Knowing and responding to your students’ diverse needs.
CONTEXTUAL BACKGROUND
At the Photorgaphy pathway at CCW Foundation centre our class of 45 students is multilingual, with many students still developing their English language confidence. Most of our international students have very recently moved to London and many of them are experiencing being taught in English for the first time.
EVALUATION
Currently, I try to keep my language simple and speak clearly – not overcomplicating new and challenging ideas with technical jargon. I have attended several name pronunciation courses which means I am fairly confident with pronouncing Chinese names. I send out the project briefs to all students in advance and we have a copy on the wall of each studio. I try to use images or videos where possible to support instructions/ideas discussed. Recently, I have reformatted the briefs to include a bullit point summary at the begining. I feel this has improved the understanding of the tasks required, however I would like to develop my practice to invite greater vocal participation and in-class engagement.
MOVING FORWARDS
Encountering Victoria Odeniyi’s Reimagining Conversations report, I was encouraged by the idea of framing multilingual backgrounds of students and tutors as a ‘pedagogic resource’. Although this study was largely considering the online teaching space, many principles can be applied to my own practice.
For example, using silence as a productive time to think, inviting students who may need more time also to offer their take. In the interaction studies, there is emphasis placed on the role of the pause as a moment which can ‘hand-over-the-mic’ to students. This observation is combined with something which I am certainly guilty of – using rising intonation as an indication of a question rather than formulating the sentence as such.
Odenuyi’s report also introduced me to the ‘Initiate – Response – Feedback/ Evaluation’ format which is somewhat instinctive but not a format I knew by name. Discussion of this, in addition to modes of meaning making such as pauses and intonation mentioned above, made me wonder how the idea of an ‘invitation’ in a classroom can encourage fruitful discussion and also manage the group by being clear about my expectations of them. How can I invite less confident students to participate without making a demand? Here the discussion of ‘calling students out’ as a way to avoid embarrassment is interesting. Odeniyi states: “[not calling out] is an ethical practice with desirable outcomes, but there is also the possibility that by not nominating or inviting students to speak, even when they cannot be understood easily, opportunities for learning are missed”. I would like to think of our discursive space rather as an invitation.
She highlights the importance of peer talk as a way of building solidarity between students. One way I can imagine to do this would be to try to invite students to respond to their peers first, before I contribute. In a group presentation scenario for example, allowing space for the peers of the student who is presenting to shape the conversation. This is often difficult, especially at the beginning of the academic year when they are not so familiar with eachother and there is at times an imbalance in language confidence. To frame this as an ‘invitation’ could take the form of giving them responsibility of chairing the conversation and taking notes for eachother (although this prospect might be intimidating to some), or to start the presentation with each person first doing a micro-share about one of their influences in a more Pecha Kucha style presentation before the ‘main event’.
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