The curriculum design project was an interesting experience for me. There were some moments of tension and confusion, but now that I’ve finished it, I can say that the process has been very educational. However, one of the most salient aspects of the project was having do it on my own. Throughout the year, I would look around the classroom during the time that Professor Shaw gave us to work on the projects, and I would be envious while watching others collaborating diligently on the creation of their curricula. At the same time, I also noticed that students who worked in groups tended to get periodically hung up on the planning phases of their projects. Groups would often disagree on things and would get stuck at specific junctures in the projects. I, on the other hand, did not have to deal with these issues, and I had the luxury of quickly making a decision and immediately moving forward. Also, because I lacked the feedback and support of having group mates, I would often engage other TFL students, who also worked alone, in order to get clarification and brainstorm ideas. I’m grateful to have had the support of those guys.

     Another thing that the curriculum design project helped me better understand is the mindset of students, and in what sequence I should introduce specific grammar points. One potential weakness of the TFL program is that I (we) do not receive information that is specific to my (our) target language(s), for example, I didn’t have anyone readily available to get advice from when it came to deciding in which sequence I should introduce the Russian cases. Initially, I had idealistic notions of going to the Russian language teachers here on campus for advice, but when things starting to get really busy, that idea quickly evaporated. Therefore, I would get help from my wife, who is a native speaker of Russian and has a degree in philology, whenever I had trouble resolving a curriculum design issue. Moreover, if I need clarification on something, I would often find the answer in one of the numerous course readings we had this semester. Unfortunately, towards the end of semesters here at MIIS, I end up doing very little of the readings and would do a lot of scanning; however, in the beginning and towards the middle of the semester, I make sure to read as much as possible and as thoroughly as possible to build up enough knowledge for use later in the semester. This practice helped me quite a bit this semester in Professor Shaw’s class, and I would recommend to other (TFL) students to do the same.

Sincerely,

Sergio