Learning to Teach Is a Process of Reflection

沈烨

【摘要】教学反思，作为教学的一部分，是指教师对教育教学实践的再认识、再思考，并以此来总结经验教训，进一步提高教育教学水平。教学反思一直以来是教师提高个人业务水平的一种有效手段。本文为笔者执教英语学科第一年的心得，通过教育案例、教育故事、或教育感想等来提高教学反思的質量。

【关键词】教学反思 反思性教学

Learning without thinking is useless， so Confucius said I must reflect myself three times a day. As a teacher in current educational situation， I should always learn before， in and after my class. Actually， learning to teach is a process of reflection.

I will detail some examples of my learning to be an English teacher which are successful and effective during my first-year teaching. I am teaching Grade One in a primary school located in Suzhou. To primary grades， oral English is significant and emphasized. My kids love English lessons very much and take active participation in the classroom. （Maybe they have to write a lot in Chinese and Maths lessons.） However， problems always exist.

As several units were finished， I noticed a phenomenon that a small part of my kids dare not raise their hands to read or practice oral English. I thought it was not a good decision to ask them to show their spoken English directly， which may scare them more. As a kid who just began to learn a foreign language， he or she wanted to say the word accurately， otherwise they could not have enough courage to speak loudly again. How can I help to build their confidence？

I immediately turned to my mentor and colleagues and attended their class. They are experienced teachers and are familiar with the child psychology. The second measure was to chat with those kids. When they regard me as a friend， they will open their mind to me， which has positive impact on their attention in English class.

The main methods that I adopt after I noticed the problem are listed below.

1.Apply group competition. Kids who are aged 7-8 like to be the star and hope to be the best. This can attract their interest at least. Now， I design reading and acting competition for them.

2.Adopt variable games. For example， one game is called “climb the line”. It is so easy to be carried out that teachers use a lot. Just draw a line on the board， and invite students to read a single word， phrase or sentence. I will draw a small star at different height of the line according to the performance. Even their pronunciation is not excellent， they will get a star at a relatively deserved place.（In fact， I will draw a little higher.） I will praise every student. If a kid needs improvement， I will first say good job and highly praise his or her loud voice. Then I read the word for him or her and encourage him or her to surpass me. In this way， they will never feel frustrated， but manage to do better than the teacher.

3.Design targeted homework. I will ask them to follow the tape at home. They will lead the other students to read next day， so they do work hard in the evening.

After these changes， those kids who were shy get improved and in my class， the involvement is satisfactory. The above story is a reflection in and after class， from which I learn to pay close attention to diffident kids， motivate them in the way they like， and observe their appearance and smile， thus making my kids be fond of my class. Whats more， there is another experience leaving deep impression on me. That learning of improving my word teaching helps me a lot and even make me feel the magic of English language.

Different from the first story， this one happened during my preparation for a certain class before the real one. My kids need to remember the words without spelling them and they were even not familiar with the alphabet. What a burden to them！ The old way of spelling can not help obviously， therefore I did a lot of searching and one word came up with me， phonics. Fortunately， I watched some videos of Craig Wright who is an expert in phonics teaching and conclude large quantity of rules between letters and their sounds. I had another chance to attend a class in other school and the teacher shew us how to apply the Craigs phonics to the primary grades.

For example， a video in that open class is called The Secret E. The kids had already learned the words dad before the class. When e is added to the end of the word dad， the sound of a is changed to the sound of letter a. Then the teacher took a card to let students try to pronounce bit. （They could tell the sound of b and t.） Afterwards， he added e to bit， and some kids can pronounce accurately according to the rule learned just now.

This is only one rule in phonics teaching and I find it useful and interesting to attract kids. In this year， I gradually introduce some rules in my class and my kids can remember the sound easily. The amazing function is that even the word is totally new to my kids， they can pronounce it directly.

My first year of teaching has been finished with harvest and still many problems. I learn to observe my kids， my class and my colleagues class. I manage to solve the obstacle I meet before， within and after each class. I will think more about my teaching and focus on the problems. Maybe there will always be some questions， but my aim is that every kid maintain their interest in my lesson and me.