My Contributions to my School's GC Program

Google Drive

I'd say one of the most useful contributions I made to the GC program at IES Ciudad de los Poetas was the shared Google Drive that I created for my 10 chosen students. We had just over a month to prepare for the January conference at the time we narrowed down our candidates, so I knew they would need to take advantage of their winter break and do some research on their own time in order to maximize our limited time together in January for orienting them with parliamentary procedure.

I decided to create a Google Drive, aptly titled "Global Classrooms Bible," which contained all of the most important information my students could need to prepare on their own time. I made the drive editable so they could upload their own papers and help each other edit them, and tried to make it as user-friendly as possible. This approach came from my decision to treat them as adults and provide them with all the materials they could need to prepare. I shared with them my teaching plan for the next few weeks, old PowerPoints I had given in class about debate vocabulary, etc, and even a copy of the official Global Classrooms conference script and evaluation criteria. Depending on how much extra preparation they wanted to have for the conference, all the materials to do so were at their disposal, and many of them rose to the occasion and came prepared to our GC sessions without me having to pressure them.

To facilitate a sense of camaraderie and teamwork between the 10 (some of which came from different classes and didn't know each other as well), I also made a group on WhatsApp so I could send them more informal reminders and give them an opportunity to interact with each other in a fun way. This might not necessarily be productive in certain groups, but I was lucky enough to have mature students who didn't abuse the group text!

Improved communication

After a few months at my school, it became important to me to increase communication between the five language assistants working there and the teachers. The language assistant's role in the classroom is set and defined by the Ministry of Education, but it seemed to me that different teachers and even LAs didn't have a clear idea of how that role was to manifest in the classroom. For example, some of my teachers asked me to prepare lesson plans that would take the full class period, whereas others would ask for a 10-minute presentation on a given topic. Still others barely incorporated me into the lessons unless I approached them ahead of time with my own ideas. I think much of this boiled down to a lack of communication on both sides between LAs and teachers. From a teacher's point of view, it can be difficult to coordinate various classes while simultaneously trying to find a place for the LA, and from the LA's point of view it could be frustrating to arrive to school only to stand in the back of the class waiting to be useful - or, alternatively, feel like they were being overused to give the teacher a free class period each week.

As someone who has always prioritized communication in the workplace, I tried to be forthcoming about my need for more transparency, but I also needed to stay aware of the cultural differences I've picked up on in Spain. Here, indirect communication is generally more common, something I have found difficult to navigate. However, when I brought up my concerns to my bilingual coordinator, she was very receptive and understanding of how this cultural difference might work both ways and agreed that teachers and LAs should meet each other halfway when it comes to lesson planning. I wouldn't say that things have changed drastically since, but I do think me starting the conversation got the ball rolling on clearing up some of these misunderstandings.

Me and the rest of my dais at the GC conference.