In my Freshman English classes today I had my first attempt at the “grade everyone’s homework in the middle of class” structure that I was attempting to do. I’ll need to revisit that idea, because it was a tad too hectic. No wasted time or anything, but my classes are simply too huge to make it work. Anyway, my activity was pretty fun, so I got that out of the way.
The first thing I did was distributed a page with 20 different pictures of different facial expressions. The students worked in small groups to describe the different expressions with as many adjectives for behavior and feelings as they knew. They worked on this for around fifteen minutes, then we got back together after I was done with checking the homework. The students then shouted out their answers, and I’d write them up on the board for everyone. I have some students that were giving an honest effort looking up everything in their pocket dictionaries possible. Their vocabulary was pretty good.
After that I followed it up by distributing all the white boards I could find in the office. I gave each group two markers and an eraser, and told them to use the expression on the paper in a scenario they invent, without any text, to tell a comic in four panels. I’ve done this exercise before with a much smaller class size. With groups, the students have to discuss the art, the story elements, and all the other things they need to finish the project. I gave them another fifteen minutes to finish that drawing, then picked up their white boards. My intention was to have each group try to guess each other’s comics and write down their answers, but we never had enough time. Instead, I just held up each of the white boards and had one of the other groups guess in front of everyone.
The students that sat for five minutes talking about what they were going to draw always did better. I might start requiring the students to plan out the comic first before I let them have a pen. The best comics were clear instantly. The most difficult comics took three or four guesses. The one I drew on the board took five tries to get exactly right. I would make them repeat each step until they got the next part right. The students would pick up the right things from the previous guess and then make their own attempt.
A few of the comics were absolutely hysterical and made everyone laugh. I think the vibe in my class so far is pretty top notch. I know last semester it was sometimes difficult to get people speaking in class. So far with my classes I haven’t had the same problems. The lure of participation points was always an option too, if I wanted to keep track of the best answers and artists. It wasn’t necessary, as everyone was working so hard.
It was an entertaining class, for sure, and people got to learn new words. It’s also hard to clean up and set up between classes. If I had classes in multiple rooms I wouldn’t have bothered with it. Carrying around all the materials requires to do this with white boards is too hard for one teacher. It was a successful experiment, but I can only do it one week per semester. What will I do next week when I need to grade something? I’ve got a week to figure that out, or decide how I’m going to be handling homework from now on. The students have the books, so I’m committed to doing something with them now.


