Alexis Romay Class Visit

IB Spanish II: Room 115: 9 students

October 26, 2015
Marley is brought to the front at the start of the period. IB requires
such presentations, and she is delivering a report on a Borges story
with relative fluency. Book in hand, but reporting rather than reading.
Seems very comfortable, almost professorial, and goes on for 10 plus
minutes. Quite impressive work, as she is emotive, and even catches
her errors in Spanish, searching for the "palabra" to get the phrasing
just right.
The other students are attentive, but to varying degrees. Alexis is
taking notes throughout Marleys presentation. Q and A follows, as
Marley essentially offers a defense of her analysis. Dan Edman asks
first in hyper-enunciated Spanish. His query seems to be easy to
answer, but Marley handles some tougher ones as well. She is very
composed.
Alexis then takes over about twenty minutes into class. He is quite
pleased with Marleys work and lets her know it. Follow up questions
by Alexis are classic teacher centered q & a, with some notes offered
on the board.
The second presentation begins at roughly 9:00. Dalton plugs in for
projection, and it is clear almost immediately that this will be a
presentation of another sort. With his back to the class, Dalton is
speaking into his computer at first, then directs our attention to the
PowerPoint. Unlike Molly, he speaks really just to Alexis. Even though
he offers a visual, his presentation is considerably less engaging
because it is so rudimentary in its approach. Clearly, he is much less
comfortable than Molly, much less engaging, and, though polite to a
degree, the audience starts to fade.
Again, q & a follows. Though Noah seems to have some difficulty
phrasing his question, Dalton seems to do better now that he is not
constrained by his PowerPoint.
Though this is largely an IB presentation series, all students are
willing to engage in meaningful ways. Profe keeps the class moving
after Dalton, though I would note that leaving the lights out makes it
hard to re-energize the crew.
Recognizing that students did not necessarily gain much from
Daltons work, Alexis breaks down the story further with some
analyses of his own. He refocuses their attention by turning to the

Borges text and ends class with a series of pointed questions.

While the difference in the abilities of the two main presenters was
stark in todays class, the sense from the other engagements that
Alexis has with students is that they are all capable of doing some
very good work - - a credit to the healthy and productive environment
that Alexis has established.
Von Rollenhagen
Dean of Faculty