Learning to Teach Better

Before I watched the recording I looked at the slides first, and at one slide I had this rush of emotions because I was thinking, I wish I had done this course when I first started out teaching.. Again, I am so grateful to be on this course! I'd like to reflect first on the tip on giving a pep talk especially to beginners or students with low self-confidence and so on. I've been giving a similar talk but I think it hasn't been that well-rounded. Will definitely improve on that! And also on not asking a 'new' class to do speaking activities in the first meeting. Secondly, I really love the practical tips! I can now imagine what I can do with the example exercises and adjust them to my current classes. I have one question, though. Most of the students I teach usually have trouble making up the content when I ask them to fill in the gaps of model sentences, as if they're afraid of making mistakes, but it's not even about the language. I suspect it's because...

First of all I'd like to thank Penny and everyone here for the great discussion! So far I haven't had the opportunity to try out the tips as the classes I taught the past week didn't cover listening skills. But many of the tips given were eye-opening for me! I haven't tried storytelling at all in my classes so far, because I mostly taught listening for academic purposes, using IELTS and TOEFL iBt practice tests and even TED Talks. But I'd love to try storytelling in my General English classes. I usually just use the listening materials already included in the coursebook, which are mainly about daily conversations. I hope to see positive results after trying this out later. Another major take-away for me is to not pre-teach the vocabulary used in the listening. I had thought that it would be an effective way to learn the language, when it actually isn't. It's more about understanding the context, taking away the gist, and so on. I think this is something th...

Hi, everyone! I'm Arimbi, but please call me Bea. I'm from Bandung, Indonesia and I've been teaching in my hometown since 2013, at a local English course provider. I teach mostly one-to-one and small classes, ranging from general English, TOEFL Prep, IELTS Prep, and English for Exams in Indonesia, and I teach students of all sorts of ages. I am so excited to do this course and I especially would like to learn more on how to plan lessons and activities that are engaging and impactful for all ages. Thanks!