question, or teaching tip for others. Thanks again for a great training! I’m gonna go soak my feet and do some more reflection from these past 2 weekends.

Pleneray Students Centered Teaching, Warmer, Wrap Ups

GTKY Plenary

Warmer 1

Warmer 2

Pronunciation Training

Teaching Pronunciation Elementary PPT

Pronunciation Activity Worksheet

Teaching Pronunciation Secondary 

Vocabulary Training 

Teaching Vocabulary PPT

Teaching Vocabulary Worksheet

Co-teaching Training 

Models of Co-teaching_Part A PPT

Models of Co-teaching_Part B PPT

Co-teaching Worksheet_Psrt A

Co-teaching Worksheet_Part B

Giving Instructions, Modeling, & CCQs

Giving Instructions PPT T

Modeling_CCQ PPT

Planning Instructions/CCQ – Worksheet

Working Across Cultures:

 Working Across Cultures PPT

Class Assessment & TaLK Febuary 2014

Man was it cold during this year’s training. Despite the cold and windy weather the training went very well. We had a lot more returning TaLK participants and even some who had taught before. Everyone was really excited to share their experiences. Below are my training training materials. Leave a comment, a tip, or questions. It was great meeting everyone. I wish you the best this year in teaching.

Class Assessment Materials:

Class Assessment PPT

Class Assessment 2014 Manuscript

Class Assessment Group Activity 5 Topics Worksheet

Class Assessment and TaLK August 2013

Yesterday I did my second TaLK training. The warm days and great weather really helped out with everyone’s excitement and vigor during the training. It was inspiring to see so many young teachers who were so passionate about teaching and living life abroad. With the great weather we got to hang out, talk, and have a few beers. I wish them the best in the next year or so while they are here in Korea. If you have any questions or want to leave some tips please leave them below.

Class Assessment Materials

Class Assessment Manuscript

2013 TaLK Handbook

1 Class Assessment Activity Worksheet

Class Assessment PPT

Classroom Assessment

I just finished up lecturing for the 2013 11th Generation TaLK Scholar Orientation. I really enjoy lecturing at the TaLK orientations. The staff is always great, hardworking, and friendly. Seeing and spending time with such a great assortment of young educators from around the world is always inspiring. Many of the scholars are here for different reasons, some are here just to experience Korea, some are here to take some time off, some are here to get teaching experience, but no matter the reason all of them were sincerely interested in becoming a thoughtful and caring teacher.  I know when they leave Korea and go back to their homes they reflect upon their time here. This reflection might be just talking to some friends over a beer or two, looking at photos with friends and family, or even writing about their experiences on a blog. No matter if they consciously do it they all will take the time for reflection.

This brings me to my topic of classroom assessment. This was my first time teaching the classroom assessment portion of an orientation and while most of us are familiar with classroom assessment I wanted to focus this blog post on the reflection portion of the assessment cycle. Reflection has been a focus of mine for the last few years and as I have grown from being able to realize that I need to in fact engage in reflection to being able to anticipate issues before they happen, I still struggle with evaluating my classroom assessment strategies, primarily how effective my assessment as learning strategies are.

My main concerns are being able measure and show a correlation to the strategies used that show an effect size that is substantial enough to prove the strategy works.  So basically do my strategies really work and to what effect? This semester as I begin to work with the second semester freshman English conversation students for the first time, I plan to implement in full force assessment as learning to help to give reason and measurable and observable progress in their learning that the students themselves can monitor. With backing and guidance from my department head and colleagues we will be really pushing the limits of our students in this aspect in hopes of giving them a reason to not only stay in the department but more importantly fuel the spark that they have for being an English major into a unstoppable life long passion. So indeed there will be much reflection in how to “fuel this spark”.  Further blog posts will detail this and follow out progress but I want to leave with asking a few questions:

1. When you see this spark in your class, how do you fuel it with classroom assessment?

2. How do you provide your students will measurable and observable learner outcomes in the EFL classroom setting?

These are two questions that I will be constantly asking myself this semester. Let me know your thoughts on this. Have a great semester as we get started up again.  To the TaLK scholars fee free to leave questions or if you have a problem let me know. I will post up some links to my resources.

Training material:

Class Assessment Manuscript

Class Assessment PPT

http://www.waygook.org  Great teacher led forum with thousands of lessons and resources , i.e. the bomb game.

http://www.slideshare.net/LienadRasanoom  My slideshare page. Slide share is a great place to share your PPTs.

http://prezi.com/user/dmoonasar/  My Prezi page

 If you need anything in this folder feel free to use it and share.

Secondary Classroom Management/ Co-teaching

I just finished the EPIK April late intake orientation. It was interesting to see so many teachers that didn’t have the orientation before teaching. Most had been teaching a month or so and then came to this training. Many of them were less nervous than the regular intake orientation and ready to gain some practical methods to get their classes going. I always learn so much from training teachers. Thank you all for letting me train you. Below is my manuscript and ppt from the training. Feel free to comment and leave some tips for myself and others.

Secondary Classroom Management Co-teaching Manuscript

Secondary School Classroom Managment_ and Co-teaching PPT