Something New; Something Interesting; Something Puzzling
This is it! Your last chance to share your ideas with your classmates (and your teacher, of course). As we did earlier in the course, share with us your thoughts on new, interesting and puzzling things you've encountered since we began our study in February. We'll share and discuss your writing at our last class session next Wednesday. Write about as many words as you wish in paragraph form (multiple paragraphs are fine).
Remember that our final tests begin on June 5th and continue on June 10. If you need to write at special times, please email me with your requirements as soon as you know.
15 comments:
At first, when I told Brad about taking this course for the second time, I remember when Brad said, “Esther loves me,” jokingly in Writing 12 class last term, and we laughed. But I don’t know, do I love Brad, or what? Hmmm, I guess I have to get back on that topic. . .
In the beginning of the class, I expected Brad to start with interviewing classmates and write biographies, then to multi paragraphs essay just like the last term, but I was surprise Brad didn’t follow that pattern again, and I was glad I had fun with poetry first. On the other hand, I have these regrets; I didn’t have a chance to learn more about multi paragraphs essay, and I regret to say I didn’t have a chance to write biographies on one of the classmates.
Throughout this course, I had fun, and learned a lot from the classmates. But, I had to admit, I had this dilemma of quitting this class in the beginning of this course, but I really am proud to say, “I’m glad that I’m sticking around!” I didn’t know why I had that feeling, but I guess I was having panic attack of “what if I don’t pass this time?” Just to let you know, I passed English 12, but I took this time to pass with a satisfactory grade for me to look at.
Now, about that topic I was mentioning to you in the beginning of the paragraph, the one about “do I love Brad or what?” Let me be clear to you that he’s a great teacher, and I’m used to “his style of teaching,”—if I can even call at that, matter of fact—is good and I definitely miss Brad and his style of teaching, and of course, I’m going to miss all of you guys . . .
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Students puzzle me, sometimes. Even after many years of teaching, I still experience new behaviours and attitudes among my students. So, like solving a jigsaw, I have to put together new pieces every term until I have built myself a reasonable understanding of them, their strengths, their weaknesses and, most importantly, their willingness to immerse themselves in my sometimes quirky, but most always interesting, classes. For me, if a student’s heart is in it, I have the most success and, if a student is better in some ways after a term, I feel the most satisfaction.
It was interesting to see how I increased my comfort level teaching the new English curriculum this term. Last term was a whirlwind with me trying new ideas nearly every week of the semester. It was exhausting! This term, my students were luckier to have me reusing successful ideas and having to test new ones only every few weeks. Recycling is an important concept for a teacher in more ways than one! It was also interesting to experience your strong reactions to film and be able to give you some basic tools to express your reactions to a visual medium. The advertisements created strong reactions, too, more than I’d imagined. And “Affluenza” spoke to 2009 more strongly than to 1994. That was especially interesting to see.
I’ve already mentioned that I teach a new curriculum, but you may not know that I’m trying to translate the experience to a self paced course. It’s a complex task to design an effective course for students who are unable to attend a regularly scheduled class. Some of the days I missed (your essay writing days, mostly) were taken up with curriculum design work. You were, in some cases, the guinea pigs for some of my ideas. One that I used was our exercise on list poems. Remember them? By using similar exercises, I am able to let my self paced students into the blog world (they have their own, but sometimes are directed to read your work for inspiration).
In all, it’s been a fun semester. I missed a few more classes than is ideal, but you seemed to have survived it all. And, you are the survivors it’s true, because you’ll note that not every student who began is still with us. Congratulations to all of you and good luck (and good writing) on your finals.
In this term, the part about film technique is new and interesting to me. I’ve gotten clear what mise-en-scene is and how important it is in film-making, and I’ve gotten to know what high and low key lighting is and what the difference is between tightly and loosely framed. Before that, I was used to enjoying a film just thinking of it as a story with image and sound, but now, while I am watching a movie, I can’t help but notice where the camera is, what the relationship of the lighting and the subject is, how the depth and density is designed in a shot and what mood and feeling the filmmaker wants to convey by the technique. That awareness makes watching movies more fun. About the puzzling part, I think I still can’t completely understand the connotation of an English poem in this short time. The main reason probably is my limited vocabulary, I think. And I also need to study further the devices of poetry such as metaphor, alliteration, or assonance and so on. These are all obstacles to hinder me from enjoying a poem; otherwise reading poems would be a beautiful thing that is full of imagination, because I like imagining.
I have been studying with Brad for a complete year, I never imagined myself to write poem, short story and a 700-words essay in two hours. Literature was my greatest fear (and still is) since I wasn’t confident in myself to be able to do this. With every week’s homework, I felt desperate about how am I going to do this? But, I got it cracking and kept going. Definitely I have improved literature skills, I could even write poem.
This course is also truly inspiring; every time was full of surprise. I went back home with my head pounded by the thoughts of how true Affluenza is, how important the practical wisdom is for our life, how miserable woman’s life is in the “the woman of the house”. As a person grew up in a Chinese background, I was so amazed by the story of “Gold boy, Emerald girl” and how truly the characters soaked into social background. I could still remember how outraged I felt when I watched the movie “1984”. What a great wide range of curriculum; I love (sometimes hate) them all.
I especially like the teaching style of Brad, he got that motor to get everybody involved; instead of reading from paper, he inspired everybody to get involved in the class discussion of some really controversial and hot topics. Of course, the classroom was always so noisy. Sometimes, I wonder I talked too much; I almost forgot I am a student who supposed to listen and keep quiet.
I was quite disappointed last term during English 11 study; I though I could get a B, but I didn’t (a C instead). It made me face the reality of my weakness in English literature; I knew I had ways to go and needed to study harder during my English 12 besides balancing my life as a mother and high school student who accidentally took three courses this term (I just love English so much!). I am certainly glad I did all my best. No matter what the grade will be, I will personally reward myself a B (despite my long time friend Beatrice commended to me: “Brad will always give you a C, no matter how hard you studied”).
For sure, this is the end and I will surly miss my teacher.
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Out of every single English course that I have ever taken - from elementary school to high school, I have by far learned the most in Brads class this semester.
Many teachers that I have had in the past would say, “read this book and answer these questions about literary terms, even though you have no idea what they mean.” Ok, maybe they didn’t say the last part, but you get the point. This class, on the other hand, was fantastic! I’ve never experienced a class that was so interactive. I found myself speaking up in many of the class discussions, when I have normally kept silent in the past.
Another aspect I noticed about Brads English class was the incorporation of technology. I was used to the usual essays, paragraphs, and poetry, but the some of the rest was pleasantly unexpected. Learning about film and advertisements was very interesting and new to me. Sending in our homework to the blog was also unfamiliar to me, and I love it!
Even though I love summer and sleeping in until noon, I’m truly sad that this course is coming to an end. I’m going to miss all my friendly classmates, this course, and our great teacher!
“Are you kidding me? You mean you didn’t study Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet?”
My co-worker was surprised to hear me say I didn’t study Shakespeare because she thinks in every English 12, you have to study Shakespeare. That’s one of the interesting things I’ve learned this term.
Though I prefer my own hard work, it would have been still tempting to just peek on what the Internet says about Shakespeare, and that worried me. What if there’s something I didn’t understand, would I go on the Internet to seek answers? I’d wondered about this since I heard about studying it in grade 12. But Brad made this easy for me by just choosing something totally different from the curricular. Yet I still learned what I was supposed to learn.
One more interesting thing I learned is the critical way to view commercial. I used to change channel whenever there’s a commercial, but now I stay there (not that I’m interested in the product, really) to view the technique they use, which makes me laugh instead of writing the product name on my shopping list. Like what Brad said, I’m confident enough to say that I can’t be persuaded by commercials anymore, not after English 12.
Another interesting thing I’ve learned this term and apply in my daily life is curing my disease, Affluenza . Before I just used to buy things and won’t even use because I have no use for them, but now before spending my money, I ask myself if I really need it, and the reaction in me is very intriguing: I found myself putting the product down and heading out the door, my debt or cash untouched.
There‘s this African saying that you never leave a room the same way you came in. In my case, I came to English 12 as an anxious about not doing well, a panicky when having exams person and I’m leaving as a (not quite) confident person who might not dose a class, but do what’s required of her, and that’s my price for waking up early and having dark circles under my eyes because I now know more interesting things ( which I don’t want to list all because it might take the whole space on the blog) I didn’t know.
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I have many memories and treasure from this class. Besides working as groups, blogging thought me a lot because I felt free to get different ideas from my classmates and state my opinion easily. I have learned more about the elements of stories at this term; I always limited setting of a story as the place and period of time when a story takes place, while many other things such as weather conditions, social conditions and mood or atmosphere of a story are also part of setting. In addition, I have got to know about the theme of a story as its controlling idea or its central insight. Now I can compare stories and characters, figure out the differences and similarities of stories, and enjoy reading more than before.
One thing has always puzzled me is the poem and poetry part because I have difficulty understanding the meaning. Even with knowing very little about the main components of the poetry, I missed this section at the beginning of the semester. The rest of the classes were full of fun and very exciting for me. Getting excellent model and instruction form from Brad, and the necessity of beating my weakness have inspired me to go to school at the same time as other students in spite having no attendance at this term.
As time comes to an ending and I believe we will not get the opportunity to contact each others, I will miss all of my classmates and wish all happy every day.
Even though four months have passed, I still clearly remember the students groaning out loud when the teacher, Brad, told that we were going to learn about poetry. Yes, most students shy away from poetry because sometimes the words using in the poem carry weight too heavy to understand, and the meaning is often hard to come by in a poem. In order to dispel our misgivings and enjoy the poetry, Brad chose a poem with a simple format, which was list poem (possibilities). After studying it, Brad let us create our own poem. For me, it was brand new experience. I have never written a poem in English. In my mind, understanding a poem has already been a tough task. Create it on my own? No way. However, while I hold my pen, gave a “feeling” word, and created a “picture” with words of that feeling, a poem has been written. It was amazing.
As for the teacher, brad, is fantastic. He makes learning fun. Every one of his classes is an amazing adventure. In our classroom, it is always full of laughers, applauses, and argument. I think this is what true teaching is all about. The course is drawing to a close. And I will miss all of you—my friendly classmates and the wonderful teacher.
I really like the English course I am taking now. To be honest, I don’t want to finish that soon. It is the first time I really enjoy English studying. I took English 10 as a summer course, but I had no chance to communicate with my teacher. The summer course is too intense and the teenager classmates made me so stressful. I finished that course, just like an exhausted battle. I really want to find an English program interesting and practical. Finally, I came to our class.
It is no doubt that I get used to go to school for passing the exam. That is the teaching model in china. “Come on, come on, try your best and get better marks!” people around me say the same thing for 20 years. I never image that learning could be a funny thing. Most of time, it is just a task for me. No matter how tough it is, I have to finish it. However, the things totally change here. I like the discussions in class and I learn a lot from different people. Yes, people are different, and everybody see the same thing from different view, including age, career, and interest. It is fantastic! Everybody has his or her “spark”! We can share that together, and we grow up together.
Another interesting thing is the materials we learned in class. They are interesting and new, and they are not the copy from text book which have already being used for 20 years. Well, as we know, English is a developing language, with more and more new words emerge and more old words disappear. How come we study a text book which is published many years ago? Our ‘text book,” is very interesting for me to read and discuss them.
In a short, I have to admit that I learn a lot in the course, and I have fun too. I found I am not scared to talk my idea in front of classmates. I became more and more comfortable and confident to speak out. Well, I know I still have a long way for English studying, but I am not worry about the future. This course opens a door for me. Just keep going!
Which impressed me most in this English course is that I really learned something from it but I don’t feel any boring in this language course. Actually, I used to think that a language is a headache for me according to my experience. I change my mind now. Normally we will be asked to read and write in a language course, but Brad gave us many different types of material such as films, commercial advertisements and lectures. It seems that we always have some fresh things to deal with. This makes us keeping the interesting of learning.
On the other hand, we have a lot of chances to discuss with other students and the teacher. This gives us the opportunity to get different ideas and think something in different ways. Also, when Brad discussed something with us, he would not limit the topic. He would tell us some relevant information not only of literature but also of society, financial and technology. I think I learn many things beyond English.
There were two Japanese girls in the bus behind me yesterday that made me crazy by their nonsense laughs and speaking aloud. I told to myself the globalization just made a dull generation that do not think seriously and wisely. It drew me to rethink about “Affluenza.” That film made me feel better that still some people in the world think and feel wisely for others. Not all the new generation is lost in the fever of buying products. I hope people will find someday that truth is in their minds and their souls not in what they have or could afford to buy.
The other section of the class that shook me a lot was watching again 1984. When I heard some of my Chinese classmates asked where these events happened, I felt a deep rage not toward them but toward the governments that made a generation completely foreigners with their past. This also happened in my country. I remember once on the set of a movie in the Zagros Mountains, one of the group members told me: “I love Mr. Khomeini. He was completely innocent, but after his death they destroyed the country!” I looked at her and asked: “How old are you?” – She had been born after 1979. I told her that you do not remember, but I remember clearly that Khomeini was signing the commandments for execution of all young fellows that had been killed during 1979 to 1987. The movie1984 backed me to my bitter memories.Maybe it seems not related but gave me deep depression during the class.
Brad knows that I like writing. Writing is my professional degree from my home country, Iran. I look forward to gain more skills to write better and better in English. In Brad’s classes, I wrote a lot; I had been corrected a lot, too, about my grammar mistakes, but I didn’t lose my hope as I lost it during Communication 12. For thirty months living in an English speaking environment, I did well, but I have to admit that lots of my knowledge came from the Brad’s efforts because I am his student almost for two years. I will stay his student for the next fall for Writing 12 again, if God’s will.
Although, at the beginning of the semester I thought that English 12 will be more difficult than that, with lots of daily homework,and it wasn't; still I think my writing approved from the last semester. I always love Brad’s classes because of his ability to teach very strongly and differently from other teachers, his broad knowledge about many different issues, his personality that is like a good friend. Also, from discussion in the class, I knew better my classmates and learned from them more. I like them all and wish for them and for my teacher all the best in their daily life.
Everything seemed so hard to me that I felt dizzy in the first class. The second class is the same, and so on are the third and the fourth….
I felt frustrated when I saw the mark on my first essay, then the second and the third.
Today, when I recall these four-month struggling experience, I can’t tell exactly from which day I have become used to this course’ learning methods and the teacher’s style; I can’t tell either from which piece of work I retrieved my confidence and began to enjoy writing my feeling. And, one day, I was surprised that I opened my mouth - I dared express my opinions in class though disfluently- because I could not help any more.
Although most of the teaching materials are not fabulous as expected, they are instructive and thoughtful, and I fell into deep thinking on many weekends.
Being led to write anything that we wanted or any feeling that we felt was tempting but also agonizing. It was so hard to express a very complicated or complex thought that I felt exhausted almost every time after finishing an in-class writing. But, on the other hand, I enjoyed the process to write something with a free and open mind, really.
Almost three years ago, I started learning English as my second language. I studied English language at secondary school and still doing it at adult school (Pearson Adult Language Centre), so I know tons of differences between secondary school and adult language centre. Every difference is very interesting and fun.
Most interesting point was about the gap of age. When I was in secondary school, most of my classmates and my friends were same age or younger than me, however, I was a "baby" in this class. Everyone has their great skills to explain their thoughts, speech, writing by using English. Also their passion to learning English was beautiful. I was little shameful about it.
Mr.Brad's teaching style and his curriculum were totally interesting and brilliant to the students. For example, We shared easily our thoughts and everyone's
individual English skills by the blog, so that our efficient English skills could upgrade from their classmates.
We did not read famous stories to learn English but we did read some stories from the "New Yorker". Stories make me to draw a vivid picture in my head, but honestly, "the woman of the house" was little bit hard to imagine the story to me. I read twice, but still can not imagine it clearly.
I loved to learn about "Affluenza", "1984", and advertisements. Of course I learned English skills from literature but these make me to think the future and people's fundamental problems. Especially, "Affluenza" made me to change my habitual practices. I upgraded two skills(English skill and chaged my behavior) by just this one part of curriculum.
I will miss this class because I learned tons of English skills from Mr.Brad. Also I earned the passion and great attitude from my classmates. Thanks to all
my classmates and Mr.Brad.
Something New; Something Interesting- My English 12 Study
When I and my son stepped into the elevator of our building yesterday afternoon, another familiar-face tenant was already there. It is said that in case we don’t know what to talk about, weather is the safest topic. Therefore, during the LONG journey from the lobby to the 10th floor, I said: “It’s too hot today.” That guy smiled and said: “Don’t complain. Just enjoy the beautiful sunshine.” So, I will try to write more about the enjoyable things in our English 12 class.
Reviewing all my paragraphs and essays since February, which are saved in a separate folder in my laptop for showing off to my husband, I cannot believe that we have touched such a diverse range of material styles and topics: from poems, short stories to lectures, videos and movies; from life attitude, practical wisdom to marriage, consumption cultural, and totalitarianism. I started enjoying reading since I took Communication 12, and now, I realize that writing is another important and helpful way for comprehensively improving language ability. Our lessons don’t focus much on comparatively boring theory, but while struggling with each writing assignment on various topics and works, I did learn and improve a lot. This is completely new in my English learning experience.
Let me say a few more words about writing in Brad’s English 12, because I found that my potential has been incredibly motivated by those assignments which allow many different directions and ways of approaching. There isn’t any specific and unique idea regarded as the only one “correct”, which gives us a very wide space where we can write in a free style. Another thing I like is Brad’s interpretation to the theme of each literature work, which effectively makes me understand more and inspires a deeper reflection especially to those complicated works. Consequently, the relative writing becomes more torturous because the deeper we penetrate into the story’s theme, the more information and thoughts we have to handle in a logical order. The finished work will turn out to be, if lucky, a neat paragraph or essay surpassing our original ability. That’s the power dragging me forward whenever I want to give up.
Among all the works, the most interesting one for me is the movie technique part because I do love watching movies. The exploration into the film-producing will make me enjoy more splendid works, from a little bit technical point of view. I couldn’t tolerate Quentin Tarantino’s “violence esthetics”, but now, after experiencing the powerful movie “1984”, maybe one day I can challenge myself to watch his famous “Pulp Fiction”.
That’s all I want to say about the 4-month study. If any friends ask me about English 12 in PALC, I would like to tell them that it’s challenging, but interesting, enjoyable enough to overcome the painful part.
Finally, I’m grateful to Brad and all classmates, who share your valuable ideas and stories with me. I totally enjoy reading your writing works on the blog. Hope my son will also be lucky enough to have an interesting and inspiring study environment in coming years. Good luck for final exam, everybody!
Something new; something interesting; something puzzling
Among the brilliant techniques that Brad uses, small group discussion was one of my favorite, which I will treasure the most and always remember. Whenever I was in the group, I learned to give respect for each member by listening eagerly, and letting the entire member to talk. In fact, listening actively is an art that needs a constant practice. For all my group mates, each one you will be in my “treasure box” that make English 12 more memorable, Thanks to you all! I knew, my listening and speaking skills are not quite there yet, so thanks for the classroom and small discussion because I was able to alleviate my weakness. And thru, TED.COM I was able to strengthen my weak points. I do really love this site because many speakers have different English background that is from all over the world.
Over the last four months, I admit I discovered something new to me such as; I became a wise spender, though the “affluenza” video was not known to many of my friends. Honestly, I was touch and change by it, but, it was truly an alarming epidemic! Another, new to me was- loving poetry- it is unusual, but fantastic, I created one which dedicated to my family. Most of all, I’ve learned to value reading and writing, in spite of my hectic schedule I read, and read a lot! Which make me proud of taking English 12
All in all, the variety of Brad’s teaching techniques was an opportunity for learning experiences, challenging but mostly fun! Another thing I have to admit is when a substitute teacher is taking over the class, I feel so bad because, I hate to say this, Kaycee and I was missing Brad, honestly! (that was our little secret with Kaycee). Above all, blogging will always part of my life as a student, as a mother, and as healthcare worker, as well. Thanks to all, and good luck to the upcoming final examination.
And to you Brad, I am so grateful of having you as our teaching, big thanks to you and more power!
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