OBSERVACIÓN Y PRÁCTICA DE LA ENSEÑANZA II

FINAL REFLECTION

Student: Juan Pablo Murúa

In this report I am going to reflect upon my academic year experience, the objectives met,

my strengths and weaknesses.

One of the objectives I set at the beginning of the year was to make the most of profit

from observations. I observed both YL and ESP teachers and it was a great experience to

see how they dealt with language, even if it was L1 in the case of ESP, the students,

interactions, activities and materials. I believe we can learn a bit from all teachers, many

things that we would like to apply to our classes and some others that we would not so

much do. I remember one YL teacher from one of the observations I made; I truly liked the

way she interacted with students, in a very active and enthusiastic way, providing fun

activities, which really made me place myself in that situation as a happy teacher who

enjoys their profession. I learnt a lot from the subject and I enjoyed both TYL and ESP and I

tried to make most of profit from them, since I had not taught nor learnt any of the two

areas.

Regarding my strengths, I reaffirmed one that is voice projection. I enjoyed a lot giving oral

presentations in the ESP context and I discovered that oral presentations may be other

strength as well. I remember feeling a bit nervous at the beginning but then I got

confident as I knew I had planned the delivery of the topics. In one of the occasions I had

an issue with the projector but I could manage to deliver the topic in an efficient way,

though. So I really enjoyed and learnt a lot about giving oral presentations. I also enjoyed

learning about teaching children. I like how active they generally are in classes, their

willingness for participation, their curiosity and above all, the warm and friendly

atmosphere that is present when working with young learners. The class we taught on

storytelling was just marvelous, an unforgettable experience. I learned the importance of

introducing storytelling not only to incorporate variety to class but also to encourage

cognitive development.

One of my weaknesses is the fact that I have little experience in teaching. However, this

does not impede me from enjoying. I used to wonder how difficult it would be to design

materials, and with the ESP materials we elaborated I proved it to be very hard work but

not an unattainable goal. I learnt that it is a very much time consuming process, which

seems to be endless sometimes but one that is very satisfying after results are the ones

expected. I know there are many aspects that I need to keep on working on such as time

management and planning but I am sure that with practice, a lot of effort and

commitment I will improve these aspects. I feel I have learnt a lot from the subject and

that I want to keep on learning. After all, learning is a never ending process.