Course assessment

Overall I found this class to be interesting and useful for my teaching accreditation. This is my first quarter and I really didn't know what to expect. I think I expected a lot more practical knowledge, not that we didn't get that, but not so much theory. But in retrospect I can see where this IS more of a theoretical class, as are most of the classes I will be taking for my ESL training at UCSD. After all we only have to take seven classes and it would unreasonable to expect that we would receive in one year the teacher training that most teachers go to college for four years to learn. And for those people who already have a teaching degree, that would be quite redundant. So after I made a mental adjustment and changed my expectations of what I was going to learn from the UCSD classes, I have found them quite useful.

So having this overview of what different methods of reading and writing were taught in previous decades and centuries for ESL students, and even L1 students, gave me an appreciation of how teaching methods have changed and what is important to keep in mind when teaching reading and writing. Also I now have a better understanding of what is different between teaching someone a foreign language, as in a high school requirement, and ESL, where people are learning English to use in their own lives for their own reasons, whether it be college training or day to day communication. I also like that along with the basic theory, there was practical applications of how to teach reading and writing to ESL students. It will certainly come in useful when I eventually have to get up in front of a class and put my knowledge to the test!