ESOL Instruction
The link below is for the lesson plan that I delivered to an adult classroom at the local refugee center where I volunteered in ESOL classrooms. As mentioned in multiple sections of this portfolio, language instruction is the topic in education that is of most interest to me in education and this volunteer opportunity allowed me to express this interest by empowering adult refugees through language instruction. In the attached lesson plan, I focused on providing students with a variety of mediums of practice. I also ensured that students always received an image or object that they were already familiar with so that they could add their new vocabulary to a context that they already knew. My lesson plans have always had a focus on always building on existing knowledge and ensuring that all instruction is provided with a context for learning. In the attached document of classroom activities, I desgined a variety of activities to facilitate conversaton in ESOL classrooms. These activities focus on allowing refugee students to express their own culture while learning about American culture.
Levitt Scholar Presentations
Hamilton College offers a Levitt Scholars program through which students create presentations on a topic of their interest and expertise. They then present these as lectures to classrooms in the surrounding counties. The following document outlines the main points of my presentation. My presentation was about the cognitive benefits of learning a second language. This presentation was geared towards students in second-language classrooms, mostly Spanish classes, to contextualize their language learning experience. This presentation was geared towards justifying langauge learning to them, explaining the advantages of this process apart from cultural factors, and motivating them to put effort into learning the langauge and keeping up with it after high school. These presentations were well-received and the students were interested in learning about what they had gained from learning a new language. One of the teachers from a classroom I presented in provided the following feedback"
"Ramya's "Language in the Brain" presentation went very well. She is a delight! My students were engaged and appeared to enjoy hearing someone else's voice other than mine. The program was interactive and 30 minutes flew by in a blink -- not a lull. Ramya is a very good public speaker and has a charm about her which drew my class into the discussion instantly.
So happy to kick up my Levitt Scholar month with this capable young woman."
Cognitive Benefits of Language Learning (Presentation Outline)
Teaching Hindi
The link below is a few of the lesson plans I have used while teaching Hindi. Since the students are expected to learn the grammar rules before class, the class time is focused on practicing speaking skills. Additionally, since these students are fluent in English, the new grammar rules are often explained in relation to English. For example, tenses are taught with the names perfective or subjunctive, and not merely explained in the context of conversation. These lessons are designed to provide students with a variety of exercises that allows them to practice previous knowledge and incorporate new vocabulary and rules into their existing structure. These lesson plans are strongly focused on using a firm foundation of Hindi grammar rules. I build on this existing foundation by introducing new rules in relation to past knowledge.
