Speaking and Listening

Speaking and Listening Session 18/11/08

1. Five things that I will try to remember when in the classroom from these sessions.

A. From the Alice in Wonderland activity we all proved that people learn in different ways. “Listening” includes comprehension which is different for everyone.

B. I learnt that everyone likes expressing themselves in drama, even adults. It is good to do warm up exercises which everyone has a turn at so that everyone is embarrassed equally!

C. Playing a character is a good way to get into their minds. When we took on the roles of people in the First World War it was easier to empathise with their positions.

D. Communication is important in team games. In the Auction activity it was important to not give conflicting advice and try to be of the same mind. Also that bluffing is a skill (I don’t have).

E. I think that drama lowers the boundaries between people and it builds up confidence in expressing yourself. The feather activity and “what are you doing?” showed me this.

2. How I felt myself doing the speaking and listening.

I really enjoyed drawing whatever I saw in my mind during the Alice in Wonderland activity. My drawings were of Alice as she appears in the Disney cartoon. My picture showed the bank by the river with Alice in detail and her sister as an outline because she wasn’t well described. I drew in the distance a rabbit in a waist coat (the waist coat was not described in the extract; it was in my mind having seen the Disney cartoon.) The rabbit was saying “I’m late, I’m late” in a speech bubble. Next I drew the rabbit hole and Alice falling down it. There was lots of detail about what Alice thought as she fell, so she got a thought bubble with a cat and a bat and the words “Do bats eat cats?” and a reversible arrow to show that Alice tried the question both ways. There was a jar of marmalade in the hole and some paintings on the walls.
I drew a tunnel under the bank along the bottom of the page. Alice was stooping because it was so low in the tunnel and there were doors on both sides. At the end of the tunnel I drew the rabbit hurrying away. I remember having lots of time when Alice discussed how she punished herself prudently and when she described the cake and the bottle I had lots of time for detail. I drew the glass table with the bottle and label saying “Drink me,” I drew the cake below the table with “Eat me” written in raisons and I drew the golden key on the table.

I have recounted this from memory which shows that I comprehended the story and that this method worked well.

3. What it taught me about group dynamics/others.
Discussing the Alice in Wonderland activity with other people was interesting. Venetia and Liane both found it hard to memorise the extract without writing anything down and were easily distracted. Rob had the same task of drawing and we were surprised at how alike our pictures were! The drawing task was popular, maybe because at a glance you could see what my thoughts had been and it was easy for people to compare their own image in their head as the extract was very vivid.
I learnt that there was still some anxiety about doing something silly in front of the rest of the class.
I also found the activities on language (“how how are are” and reading whilst being distracted) very interesting. When I was asked an interesting question I would start to answer it fully before stopping myself. It was hard to get a balance between not giving one word answers and giving longer answers that would make me lose my place on the page. Concentration does not last long once diverted from the original task.

4 b Look carefully at the handout – the objectives and then the objectives from the primary strategy: which if any of these have we hit today?

• Y1 Speaking (interpret a text by reading it aloud) and Y1 listening and responding (listening with sustained concentration) during the Alice in Wonderland activity.
• Y1 Listening and Responding (Listening and following instructions accurately) during the Robot activity.
• Y6 Speaking – (Use a range of oral techniques to present persuasive arguments.) The Lend me £50 activity
• Y1 Drama- (Explore themes and characters through improvisation) The Street Party activity.

Fi, I was just wondering if you could possibly lend me £50. I have this little problem you see...........!!

It was a good session, wasn't it?!

I wouldn't have given me the money either!!