Sunday, September 16, 2012

Teaching again

After several days of hesitation, I've finally started conducting French language classes at work. Teaching was one of the first things that I ticked off my list when I started to lose my eyesight. It seemed impossible to conduct sessions when I myself cannot read what anyone will write. Eye contact is out of question.

First day of class and I couldn't help getting overwhelmed with the positive feedback I got from everyone from my batch. I used presentation slides and a notepad instead of traditional whiteboard. Used PPT pen to highlight, underline, draw (all those useless hours spent drawing in paint finally came to some good). Took a lot of time in creating slides out of the lesson plans, scanning worksheets etc., but it ensured that everything is one place and in order.

Have delivered six successful sessions. Very pleased that teaching still remains possible and as interesting as ever.  Are you also a visually impaired teacher? What methods of teaching do you use to conduct your classes?

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

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Bhumika said...

Glad that it could help you :o)

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Anonymous said...

I am a teacher, also recently diagnosed with Stargardt's. I have had an increasingly difficult time reading students' work over the past few years, especially when written in pencil on white paper. Thankfully, many students increasingly prefer technology-based work of any kind (even if it's just getting to type a paper versus hand-written work!), so I've started giving assignments that can be submitted to me electronically. That way I can open things on my iPad and use the touch screen to expand things to a size that's perfect for me to read. For hand-written work (esp. that done in pencil) I've found this trick helpful also: make a photocopy of the student's work using the darkest setting possible so the contrast is sharper. Then you can even increase the size % on the copier itself or use the camera feature as described above. I don't want my students to know the extent of my struggles, so these options allow me to deal with grading work accurately during planning time when they're not there. If instant feedback is necessary, make it a common practice in your room that the student reads their work aloud...it's a great way to help them catch their own writing and speaking errors and can become part of listening objectives for classmates. Hope this helps! I'd love to keep sharing ideas -- this is e first time I have encountered another language teacher who's dealing with this...it's actually a bit comforting to know I'm not alone in the effort to adapt...thank you!

Bhumika said...

thank you, your post was really helpful. Really happy to know that you are continuing with teaching despite all the problems we usually have.

I can completely identify with all that you said. In fact, even I scan the papers and then adjust the contrast on my photo editor to view what is written. Sometimes even pen is not readable :-) One of my students brought a magnifier for me to read his answers. I still couldn't read anything. lol.