Lessons from the classroom CELTA assignment cover sheet
To be completed by CELTA candidate
Name Ruba AlBadi
Submitted on (date) 2nd August
Number of words 801
Declaration This assignment is my original work and I have acknowledged all sources.
Full name: Ruba Al Badi
Resub submitted on
To be completed by CELTA tutor
Grade
1st submission: Pass / Resubmit Tutor: ____________________ Date: _____________
Double marked: Y/ N Tutor: ____________________
Deadline for resubmission: _____________________________
Resubmission: Pass / Fail Tutor: ____________________ Date: _____________
Assessment criteria Y or N- 1st submission Y or N -resub
a. noting their own teaching strengths and
weaknesses in different situations in light of
feedback from learners, teachers and teacher
educators.
b. identifying which ELT areas of knowledge and
skills they need further development in.
c. describing in a specific way how they might
develop their ELT knowledge and skills beyond
the course.
d. using written language that is clear, accurate
and appropriate to the task.
General comments:
Teaching Strengths
One aspect of my teaching which has been noted in my feedback as a good point is good
attitude and personality with the students. I am able to set a positive and fun atmosphere
in the classroom where the students will be engaged. Dealing with the students is
something I have come to find quite easy and enjoyable. I was glad to see this reflected in
comments given by my tutor Katie in TP1 and TP2 feedback as students “responded well to
my lively manner and sense of humour, and I created a good rapport with the group
quickly.”
Selecting appropriate tasks for the lessons I’m teaching was another area of strength and
one that I improved throughout the course. Thanks to the ongoing feedback and the
discussions I had with my tutors a day before my lesson and also during the day before we
start the lesson, my selection of the task became easier to pick and I would know which
task is appropriate for each lesson and skill I’m teaching. My second tutor Michelle
mentioned this in my feedback for TP5 and TP6.
I’ve done my best to get the students to work together and have as much ss time as
possible during the lesson. We were told to give students the space and time to talk and
practice the target language to assess how much the understood from the lesson, and it’s
also a good way for them to talk to each other and use the language they just learned. I was
happy to see that I have got a positive feedback several times in TP4, TP3 and TP5
Areas of improvement
Time management- I still need to get better at managing my time. I went 6 minutes over on
TP1, so I made sure to pay attention to this in each following TP. Even though I never
substantially went over my lesson time, there were several lesson stages when I took longer
than I'd anticipated, such as when I was teaching pronunciation, meaning, or grammar. This
caused me to deduct some other parts of the lessons, such as peer checking or delayed
error correction. By the end of the course, I had developed coping mechanisms for better
handling this, for example: marking specific tasks in my lesson plans that I could skip if I was
running late.
Giving clear instructions was another challenge that I had to work really hard on during the
course. I find myself sometimes speaking way too fast, use too many words or repeat
myself a lot. Then I found that scripting my speech in lesson plans was the best way to
manage this.
and lastly, making my teaching more student-centered and cutting down on teacher talking
time will increase communication in the classroom, which would hopefully result in more
engaging and memorable lessons. Michelle mentioned this in TP 7 when I was teaching
grammar. There's room to be more consistent, even though I got better at this over time I
still need to get a hold of myself.
Observations of other trainees and experienced teachers
Observing tutors and the online videos we watched throughout the course were very useful
in developing effective teaching practices and how to use different materials in the
classroom to help me with conducting the lessons. I picked specific ideas from the online
videos we watched that were very helpful for the vocabulary and grammar lessons. The
lesson we watched for observation 3 was a grammar lesson and I was particularly very
pleased with how the teacher set the context with the picture of the two coworkers and
how she let the students guess what their relationship is etc.., then when she was teaching
the grammar she mostly elicited the rule and the words from the students themselves so I
tried to copy her technique as much I as I could when I was doing the grammar lesson.
I observed Chris, a classmate, and both his positive and negative teaching strategies. I like
his relaxed personality and constant efforts to make his classes enjoyable. The majority of
the time, this resulted in very good student participation.
Further development after the course
In the near future, I want to concentrate on improving my teaching abilities in two key
areas:
I’m planning on going through the videos provided by our tutors in the Moodle to continue
observing experienced teachers and try to get as much helpful strategies and techniques as
possible, as well as searching for more sources online to expand my vision on classroom
and lesson planning.
Additionally, I believe that learning a language for myself will be one of the best things I can
do to develop empathy for students and recognize great teaching and learning strategies. I
therefore intend to continue learning French and Korean.
