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Teaching English - Teachers Talk Teaching
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| Angela Bird is an experienced English teacher who has taught in a number of high schools and colleges in the north west and south of the state. In 1996-7, she was the English Officer for the Bowen District. At the time of this interview, Angela was teaching English 11B and Writers' Workshop at Hobart College where she held an AST3 position. Below, Angela talks about how she and the English staff set up their teaching areas, before focussing on the general year 11 course, English 11B. She discusses student grouping, reading, viewing and the use of technology. The resource list Angela and her colleagues have developed for English 11B is included at the end of her interview. |
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Setting
up the classroom and classroom resources
Using computer technology
Teaching English 11B
Student grouping and discussion
Wide reading program
Teaching novels in small groups
Visual texts and viewing
Working
with colleagues
References and resources
Setting up the classroom and classroom resources
I think it’s important to group the students so that they are facing each other and so that they can be easily re-grouped in different ways. At the beginning of the year in Writers’ Workshop we removed all the small desks and replaced them with large tables so that the students could have a larger working space.
This year we bought a small set of different sorts of dictionaries for the students to use which we leave in the room all the time. We’ve also got examples of student work from other years and we try to replace the displays on the walls regularly. Teachers have access to baskets of books with different sorts of reading materials like short stories or novels and we have also bought a lot of novels this year for less able or more reluctant readers. We have videos and video players and tape recorders and things accessible to the classroom.
| In the Writers’ Workshop room we have a double classroom and half of the classroom has about sixteen computers in it. That gives the students easy access to the computers. There’s a concertina door dividing the computer area from the rest of the classroom. Students from other classes have access to the computer area and there are usually computers free for other students to use as well, so it’s a fairly easily accessible use, it’s not formalised use of the computers. We have another room with eight computers in it and that has a connecting door to a classroom, giving students easy access to the computers. |
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The technology we’ve had this year hasn’t been that good as far as speed goes. We’ve only had access to Works, we haven’t been able to use Publisher and that’s been a drawback for a lot of students, particularly the students in English B. We probably would have benefited from having that and also Word. Next year we hope we will have Word and Publisher. But all the students have had access to the Internet and e-mail and that’s become quite popular and acceptable.
There is a whole college emphasis on technology and some of us have been trying to incorporate technology naturally into the program. One of the teachers e-mails all her work sheets to the students so that they can print them out at any time if they lose one. Students e-mail their work to me if they want me to read a draft and I’ll print that out. So we’re trying to incorporate the technology in the day-to-day workings of the classroom, not making it something special or added on.
English 11B isn’t pre-tertiary and doesn’t necessarily lead on to any other course. It might be the student’s last year of English. At Hobart College we tend to get a majority of middle stream students doing English B as the students who would have studied at the top level in Grade 10 usually go into a pre-tertiary. Apart from that element of self-streaming, the structure of the English B classes is heterogeneous.
Student grouping and discussion
| The students work individually, in small groups and as a whole class - a mixture of all those things. If I’m introducing something it’s the whole class but they’re always sitting in groups and I think that having them sitting in groups makes it easier then to move to a group task and it encourages them to communicate. Because they’re facing each other, they do talk and this encourages the development of social skills. There’s often conversation in the class about appropriate ways to speak to each other or appropriate responses to give, supportive responses. |
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I did some work at the beginning of the year to help them get to know each other, some cooperative learning games, so that they all knew each other’s names. They come from quite a number of schools so there were pockets of students who didn’t know each other, and some, four or five, who knew each other. They still tend to sit with those groups. However they’re quite comfortable to work with each other and if we’re doing a particular task I might split them up by doing a numbered head jigsaw type approach. That seems to have worked quite well during the year. If it’s a short task I won’t move them, they’ll just do a think-pair-share and then share with the other two at their table, so I vary the sorts of structures that we use. If it’s a whole class activity I try to have some small group discussion first and then have a whole class discussion so that everybody has something to say.
| With English 11B, one of the first routines I put in place is a reading time. It’s very structured at the beginning of each lesson because they only have two lessons a week - one is three hours and the other is an hour and a half. With the three hour lesson they have about half an hour reading from 8.45 to 9.15. At the beginning of the year they set up a reading log, which is just a record of what they read each day. I also encourage them to record other things that they read. I provide them with a basket of, hopefully, interesting books which they dip into.It’s not just fiction; we’ve also bought quite a number of high interest non-fiction books like the True Stories series and the Hot Shots series. |
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There are a couple of new series out that they find really interesting so we’ve tried to mix in some good quality non-fiction and high interest books as well, which seems to have worked because sometimes they don’t have to actually read the whole book; they can read sections out of it. It’s a bit more like magazine reading but it’s probably more informative and hopefully it’ll get them reading narrative.
We’ve got some collections of short stories that we take in as well but we encourage students to take out books from the library and continue reading. For some of them that’s not always possible so I will sometimes keep their book for them if they don’t think they’re going to be able to manage to bring it to the next lesson.
There’s an expectation that they make some response to the reading after a period of time. I give them out some general lead-in questions and perhaps once a fortnight they write a more extended response trying to get beyond just retelling the story to connect with the characters and to relate it to their own experience, to predict what’s going to happen, those sorts of things.
Probably twice a term I collect up their exercise books, comment and sign the book. I’ve collected up their books during this year four or five times, usually before reporting time. They know that they’ll get a rating on a reading criterion for it so it’s some feedback for them about what they’re doing.
How do the students find out about good books to read?
We have an introductory session with the librarian, who’s really into teenage fiction and young adult fiction. We also discuss what sorts of books they’ve read before. I share with them things that I’ve read as well and show them books that I’m reading; hopefully just by me sitting there reading something they’ll think it might be OK. They also have some opportunity to share with each other the books they’ve been reading.
Teaching novels in small groups
We haven’t actually done a whole class novel this year but the students have done two novels in small groups and they found that quite good I think. I did that in preference to a whole class novel because I couldn’t find something that I thought the whole class could be engaged in -at this level it’s very difficult. We bought a few new books to add to the existing collections and the students could choose. I introduced the range of books to the whole class, then they had half an hour where they read bits of each one and then chose one. I think giving them more control over what they’re going to read means they may be more committed to it.
I’ve been looking a lot at film and the media in general. We used the Frontline series to look at different media techniques involved in the presentation of an issue. I think that the students gained a lot of insight from that and they were coming back into class discussing different issues that were in the media. We also focussed on the Paxton case, which was on A Current Affair a couple of years ago. It’s written up in the book English Now. We used that and other classes then used it as well and found that that was a really good introduction for some of the students going on to do pre-tertiary English because of some of the issues raised there. One of the things that I started doing last term was showing them episodes of Race Around the World to teach them about film technique. We’d stop after each short film and, in groups, the students would decide what score they’d give them. We brainstormed all the elements that they thought a documentary like that should have, so they were able to comment on the camera techniques and the structure of the film and all of those other things that the people who made Race Around the World had used. They actually became quite connected to each of the racers and were able to give their own analysis of each of the films.
More recently they had a choice of doing a negotiated study in the more traditional sense or a communication project in groups or individually. Two groups made a video and they had very ambitious ideas about how they could make a 30 minute film about skateboard culture. I think the process of it was more important than the product. They discussed the process they went through and how difficult it was and the problems they had with the technology and learning how to edit. There was a lot of communication involved because they had to go and find other teachers to help them, and talk to each other. Negotiating about that and borrowing the equipment taught them a lot about responsibility and being able to communicate what they needed and wanted. Realising that the equipment was worth a lot of money and that they had to get a signature from me and go through all those steps was really valuable. Another two groups made a web page and we had a stumbling block with the technology in our area so that they had to go off and find other resources. Some of them did that responsibly and some of them didn’t. It’s been good experience. I’d like to do it again and improve what I did with it.
| Something else we have just done recently is to look at film techniques — looking at camera angle and lighting and sound and editing. I used the Text Files television series because the teacher support material was really useful We used the activity with picture books looking at use of different camera angles. Books such as Way Home and Water Tower were really useful and gave the students a still image to examine. They could talk about the reasons for choosing that particular angle on the image and how it made the reader or viewer feel, what sort of emotional impact choosing those sorts of angles and lighting would have. |
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This week we looked at the editing process. When we looked at the complexity of editing and talked about pace and sequencing and how storyboards are constructed, I think they realised how complex editing can be and what impact it might have. We looked at snippets of films - such as the opening sequence of Four Weddings and a Funeral - and talked a bit about the use of symbols and codes in them. We also looked at an extract from Round the Twist where the lighting is significant because it’s very dark. We also considered the use of sound effects and sound effects are layered in the film. The X Files was useful to see how that’s paced and how lighting is used to effect. We also started looking at camera angles and lighting. We looked at probably the first five to ten minutes of The Fugitive because it really uses film techniques very well, particularly the idea of flashback. The editing and pace of the opening sequence is quite useful for teaching that aspect of camera technique.
Another thing we did this year was combine some classes during our negotiated study period, which is a bit flexible because the pre-tertiary students have exams. We’ve got a video projector and a small theatre where we can show feature films. We looked at two films, Once Were Warriors and Blackfellas, focusing on some of the scenes and how the director had created tension in them. With the particular scene at the end of Blackfellas where there’s the shooting, we looked at all the different camera angles, the long shots and the close ups and I think they gained a lot from that. The emotional tension in Once Were Warriors was so powerful - I think that they could actually see the quality of film in Once Were Warriors was greater than the quality in Blackfellas and so was the quality of the acting. We’re also looking at the ideas in the film as well as the making of the film. Looking at those two films allowed us to see how ideas about culture were developed: they showed how cultural heritage can influence the way people live and how the clash of cultures has impacted on the lives of those people in two different countries.
Below is the resource list that Angela and her colleagues have developed for English 11B.
English 11B Reference List
(This is a recommended rather than a prescribed list)
| General
Reference: A Statement on English for Australian Schools, Curriculum Corporation English — A Curriculum Profile for Australian Schools, Curriculum Corporation What Is English?, DECCD DECCD English Web Site Hancock, J., & Leaver, C., Major Teaching Strategies for English, ALEA Rickwood,J., & Satrapa, J., When Its Fun You Learn, AATE General Source Books Quin, R. , and Cody, W., Senior English Now Books 1&2, Longman. McRoberts, R., English Skills, MacMillan McRoberts, R., Exploring English Skills, MacMillan Schill, J., On Purpose, Heinemann Glasson, T., English Outcomes 4, Heinemann Schill, J., On Target, Heinemann Bechervaise, N., & Stapleton, Contemporary English, Thomson Media and Film Source Books Quinn, R., Teaching Viewing and Visual Texts, Curriculum Corporation Arnold, j., Reading Television Books 1&2,Oxford Partridge, d., & Hughes, P., Flicks, Oxford Cox, P., & Goldsworthy, F., Featuring Film Books 1&2, Oxford Clothier, E., & Donohoe L., Switched On , Longman McRoberts, R., Media Workshop Books 1&2, McMillan McGregor, r., & McGregor, M., Teaching Film as Text 1&2, The English Club, Email: engclub@netspace.net.au Inside Out, ABC Television series Cochrane, P., Diprose, L., Munro,D., Inside Out Student Guide, Curriculum Corporation Text Files, ABC Television Series Text Files support book, Ashton Scholastic Language Skills Foerrestal,P., Look It Up, Nelson Fox, M., English Essentials, MacMillan Kock, T., English Manual, Macmillan Johncock & Leary, Super Spell, CD Rom, Assessment Technology Spelling, Decs South Australia Johnston, M., Every Students Guide to English Language, Mcgaw-Hill Down, E., Mastering Grammar, Longman Smedley, D., Teaching the Basic Skills, Methuen Speaking and Listening Toovey., C., Speak Up, Oxford Travers, M., Talking with Confidence, Cambridge McGegor, G., Working Together, Nelson Recommended Films In The Name Of The Father Murial’s Wedding The Castle Blackfellas Evil Angels The Shawshank Redemption What’ Eating Gilbert GrapeRecommended Novels |
Teacher Reference: Benton, M., & Fox G., Teaching Literature Robinson, D., The World of Fiction, St Clair Press Novels: Degoldi, K., Sanctuary, Puffin Hartnett, Sleeping Dogs, Viking Parry,G., Monster Man, Random House McCarthy, Ganglands and Cross My Heart Maloney, J., A Bridge to Wiseman’s Cove Lowry,B., Guitar Highway Rose, Ark Fiction Herrick, S., Love Ghosts and Nose Hair, UQP Donaghy, B., Anna’s Story, Angus and Robertson Caswell, B., & Phu An Chen,D., Only the Heart, QUP Kelleher, V., Slow Burn, Viking Metzenthan, D., Johnny Hart’s Heroes, Puffin Clark, M., Back On Track, Random House Reading Series for the Reluctant Reader Rave , Longman True Stories, Allen and Unwin Masterpiece, Angus and Robertson Shorts, Omnibus Books Slam Dunk, Longman Poetry Mallick, D., The Writing of Poetry, Nelson Harris, r., & McFarlane, P., A Book to Write Poems By, AATE Scott, T., Poetry Involves, Heinemann Travers, M., Life Lines, Longman Manning &O’Neill, New Ways Into Poetry, Oxford Short Story Anthologies Keyte, B., Making Connections, Longman Dahl, R., Tales of the Unexpected, Penguin Hathorn, L.,ed., The Blue Dress, Mammoth Corcoran, C., & Tyrrell, M., Goodbye and Hello, Puffin MacDonald, C., Hostilities, Omnibus Sheahan, R., Original Sin, UQP McFarlane, P., Lovebird, Puffin Wilson, B., My Cousin Clarette, UQP Niewwenhuizen, A., Family, Mammoth Picture Books Watson, K., Word and Image, Using Picture Books, St Clair Press Stanley, E., The Deliverance of Dancing Bears, Penguin Crew, G., The Water Tower, Keystone The Figures of Julian Ashcroft, UQP Lost Diamonds of Killiecrankie, Lothian Books First Light, Lothian Lucy’s Bay, Jam Roll Press Caleb, ERA Hathorn, L., Way Home, Red Fox French,F., Snow White in New York, Oxford Jeffers, S., Brother Eagle Sister Sky, Puffin Baker, J., Window, Puffin Van Allsburg,C., The Sweetest Fig, Andersen Press Collington, P., The Coming of Surfman, Jonathon Cape |
