Name: Lovely Grace A.

Garvez
Year & Section: 4 – 401
Course & Specialization: BSED – ENGLISH

Reflective Journal # 11 A:
Executing my demonstration plan

Before diving in into how I will execute my demonstration plan. It is a must for me to define
first what the topic at hand about. A demonstration plan is a planned lesson taught to a group of
students to assess their abilities and skills as students.

“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred
battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every Victory gained you will also suffer defeat.
If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle” -Lao Tzu from the
book of Art of war. Though teachers are not facing any soldiers or any opposing force but in order
for me to execute a perfect demonstration plan. It is crucial to know your enemies/slash students
and yourself. You must know what is effective and what is not in your audience. One must know
also what one is capable of doing and not doing towards your audience. If you insist on doing
demonstrations through the means of calculations or research towards students who doesn't favor
in that field. Then failure will surely follow afterwards. Let’s jump on the teacher's side also. If by
any means you as a teacher force yourself to do a skill or ability that you aren't capable of. Let’s say
dancing? Surely it will fail. You can’t teach what you don't know or have and that’s why it is crucial
to know yourself and the people you are facing. Though it is not a battle between two opposing
militaries but it is really important in knowing everyone including yourself. So that I as a teacher
can demonstrate more properly and neatly. Since I'm a teacher. It is my job to find a material fit for
the course and time. I just can't go out and hand out unrelated materials and topics. If I'm given a
topic to teach in an actual course. It is a must for me to find out where that topic fits into the course
itself. So it wouldn't be a jumble of ideas. Stuffed into a more jumbled material. Questions like “what
have the students learned beforehand?” “What will they be learning afterward?” “What assignments
will I hand out to them?” are surely one of my guide questions if ever I become a teacher.
If by any means I'm given a much broader topic where I can choose where to start. Then in
order to save time and be cost efficient, it is a must for me to select/choose something that I can
manage in the time given. I must also aim to end no more than 5 or 10 minutes left on the clock. So
that I can still ask my students some questions. In case things go south it is a must also to have a
backup plan. Engaging my students as a teacher is another way for me to execute perfectly my
demonstration plan. Why? Because it is my teaching demo not a research talk. Instead of me talking
and blabbing about the lecture all day long, I must show them also that I can do something more by
engaging them with active learning. It could be through making my students more interested by
using jokes. By interacting with them more positively and so many more. The possibilities are
endless for ways to engage with your students. One must also start an interesting hook to grab the
student’s attention and interest. It could be through statistics, news, thought provoking questions,
etc. So that right from the start. I already have the student’s attention.

All of these carefully thought out plans I've listed above is effective, of course but it only
becomes perfect when it is mastered. That is why the biggest barrier for me, Is how can I practice
these that I have thought about? Practice and more practice makes perfect but how can I achieve it
when I cannot even practice? Why? It is because of the ravaging covid that is still with us every day.
That is still messing up the education system and how students and teachers cooperate. Since I
can't practice these because I can't see my students nor it is the same teaching in virtual than in
reality. Then all of these thoughts/ideas that I've created for a way for me to execute my
demonstration plan is close to worthless. Why? It is because how do we know that it works?