A working session with #TeamLaV members, 2024
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The classroom is the place where I belong. I first realized that in 1990, my senior year of high school, when I did my social service, I supported students finishing high school via public radio. I met them every Saturday to help them with their English homework and offering extra lessons to support their radio classes. After a quick detour in Engineering in 1991, I did take that proverbial "left turn in Albuquerque" (using that famous Bugs Bunny quote) and moved to Education in 1992 and haven't looked back.
These days, I engage with students in undergraduate and doctoral seminars. Although I no longer teach the Methods and Approaches in the Teaching of Languages (#MATLUPB) and it's a bit more difficult to gather testimonials due to teaching virtual courses, I still cherish what my students wrote in their Medium blog posts as commentary about the class. Some choose to talk about me, and their words always inspire me to never give less than 100% to my students. I want to share some of these thoughts, with gratitude, as a reminder of all the work that's left to do to help these young teachers find the best version of themselves! (And hopefully... I'll be able to provide more recent testimonials!) |
More than a respectable professor, he is an amazing performer, a world-class actor, a terrific voice over artist, and sometimes, even a clown. With a word he can dismantle a blue sad face and paint it pitch black. May the force be with those brave enough to be his padawans: no one really knows which side of the force he is, but what is clear is that he is the master. |
Professor Mora taught us to see beyond the students, communicating personal interest in pupils by calling us by our names, asking questions during the class and talking about topics that we know were interested about. He taught us that taking care of the students and looking after their interest and needs is the very reason for the existence of the teachers. |
Dr. Mora is a great example of passion and dedication for teaching and producing a positive impact on the students. The course is not only about the methods and approaches in the teaching of languages, but also about discovering the way to find our presence and voice in the classroom, to leave our essence in our teaching practice. |
Finally, regarding the MATLUPB professor, I think that he is an idol completely. His attitude and behavior during the class inspire to achieve every goal and never give up in light of difficulties and obstacles that teachers face nowadays. His experience is evident in each advice that he has to share. He manages the perfect relation that every educator must keep with the students. The class is appropriately organized, prepared and supported by few authors and materials that are useful not only for the class but also for the future. |
Dr. Berry also makes me question about the type of teacher that I aspire to be when I graduate. He made me think that being teachers not only means that we will be in charge of promoting ideas in students; encouraging their creativity, imagination, provide them with tools so that they know how to function in today’s societies, and guide them to taking good decisions, we also have to take into account the social difficulties and struggles the students face every day, and that affect their performance during classes. |
This is where Dr. Berry’s teaching methods steal the scene: there’s a purpose behind everything, and it’s the teacher’s work to make students question themselves by giving them the tools to find their own foundations. |
Thanks to you, professor Mora because even if you did not notice it, you taught us how to put ourselves in front of a class, not just to teach a topic, but to recognize our students as an important part of every process of learning, you taught us that a lot of things matter when you talk about learning, that it does matter how the students link their classes, their feelings and their fears and how they overcome them. |
For all future teachers at the UPB, I hope that at least once in life you can have a conference, a course, a class or a conversation with Dr. Berry, he is the live image of a teacher who loves what he does. |
Hearing from someone else that you will probably not succeed immediately at something is a good way of realizing making mistakes is alright. I liked this class because I had the chance to learn quite a lot about my exercise of writing but how to apply it in the classroom as well. A gemstone for teaching. |
I am deeply grateful to Professor Mora for the opportunity he gave us all to express in such a beautiful way our thoughts and our feelings about different matters that we carry within us. And that he also gave us the possibility to be heard, since it seems like a paradox but even though we young people are very noisy, we are rarely listened to. |
All the above are ideas that the teacher gave to us to be closer to our students, to help them and to help us to create a holistic process. These suggestions help us to act in REAL moments, with REAL students and in REAL lessons. |
Retaking the Demo Thursdays, one day I would like to have something like it in my own class and have something that my students as I was are eager to do, moreover I think fixtures like this should be implemented more in today's classrooms, for me, I felt it was more or less an escape or even better, a different essence of the same class. |
March 8, this was the most satisfying demo — Thursday ever in this semester. This day we expect for a great class as every Thursday, where we as teachers in formation, create some criteria or activities to have in account for the day when we start to teach; Whereas, this day Dr. Mora came with a great activity where we have to use our speaking capacity, and |
Looking back, I can tell all those activities and all that information worked as an illustrative example for us to know what didactics and tools we could use and, based on that, arrange a lesson plan more creatively and pragmatically because it is important to maintain the students’ attention to engage them more exhaustively. We, as teachers, must be aware that we will have to face some situations in which classroom engagement will be hard to reach and knowledge will be difficult to transmit because students may not have the adequate basis and they might not feel attracted to the topic because they feel they do not understand. |
The last song we listened to in that demo Friday was “ We Didn’t Start the fire by Billy Joel” and it has a strong message, a revolutionary one. Actually the main idea is more about fighting for what is worth. Nowadays, there are numerous circumstances that we just let happen, and it is our to duty to stand against them and scream “WE DIND’T START THE FIRE IT WAS ALWAYS BURNING SINCE THE WORLD’S BEEN TURNING NO WE DIDN’T NOT LIGHT IT, BUT WE TRIED TO FIGHT IT” |
In conclusion the subject of methods and approaches helped me to recognize that the study and teach of a language like English has many ways to be spread, people can enjoy it discovering the different uses, both here and abroad, the origins and the pedagogic issue there is always behind a class. |
Reading has the power to engage people from all ages, because imagination never dies. This experience was one of my favorites in that class, and I am sure of the fact that I want to implement a lot of strategies that include reading (and most of all, storytelling) as much as I can. Thanks to this class I have a baggage that allows mi to take a first step planning my classes to make them different, but the most important: unique and meaningful! |
The integration of reading aloud in the classroom never went beyond to something stronger or meaningful for learners. From my experience I can say this procedure has not been correctly applied in any form; reading aloud should be significant to learners and not only an excuse teachers use for the “participation” of students. |