Reflection on Graham’s Activities
Comments(4) Having been an English Language Learner myself, I have experienced first hand how intimidating it can be sitting in a class and not having a clue what the teacher is talking about or what your peers are laughing at. When it comes to being in an activity where you are expected to participate and have input this becomes even more challenging. I really enjoyed the games that Graham introduced us to on Wednesday as they eliminated that fear factor. The games included one called “stomp”, which had everyone standing in a circle and involved the passing of rhythm from one to another around the room. Another game was similar but involved the hand clapping. A third game called “May I” that involved people switching positions in a circle through eye contact and the asking of “may I” to each other. These games have a commonality in that they all depend little if at all of verbal language communication. I thought it was interesting when a student from the class who had missed the introduction of the activity and came in midway through the game was still able to participate fully throughout the game. Communications involved were primarily eye contact and hand/body gestures. An ELL student can easily understand the situation and not feel left out. This was especially apparent during the feet stomping activity when without communicating to the class Graham facilitated a change in direction of the feet stomping. Everyone in the class was able to catch up on that despite no verbal communication was involved. I thoroughly enjoyed the activities and will definitely use them in the future with my own classes.
– Emily
Coming from a discipline that regularly uses games like these as multi-layered exercises that teach the micro-skills that are integral to honest and connected performance work – it’s easy for me to overlook the basic ways that such games can enrich a group setting. I agree with Emily’s observation that we experienced a different kind of communication than what we generally see in the classroom: non-verbal communication. I also appreciated the opportunity to witness a feeling of connectivity between the members of our class, as we “passed the stomp” and worked towards a common goal without ever acknowledging what that goal was. I think it is important to allow our students to feel connected, and in-sync with one another when possible, and it’s amazing to me how standing in a circle and establishing eye-contact with your peers can accomplish that in a very inclusive way. I definitely enjoyed this reminder that games don’t HAVE to just be sneaky ways to achieve PLO’s, but can also be a fun, simple way to establish a different kind of classroom environment.
It’s great that somebody has posted in regards to Graham’s class. I agree with many of your comments in this post and I too enjoyed the class and felt that I learned a great deal from it in regards to non-verbal communication. In the past, early in a semester, I have felt awkward in many classes when I don’t know others in the class. I feel that these activities will play a vital role within my teaching as they allow students to feel more comfortable within the classroom setting. I also found it extremely interesting when the student entered the classroom and was able to join into the activity with no explanation. Also, it was remarkable how some students were able to change direction during to clapping game without instruction from Graham. Most likely as teachers we will have ELL’s within our classrooms and these non-verbal activities will help these students who perhaps lack the necessary verbal skills to feel a part of the class.
Another activity that was taught during this class was the “line activity”, where students stood in a certain area of the room depending upon their opinion of a topic. Afterwards students within the area talked about and gave reasons to why they felt this way about the topic. Finally, some people shared their opinions with the class as a whole. I feel this activity can definitely be implemented into my classroom as an opportunity to get students to voice their opinions in a more comfortable low-pressure situation, which should better facilitate participation.
While I have never been an ELL I agree with you about the usefulness of the exercises Graham showed us. I have had the experience of being in a school environment in Nepal where I knew extremely little Nepali, and those around me knew limited English. Their school system works completely differently, and the relationships and interactions between students and teachers were completely foreign. It was interesting to realize just how much body language and eye contact can influence our understanding. I thought that the ‘May I’ game was also a very useful demonstration which highlighted that. The game illustrated how important it can be to look directly at someone when speaking, and also to use hand gestures, facial expression and body language to make it clear who you are talking to and what you want from them. Certainly, in Nepal, there were many occasions where my communication with others was limited to gesturing and modelling activities to confirm that both parties understood what we wanted from each other. In that instance, it was also very important that we were all comfortable around each other and willing to laugh at the ridiculous sight I’m sure we all made as we flailed around and ended up completely missing what the other person was trying to say. Trying to learn from someone whose communication with you is limited to the few words you both know (in my case ‘thank you,’ ‘good,’ ‘no,’ and ‘pass’) requires a lot of hands on activities where it is easiest if you can literally copy what the other person is doing. However, one of the biggest challenges is actually knowing why it is that the person is doing something in one way and not another, rather than just being able to copy what they do.
I totally agree that it can be a very scary experience to be in a class where you have no idea what your peers or your teacher is saying, since I have been being an English Language Learner. When I just immigrated, I didn’t know any of that games that were played in class. Since I never had a chance to play it before, it took me for a while to learn some games and rules. Sometimes I got confused with rules and how to score due to limited language skills and because there were many games too similar to each other. So often an entire class would be spent playing a game and I would not understand it even after the class was over. To this day, I still don’t know most games that students play in classrooms. Therefore, when Graham told us that we were going to play the games, I was anxious that I might not understand how to play those games right away. However, as you mentioned it, there was no need for long verbal instruction or clarification for the game. Before we started, I was little confused on how to play it, but I could get it right away as we started. I really enjoyed the “May I” game. As you said, we were doing eye contact, hand/body gestures and facial expressions to communicate during the game. As I was playing, I realized that I haven’t talked with most of classmates and some of them I didn’t even notice they were taking the same course with me. For that reason, I think it would be a perfect game for the first day of class. Since there isn’t much of verbal communication in it, students of all kinds ranging from outgoing ones to shy ones in class can enjoy it even though they might be surrounded with unfamiliar peers.