Localization, Contextualization and Integration: A Way to Learner’s Heart

This day, the first class that I will be teaching at were students I have never introduced myself to before. Considering this, I felt the need to integrate myself during my introduction and build that personal connection which I believe is the thin line between successful teaching-learning process and an ineffective one.

               During the motivation, since my topic was all about Recount Text, I asked four tourist spots in or around Lamongan City to which they answered:

• WBL
• PP
• WG
• Alon-alon

               This way, I was able to localize and contextualize the topic at hand. Students were able to share a lot of things about the places as most of them have already visited the places for at least once at one point in the past. Having the students share their experiences, I lead them to the topic of Recount Text.

               I was able to reflect on how very important it is to localize instructions during this class.

               Even if I am not familiar with the places, I kind of have to accommodate those differences from their experiences to mine, in order to have students better interest hence understanding and retention of the topic.

               I used their examples during the motivation to further elaborate how to go about doing Recounting Text be it in written or spoken manner.

               Also, I gave them an assignment which I will be collecting this September 21. It’s about their most unforgettable experience which would stipulate details included in recounting text.

               For my second class of the same day, the topic is a little technical as opposed to the previous class. This day, we discussed grammar: Simple Tenses and Perfect Tenses in particular.

               Discussing this to them one by one caused an unusual and awkward silence which to me signals lack of understanding or interest to the lesson.

               I showed them a table that summarizes the four tenses and ask for examples from them following the pattern on the table.

               This made my life easier, I thought. I’m assuming now that most of the students are visual learners since most of them at this point were able to get the gist of how the different tenses are formed better than the first approach which is discussion.

               Overall, I had an interesting and fun class fully packed with lessons not just for the students but also for me as a future educator. Assessments on the next meeting will tell me how much they have learned.