In response to Dave:
My name’s Mike and, yes, I kind of botched [note - 'to botch something up' means 'to make a mess of it'] up my lesson today…
Sympathetic noises from the other attendees
It’s true, and I’m not too pleased with myself about it. I had a great idea and it just went rubbish…
Murmurs, someone says ”’Appens to us all, mate”
They were supposed to get my email, with a list of different links to look at about CVs. A video too! But it just failed badly. First, when they came back they said there weren’t any free computers in the library..
“There’s never enough computers for all the students, y’know…”
Then, the texts I linked to were really too difficult for the students in the class.
“Classic mistake, mate! So easy!”
If only I’d used twurdy.com or something, I could have better graded the texts, or maybe I could have followed Vladka’s advice and graded my task a bit better…
“You’ll know that for next time..”
Yeh, I will but still feel a bit of a chump. They couldn’t even get on YouTube to watch the video!!
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Hi Mike,
Thanks for sharing your experience. Nothing worse than when you find a great reading passage or video only for the students to say it’s too hard… Still, as long as the lessons learned are applied next time, it can still be a worthwhile experience.
Here’s my admission to a bit of bad-preparation-as-teacher moment, honestly I didn’t check the sources well enough. They were too difficult for the level. I’ve asked them to see what they can find out from them in their own time (perhaps less pressure will help their reading too…) and be a bit more lenient in what to expect from them. Still my lessons are being learned. I might accompany them to the computer room or library next time as well.
Cheers for the challenge, Dave
“There’s never enough computers for all the students, y’know…”
In my case today, “there’ll always be epic technology fails when there weren’t in the run-through”.
I used Soundcloud, Voicethread and Wallwisher today to practise some focused listening, opinions, paraphrasing and counter-arguments…or at least I tried to. OF COURSE, the wifi signal in class wasn’t super strong today; the Wallwisher page I’d set up kept giving error messages and the Voicethread confirm emails weren’t getting sent to my students’ email addresses. Le sigh.
Best of intentions… all became homework instead.
Better luck next time, mate. =)
Cheers, Tyson.
Actually the Wallwisher ‘Problems in the Matrix. The agents are coming’ happened to me once. Right before I was about to go in and use it for most of a 2 hour lesson! I quickly switched back to paper and re-planned using Google docs instead. I’ll blog about that one sometime soon.
Mike =)
It’s funny since it was the first time this year that I planned out a full lesson largely dependent on internet sites and therefore wifi connection. In this particular building, wifi strength was known to be great (University of Toronto buildings are surprisingly old-fashioned elsewhere) so I thought I was safe and imagined students loving the whole change-up.
I think a blog post about “When technology fails” is brewing for me. =)
That will be interesting.
Might be a good flip side for one I’ve got coming up about doing dogme with tech…
“Happens to the best of us”
I know but I still feel bad.
I hear ya, mike. It’s one of the worst feelings when you feel you’ve disappointed your audience. Sometimes you were even excited about that lesson plan, and the ooops… overlooking one detail throws the wrench right on in there.
New lesson plans are so exciting and yet, they can also be a recipe for disaster… especially when you’re dealing with issues over which you have no control like computer availability.
We all crash and burn from time to time, and I’m sure the students even felt bad for you cuz you must normally do a good job. Oh well. Another day…
It’s one of the worst feelings when teaching.
Thanks for the support, Brad.
Better next time!
Mike =)
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We’ve all been there Mike and the important thing is to learn from it (easier said than done, I know).
Why not get your students to report on what they did, what problems occurred, how they attempted to overcome the problems themselves (always a great one, that) and what they learned from the experience.
If you’re feeling cheeky, you could tell them that you ‘set them up for a fall’ on purpose, so that they could go through this reflection process. After all, they’ll encounter problems like this every day of their lives.
Alternatively, and I prefer to take this approach, ‘fess up and say that it didn’t go as planned… and you won’t make them go through that again. You can still get them to reflect on what happened and how they attempted to cope with it all – not a lost lesson but an opportunity!
I took your approach, just held hands up and said sorry. I think the students appreciated it. They were very kind and put some of the blame on technology and facilities, which was quite nice.
Mike =)
Hi Mike!
. No matter, how much I try, it happens (maybe I am just over motivated sometimes…more interested in stuff that students )…and it seems it’s really something we can’t avoid. We all learn from mistakes, teachers as well as learners. So, what I wanted to say is, don’t worry and keep your enthusiasm, passion and creativity!
It’s really nice from you to share this experience. Well, to be honest, it happens to me as well. Some lessons are just disaster
ps: concerning my advice on simplifying the task….hmm, I don’t claim I can always manage it…I just try and do my best …just like you, I suppose.
Thanks for the comment, Vladka.
Don’t worry, I’ve some ideas up my sleeve creativity-wise (with this group and others) – I will just be sure to plan the sessions a bit better and ask more questions about what could go wrong!
Mike =)
[...] Pear-shaped project work and how to avoid it – Mike J. Harrison [...]
I know that feeling – going to the classroom thinking that you have thought of everything and prepared a great lesson and then somehow it fails:( But it’s good to know that it happens to all of us from time to time. To make you feel better – in my school there are no computers, in one of the classrooms there is a very old blackboard with chalk and I have no Internet connection;) Thanks for this post Mike:)
Thanks, Ania.
Your comment reminds me of my days as an language assistant I did at a Spanish secondary school. They had greenboards and chalk. The high tech room was different in that it had a whiteboard! The teachers did have a handful of computers between them, and I think there was a computer room for the students, but for the most part chalk and board!
Mike =)
Yah, lots of platitudes… but feel for ya and sending a virtual hug.
Karenne
The hug is appreciated!
It is true though, these are the kind of experiences you really learn from – what’s going to work and what isn’t, what preparations you really need to make to ensure that it runs smoothly…
Needless to say, I’m on to better things, namely finding out about all this mobile jazz on SEETA.
As they say in Spain: más y mejor!!
Mike =)