More thoughts on the game

The game went quite differently in class 1. I had a lot of students really interested in playing. However there were some students or teams that did not try at all. I told them they could get points towards getting a moon cake if they just answered if it was continuous or not. I am not sure how to motivate them. I may want to switch up the groups more or something. I think students were not working in pairs, but more individually. It worked somewhat. I asked the first two students who put up their boards to give a verbal answer. Then everyone who gave an answer gets a point. I wanted to be pair work so that they could get more practice in English. However I think the time pressure made people skip the step of talking to their partner. However I this class was much more engaged and go get em for those points. That was fun to see. This is the first time I had trouble discerning who put up their whiteboards first. They posed an interesting problem since I would say half the class or maybe a little more than half was engaged in the game. Some of the students who were not engaged were some of my smarter students. I am worried I am boring them. 

The changes I made to the game after playing it a couple times were to always call on the first two teams to put up their whiteboard. This gave more people more chances at points. It also provided an opportunity to listen to different explanations. I also decided on the second time I played it that each person on the first place team got a whole moon cake. The second place team had to split the moon cake between them. Then the third place team also split a moon cake. I thought this made it so enough teams got rewards and gave a chance for a prize for people with not as many points. 

So the game went well that third time, but it still needs to be fixed some more. I also seem to also not have enough planned for class one. When I see class one I have taught the lesson three times by then and so it goes so much faster because I know what I am doing more and I do it differently so that it goes smoother. However I hate having ten or fifteen minutes left. I may start pulling out some of the English games I learned in Beijing as a time filler. I mean it is good practice for their English and that is a goal of the AP center. I realized today that I could have done a game instead of filling the last bit of the class with me yammering on about this and that. 

So I am learning a lot from day to day. I am trying to improve my teaching from day to day. I feel much more relaxed and comfortable in the classroom. I think I had to be after being thrown back in right away after returning from Beijing and being sick on top of that. 

I still don't have the journals like I want them to be organized. I think I will spend some time next week working that out. Then I will collect them a week after we go over the set up. 

I will keep you updated as best I can about my classroom and my teaching.