Enrico Grazzithe Cassino Project of Classroom Observation

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Enrico GrazziThe Cassino Project of Classroom Observation

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Università degli Studi di Cassino

Facoltà di Lettere e Filosofia

Corso di Laurea in Lingue e Letterature Straniere

Dipartimento di Linguistica e Letterature Comparate

Enrico Grazzi

The Cassino Project of Classroom Observation

Foreword

The purpose of this paper is to show the great relevance of classroom observation (CO) as a valuable resource to test the efficacy of foreign language teaching, particularly to analyse the dynamic combination of the elements which characterise the process of learning/teaching English and French as foreign languages.

I will refer to a project that I recently co-ordinated, called: The Cassino Project of Classroom Observation (CPCO)[1], which involved, as observers, a large group of university students attending my course of Glottodidattica (language teaching methodology) at the University of Cassino[2] and, as observees, a relevant number of teachers and learners of English and French from all different school levels (elementary school, middle school and high school).

The CPCO had the following three main goals:

1. To give the university students of Glottodidattica – all potential teachers of English and French – a chance to verify “in the field” the several theories of language teaching methodology they had studied.
2. To increase the learners’ and teachers’ awareness of their specific process of learning/teaching a foreign language, by pointing out and discussing its positive and negative features.
3. To encourage both teachers and teachers-to-be to become familiar with CO, so as to be able to adopt it as a useful resource that can make a great contribution to the success of language learning/teaching. Ruth Wajnryb[3] defines observation as:

(…)a learning tool. It is about being an observer in the language learning classroom and learning from the observation of classroom processes.

I am not going to anticipate the results of the Cassino project here, as these will be fully reported later on in this paper. However, I should just add a few words about the structure of this report on the CPCO.

Apart from the Foreword and the Conclusions, the paper is divided into three main sections, which broadly correspond to Wajnryb’s suggested three phases in running CO[4], namely:

Phase 1: Preparation

Phase 2: Observation

Phase 3: Follow up

Quoting from Wajinryb once more[5]:

(…) The experience of observing comprises more than the time actually spent in the classroom. It also includes preparation for the period in the classroom and follow up from the time spent there. The preparation can include the selection of a focus and purpose and a method of data collection, as well as collaboration with others involved. The follow up includes analysis, discussion and interpretation of the data and experiences acquired in the classroom, and reflection on the whole experience.

Therefore, in Phase 1 I will describe the general features of the CPCO and give details about the procedure that was devised together with the observers (the University students) to carry out their observation tasks.

In Phase 2 I will report on the process of data collection and focus on some relevant events which characterised it. I will also present the observation grid that was used as the main observation tool.

In Phase 3 I will report on the data analysis and on the interesting debate which followed the CO.

Finally, in the Conclusions, I will express a general opinion on the whole of the CPCO and spend a few words on what I believe should be the future perspective of CO within the Italian school system.

Phase 1: Preparation

1.1The Observers and the observation task

The need to plan a project of classroom observation was the logical consequence of two different observations:

• first of all, my university students will probably become foreign language teachers one day, without having received any sort of practical training, but only a basic theoretical background in applied linguistics and methodology.

• Secondly, most Italian teachers of a foreign language agree on the need to test the efficacy of their syllabuses, even though they often have not got the faintest idea of how to proceed in planning and carrying out an activity such as classroom observation, which would give them valuable feedback. I have to admit, in fact, that in Italy language teachers (as well as teachers of other subjects) have unfortunately never been trained and selected specifically to become “professionals”, so that they very often lack a sound methodological background. As practitioners, they have usually developed practical skills, which are based on their “experience” and on an intuitive rather than a systematic approach to teaching.[6]

The pivotal idea of the CPCO, then, was to use classroom observation as a tool to improve both my university students’ and the teachers’ awareness of the many components which contribute to a good lesson. I firmly believe, in fact, that a proper interpretation of the data that are collected through CO becomes the theoretical foundation of any decision concerning changes in a language syllabus.

The initial move on starting the CPCO was to discuss with my University students the aims of our CO. I first told them about the two crucial points I have just mentioned above and soon an open debate began. Finally, we decided that the main focus of the project should be on the process of learning/teaching English and French at all school levels. At first sight, this theme might seem rather pretentious, but in fact, it well represents the students’ different interests and plans for their future as language teachers. Very pragmatically, the students decided to restrict the project to English and French, because these are the two most commonly taught foreign languages in Italian schools, and consequently the ones that may offer better job opportunities[7]. Moreover, they wanted to monitor either classes of primary school, middle school or high school, because some of them were particularly interested in becoming elementary teachers, while others intended to specialise in secondary school language teaching.

The most interesting part of the debate, which led to the theme of the CPCO, was definitely about the definition of learning and teaching a foreign language as a complex process. My students agreed on the idea that the L2 curriculum should not be considered in the abstract, so the word process was chosen as the most appropriate to indicate what the object of our task should be: to draw an accurate map of the interplay of the components which all together determine the specific profile of a class. Actually, the process of learning/teaching a foreign language usually takes on unique features, which differ from a class to another, both in terms of the objectives and of the results of the language syllabus. The acquisition of an L2 as part of a school curriculum is in fact greatly influenced by several contextual variables such as: the teacher, the learners, the educational environment, the teaching aids, the socio-cultural background of the school, and so forth, and teachers normally cannot have a clear picture of how these different elements interact, because they are part of the picture themselves. That is why CO proves to be a valuable tool if teachers want to have a more objective feedback of what really takes place during their lessons.

Furthermore, through CO it is possible to elicit the critical points which inhibit the learning of English and French, so that the teacher can readjust the syllabus and introduce the necessary changes which will enable the students to reach a higher competence in their use of the foreign language. As Dick Allwright appropriately points out, in fact, there is a reciprocal effect between Classroom Observation (ie the teacher and the learners' acquiring a higher degree of awareness of the class dynamics) and the overall growth of the language acquisition potential. In his book Observation in theLanguage Classroom[8] the author affirms that:

(…) Good research can be good pedagogy, and good pedagogy can itself be good research.

When the preliminary discussion with my students was over, I let them free to decide if they wanted to take part to the CPCO[9], and I asked them to form little groups of observers (no more than three observers per group were allowed) on the base of the language they had chosen (English or French) and of the school level they wanted to monitor. Altogether, I had forty-six students participating in the project, divided into nineteen groups and distributed as shown in the following grids.

1.2The Observees

For what concerns the selection of the teachers and classes to be observed (the Observees), I have to thank Mrs Maria Scerrato very warmly, a teacher of English from Frosinone and the co-ordinator of the local group of TESOL-Italy[10], whom I asked to look for schools in the province of Frosinone willing to participate to our CPCO. I was very impressed by the number of teachers who joined the project with sheer curiosity and enthusiasm (obviously Mrs Scerrato had already made a selection of the right people who she would ask to participate), though it is sad to say that in some cases we found resistance from the headmasters, who were very suspicious and feared the interference of the University[11]. Luckily, I found a teacher and a class for each group of observers, and ended up by having nineteen teachers and classes available for the CO. These were scattered all around the province of Frosinone and located either in very small towns in the countryside, in the mountains and near the sea, or in larger cities like Frosinone and Cassino.

1.3Procedure and key questions

Phase 1 of the CPCO concluded with an important organisational session in which my students had to make arrangements for the execution of the CO. I told the small groups of observers to gather in three larger groups, according to the school level they were going to monitor. Then I gave each group a copy of the flowchart of the CO, and a list of key questions[12] (see the two figures on the next two pages), and asked them to brainstorm for a while, before the plenary session where we would agree on the principles and procedure of our project.

The discussion which followed the groups’ brainstorming was very interesting, and my role was basically to guide it and summarise on the blackboard the main points that the students touched on. Finally, we had the framework for the CPCO that would lead the students to the definition of a proper classroom observation grid. As mentioned in the introduction, this will be presented in Phase 2 of this paper.

Figure 1

Define the topic of your

observation task

Describe the background

situation of the class

Define the task

objective

Decide what to do

before the lesson

Decide what to do

during the lesson

Decide how to organise

the follow-up session

Figure 2

Key questions

1. What's the observation task?
2. Who are the observer & the observees?
3. How should the observation be carried out? (describe the preparation phase)
4. When is the observation taking place?
5. What tools does the observer need?
6. How will the follow-up be carried out?

Phase 2: Observation

2.1The Classroom observation tasks

Reconsidering the work I did for the CPCO from a more theoretical point of view and looking back at the notes that were taken during the discussion which followed the groups’ brainstorming (see paragraph 1.3, p 8), I have realised that they could well be grouped into the seven major areas which Wajnryb refers to as Observation tasks[13], namely:

1. The learner
2. Language
3. Learning
4. The lesson
5. Teaching skills and strategies
6. Classroom management
7. Materials and resources

Moreover I have become aware of the fact that CO could have been carried out in several ways and that the observation phase of the CPCO has been actually different from the procedures suggested by other authors, such as Wajnryb, Allwright[14], and Nunan.[15] Actually, Wajnryb suggests focusing on one of the seven tasks mentioned above at the time, while the purpose of the Pennsylvania Project, reported by Allwright, was to make a statistical analysis of the data collected during the CO. The two projects reported by Nunan, on the other hand, were an ESL study and a Core French study, which were basically different from our CO on EFL.

The characteristic of the CPCO is essentially the fact that it aimed at considering Wajnryb’s seven areas of observation simultaneously, as if taking a series of “pictures” of the life of a class. I have to admit, though, that Wajnryb’s, Allwright’s and Nunan’s materials, refer to more systematic projects of CO, that consisted of long-term observations, aimed at collecting data in a given situation in order to modify some elements of the learning/teaching process. By contrast, the CPCO was essentially a demonstrative project, whose three particular goals I have described in the Foreword.[16]

2.2The Classroom observation grid

As I have said, the purpose of the CPCO was to portray the life of a series of classes at different school levels, and to elicit the main features of the process of learning/teaching English and French as foreign languages. To do this, my students prepared an observation grid, which became their essential tool for taking notes during the observation phase. The points contained in the grid were selected both on the basis of the students’ brainstorming and discussion (see paragraph 1.3), and by following the list of items for CO suggested by Nunan[17]. As the observation grid covers a wide range of topics, it would have been impossible for an observer to consider them all simultaneously, so it was necessary to form small groups of three observers, each of which would focus their attention on a third of the total amount of items. Every observer filled in their own grid during the CO, and then, at the end of this phase they put together all the data they had collected. Each group of observers monitored a class for at least three hours, which correspond to three distinct lessons.

My students prepared two versions of the same observation grid: one in English and one in French, as they were going to work either with English or French classes (obviously, I am only presenting the English version here; see Figure 3).

Finally, the students and I decided that it was better not to show the observation grid in advance to the language teachers and the learners we were going to monitor, so as to prevent them from assuming unnatural attitudes during their lessons. The only thing the observees knew was of course the timetable of the CO. In fact it was necessary to plan the observation well in advance, due to the teachers’ full agenda (eg tests, school trips etc.)[18].

However, the presence of observers in the classroom is never entirely neutral, and to a certain extent it certainly affected the behaviour both of teachers and learners.[19] Nevertheless, in our case, the level of interference from the observers with the objects of their observation decreased noticeably from the first session to the last one. Once the observees had got used to the presence of strangers in their classroom, the lessons became more and more spontaneous.

Figure 3

Date:______Class:_____Teacher:______Observer:______

Phase 3: Follow up

The follow-up phase of the CPCO consisted of two different steps:

1. Every group of observers reported about their CO and wrote a paper where they described their experience and analysed the data they had collected. Then, as a part of the exam of Glottodidattica, each individual student had the opportunity to discuss with me the results of the work s/he had done within his/her group, and the value of this experience for his/her future career as a language teacher.
2. A plenary session was held at the university, with the participation of: the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cassino, the Dean of the Faculty of Humanities, the President of the degree course in Foreign Languages and Literatures, all the groups of students/observers and all the teachers that had been monitored, with myself as chairman. During the first part of the meeting, the groups of observers presented, in turn, the results they had come up with in analysing the data collected for the CO, and then discussed their conclusions with the teachers they had observed. When all the groups had delivered their reports, the session continued with an interesting open debate on the formative value of the CPCO, both for the university students, who one day could become language teachers, and for the classes that had been monitored.

I do not intend to analyse step a., nor shall I go into details about the lengthy meeting referred to in step b. I will only say that the follow-up phase was an essential part of the whole project, because it allowed both the observers and the observees to share their ideas and impressions, and then to reach a higher level of awareness related to some problematic aspects of the process of learning/teaching a foreign language. However, below I sum up the major conclusions that can be drawn from the whole project.