Experiences of a teacher of English

Teacher B said to teacher A, “You can tell your students to take moderate risks when writing.  It’s a way to advance.  Sometimes the risk will be something they learned long ago and now they think it is like they write it in their essays.  The important thing of a composition is it should be clear and should communicate a relevant and meaningful message.” / Photo from: stock footage student reading a book in the library. herrickshighlander com

Teacher A said to teacher B, “When talking with a marriage at the tutoring sessions, sometimes you’ll have to tell them, and this is concerning TV, that a lot of violence and sex may destroy the physical and psychological basis of their son.  Nevertheless tell them positive things, more than negative issues.” / Photo from: milkman. en loadtr com

Teacher B said to teacher A, “Bullying. In a school of the south of Spain where I worked for some unforgettable years we used to cut off any nuance among the students, when a few of them for example started on and teased one specific kid.  We on one side called the victim kid to talk with him and also called his parents – his tutor did this latter thing. The idea was to have the kid relax and retrieve information from him about the bullying actions he had suffered.  On the other side we summoned the suspected authors of the bullying, also to talk with them. We asked them some questions to learn about what could have disturbed the kid victim.  We then, on following days, invigilated the play ground in a more focused way.  Plus in those students’ classes we spoke about friendship and comradeship.  Close to all the other classmates did know about these actions of bullying. Even the authors could receive some kind of punishment (more hours...

Teacher A said to teacher B, “It’s at home, from parents, where most of the influences operate in a kid’s education.  At home, more if the atmosphere is cozy, kids learn a lot, for example about their parents’ vision of work.  If the parents easily view their children’s notebooks and other material, like textbooks or course books, with their permission, they can help a lot regarding the children’s education.  One day you can study and work with your younger daughter, and you could learn a lot about the ways she does, both positive and negative – she can have dyslexia or can be really great at studying from textbooks and course books.” / Photo from: 20090716-happy-family-350x263 www oprah com

Teacher A said to teacher B, “If you wish your students would speak in English, they need to listen to massive speech by you.  Talk to them in English, at the regular conducting of classes. Although you think they understand little.  Anyway there will be low-achievers, average and high-achievers. They may understand you more than what you’re thinking. This isn’t an obstacle for trying to have communication with them – now the communication is that you speak and they understand, more or less, doesn’t matter too much: you are on the correct railroad.” / Photo from: bleachreport com

Teacher B said to teacher A, “Any of the kids that attend our classes must be reckoned on, valued, and felt he or she is loved with a love of benevolence.  And we can carry out this at the tutoring sessions with each student of the school.  However not only at those times must he be recognized, valued and loved, yet alike at each class. You can consider a class as a mass of people, or as a group of persons which must focus our attention and our concern. It’s the only way to educate our kids.” / Photo from: www streethypenewspaper com

Teacher A said to teacher B, “Take advantage of the very conducting of classes to speak in English.  They will be understanding you more and more.  Communication in English cannot be left for specific activities – use English for the ordinary behaving in classes. They shall respond in Spanish, their mother language.  Here you can do two things. Firstly you answer in English to what they say and ask in Spanish.  Otherwise you can play like a treat with them: you pretend you do not understand what they’re saying in Spanish, so they – mostly high-achievers – will try to speak in English.” / Photo from: football. www foxnews com

Teacher B said to teacher A, “I knew a generous teacher who used to write a comment on each and every test paper of his students.  It is sound not to confine to correct, in red, all the errors and mistakes. Not too much red ink.  I personally correct SOME errors and mistakes; and in English I write a comment to most of my students. Comments which could encourage, back up, my students. My tests can be corrected and graded [marked] rather quickly.  Then, the next day with that class-group I hand over the tests to my students, and we correct the test on the chalkboard. I ask them for suggestions. Then they can keep the exams; I don’t need them anymore.” / Photo from:  woodcutter. www photo-dictionary com   

Teacher A said to teacher B, “Communication between both spouses is of an utter importance for their kids’ happiness and their studies as well.  A nice time and a simple one of communication between dad and mom can be in the evening, when the children are sleeping.  Take into account that splitting up a marriage influences on the children, and the other way round, when within a family there’s an atmosphere of communication between the parents, plus nice conversations with the kids at meals, a sane interest for the latter ones’ things today at the school, things likely will go smooth.” / Photo from: sweeping. www xaraxone com

Teacher B said to teacher A, “Planning the classes, this is, order and sequence, makes it come up more order in your classes.  Devote to your students in the classes.  If you’re done after a day of classes, tutoring sessions, planning classes, talking with a dad worried about his son…, that means you have devoted to your students: that’s a good sign and a good indication. Teaching drains your strength a lot, if you gave yourself to your students.” / Photo from: avioneta fumigando. ecosalta blogspot com

Teacher A said to teacher B, “Concerning motivation I can also tell you that it depends on the atmosphere at home.  I knew a father that used to read a lot; their children grew among books, and these latter ones were commented on at meals for example.  Once there was a young man of 18 that some years before, in hot summers, during siesta time (nap time) used to study progressive English by means of a course book and cassettes. He listened to the cassettes lowly, because it was siesta time in the town.  At 18 he wanted to study History at college, but his dad suggested to him that he could study Philology of English, which had more chances for a post of work as a teacher, and he did like English.  The ambiance at home does a lot to children. What they’re starting to be now, they’ll likely be when adults.” / Photo from: www easyviajar com. celtas asturias españa

Teacher B said to teacher A, “Motivation is often a consequence and a result of the effort invested in the process of learning English or another language.  They see they understand you more and more, and this is a source of motivation, which will make them advance more and more.  So, motivation is after work, and not necessarily the opposite. Tell them they’re learning: they should be aware of this step forward.” / Photo from: celtic. www rootsweb ancestry com. 

Teacher A said to teacher B, “It seems sound that our students use the dictionary to learn English. When they are 10 more or less it may be an adequate age to learn how to use a dictionary, a bilingual one.  The dictionary is like a private teacher.  For learning to utilize it I implement the following game in my classes.  Oh, and by using the dictionary they become more autonomous learners.  I write on the whiteboard for example the following list of words: be, beseech, believe, believer, bachelor, bee, banquet, been, being . They’ve got to tell me the order of sequence they keep in the dictionary. I work with the whole class as a group.” / Photo from: paperboy. www lendio com

Teacher B said to teacher A, “I have read in a book by Richard Hermstein and Charles Murray that education ought to get much more than a technical ability.  Education should foster wisdom and virtue through the ideal of an educated person.  There will be little of a change until educators would assume this aspect anew.” / Photo from: preschool lunch. www healthypreschoolers com

Teacher A said to teacher B, “One thing we must foster among our students is friendship and companionship.  At the tutoring sessions we can ask each student how he gets along with his classmates. Does he help his classmates in some way? Does he borrow school material to his classmates? Is he a good friend?  As well a teacher told me once that we teachers should have something to tell our students at tutorials, lest there would not be a fluent conversation. We can talk about friendship, how to help out at home, the angels and their help, reading, making good use of time at school...” / Photo from: Education Page. Students together. www buckssportmaine gov

Teacher B said to teacher A, “The true teacher is creative, and he has something of an artist.  Teaching a language comprises being creative, it requires imagination to create an effective help for the students to actually learn how to communicate in English.  His classes are amusing but demanding, practical but with the rigor of a methodology, like for example the communicative methodology.” / Photo from: students listening to the teacher. www evolveimages com

Teacher A said to teacher B, “I can see you wish to help your students at tutoring sessions. The student can see you wish to help him at tutoring sessions. There grows confidence and trust.  You have won confidence thanks to your trying to be upright, and thanks to your honest and sincere effort to aid him.  This confidence, albeit you keep being the teacher and he is a student, is one that they may not have with their own parents.” / Photo from: Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt serve food to the homeless. www posh24 com

Teacher B said to teacher A, “At the beginning of a course or the academic year set a few rules, for your students to learn how they must behave.  One example is raising his hand when he wants to say something or thinks he knows the answer.  You must keep serene and easy: you attend the class to carry out your work, and your students must know that this hour or any class-period is for dedicating their effort to fulfill their duty, as professionals of study they are. Let them learn all this. If there’s any problem of behavior, stop the class and make that or those few students think about the trouble for them and for all the class.” / Photo from: drinking coffee. next-thing net  

Teacher A said to teacher B, “We teachers should not confine to educate our students in knowledge and capability to carry out activities with acquired abilities.  That is okay but not enough.  We have to educate persons that may positively influence on society, persons that can lead other people with their regular lives. So, leaders. We’ve got to educate our students to become thorough professionals. And alike good children of God, this latter thing counting on their families.” / Photo from: Musto_Skiff. en wikipedia org

Teacher A said to teacher B, “People learn a foreign language when they need it.  In class the students have to learn a language for the games at extra school activities and classes.  Playing games prepares the kids for adult life.  The student that is a low-achiever should be encouraged by you at the games. Give him the chance, and discreetly congratulate him for his responses and contributions. Once and over again. You’re changing his life, and he’s changing to better himself. Seek help with your high-achievers as monitors, though they would use their native language. The important point now is no one should be left behind.” / Photo from: www geograph org uk

Teacher B said to teacher A, “Something useful and productive I implement in my classes is to describe a picture from a magazine, namely National Geographic .  While I’m describing the photo they’re listening to me.  When I finish I ask them questions or what they can remember. After having described several pictures one day it’s the students who describe pictures.  It’s an exercise where the student has to use present continuous, adverbs and prepositions, a varied set of vocabulary... The activity is demanding but very practical for them. Both I and they show the pictures to the other students when we have finished.” / Photo from: sending_a_letter_to_santa-6151 www luvimages com

Teacher A said to teacher B, “When planning the next class is the appropriate time to think about your students: needs, understanding you, they have various abilities, some are high-achievers, discipline, objectives and goals.  And all of this like in quick mental peeks.” / Photo from: Champions-League-Celtic-vs-Ajax. www inamsports com. 2013 champions league soccer game

Teacher B said to teacher A, “Education? First we have to think about what man and woman are.  They have been created by God in his own image and likeness. Human beings are also children of God.  He wanted, and wish human people be happy.  Man and woman have freedom and are destined to know and love God.  Man and woman have intelligence and we teachers (first their families) can fill that gap of knowledge with our job. As well, and more importantly we have to aid kids (and adults) to become free and responsible, and to get the best from every student’s interiority.  The academic aim is to find truth, and that’s what we in class every day try to find.  Families (first, parents) are the ones that have the mission of educating their children, and we teachers ‘just’ help out. This is the key core of this blog and of all my tasks.” / Photo from: writing. debrabell com

Teacher A said to teacher B, “A value and virtue that helps our students is temperance and detachment.  We can teach them: how hard it is to earn the money they can have at hand, to rise in the morning at the same time every day, to buy sport suits and sneakers that are economical yet they are not of the make which is in fashion now, sobriety at meals at birthday parties, to clear up the table and the room after the birthday party, to buy not the most posh smartphone but one that is simple and covers their needs now.  They aren’t necessarily negative things, but they teach them how to live with what is necessary and to live free and detached from objects they may consider crucial and cool, and with which things they can actually become slaves of makes and fashion.  We parents and teachers ought to be capable of discernment about all this.  Often important makes and brands are more economical than cheap (and bad) articles.  We decide wh...

Teacher B said to teacher A, “In classes, by doing activities of the four skills of any language, English in our case, your students will be trained for the test.  They ought to expect the kind of questions in the test, because similar things have been done in classes. The goal is for you to learn what the students can perform in the test.” / Photo from: scuba diving.  www sis ac. Sotogrande Spain

Teacher A said to teacher B, “All right. The discussion previous to the actual listening activity can start by eliciting what the students know about the topic of the listening-text, and by your own contributions.  The fact of coming up words about the topic will help the students to understand more, and to be more focused on the listening.” / Photo from: serving illustrated. tennisnation wordpress com

Teacher B said to teacher A, “Listening is an activity that prepares our students a lot for learning English or other languages.  It can be the most difficult language skill for a learner.  In the classes they can listen to CD’s or to us teachers, or watch a DVD.  Some students catch the general topic of the text or some words and so they can make up a general picture.  It’s sound to prepare the student for the listening activity, like for example by means of a previous discussion or by eliciting lexis about the topic.” / Photo from: frederick-carl-frieske-1874-tea org. picty com

Teacher A said to teacher B, “Arrive at the classroom one day speaking in English all the time.  If such and such students start giggling, address them seriously and raise your voice a little bit. They will see plastically that learning a language is a serious thing.  Don’t mind you think they aren’t understanding you; they may be understanding more than what you think. And use body language.” / Photo from: teacher and kids. montessoritraining blogspot com

Teacher B said to teacher A, “In the same class it is usual that the different skills of language are practiced: listening, speaking, reading and writing. All of them are practiced, or some of them.  Other times one skill can be more accurately practiced and assessed than the others.  In tests you can make the students utilize listening, reading and writing, which makes tests more complete and more naturalistic. You need to assess those three skills.  And regarding speaking, it is practiced and tested every day. Besides you can make them, for instance, prepare a presentation of a topic of their choice for such or such number of minutes.” / Photo from: writing. www deanza fhda edu

Teacher A said to teacher B, “Young students, of 8 years for example, need images to learn language.  They can be flash-cards, posters, pieces of paper, real things ( realia ).  And with your older students, 15 years for example, utilize the illustrations of the course books to help them think visually as well. Many activities have attached pictures, and they aren’t only for decoration. They are helps to solve the activities.  We often connect an idea with an image, in daily life. So also in the school.” / Photo from: skiing. www thrillofilia com

Teacher B said to teacher A, “Sometimes a good teacher achieves to create a nice atmosphere at tutoring sessions, a marvelous sensitivity that makes the student would open his heart and vent his interiority.  He talks abundantly, a lot, and gets more open to receive his tutor’s advice. There arises a climax of confidence.  Some other times the teacher thinks that what he has said doesn’t influence on his student, or this teacher feels that then his words are not the suitable ones.  This teacher has to think that nothing is lost concerning tutoring sessions, and more when there is love of benevolence and love of God, and connection with his family.” / Photo from: coffee drinking girl salida colorado  www survivingheels com

Teacher A said to teacher B, “In our school every month or two months we edit and publish a magazine in English, and French and German, made and written by the students themselves.  We publish the articles written by them, with few corrections: we want to show what the students can do, with the teachers’ help.  The students are eager to participate. They write about current news, topics they are learning about, some humor.  When each issue is published we work on the texts in class. The students feel satisfied for having cooperated in this enterprise.” / Photo from: everydaylife glocalpost com

Teacher B said to teacher A, “Fortitude. This value and virtue is necessary to maintain the wish to do things well, to work with constancy and perseverance.  And constancy and perseverance are essential to learn a language.  How do you attain this virtue? Through the repetition of good actions.  If a student starts to study and work at the same time every day, he will likely achieve to get good grades and to learn and acquire the language. Also he will be more capable to start at the same time with the repetition of actions: after some months he’ll set to study and work more and more easily.” / Photo from: www odisea2008 com. granada foto antigua

Teacher A said to teacher B, “Believe in the grand wishes a student of yours tells you at the tutorial session.  Youngsters are able to embark in great ideals. Set out from there at those sessions, when perhaps that student tells you about those goals.  Usually he will let you know about those grand goals when there are confidence and trust by both parts, you and the student. You can help him to specify those goals into something practical.  Help him give small steps on his study and work within the big scheme of great ideals of aiding other people. One day after another can produce, as a result, those goals and big ideas.  Let him get excited with great horizons: he can ‘fly’ high and far. Better to have those sessions with a male teacher if the student is a boy, and a female teacher if the student is a girl.” / Photo from: LDYR-Food-Assembly-Line-by-Woody-small ltcpaloalto com