Coruses TESOL

Before taking this course, I was assuming that I knew much more than I really did. I have a background in linguistics, and I have taught college level spanish, so I was already familiar with some of the concepts and material that were covered. However, this course actually did quite a good job at exploring various teaching methodology, and offering advice and details on how best to handle the variety of class scenarios, obstacles, regularities and irregularities that an instructor might encounter in their lessons. I also particularly enjoyed all of the suggested games, activities, and exercise examples, many of which I will review again and use in lessons of my own. There were some really good ideas that can pull the students out of their shells, and get them to participate. It’s also quite essential to have as large of a variety as possible of teaching ideas and resources, because in every class, and every lesson, and every activity, the teachers will be battling boredom, short attention spans, confusion, anxiety, and many other challenges, and if they have more resources, ideas, and experience to choose from, they will be better equipped to avoid as many obstacles as possible, or at least reduce them, and increase the effectiveness of the learning experience. Completing this course was also beneficial for me to gain a better understanding of the different types of students that I may have in the future; whether they are multilingual or monolingual, younger learners or adult learners, 1-1 or large classes, beginners or advanced, and everything in between. This is something I never really considered, although I may have known it, but I certainly didn’t analyze all the advantages and disadvantages to each of the types and the best ways to utilize their advantages while avoiding their disadvantages. I think the english classes that TEFL instructors will be teaching are very unique in this sense, because it’s not common for instructors of a subject to have to be prepared to face such a wide range of student qualities and backgrounds. For this reason, I am very glad to have an idea of what to expect, and to be prepared for a multitude of scenarios. As for applying this knowledge, it will particularly be utilized in the form of revisiting these materials when preparing class lessons, especially if one of the lessons revolves around a particular grammar point that was covered in detail in the tefl materials. All of the readings and completed worksheets will serve as supplemental resources for future classes and lessons. Not to mention all of the practice lesson plans that I have created, or the suggested ones provided as examples in the readings. They will also be good reminders on how to handle the particular teaching situations or problems that can arise.