required mcpost #1: formal evaluation

3. Watch your video-taped lesson plan. Comment on your strenghts and your areas for improvement.

le comment:

even after four years of college radio, i've never gotten used to the sound of my recored voice - it's always too nasal and mumbly. in the classroom, i complement this with a wide range of dramatic arm movements and bouncing eyebrows (in the video, i whip out my teacher look only once, when sylvia accidentally drops a textbook; after the loud bang, my eybrow shoots up, and my eye strongly fixes on the problem, ready to fire).

yet - darting between groups as my kids fill out a worksheet - i look like a teacher: often, i just perch above a shoulder, checking the progress; i positively reinforce productive responses with a constant barrage of "good," "yes," "exactly," and the occasional "brilliant." i use the first-person plural ("so, now we're looking up at the board..."; "later we'll be reading a short story...") to get things moving; instead of responding to the same query 20 times, i abstract common problems and teach/reteach.

of course, there's plenty of things that i'll need to work on: my transitions are sloppy (likewise my intro and closure); my directions aren't explicit enough (leading to too much time wasted on clarifying procedures); and my teaching objectives don't hit home from as many angles (and in as many explicitly noted places) that i'd like.

also, from dr. sullivan's notes,

1. i mention that d.c. and new york city is on the east coast (we're filling out a map), but so is georgia (also a location we're dealing with). in my defense, we were talking about atlanta, ga - which is definitely not on the east coast. yet, it's true that i'm running into a cultural conflict where i have a non-geographically pure distinction between east and south (i.e. by east, i mean dc and up on the atlantic.)
2. i'm a "little too animated" - to which i dramatically shrug my shoulders.