Classical Conversations: Cycle 1 Wrap-Up

Years ago, I wrote this post after my first year substitute teaching. I thought I’d answer the same questions about my first year teaching with Classical Conversations, with a slight alteration to question two!

1. What surprised you the most about teaching with Classical Conversations?

The way Classical Conversations can be both rigid and flexible surprised me the most this year. We followed the same schedule every Community Day: half-hour increments of New Grammar, Presentations, Fine Arts, Science, and Grammar Review. We only strayed from that schedule once at Week 24, combining Science and Grammar Review into a Compass Walk. We could, however, teach the subject matter for each half-hour activity in whatever way fit our class the best. I used a lot of visual aids, props, and songs for New Grammar, gave my class extra time to draw in Fine Arts, asked many questions in Science, and mostly planned active games for Grammar Review. One of my favorite Grammar Review games was “Mrs. A’s All-Grammar Diner, where you eat the grammar before it eats you!” I made menus where each item corresponded to a grammar question. I think the class enjoyed this activity, even though the menu items made them hungry!

2. Which subject did you like teaching the best? Which subject did you like teaching the least?

As far as New Grammar goes, I liked teaching History the best. The class always contributed good ideas to our discussions and asked thoughtful questions. Overall, the two subjects I liked teaching the best were Fine Arts and Science. My class patiently indulged me when I wanted to teach them extra information about the topics we studied during Science, such as how tornadoes form. That was a fun discussion! During Fine Arts, I spent a couple Community Days teaching our whole community about Classical Music. I especially liked hearing our community sing together.

3. Describe your favorite Community Day.

My favorite Community Days happened when we ended up with extra time to work on our Fine Arts projects. I usually put on music in the background and then we talked quietly while we worked. I learned so many new things about the students in my class during these times. I also appreciated seeing how they expressed themselves through art. Each student seemed to have different ideas about what looked beautiful and how each project should come together. Their final products looked amazing every time because they were unique to each students’ personality and interests.

4. Describe the five most important things you learned while teaching this year. 

1) Classroom management between middle and high school students and elementary school students is very different. Next year, I will approach my classroom management style with this in mind. I’d like to find a better way to get my class’s attention than staring at them until they stop talking. This worked well in the older grades, but not so well with the younger students. I also don’t tend to like the more “gimmicky” ways of getting students’ attention, like clapping or call and response. I’m sure there’s a management technique somewhere in the middle, and I’ll find it!

2) Posting a schedule for the day helped my class stay calm because they knew what was coming next. I tried to sum up our New Grammar activities into one phrase that described most of the activities (for example: Visual Aids or Songs). I included the presentation topic on the schedule and also the topics for Science and Fine Arts. I tried to give my Grammar Review games interesting names so the class could look forward to them.

3) At the beginning of the year, I tried to write my lesson plans in the Classical Conversations Foundations Guide, like most tutors do. Because I’m so used to writing my own lesson plans using my own format, I felt completely lost when I used the book. After the first few Community Days I gave up writing in the book and wrote out my plans in the style I like. This helped keep me organized and focused.

4) Time is not everything. At the beginning of the year, I gave so much of my attention to the clock, making sure we kept strictly to the half-hour time slots. By the end of the year, I varied each subject by a few minutes depending on how the class responded to the activities I planned and what those activities were. I still followed the official Classical Conversations guidelines, but gave my class and myself some space when things were going well or not so well.

5) I’m going to answer this fifth point similar to how I answered in my post about substitute teaching all those years ago. I said, “Trust in the Lord to give you patience and love for every student, remembering God made every student in His image.” The goal of any type of teaching should be to teach the whole person; not just knowledge, but how to apply that knowledge in living godly lives that honor our Creator. We do this by first and foremost teaching our students what loving Jesus and serving Him wholeheartedly looks like. I hope my students saw Jesus’ work in my life as I taught this year. All glory be to Him!