SEGARRA TODAY: CLASS WIKI

My “unit of work” was dedicated entirely to teaching the second year of Baxtillerat.  It was a mixed ability class so I had design a unit of work that would cater for students of different abilities and which would also try to take in as many of the key competences as possible. My teaching unit took into consideration all the key competences, except one, the mathematical competence. The unit of work also took into account the three specific English competences of communication, literary and plurilingualism and interculturailty. The teaching unit took place from the thirteenth of February and would continue, eventually over twelve sessions, until the twelfth of March. The students had previously been following the textbook, Definitions Two, in class and my instructions from my tutor was that I had to cover the aspects of unit four, “Making The News” from the same book. I was very fortunate in that I was given leeway to choose to carry out the class as I felt best. My tutor was very supportive.

What I decided to do, according to what I had learnt in “Aprenentatge”, was to create a final project which would embark on much of the material from the unit but also make it practical and active for the students. One of the fundamental aspects of learning is to be active, not passive. My overwhelming objective in designing the unit was to make the students as active as possible, with very little focus on myself as a teacher. I was also determined to make the students responsible for their learning and I dedicated a session to this aspect.

I set the whole project up as a class wiki. In this way, it would be a truly collaborative work where students could share ideas and correct each other’s work to produce a final project that would be worthy of their efforts and abilities. Together with the tutor, each group was chosen according to the abilities and nature of each student. Each group was of a mixed ability (in English) but would have various other organisation and I.T. skills.

The entire unit of work was posted on the class wiki so that students would have a clear idea of what was expected of them in each session. All of the worksheets were posted on the wiki, together with the answers of the activities (progressively). The students were expected to self-correct the worksheets. At the end of the session, I sensed the students were rather excited with the project but also quite apprehensive with the workload. However, I did not buckle under the pressure. My feeling was that all students complain about the work they are given, but the work would be done if the teacher was confident in their convictions. I feel I was proven right at the end of the unit.