Our Open Class


Nicole Jerome
Haksung Elementary School
I have to admit that when I first heard that we were asked to do an open class with foreign and native teachers observing us and making comments, I was pretty nervous but somewhat excited. There was quite a build up to the actual day in terms of preparation of materials and practicing our activities in order for the class to be effective and run smoothly.
Mr Kim, my co-teacher, being the perfectionist that he is, made extra sure that each color on every item and poster was absolutely perfect, so much so that if something didn¡¯t match or didn¡¯t look right we remade it from scratch. We prepared and practiced in our breaks, glued, cut out, went shopping for materials, got together on the weekend before the open class and then finally the day arrived. We were prepared and both wanted the class to go well. Mr Kim arrived in his wedding suit, at this point I realized the importance of this class, and we were ready to do our best.
The one thing I definitely learnt in our preparation was the importance of teamwork from both teachers. I truly believe that children respond better to teachers who work well together and share their roles. This is an important lesson that I hope will continue to be implemented in our future classes. Communication is another big aspect, preparing for lessons together, sharing ideas and communicating with each other to know what is expected, is vital, this prevents any miscommunication or uncertainty.
Overall I believe our open class went well, the children responded and took part in the activities, and they used all the key phrases and target language, which was the main objective of our lesson.
Another important lesson I learnt was that things might not go the way you expected, it¡¯s important to just pick up and carry on, we as teachers cannot always control how we want everything to run in our classes.
I found the reviews and evaluation after the class to be extremely beneficial. During this time we have the opportunity to get an outsiders perspective and use the constructive criticism given, to better our own teaching methods. Without this we may continue to make the same mistakes without being aware of them.
In conclusion, I believe open classes are important to help foreign and native teachers re-evaluate their teaching methods to function more optimally as a unit. Personally after our open class I can see that Mr Kim and I need to share teaching roles more and communicate more to each other about what is expected. This insight is valuable to our growth and to enrich our performance as teachers.