Confidence

So, I was recently critiqued on one of my "classes" that I taught, and the main portion of the reply noted my lack of confidence. While I realize that I was not completely confident, I feel as if I was decently confident in the critiqued class. I began to think perhaps the reason I seemed unconfident was because of much of my phrase and word choices. Phrases such as, "If you please", "Perhaps/maybe", and my personal favorite "I feel like...." I realized I use these phrases in my everyday speech, so why wouldn't it just be considered an act of politeness? As my mentor told me, it's not that [you're] being rude by simply telling students to do something a certain way, that's just how it is. I started to realize I was too fearful of the students wanting to rebel whenever I told them directly to do something (i.e. move their desks, turn in a paper, stop freewriting, etc).I remembered back to when I was a freshman and started to recollect my feelings toward the teacher when they told me up front to do or not do something. It dawned on me that I never had any negative feelings towards the teacher, nor did I want to rebel against what they told me to do. Perhaps it is just the current generations mentality of "You can't control me. You can't tell me what to do" that has seeped its way into my brain and makes me want to be overly careful not to be forceful. Perhaps I just need to channel my inner Julie Andrews and stroll into class with the tune of "I have confidence" in my head- it wouldn't be a bad idea, right? (As long as I don't actually sing the song?)

To Y'all or not to Y'all?

Since my focus in the English department is Second Language Learning and I'm also from Texas, I found comp tale 59 especially pertinent. Though I have not begun to create a lesson plan for a Second Language (L2) classroom, ideas pop up in my head every day of different tactics that will perhaps reach my students better or assist in their Second Language Acquisition(SLA). One of the recent phenomenons I've been taking into consideration is the aspect of utilizing "real" English language in the classroom as compared to textbook English. While this includes not only pronunciation but grammatical differences as well, I'm torn as to what my philosophy is on the subject. It seems to be generally accepted to at least mention, and sometimes showcase, these differences to the L2 student, but I have yet to find a study on the effects, either short- or long-term, of prolonged exposure to a specific regional system of English on L2 learners. I think it would be very interesting to compare how these students interact in different settings, both professional and casual, with native speakers and non-native speakers. I don't want to begin discussing this idea as I would simply seem to be writing a proposal paper rather than an informal blog post, but hey- it's food for thought right?

So far...

So good. I haven't exploded into tears, made a complete fool of myself, or done something embarrassing like loudly passing gas while in front of the class. Luckily I have an awesome mentor and super supportive students, which has made my teaching experience thus far pretty darn decent. I'm feeling more and more comfortable by the day, filling the class time with more useful information and activities. I was actually feeling alright about having to teach next semester, and then the class assignments were emailed out. My first freak out moment happened when I read that I had two classes in a row. This worries me since I want to make sure I'm prepared for each class before stepping into the room. I'm assuming though that this won't be too big of a deal since they're both 104. This leads me to my next issue though- 104! Not 103- the class I've been learning how to conduct- but the next level up! GAH! Not only will I be dealing with not so fresh freshman, which could be problematic since they may believe they'll be more in control of the classroom,but new information as well! In addition to this, the book orders are do soon! There's so much happening and we're not even at fall break yet. Not that I'm extremely overwhelmed (watch me jinx myself saying that), but it's just so much responsibility to think about and start to think about. It's crazy, crazy, CRAZY, I tell you!

"Borders"

I think tale 48 in the comp tales book coincides well with the "writing over borders" video we watched last WC meeting. We must be conscious and considerate of the fact that writing does not only vary across languages, but even the same language in different areas. Not only within the line of phonology and morphology, but the common person can realize that British English is different from Jamaican English, which is different from American English. Even within our own borders, there are regional differences that can obstruct communication between a person from say the deep south and someone from Idaho. Thinking about the word "borders" in relation to physical borders such as between North and South Korea, or even societal borders such as religion, makes me take into consideration the fact that all of these "borders" create the person whose writing I'm to grade. On a more professional level, if I'm ever reading a candidate's application for a job am I to take into consideration their "borders" background, or should I hold them to the same level as everyone else as the recruit in comp tale 48 did? Where should the line be drawn, and are exceptions to the rule beneficial?