Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified in Washington? Are you interested in teaching English in Camas, Washington? Check out our opportunities in Camas, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English in your community or abroad! Teflonline.net offers a wide variety of Online TESOL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language. Here Below you can check out the feedback (for one of our units) of one of the 16.000 students that last year took an online course with ITTT!
In this module, we will be focusing on how to teach special groups.
The term ‘beginners’ tends to strike fear into the hearts of inexperienced teachers. however, many teachers claim that teaching beginners is one of the most rewarding and enjoyable aspects of EFL teaching. The term beginners has such a range of connotations, it is often helpful to think in terms of categories of beginners. Bear in mind that these terms aren’t mutually exclusive, and that many students will fall into two or even three categories such as, the absolute beginner, the false beginner, the adult beginner, the young beginner, the beginner without roman alphabet. The absolute beginners means that students who have no English at all. The false beginner means that students may have studied or been exposed to English previously but have not retained much language. The adult beginner will often have made their own decision to learn English and as a result will usually be highly motivated. The young beginners often lack motivation as they haven’t usually made the choice to study and cannot see the benefit of learning language. The beginner with Roman alphabet such students will need a lot of initial work on basic literacy skills.
Tips for teaching beginners requires special skills and psychology. They will have to be aware of the students’ needs and they must have clear and realistic aims. Teachers would need to adapt to the situation, arrange the classroom, be as visual as possible, take care of the board work, need to control the language, give clear, simple instructions, pace the lessons, have to use choral repetition, ask lots of questions, encourage students to speak English in class as much as possible.
Possible problems, what can you do with a mix of real and false beginners. The reality is that both have very similar needs. Many false beginners will ask to start from scratch anyway. Teacher can help weaker students by pairing them with stronger students. Teachers might also face the problem of not being able to get through all the planned material in a single lesson and it would be advised for the teachers to not rush through it and to maybe save it for revision purposes. Teacher would need to be vary when they feel that they have ran out of material in a lesson. This should not be case but if this happens, simple revision, review activities and games can be used as fillers.
Teachers should motivate students and they should try not to over correct them, and to not have the book open all the time. They should also be sensitive to the students, they would be respond to your students as individuals, create a relaxed and supportive atmosphere. Teacher should learn praise and encourage. Focus on what is easy, not what is difficult. Explain, your methods.
In recent years the EFL industry has seen a large increase in demand for one-to-one lessons, particularly in the business world. Students feel that the course can be more specifically geared towards their own needs and wants than a group course could. Individual lessons also have a number of advantaged for the teacher, no mixed levels, usually highly motivated students needs can be clearly defined, developing a close relationship with the students. teaching individual can have drawbacks, however, and almost all teachers comment upon the loss of classroom dynamics tiredness. Obviously, as there is only one student, some activities become impossible to do.
One to one activities can be used such short stories, articles from newspapers, horoscopes, quizzes, idioms, taboo words, discuss relevant topical new items, personal history such as family/education.
Some teachers give students homework every lesson and some students cannot cope with homework because of pressure of work/other studies. Sometimes teachers give the student a newspaper article to read before the next lesson. Student often enjoy reading English books and swap books with the teacher and then discuss what has been read. Teachers can ask the students to prepare a short oral presentation on a topic of the student’s choice, or one that has arisen during other work in the course.
If you are using a newspaper article, pre-read and prepare any potentially difficult vocabulary and structures. If the passage is long, number either the lines or the paragraphs for easy reference.
Teaching children can be one of the most rewarding to teach. Children possess an innate curiosity, which is in itself a motivating factor. From an early age children are accustomed to listening to their parents and other family members patiently repeating single words while the child focuses on real objects, people or activities taking place. The parents talk about the child’s daily routine and its surroundings repeatedly. The parents may chant, sing or play rhythmic language games. The child’s early effort at speaking are greeted with excitement while mistakes are not only overlooked but also enjoyed and imitated.
The classroom in which children are taught has its own dynamic, irrespective of the physical conditions in which the teacher find himself/herself. It is always possible, with a little imagination to make the classroom environment a pleasant and welcoming place. For example, it is possible to improve the classroom environment with posters, cartoons, children’s own artwork. A cold, grey, institutional type of environment can have a very negative effect on motivation.
Children, by definition have high energy levels and it is inevitable that from time to time the teacher may have to deal with disruptive behaviour. As with all students the mood of the class and the individuals within that class will be determined by many external factors. It may therefore be useful to take account of the following comment, the behaviour and attitude and personality of the teacher is perhaps the single most important factor in classroom and can thus have a major effect on discipline. Before considering how to discipline, we need to think about some of the reasons why such problems may arise.
A growing amount of English teaching world-wide is to business people. It involves an increasing amount of English for Specific Purposes (ESP), for example teaching hotel staff the type of language that will be useful to them professionally or teaching the language of law to lawyers. However, while these specialist areas are still developing, it is more likely that you will find yourself teaching general English to professional people or teaching business content and skills through the medium of English to pre-professionals. A lot of teachers have initial fears about teaching ‘Business English’ arguing they have no experience in the field. While knowledge of business is very useful, it is definitely not a prerequisite to teaching English to business people. It is more a case of adapting to a different approach from the one you would use if you were teaching a general English class in the school.
Before you can begin any course you have to find out what the students want and what they need. There is often difference. You also have to balance the clients’ wants and needs with those of the company. A lot of business people still need basic grounding in English rather than anything too specific. This doesn’t mean you cannot draw on their own work environment to make the course relevant to them. You need to have a general understanding of the client’s job, this will help you to understand the areas of English that the students require.
After initially testing your clients to get an idea of their level, your next steps should be to give them a ‘needs analysis’. This can be in the form of a written questionnaire for the clients to complete or simply an informal chat with the clients and/or training manager.
After the pre-course assessment of needs and ability from the questionnaire responses and negotiation with the group, begin listing suitable learning objectives, situation, language and published materials. About halfway through the course, set some work that participants can do individually. Take each student out for five minutes to elicit reactions so far and their needs for the remainder of the course. This gives credibility and gives you a double check on how the learners feel about the course.
There are abundance of material on the market for teaching business English and a lot is now widely available worldwide. This varies from general business English books to very specific books, for examples, English for Banking. A high proportion of these also come with accompanying tapes. A number of videos specifically made for teaching business people are now available and, although quite expensive, can add variety to the lesson. Authentic materials are invaluable when teaching business groups are proven to be very useful.
Before the course, it would be relevant to find out as much as you can about the company and if you are teaching at the company, find out how you get there, who to meet, what are the facilities offered, what the contact telephone number and address is. It is also relevant to remind yourself that you are no an expert in the client’s field of activity or business, but that you are an expert in the English language and the teaching.
It will also be great for the teacher to be over-prepared rather than under prepared such as bringing board pens, photocopies of certain materials, reference books. The teacher should dress appropriately and wear formal clothes as appearance will always be judged.
Keep a record of attendance, material covered, details of lessons cancelled, any problems. Always tell your employer if clients want to reschedule lessons or change the program in any way. Never gossip about the participants to other people in the company.
After the course it is probably good to write a post-course report. This would normally include details of course content, student evaluation, test/attendance percentages, plus suggestions for further study.
In a multilingual class are from various different nationalities. Such classes are normally found in countries where English is the native language and the students are either residing there, or are there specifically for the purpose of learning English. Students in multilingual classes are from different countries, they only have English as their common language. This then can be used as an advantage for the teachers as now the students are only needed to communicate with each other in English. Monolingual classes usually take place in the students’ home country, however the advantages received by a multilingual cannot be offered to a monolingual class. The teacher should avoid using the mother tongue of the respected country in the classroom.
