Experiences of a teacher of English

What to do with low-achievers in classes where there are high-achievers and average students?  Something you can do when implementing activities from their course books is molding the exercises (teaching how to do the activities) by circulating across the rows of desks. / Photo from: original  www leicestershirevillages com

Lately I have seen that tablets (like iPads and others) are being used more and more in classrooms.  I think I’ve got to update my methods without putting aside what has worked fine and has turned out to be okay in my classes. / Photo from: ipad classroom1 tablets-textbooks procon org

Learning and acquiring English is a free and responsible action, or sequence of actions.  I want to learn, I wish to learn.  Because of that I implement a series of actions that make me learn and acquire a language. The engine is in me. It doesn’t depend too much on the teacher and the way he struggles to teach.  I learn just because I want to. I’m free to learn or not to learn. / Photo from: studying blog tutoruniverse com

I have my opinion about the following point.  A few times, very few times, it may be educative to shout at a student or at some students.  Usually the solution of problems can be explained to the students by talking, but it might be educative – as I said – to shout a correction or a reprimand at your students, few times, not as a habit or costume. This should be the aim. / Photo from: Study Bench www pdx edu

I would tell you to plan the classes you teach, or you have.  English is not taught – history is taught.  We work out English in classes. You don’t teach English – somewhat yes – but you have classes of English with your students: you work out activities.  Sometimes you teach English because you present the perfect future tense or the four types of conditional sentences. Plan each class, I’d tell you, and avoid your being accustomed to teach the same classes for years and years, with the same yellowish notes. / Photo from: Window Cleaning Service the-windowguy com

The fact that our students should study and work isn’t a mere matter of grades, remedial tests, etc.  Our students’ job now is studying and learning.  In this way they will be able to help our society go forward. Our society and our country and Europe and the entire world. / Photo from: www tjed org

I do not set any homework to my adult students, but they, on their own, study the worksheets I give them. It’s a nice thing. They take English very seriously, and learn words, idioms, ways to say things in English.  One interesting point is that they tend to translate from English into Spanish.  Sometimes I ask them in class is whether they understand a sentence BUT without translating it into Spanish. They usually say Yes, but their trend to translate is very strong: they’re sixty- something, seventy-something, someone eighty-something. / Photo from: lawn_mowing-smiley www cuttinuplawns com

I have trained candidates for Cambridge examinations of English. Other times I have had classes of conversation in English.  Today in Spain youngsters look for official examination diplomas because they wish to find a job somewhere, and English is a point in favor on their resume ( Curriculum Vitae ).  And conversation classes can help get trained for those examinations concerning speaking.  Youngsters need a B1 or B2 for applying for a job. Those levels of English are within the Common European Framework. There are three letters, A, B, C, and each level has two numbers, for example B2. Those letters belong in a sequence of mastering English, with A as the lowest level. / Photo from: careers-001-original www careers osu edu

You could implement the following activity as a warmer or warm-up.  After learning and acquiring past simple for instance, your students will be able to reply your questions naturalistically.  The students will have learned and acquired that verbal tense so well that they’ll be able to answer more sophisticated or complex questions and situations.  They will be able to use past simple in debates, presentations and more complex activities, also when writing an essay, conveying opinions, telling what they did the previous day... / Photo from: Students-in-class-008 www chsarrow com

Yesterday a friend of mine, who is a teacher, told me that in his school he’s in charge of treating the most disruptive and misbehaving students.  He passes by the classrooms and picks up one student, I mean one by one.  And he tries to help them by for example teaching them how to do activities, how to study, why to study, why to be at school, their future…  The results are positive: some students have problems at home, with their families, etc., and he achieves to motivate and teach these students, which is not simple, possible though. / Photo from: schoolchemlab www rickdostie com

I’m getting the computer work, but the Internet works at different and fortuitous and random times. I take the advantage of being able to publish right now to wish you all readers and teachers a Merry Christmas.  For those of you who aren’t Christians I’m saying some words.  Today night and tomorrow and these two weeks approximately we celebrate with joy the birth of Jesus Christ, true God and true man.  You can read about this believing of ours in the four Gospels of the New Testament of the Bible, namely in Luke’s gospel, in its first short chapters.  Christ Jesus incarnated to get us free from sin, and from Hell for ever. He died on a Roman cross one Good Friday, and resurrected on next Sunday. / Photo from: www lonelyplanet co

I am trying to publish more posts but I have some problems with the computer plus the Internet. Hope soon I'll publish furtherly. / Photo from: hongkong-english-secondary www britishcouncil org

We need English words for communication, and our students also for activities and games in the class.  A game students love because it is very competitive is a vocabulary competition.  A pair of students says words each one by turns. The winner is the student that says more words. In this way they can practice the vocabulary of the unit you all are studying. Or a revision of past units.  Something they love too is a competition between you teacher and all the class as a chorus. It’s very fun and focusing. / Photo from: man reading to kids library blogs voices com. Usually the students that love that game are older than the ones that appear on this picture, but those ones above are learning vocabulary

When discipline is settled and the atmosphere is serene and settled alike, the students can work and learn properly.  They can engage their brains in the activities you implement.  Try to acquire a nice rapport with your students, albeit you will have to pacify the atmosphere with a watchful attitude all the time.  If the kids approach your desk after a class with an amicable feeling I can assure you discipline is settled enough, as I said. However this precise occurrence could not happen, but there are other signs of that nice rapport. / Photo from: children reading in the library www democratandchronicle com

The first educators are the parents.  We teachers give the kids instruction and knowledge.  Just that? I’d say No.  We try our students have a mind, have a heart and have personality.  The students so would dream and think high, have a heart big enough to serve and love others with love of benevolence, and personality enough to be free and responsible. You may read this post again, slowly, if you fancy. I’d feel satisfied you grip the core of it. / Photo from:  a pretty girl. timthumb elkgrovetutors net

The student is always free.  He learns just because he wishes to.  Otherwise he would not move to learn.  Learning a language is a series of free and responsible actions. The teacher’s role ought to be to facilitate that educative process, and if his students are young, help them to learn, inspire them how to learn, show possible ways and methods to learn and acquire the target language. / Photo from: Math tutors lwchartreschools com

Attend the tutoring sessions to help and assist sincerely. Listen to your student.  It’s better and adecuate if a male teacher can listen to a male student and the same with regard to women. Because that student will reach confidence with you: if you have gotten to be frank with him, he can let you see his interior life.  I remember a summer course as a remedial program for students with low grades and fails. The students lived in the school all the week long. There was sheer discipline.  The students that had passed their tests had the permission to go with their parents out on the weekend. In this context, which was somehow hard and tough, the students gave vent to their problems and anxieties at the tutoring sessions: they did need some escape way like for example a nice conversation with their tutor. Some had problems with drugs. Tutoring sessions were like a balsam, a relief. / Photo from: tutoría www uttecamac edu mx

I would like to thank many people that have helped me write this blog in some way or another.  Going more or less backward and sorry if I forget someone I appreciate the labor of professor H. D. Brown, José Bernardo Carrasco, Antonio Barnés, my students of all levels of English and ages, Antonio Rojas, Antonio Bueno, Javier Yeguas, Leoncio Carmona, Lucas Huitjbregts, Rich Mayer, Michael Gronow, Anthony Bruton, Chris Scott, Chris Judd, Andrew Almendras, Gavan, Jane Arnold, Marisa Alzueta Zubiri, Kate, my dad. / Photo from: thank you teacher limpehft blogspot com

Warmers or warm-ups are helpful to make the students land in the target language class.  They can take few minutes. You can ask them to use the verbal tense they’re learning, ask them something more personal, which is something meaningful to them, some guessing game, the weather today. / Photo from: welcome teachers corner almadenahnews com

Teaching English cannot be confined and limited to something technical.  We as teachers ought to teach people – our students and all the center or school – to communicate with one another.  An example could be to set as a project-work to prepare a topic to present in the classroom, for 3 minutes and longer. After the presentation the other classmates should be allowed to ask questions and show their point of view.  Our labor has to get people together in some way, also with people out of the school and out of the country. / Photo from: Translation digitween12-2 flatclasroomproject com

Vocabulary is just essential for a language, for communication between two people, between two persons.  Some students teach us some learning strategies.  Make up a group of words of the same semantic field,  focus on spelling,  think of or write sentences with the new lexis,  focus on the Latin root if the learner is Spanish for example,  write difficult-spelling words several times,  make like a photo of a new word,  play with the words,  make up original sentences,  learn a word every day or two words or several ones,  revise the already known ones,  ask oneself as if one would be his own teacher in some way. / Photo from: student profiles www ieinstitute net

A teacher of English or another language can read books and web sites (like British Council - BBC) to improve technically his ways to teach and help students learn the language.  The teacher can recycle his training by those means.  Maybe he will re-discover a technique or a method.  And non-native teachers of English can keep on learning and practicing English: it is a life-long learning. / Photo from: two-business-people-talking-face-to-face shutterstock com

I would tell you to go on speaking in English, the target language; it’s awesome the level they acquire of understanding what you say.  Well, it’s true that that class of adults is special: they wish to learn and acquire English – they attend the classes just because they wish. One thing we talked today – and maybe they were not very aware we were speaking in English – was about composing a resume or curriculum vitae. / Photo from: letter writing www salon com

In a summer course of English we watched two movies, Vertical Limit , and Braveheart , by Mel Gibson.  This activity broke the monotony up.  We were watching them, and from time to time I paused and made simple and advanced-level questions, for there were low-achievers and high-achievers.  A simple question can be ‘How many people are there?’, and a complex question can be ‘Why does Braveheart break out in anger after the soldiers’ petition?’ It was a nice activity.” / Photo from: agentes guardia-civil despejando www academiacorpore es

Once I was teaching a class, when a few students started to look through the small window of the classroom door, and to do gestures and disturb.  A student of mine, Carlos, who had prestige among his classmates, told me not to get disturbed by such things.  Besides all the class was focused on the activity we were carrying out.  That student, Carlos, made me stop, because I was about to go to the door to reprimand them with me upset – so it was a time not to scold anyone. I think I caught who the students were, for next day’s reprimanding and teaching how to behave. / Photo from: images mutuamotera blogspot com. The traffic guardia civil was created in 1959

On post # 1543 I said that the educator has to read about adolescents, but where, in what books?  I would recommend books and web sites with values such as honesty, sincerity, generosity, friendship, hard-working, environment friendliness, solidarity, peace also internal, family, capability of hard working, joyfulness, etc.,  and I would suggest Christian values and habits for example praying, charity, faith, hope, justice, fortitude, prudence, temperance, chastity, love, happiness, frequency of sacraments – they’re very helpful for each need and circumstances!, etc: they comprise the previous ones. / Photo from: students working www expressessays co uk

Teens, adolescents are forming their personality, but often today from the exterior part or external image, both body and dressing, in an exaggerated way.  They imitate other youngsters and often too feel not secure.  Their traits have to do with getting bored, weakness, arrogance, etc.  A tutor who has to treat adolescents have to learn and read about this period of crisis or change, plus treating them very tactfully, and praising their targets – sometimes they do not know if they have aimed correctly; they need and expect adults’ criteria and approval, more if the adult has achieved to deserve the teen’s trust. / Photo from: teen talk teens www nhs uk

Something else about discipline. I told you on post # 1540 I sing in a choir of friends.  The conductor is pretty essential.  However each and every singer must fulfill his or her duty and sing in consonance with the rest of singers. He knows what he has to sing and has the lyrics and the pentagram: in some way he’s autonomous. / Photo from: moto guardia civil www academiacorpore es

Nothing done or made by us teachers is lost: reprimanding, implementing an activity, watching a movie with our students…  All yields its fruit, now or within years.  For more basis, if you do something to please and love God too, the fruit is sure, though apparently you notice nothing. Moreover you are gaining Heaven, and helping others gain it. / Photo from: asia east 2004 www lib utexas edu

I sing in a choir, the one of the parish of San Ildefonso, in Granada, Spain.  After the practice, while we’re going down the stairs to enter the church, we have been told to keep focused and concentrated on the chants, and not to chatter amongst us.  Obviously we’re adults, and we’re supposed to have self-discipline. This latter one is the best of disciplines – we do not need another adult person keep us silent and focused. / Photo from: Students working in the library. www theguardian com

On post # 1538 I wrote about the way a teacher achieved to keep the necessary discipline.  Now I have got to say that when the circumstances turned into a regular class, that teacher knew how to smile and have his students’ back-up.  So the point is discipline in a serious way but with a later back-up, so as to avoid a sad atmosphere, which would be counter-productive for learning. The class-group with his teacher then formed a team of work. / Photo from: a class with students. archive dailycal org

One day most of the students in a class were chattering.  In order to keep discipline the teacher stopped to say anything else and kept silent and still like a statue and utterly serious.  Then silence was what we say in Spanish “que se cortaba”, that is, silence was complete and utter. / Photo from: 20120419 Car Fire, fire fighter www dailycamera com

With all said so far in this blog you can draw the conclusion that an atmosphere where English is the spoken language has been created and gotten.  It’s like a piece of an English-speaking country within Spain.  Because of that and as a result you can conclude the importance of the fact that the teacher should speak in English all the class – all the class perhaps with a small minimum of Spanish. And all this at any age: from infants to oldies. / Photo from: original  soldier of the future. www army mil. I’m in favor of peace.

Mr. H. D. Brown recommended to plunge into the pond, and to communicate in the target language by overwhelming fear.  A teacher I know is happy to see her students understanding and communicating more and more in English. She is like pulling her students up the hill advancing on a slope and gradient upward, little by little, step after step. / Photo from: www akihabaranews com

Great H. D. Brown said that the learner of a language must plunge into the water, must speak in English in our case and our students’. When for example the teacher decides to say his daily Holy Rosary in English once, does this have to do with Mr. Brown’s proposal? / Photo from: student. www recapo com

I have written a lot about learning strategies.  You can click on its label.  Good students utilize learning strategies. Because of that they’re successful. They are aware and conscious of many of them.  Good students achieve to learn and acquire English. They are constant and perseverant.  They attain their goals. They have goals.  For example let’s talk a bit about a difficult skill: listening. And now think of a student that tries to understand: he catches words and completes all the message by means of this learning strategy – he understands words and he completes the whole message, and he understands more and more. / Photo from: student girls  working with computer in library. www 123f com

Summing up now, I can tell you all that my adult students today asked me for copies of the Hail Mary and Our Father prayers. Here they are for you. The pronouns and possessive adjectives are rather Old English. / Photo from: Soccer boys. www phlmetropolis com Our Father Our Father, Who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name; Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread; and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us; and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Amen. Hail Mary Hail Mary, full of grace. The Lord is with Thee. Blessed art Thou amongst women, and blessed is the fruit of Thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen.