Expressing Emotions With Students in the Gaza Strip

Abstract

This chapter presents and analyses activities that were created during an online teacher training course with pre-service English teachers in the Gaza Strip (Palestine). Thirteen pre-service English teachers developed a series of teaching practices adopting creative and critical language methodologies suitable for Grade 9 and Grade 10 students. The training stressed the importance of considering students’ wellbeing and resilience when teaching English in a language pedagogy focussed on wellbeing. The lesson presented here, Being Happy, focussed on expressing emotions. The material allowed pre-service English teachers to share vulnerabilities, difficult knowledge, and emotions with students, by linking the English classroom to the conflictive context in which they live. The lesson adopted embodied, critical, and creative methodologies where emotions were shaped relationally, like drama pedagogy, playful activities, poems, and situated role-plays. Through processes of radical listening, acknowledgement, and sharing vulnerabilities, the pre-service English teachers nurtured their wellbeing and were able to support each other while also smiling and laughing in the face of adversity.