Educator

I have worked for over 5 years in the ESL/EAL field in four different countries. I am CELTA certified and greatly enjoy working with adults, but I am also practiced in teaching children and teens. I also create educational videos on a freelance basis. When I’m not in the classroom, I think about education regularly and insert it as much as possible into other parts of my life.

I have provided three examples of my work below. WIth these, I have also included commentary on what I would do now, should I create the content again. The revision statements are based on feedback from clients and colleagues as well as my own introspection on the development of each piece.

Classroom Activity

Below is an example of an activity I created and prepared for an adult A1 high ESL class. The class was learning phrases involved in giving and receiving directions in English. The class was divided into small groups, and each group was given a map while one student was given the list of directions. The student with the directions was told to read the directions to their partner(s) while the other student(s) in the group could only see the map. The students would start at the ‘R’ and follow the directions from there to other letters on the map which would eventually spell out the word ‘Reception’. Upon discovering this, the students went to the reception desk at the school where I had left a bag of candy with the receptionist as a prize for the first group to follow the directions correctly. Upon completion, the students were tasked with choosing their own word (five or more letters) and writing directions to spell the word starting with the first letter. This activity was designed to practice reading, listening, speaking, and writing while enforcing use of target language in a controlled setting. Many colors were left unmarked in the key to allow students choice regarding what other stores they might see in their town. This also allows the teacher to reuse this map for higher level classes by adding in new target language or more complex directions.

If I were to create this activity again, I would…

  • …make the letters in Photoshop in a separate layer so that they would be easier to move.

  • …move the letters to make them more spread out and therefore making the instructions a bit more interesting (as it is, the students end up circling the central park area multiple times, and they don’t get the chance to use the southwest corner at all).

  • …definitely spend some time filling in the gaps on the left, right, and bottom of the map to give a better impression that this is a selection of a map of a much larger town.

  • …make River Road follow a more interesting path south of the park. This is mostly to make the road less redundant in east-west directions, but also because it’s ugly.

  • …make the “walking trails” in the park continue across the park so that there are walking paths students could give directions through. (As it is, the walking paths I made are basically pointless in the exercise.)

Instructional Video

This video was created for DreamTree LLC., makers of the Modern Christmas Tree, to help their customers unbox and put together their new tree. A QR code in the box directs customers to appropriate video for the product they purchased. All told, there are five different videos. I have included the one with the most steps. Overall, reception was good, and the company experienced 85% fewer customer service calls with questions regarding how to set up a tree the year after the videos went live.

If I were to make these videos again, I would…

  • …spend more time making sure that the pieces of the tree were visible in every shot (avoid blocking assembly with hands).

  • …avoid using LED lighting in the shots where it caused flicker.

  • …look for help with the color grading to avoid the strange white shifts at some points in the video.

Informational Video

This video was created to showcase the wine factory I worked at in Blenheim, New Zealand. The video shows the entire process of wine being bottled and packaged before being shipped to the United States.

If I were to do this project again, I would…

  • …script the video and create a shot list before entering the factory so I knew exactly which shots I needed to tell the story.

  • …maintain a quicker pace by reducing the duration of less informative shots.

  • …use the script to write and deliver voice over narration.

  • …change music with each room in the process as some people found it monotonous.

  • …choose another way to show the multiple pieces of the final stacker working at the same time instead of the picture overlay I used.