|
Why an English Learning Center?
As often happens, change is born from a lack of satisfaction with the conception of English centers we had seen. We wanted something else. We wanted change – and we created it: a learning center built around a central theme, essentially heterogeneous providing ample opportunities for learners with many different learning styles. We wanted to offer a multi-faceted array of learning options.
How we created our own English Learning Center
Central Theme
The English staff considered several ideas for a central theme and voted on them. Since we decided to pilot the ninth grade in the ELC before opening it to the entire school population, we offered our 9th grade learners a group of topics from which to choose. The learners voted and selected Political Assassinations. There are now 3 central topics, which are rotated each year (so that each learner is exposed to each topic in their junior high school years). The other topics, in addition to Political Assassinations are: Customs and Beliefs and Teenagers Around the World.
Team Work
For the success of the ELC, teamwork is essential. Because the ELC needs to be constantly “fed”, it is not enough to open the ELC with a certain number of activities and leave it at that. IT IS IMPERATIVE THAT GROWTH CONTINUES THROUGHOUT THE LEARNING PROCESS! Each teacher needs to “feed” the ELC with new ideas including his/her own classes’ requests. This is what raises the level of variety and choice to all the students. Communication between the teachers is a major factor in the success of the ELC, as different work for different students is introduced. A “New Work” bulletin board is incredibly helpful.
The ELC and the High School classes
When faced with the challenge of developing the learning center for High School learners, we decided to focus on activities that would allow for in-depth independent study of the literature they learn for the literature program.
In addition, we found that the ELC was an amazingly rich source for the project work that our learners have to do for the oral bagrut. Teachers who choose to do so, base their projects on the topic of the ELC for that year. This provides plenty of resource material (both adapted and unadapted) for high school learners on all levels. Some of the teachers even incorporate into their projects, a production of a performance based task, which then goes back into the ELC for other learners to use, as well as a tangible product to discuss when they reach their oral bagrut exam.
You are welcome to come and visit us! The person to contact is: Judih
privaj@yahoo.com
|