Para português, clique aqui.

I have recently finished my first semester teaching English in London and have once again confirmed saying goodbye to students is never easy. To me, the most difficult thing is planning such a lesson.

Here’s my thought process:

”Should I teach something new?”

“Nope.”

“Should I revise eve thing I have covered?”

“Too much content.”

“ Should I play a movie?”
”Ab-solutely NOT. I am NOT getting paid to play something on Netflix.”

Below are two ideas to make good use of this bittersweet moment:

Have your students write a letter to your future students

This is a great way to get them to talk about what you were like as a teacher. You can have them write a letter to the future students who will take this course. You can ask them to include information, such as:

*your teacher’s favorite things

*ways to make your teacher happy some of the things your teacher doesn’t like

*some of the cool things you have learned this year  

 *the class rules   

*advantages to being at the level where you currently are   

*your favorite stuff from this year

(source: teachers pay teachers)

Anything else you might want to include. I think this is a lighthearted way to ask for feedback and also show them they have progressed. Additionally, this is content you may use for your future students. I love marking both the first class writing task I always assign and compare the results to show them how much they have progressed in the end.

I absolutely love these guys and will miss working with them a lot. It has touched me really deeply to see they have noticed I cared about everyone feeling included, I am knowledgeable, fostered team work and allowed them to have a learner-centred experience. . Almost all of them mentioned “working in pairs/pair work”, which is a wonderful thing for a teacher to read. On top of that, knowing they have noticed I wanted everyone to feel comfortable in my class means the world to me and it’s feedback I intend to do my best to continue to receive.

Printable version

Online version

The fake test task

You can assign a test featuring mistakes you have identified during your class interaction and/or on past tests. I usually assign a writing task at the beginning of the course, so I take mistakes from this first class task and add to the test.

Procedure:

Tell them them the purpose of this test is cheating as much as you can using all thinkable sources. Make sure you let them know these are mistakes you have collected throughout the term, and that you want to see if they have learned how to work on them.

Elect the best cheater in the group to be the registrar. 

Tip: the best cheater is usually someone who is not the shyest, but also not the most outgoing of students.

You should take the backstage and only monitor and interfere when necessary. You can make a weird noise every time something is wrong. When/If you see one of them is overpowering the others you can ask the shyer ones to interfere like they know the answer better than the rest (and make them feel they do). By doing so, you will manage to learn more about your students’ progress more than any traditional test will allow you to.

Once they are finished with the test, I show them the mistakes they made when we first started and mistakes they made on past tests. I think it’s a wonderful way for them to see their own progress and what they’ve learnt.

Happy last class!