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Making Reflection An Action – 5 Practical Activities You Need To Try

shutterstock_115208812Martyn Clarke has worked in ELT classrooms as a teacher and trainer for over twenty years and in more than fifteen countries. He has taught English at all levels and in many contexts from one-to-one in financial institutions to rural schools with classes of eighty students.

We learn how to be a teacher in many different ways. We have our initial qualification courses, we go on INSET training, and attend conferences. We might even read a few books on the subject. But perhaps one of the most influential sources of learning for us is in the daily experience of actually doing the job. The problem is when we are in the classroom there is no time for us to stop and think about what we’re learning.  Then between classes we are probably marking students work, gathering resources, or preparing for our next lesson. We probably all think that reflection is a useful process in our development. But many of us probably wonder when we will find the time to do it.

Making the process of reflection an explicit action can sometimes help here. These five activities are designed to help us stop and capture this elusive, but extremely important every day learning. They can be done by an individual teacher, or together with a colleague or with a group of peers. They are also very useful if you are building a portfolio of CPD activities and outcomes as evidence of your own professional development.

The procedure for each activity is the same, but of course you can change things to fit into your context.

Suggested Activity Procedure

  1. Set aside 30 minutes.
  2. Use the Recalling Prompts to guide your exploration
  3. Use the Reflective Questions to guide your analysis of the data and record your conclusions and future actions.
  4. If working with colleagues share your outcomes in weekly meeting and use the questions to explore what you have noticed.
  5. Consider recording the outcomes of your meetings on a poster in the staffroom for other colleagues, and to use as a springboard for discussion professional development sessions.
  1. What’s different?

Professional learning often involves ‘noticing’ when something changes, and reflecting on the causes and the impact this might have.

Recalling Prompts

Look back over the week and note down:

  • Something you know about your students that you didn’t before
  • Something that happened in your lessons that hasn’t happened before
  • A skill that you now have
  • A way of explaining grammar/vocabulary
  • An opinion that has changed over the last week
  • A way of working with colleagues that was different

Reflection Questions

  • What caused the change?
  • Why do you think this might be important?
  • How will this change impact on the way you teach/work?
  • What opportunities/dangers does it bring?
  • What can you do to engage with the change?
  1. Back on the Bike

The expression ‘to get back on the bike’ comes from the idea that when we are learning to ride a bicycle and we fall off, the best thing to do is to get back on the bike immediately and try again.  This way our mistakes become an impetus for renewed effort and learning.

Recalling Prompts

If you try something that doesn’t work well, note down as soon as you can what you wanted to do and what actually happened.

  • Where did this happen and who was involved?
  • What was your objective?
  • Why did you choose this action to achieve this objective?
  • Have you tried this before with different results?
  • What happened as a result of this action?

Reflection Questions

  • What made you notice that it didn’t work?
  • If you’ve tried this before with different results, how do you account for the change?
  • Why do you think the results of the action didn’t meet your expectations?
  • What do you know now that you didn’t at the time?
  • What is the next opportunity for you to try this again?
  • What changes will you make to the action to account for your new understandings?
  1. Why it Worked

Reflection often starts with problems all areas of difficulty, but this activity focuses on the learning we can gain from our successes, and possible apply to other areas of our practice.

Recalling Prompts

Identify something you are involved in that was successful this week.

  • Where did this happen and who was involved?
  • How do you know you were successful?
  • Have you tried activity before with different results?
  • What effect did the success have on the people involved?

Reflection Questions

  • How do you measure the success?
  • Does everybody involved share your evaluation? If not, why?
  • How replicable is this success – can you repeat the activity with the same results?
  • If you’ve tried this before with different results, how do you account for the change?
  • What aspects of the activity (in planning or in delivery) could you use with other activities?
  1. Needs and Wants

Our colleagues play a significant role in our daily school life and our development as a professional. In this activity you can analyse what relationships you have with your colleagues.

Recalling Prompts

Identify key colleagues from different areas of the school.

  • What does X need from you? What’s your role in X’s eyes?
  • What do you need from X?
  • What are the features of your professional relationship?

Reflection Questions

  • How much does your colleague know already about your opinions above?
  • If they answered these questions, what would you be unsure about?
  • What do you want to stop/change/continue about your professional relationship?
  • What steps could you take to make your professional relationship more productive?
  1. Ups and Downs

Teaching is an emotional activity, and even the most experienced teacher will have both good and bad moments during a week. This activity uses these responses as a way of accessing development.

Recalling Prompts

  • What moments of positive & negative emotions have you felt during the week?
  • What categories of emotions would you place the different emotions in?
  • What particular moments stand out either in a positive of negative way?

Reflection Questions

  • How did you respond to the emotion? What could you do to increase its learning impact?
  • Which emotions have been caused by external factors over which you had no control? How can you exploit these external factors in the future?
  • When were your actions responsible for your emotions? How can you avoid/repeat these?


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#EFLproblems – Revising, reflecting, adapting, improving

Teenage students in classWe’re helping to solve your EFL teaching problems by answering your questions every two weeks. This week, Verissimo Toste responds to Juliana Mota’s Facebook comment about how to connect one lesson to the next.

Juliana wrote:

How should we review lessons learned and make a connection with the new class?”

The first obvious answer is, “It depends.” But that’s not very useful. So let me propose some ideas and activities which you can adapt to the age of your students, their learning preferences, and their different abilities.

It’s their responsibility

From the very beginning, I try to make any revision the students’ responsibility. Once we have finished work on a unit or a module, I give them time to go back through the work we have done and ask any questions. This, of course, is easier when the class is based on a course book. Students leaf through the pages and are reminded of the work done. I then ask them to assess how they feel about the work in grammar, vocabulary, and the different skills. This assessment differs from class to class depending on the age and level of the students.

Students make a test

I ask students to make the test for the work we have done. Usually students leaf through the pages and suggest activities from the class book and the workbook. I ask each student to do this individually then compare their suggestions in pairs. Then, I ask them to work in groups of four. At this point, they compare their suggestions, but they must also agree on one test for the group. This generates a good discussion on the length of the test and what content is most important. More importantly, however, is that it creates a context for students to revise the work done, to prioritise that work, and to assess how they feel they are doing.

With the test based on their suggestions, students get a clearer idea of what they need to do in order to prepare. Giving them time to revise the work done generates more questions, leads to some revision exercises, and helps them notice their strengths and weaknesses. This is further reinforced when they get their test back.

Connect learning

When possible, connect new learning with language students have already learned. For example, you can base presenting the past simple on a daily routine. The daily routine gives the teacher an opportunity to revise the present simple, both the grammar and the vocabulary. Teaching adverbs can present opportunities to revise adjectives, as well as verbs. A text on the events of a very bad day can revise past forms and lead to teaching the conditional, “If they hadn’t …”

Skills lessons

Lessons with the aim of developing skills can, and should, focus on language learned. A listening or reading text will, most likely, use language students have learned. Once you have worked on the skill itself, guide your students to notice the language used in the text. Noticing language is an important learning tool that will help students improve their English.

Developing the productive skills of speaking and writing, will also provide students with an opportunity to revise language they have learned. Speaking activities are usually based on language students have just learned. Controlled practice activities will give them a chance to correct any mistakes. Writing tasks can give students an opportunity to use the language they have learned. Unlike speaking, students have more time to reflect on their mistakes and opportunities to correct through the writing process.

Project work        

I am a big fan of project work, whether the projects are small, taking little time, or larger projects spread over a greater length of time. Project work offers students the opportunity to use the language they have learned. As they share their work with others in the class, they will be exposed to the language in different contexts to communicate real information, usually about them and their experiences. The project will give them opportunities to reflect on the language they need. As the projects are meant to be shared, students are careful about mistakes, motivated to correct them before the project is presented to others.

The activities I mention here are based on making revision an integral part of the class and not necessarily based on any particular language point or skill in which students have difficulty and thus need more work. The activities give students the opportunity to revise what they have learned, reflect on their progress, adapt their learning based on the reflection, and finally, improve their English.

Invitation to share your ideas

Do you have anything to add on the subject of revising language? We’d love to hear from you! You can respond directly to this blog by leaving a comment below.

Please keep your challenges coming. The best way to let us know is by leaving a comment below or on the EFLproblems blog post. We will respond to your challenges in a blog every two weeks.


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A Letter to My Younger Self

Young woman thinking as she writesMeghan Beler is a full-time teacher trainer for Oxford University Press in Istanbul, Turkey. In this piece she writes a letter to herself about things she wished she knew when she first started teaching.

Dear Younger Self,

As you have probably realised by now, teaching is hard work. On top of a full teaching load you have to deal with homework, exams, misbehaving students, staff meetings and (gasp!) students’ parents. You are experiencing a lot of uncertainty and ups and downs, sometimes even on an hourly basis. You may feel that you don’t have enough time to plan the spectacular lessons you dreamt of when you were training to become a teacher. I remember what it feels like to be a new teacher, so I would like to offer you some simple advice that can help you deal with some of the challenges you are currently facing.

Choice: First of all, don’t be afraid to give your students choices about their learning. As a teacher, it’s very easy to fall into a pattern of being the decision-maker, judge and jury in the classroom, but allowing choice is an important part of helping students become autonomous learners. By having your students make some decisions in the classroom, you can also increase their involvement and enjoyment of your lessons. Start with something simple, such as allowing students to choose which questions from an exercise that they would like to answer. You might also consider asking them how they would like to carry out an activity – individually, in pairs or in groups? Homework and projects are other areas where choice is a possibility. If you want them to get more practice with past simple at home, give them some options and take a whole class vote, for example:

  1. Write a short composition about your last holiday.
  2. Record yourself talking about what you did last weekend.
  3. Prepare a ‘past simple’ quiz for your classmates.

This allows you to cater to different learning styles while encouraging students to take responsibility for their own learning. For learners who are not accustomed to being given choice in the classroom, this new responsibility may come as a shock to them and they may struggle to come up with ideas or even try to ‘cheat’ the system. But with a bit of persistence and optimism on your part, you will be amazed at the wonderful ideas your students can come up with.

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How to reflect on how we teach

Young woman using laptop on park benchJulietta Schoenmann, a language teacher and teacher trainer with over twenty years’ experience, considers ways in which teachers can reflect on how they teach.

As professionals who care about our students and the quality of the lessons we prepare and deliver, we do from time to time want to explore certain aspects of our practice in more depth. One way of doing this is by carrying out an action research project. ‘Project’ makes it sound rather grand and formal but it doesn’t have to be as inaccessible as it sounds. Classroom-based research is simply a method for finding out more about teaching and learning which then, in theory, makes you a better teacher and also helps your students become better learners. So how do you go about doing it?

On your own

There are loads of things you can do by yourself which reveal plenty about you as a teacher – your attitude to your work and your students, your role in the classroom, your management techniques, your lesson planning abilities, etc. The first thing you need to do is think about which aspect of your lessons you want to research. Looking through any pages of the New English File Teacher’s Book can get you thinking about areas that deserve attention:

  • How effectively do you present new grammar structures?
  • How helpful are your techniques for explaining new vocabulary?
  • Do you provide adequate feedback on students’ performance?
  • Do you set up and conclude activities in a logical and engaging way?

It’s helpful to write down some questions to get you started so that you have a focus to work with. Let me give you an example from my own teaching.

A little while ago I wanted to find out how effective my instructions were with pre-intermediate group and decided to record my lesson. The digital recording device I used was nice and discreet so it wasn’t distracting for students in class. I was able to stop and start it whenever I wanted (rather than waste time on footage that wasn’t that helpful to me, such as groups doing a writing task). I set aside time a few days later to listen to what I’d captured.

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