Monsieur Senderoff’s Students Speak, Play, Learn

“Se lever,” Metropolitan Business Academy French teacher Dylan Senderoff instructed his students while motioning his hands for them to get up from their seats. 

It was almost the end of class, and time to play ​“Jacques a dit” — a Francophone riff on ​“Simon Says” that would help students identify their tête, nez, ventre, and cou, all while building their vocab through immersive play.

Senderoff led his students through that game on a recent Thursday in a fourth-floor classroom at Metro’s 115 Water St. school building.

Senderoff, who is in his first year teaching for the New Haven Public Schools (NHPS) district, focuses his daily instructions for his level three French class on the most up-to-date pedagogy of immersing students in a new language through dialogue rather than focusing first on learning grammar rules. That includes the occasional game playing, led by a teacher whom students know as ​“Monsieur Senderoff.”

During this past Thursday’s class, students started off the first ten minutes of class with a ​“do now” or ​“a faire maintenant” crossword puzzle activity. Students prepared by grabbing pens and pencils from Senderoff’s desk and taking their seats. 

One student expressed a dislike for crossword puzzles and opted not to complete the first activity of the day until encouraged by Senderoff, who told her, ​“It’s not about doing it perfectly, as long as you give it a shot I’ll be happy.” Five minutes in, the hesitant student had found several of the words in the puzzle. 

After completing the crossword full of French vocabulary for body parts, the students put their completed sheets in a blue box for Senderoff to grade later.

As students finished their first activity of the day, Senderoff asked, ​“Fini?” and students responded, ​“Oui.”

Senderoff’s fourth-floor classroom is decorated with dozens of flags for different countries, as well as posters of the Eiffel tower. His level three class is made up of mostly juniors.

With instrumental music playing softly in the background, Senderoff read Thursday’s objective aloud to the students in French. 

He then went on to explain the key concepts of the current unit, which is about learning to communicate during a visit to the doctor and how to handle emergency situations if an accident were to occur while a student studies aboard.

The unit’s key concepts read on the smartboard: ​“Different cultures have different traditions around doctor’s visits and medicines. It is essential to be prepared for medical emergencies when traveling. When I’m not sure how to explain something in the target language, I can use the words I DO know to ​‘circumlocute.’ ”

At the start of the unit, Senderoff taught his students about the differences in healthcare systems in other places around the world. His students had discussions about employment rights, which in some places include eight weeks of paid vacation each year and offerings of six months of maternity leave for parents. 

The key skills Senderoff tasks his students with learning are describing events that happen in the past and learning to speak and write at an intermediate level using simple sentences. 

Towards the end of the unit, students will participate in a final interpretive assignment where they will listen to Senderoff describe a medical situation, indicating specific ailments with body parts and they will work to identify what’s happening and the issue.

Senderoff worked toward the goal of helping his class learn the practical skills of how to handle themselves in French-speaking places in case of an emergency through the learning of different ways to use adjectives, knowing body parts. 

“They should feel safe when traveling,” Senderoff said. ​“It’s not about having all words memorized but to say ​‘this hurts or that,’ ​‘can you help me’ and give descriptions and indications.” 

He also hopes for his students to understand how to share their emotions.

Next Senderoff’s class of 18 students joined him in reading a section of a French poem by poet Paul Verlaine called ​“Soleils Couchants.”

At first only Senderoff’s voice was heard reciting the words of the poem. After reading it aloud for a third and fourth time, more and more students joined in. 

“Merci,” Senderoff said in response to students participation.

Senderoff then moved on to his next lesson slide which projected a world map onto the smartboard. He asked the students to translate the words ​“Algérie” and ​“Cambodge” while holding up a sign allowing them to respond in English. 

Senderoff showed the students where each of the countries are on the map. He then moved around the classroom to each student’s desk, passing them an inflatable globe and asking them to find and point out one of the two countries. 

After each student answered successfully, Senderoff cheered ​“très bien.”

Throughout the class, Senderoff used physical movements as he spoke in French to help students to understand. When asking students to ​“écouter” or listen, Senderoff pointed to his ears. 

He then tasked the class with watching a video and listening to the dialogue to confirm whether or not the speakers use previously learned vocabulary like ​“automatique” and ​“voiture.”

While watching the video some students noted down which words they heard throughout. 

A half hour into the hour-long class Senderoff put the words ​“La pause” on the board, giving students a five minute break to stretch, chat, and use the bathroom which decreased the likelihood of them doing so as he taught. 

This break was interrupted around 9:35 a.m. by a five minute end-of-month fire drill. Students grabbed their coats and headed outside the school building and across its parking lot. Teachers took a count for their class and then they headed back in.

Sophomore Amber Mushtaq said she enjoyed Senderoff’s class more than the previous French courses she’s taken over the past five years. She said his teaching style is like a ​“steady rhythm” and energetic, whereas her past instructors predominantly taught lecture style. 

“I’m actually learning in this class,” she said. 

When asked why Mushtaq chose to study French, she said the interest stems from her love for the children’s book ​“The Little Prince” and the animated French show ​“The Long Long Holiday,” which she watched without subtitles as a child despite not knowing French at the time. 

“I wanted to understand the show,” she said in her explanation. 

Once the class returned from the fire drill Senderoff used the final ten class minutes to play ​“Jacques a dit.”

Instructions came quicker and trickier as Senderoff attempted to stump students, but was proven unsuccessful when several students remained standing after the activity. Prizes included candy and stickers. 

The fire drill limited Senderoff’s time to review the body part vocabulary words with the students. They weren’t able to get to a planned matching game in small groups or a bingo activity. 

When the class bell rang students called out ​“au revoir” to Senderoff.

This year is Senderoff’s first year teaching in the New Haven Public Schools district. He previously was a long-term substitute English teacher for Wolcott Public Schools starting in 2020. 

He first began learning French in 7th grade and continued through high school in Wolcott. 

As his high school career neared an end, Senderoff considered pursuing a career in healthcare as a nurse but ultimately decided his high school French teacher had inspired him deeply.

He passed the idea by his former teacher, now turned friend, and they agreed because of his love for languages and experience tutoring French in high school, which he continued through college. 

Now Senderoff borrows activities that he once did as a student with his former teacher, though as a student of French in high school Senderoff recalled not having such an innovative curriculum. Rather, grammar and translations were the basis of his learning. This differs from current language learning pedagogy that pushes to immerse students in the language through conversation.

One of the most influential activities Senderoff did as a student was reading ​“The Little Prince” with his class and acting out the character roles. ​“That book changed me, it’s one of the most beautiful books I ever read,” he said. 

He hopes one day to teach his French students about the book and get them skilled enough to read the book together. 

Senderoff is Metro’s only French educator and teaches levels one through three to ninth, tenth, and eleventh graders. He is working on getting his elementary language teaching certification.

When asked how his first year of teaching has been so far, Senderoff first recalled his first week at Metro as a ​“whirlwind.” He struggled emotionally for the first two months, he said, to take on the role of being an adult, though fresh out of college, that young students will rely on and trust. ​“I didn’t know always if I had the kind of skills for that,” he said. ​“It felt like it was too soon.” 

Though as he has settled more into the job he said he’s built relationships with his students and colleagues that have helped him to ​“finally feel more relaxed.” 

As anxiety lessened and a community was established he said he realized that ​“this is exactly what I wanted out of teaching.” 

He added that being across the hall from the school’s veteran Chinese teacher Chia-Lien Griffin has offered him with a a resource for collaborative language learning activities. 

Senderoff’s goal for his level three students is to help them reach near proficiency in writing and speaking French helping them to qualify for a seal of biliteracy. 

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