Learning to Teach Better

Dear fellow teachers, Like many others, I started teaching EFL in Japan in 2001 in what was going to be a 1-2 year experience(!) whilst working on my Japanese before heading back into the world of business/finance or law. But within a year, I realised that I loved my job so there was no reason to change. ;-) So, I ended up teaching in Japan until 2014 in various contexts from kindergarten, secondary school and university to private language schools, businesses, government ministries, and on Peace Boat. I've been volunteering as a Mentor for iTDi since 2012 and am currently working with Steven Herder on the forthcoming TESOL Certificate course and other exciting iTDi developments :-) Having role-swapped with my wife in 2014 as primary caregiver for our kids (now 2, 4, and 6 years old), I work part-time from home as a Tutor on the University of Birmingham’s MA TESOL and Applied Linguistics (distance learning) programmes, do some editing, and have just started private tuition classes...

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...

Principle 2 is the best principle of all 3. In Malaysia, we are working on CEFR thus teachers are asked to go on to many courses. There is a course on materials adaptation. We are suggested to give different tasks to students of different levels. This then raises the issue of time. Teachers do not have time. It is interesting when Penny suggests a list of techniques for questioning. It really helps. It makes differentiation be very easy to be done in lessons!

Takeaways for me: Storytelling, Use class time effectively, and never ask Ss to do what you can’t. I did a ton of storytelling this week and it has proven effective. I’ve even been able to get the students to tell their own stories and relate back to the text we are reading. I am usually so focused on getting through the lesson that I don’t allow for tangents like storytelling. But I realize I may be too much of the other extreme in my classes. I’m trying so hard to keep the students “learning” and my teacher talk time down that I am not giving the Ss mental breaks to digest their learning. In terms of realistic ‘asks’ I need to do a better job of this although sometimes my students have better talents than I do. Sometimes I like to throw in a unique task and see what they do with it. If they struggle, I always have a plan B.

I want to share with you my experience with applying principle 2. from the begining of the academic year, my major concern was to encourage shy and "weak" students to participate more and be more engaged. So, I used the recall and share teachnique, with cardinal and ordinal numbers. I asked the students to do as much as they can do. it was a very enjoyable activity. the most importantly, that "weak" students were active :)

Hi Everyone, it’s been 6 days of lively and insightful discussions! Here are things that struck me from the first live session last week: 1. Not to pre-teach new vocabulary before listening. I have been pre-teaching new vocabulary (with visuals and word definitions, etc) quite often before a listening or reading activity, especially when these words are vital to the comprehension of what is being discussed. Doing this for a listening activity sometimes works (with minimum success) and many times doesn’t (especially with young learners). On the other hand, for a reading activity, that works most of the time. I didn’t really investigate this myself until I learned from Penny that “a single exposure to a vocabulary item won’t normally lead to retention”. This kind of gave me the answer, I think, it means that when students come across an unfamiliar word in a listening activity, the meaning is often not ready yet at their disposal and they don’t have enough time to relate and recall this ...

SPEAKING EXAM PRACTICE Give everyone a set of pictures or a mind map and have them record an audio file of their 1 minute comparisons and 3 min parwork discussions (Canbridge First/Advanced Speaking Parts 2 and 3) on their phones in their own time then send them to you by email. This is optional but many take the opportunity to do this. It might seem like a lot of work for the teacher but I find that it’s actually easier for me, as I can listen again and give more valuable feedback rather than simultaneously listening to them and scribbling down things I thought I heard during a 20 min face-to-face session. They can record themselves as many times as they like and only send me the one they think is their best version, instantly solving the problem of limited time to practise these in class. They also get to hear themselves and be their own examiners, and have a better idea of how long these parts last for.