Experiences of a teacher of English

  A lot of us people want to learn a language – I teach English and keep learning it! – and we have to practice all four language skills: listening, speaking, reading, and writing.  For me and many of us listening may be the most difficult skill to acquire, but with practice you do improve a lot, believe me.  Anyway, today I would like to tell you especially about reading. Reading books, articles, websites. And also believe me, it’s a great skill to practice.  Stephen Krashen stated that by reading books you can learn a great deal of a second or foreign language, and I can assure you it’s thus. I have no big problems to read any text in English: fiction, non-fiction … except Joseph Conrad’s books perhaps, for they show to be extremely difficult for me to understand – even I had an Irish friend, Connor by name, who told me also that for him it was tough to understand, and he said that he read like one page per day, of his books. It’s curious, Conrad was Polish by birt...

  It’s amazing. Or it may be so. Before we said that tablets and computers were welcome in our classrooms, and I’ve said something of the kind in this blog – up to some extent. And now more and more people, and experts, say that those devices may get our students distracted. Plus we should bring back utilizing printed books in class and at home. I plainly agree.  My grandfather used to say, when my siblings and I were starting a new school year, and we were using new books, new textbooks, that it was great to study with such books, and he was right! I can recall for example history textbooks – I did like them – and I liked to have a look at the different chapters or units, and foresee and anticipate what we were going to learn in some months, the French Revolution, or the industrial revolution, or whatever.  We ought to have our students study on such books, and thus get habits of studying in such books. It’s so paramount we’d better get our dear students acquire studying...

  We as teachers wish our students would learn a lot, who doesn’t wish so?  It seems sound and sensible they would gain reading comprehension. At least here in Spain quite some or many students have rather poor reading understanding at school and when they leave school.  And experts now state that some drawback for them is they may be so accustomed to screens. Even they may show some addiction to them. Well, it’s ok they use computers and tablets at school, yet it seems more important they’d use paper books and practice handwriting: sometimes you can encounter kids or teens or college students that have no dexterity at composing an essay, or understanding an article properly.  And that’s a big problem.  It is so necessary our students would dedicate a lot of their daily time to study their paper books and write essays. What can you do with a student who reaches college and cannot answer an exam with some appropriate response?  It is paramount our students s...

  Now I’m presenting what could be a first lesson, now that we are starting a new school year. I hope something from all this may help you out, whatever foreign or second language level you teach. In my case I teach English to adults from some false beginner to upper intermediate levels, namely from some A2 to C1.  All this may be even something beautiful, because we treat people, persons, and each and every one is unique, and we teachers may be influencing much on their lives: what a responsibility we have!  Something basic from this start lesson: we may address each student by looking into their eyes so they may feel they are and they are going to be treated like singular persons. That is something that has helped me a lot along my career as an English teacher, both kids and adults.  First I may introduce myself – on the running first days I will get to know their names; all this may vary in your case, obviously, depending on whom you teach; anyway I hope all this ...

  Are you a second or foreign language teacher? Well, you may have realized the fact that that school subject is different from others.  We are dealing with a practical subject, a very practical one indeed.  We teachers do not confine to teach language facts, but we help our students would speak in that language, English for example. Even lessons are conducted in that language.  We do not confine to explain some concepts, like grammar patterns, and subsequently our dear students learn and study them and eventually they will have to pass an exam or test.  We teach them to use the language. And in class we carry out some practical activities, so our dear students partake a lot: both teacher and students are the lesson protagonists.  Well, by the way, we must expose our students to much English, by us ourselves as teachers plus from videos and audios.  Dick Allwright said that in class there must be “exposure, motivation, and opportunities for use”. Those...

  Quite many students learn and acquire a second or foreign language by reading books. Me myself.  Well, as you know you need to practice all four language skills, namely listening, speaking, reading, and writing. Ok. I always have a book in English which I’m reading. Now, two: a graded reader plus Jeremy Harmer’s The Practice of English Language Teaching .  I’m learning and re-learning quite a lot from this latter one. Well, also from the graded reader. From Jeremy Harmer I’m learning a lot of insightful points for teaching my English lessons.  Now we have summer vacations, but I’m taking lots of mental notes for those classes I’ll teach in fall. And the graded reader, well, basically it’s B2 level, yet it serves the purpose for me for reviewing lots of expressions and ways to say such and such things in English. Remember that level is upper intermediate.  When I come across a new phrase or word, I stop reading, study and take like a mental photo of it. In that...

  A lot of people want to learn a second or foreign language. Me too. So do I.  At the same time I teach that language I’m learning and acquiring, namely English.  And you may know that I often say that reading books and graded readers help learn and acquire those target languages. Indeed. It’s my experience, plus Stephen Krashen says it’s so, even he pinpoints and says that fiction is better than non-fiction.  Ok now I can say that only after having read a lot and used the dictionary also a lot can you learn many a word. Hundreds of them, perhaps thousands.  Only then some or many words get stuck in memory. Well, maybe you'll learn a lot of vocabulary by other means. Then you can use them when speaking or writing in the target tongue. Because you’ve gotten a massive tank of lexis.  Of course there are more words you can understand than the ones you can use when communicating. Passive vocab is ampler than active vocab.  Then you can remember many words...

  If I want to learn a language, well, I have to practice all four language skills, namely listening, speaking, reading, and writing.  Okay. You may be a foreign or second language teacher, and may have a textbook or course-book to apply in class and even useful for your students to learn that language. And you may have for instance only two lessons per week and per class of students.  Definitely two classes a week is not enough to master that tongue.  You as a learner ought to put in six or seven days of the week to learn it, dedicating perhaps some minutes to that school subject. Well, better it’s to devote like half an hour or even more to that learning. At least some minutes.  With some of my students – they’re adults – we have such a textbook, yet I encourage them to read in English, for example a graded reader their choice; some of them can afford to read unabridged books.  Reading, reading is necessary.  It gives us the vocab and grammar we need...

  Do our dear students ever think? I gave that title to a previous post, remember?  And the point is that we as teachers have to teach our students to think, to engage their brains, to learn also how to study and learn.  They have to get the most from their textbook: thus we have to teach them to study.  As well we can elicit what they do for studying their textbook, so their classmates will learn new and sound ways to study, perhaps.  By the way, at many schools and in some countries they are starting to think that… it’s better for the students to have a paper book than a tablet.  Ok, let’s proceed.  We teachers also have to make them think: we oughtn’t to give all the stuff too much digestible: they have to learn to study and draw their own conclusions.  Something we may implement in class is to think with them. I mean, you know, the teacher can think aloud and so his or her dear students will see how to think.  Even something I do with my ...

  I know that you want to become a good teacher. One who makes his or her students think, right?  This latter thing may seem obvious, but do our dear students really think? Do they invest all their cleverness capabilities upon learning in the best possible way?  In order to achieve our dear students would think, and more if they are kids, we have to teach them how to think. If they settle down to study their books, we may be heading in the right direction.  We as teachers may think in a loud voice, say, to teach them to think, in class.  I was remembering that when I taught kids at the first school where I began to teach, we had, in accordance to their parents, there in the nineties of last century, a plan for educating them. It was not one more school subject, like math or literature or biology, but they were weekly sessions about topics where we made them think: ethics, how to solve problems, virtues and values, situations they might face as teens, etcetera. I...

  Today I wanted to share with you several points which can help both teach and learn a second or foreign language.  For example I’m still learning English and I know that I will finish my days on earth by still learning: When can you say, well, ok, I’ve already finished to learn Croatian or Polish or Spanish?  Something I’m doing lately is reading an interesting book. I confess I’ve been reading it – with some stops anyway – for almost a year. The book, about the Apollo missions to put the first man on the moon and written by a space historian, is a volume of more than six hundred pages and I’ve been reading it since last December.  You know, it was a present from the Wise Men or Kings on 2018 or so Christmas when we were going to celebrate the 50 th anniversary of sending a man to the moon and returning him safely.  Then, in 2019, when the 50 th anniversary, I read it more quickly – namely several months – and now I’m studying it, let’s say, because I try an...

  What are good lessons like? Let’s try and mull something about that question, from what Gregorio Luri states plus my own experience. He is a Spanish teacher, pedagogue, and philosopher.  Some teachers say classes must be fun.  Are you sure? Well, classes shouldn’t be a bore or drag, but fun at all? A bit fun may be okay.  They have to be well taught, for the teacher has planned them nice and competently. That’s the first premise. And planned with his or her students in mind.  And that teacher has to speak well, so his or her students put in and take in good language.  I think that if the teacher acts that way, more likely his lessons will be consistent and interesting. And the classroom atmosphere must be serene, so the students can work, learn, study, and grow up well and with no stridencies. That’s also applicable if your learners are adults, like in my case. In that environment those people can work intensely.  Thus over time that kind of work is ...

  So we have – continuing what said on the previous post – that we can learn a foreign or second language, but also we can acquire it. Subconsciously. Similar to what little children do.  And we language learners have to receive a comprehensible input, to acquire the language. Thus we will be exposed to that input, which should be a bit above my actual level, thus we can proceed and advance in that language learning.  All this entails practical points for the classroom.  Remember all that was already said by Stephen Krashen from the seventies and eighties of last century. A great fellow this expert I guess.  He also said that you can learn & acquire the target tongue by reading books, and this is good news – I do like reading books and articles.  He puts that fiction books, like novels, help you a great deal in those learning & acquiring: those books bring everyday lexis and sayings and kinds of expressions. And even it seems better if you select th...

  We teachers have to learn from the experts. If we want to teach our dear students fine.  So Stephen Krashen – an expert on learning a second or foreign language himself – put his first theories in the seventies and eighties of last century. According to them we know that we can learn a language, ok, but – and it’s good news – as well we can acquire that dear language. Subconsciously.  We can acquire a language without being aware we are learning that tongue.  For that we have to receive comprehensible input in that language, for example by reading a fiction book we have selected ourselves, not necessarily an assigned class read.  Of course also we can learn that language: it’s when we study its grammar and such in an aware way we are learning.  And – if you let me say so – to produce that language (to speak and write) we can hand those both learned and acquired languages, which is what I note I do when I speak or write in English – which is not my mother ...

  So we have already finished another school year or are about to do it.  Do we teachers have into account that we have to also educate our students, and so in accordance with their parents’ views?  We also have to educate them in freedom. If we educate our students like they were robots… we are doing wrong with them.  I teach adults. Yet something similar in some way may be applied to teens. I believe that a lot of English may be learned by reading books – like Krashen himself puts it himself. And, you know?, I say to those learners of mine they have to purchase graded readers or unabridged books. On their own.  As well they have to massively and intensively read, on their own. Beside what we actually do in the classroom to learn English. On their own, I said, by themselves. I leave them on their own.  Something I do is I encourage them to read, and when they’ve finished that graded reader, then, come on, get a new one. Or an unabridged book, which for the...

  Are you a teacher yourself? I mean, a second or foreign language teacher?  I’m going to tell you something today which hopefully may help you with your lessons. Let’s see to it.  It’s common to say that we language teachers have to have our students practice the language they’re learning and we should not confine our teaching to teaching language facts. And that’s okay. We should not confine our teaching to grammar and little else.  Yep, that’s right. However, let us not think we cannot teach those grammar facts, like for example verbal tenses or the use of the comparative of irregular adjectives.  Thus, if I’m teaching a bit of grammar or lexis, I don’t have to think I’m doing something wrong. Come on, as well you have to give your dear students language facts and grammar and the like, because those students do need those facts… to be able to precisely communicate in the target language. And above all if they are adults or even teens.  They do need the l...

  I wrote a few days ago the following.  One more year has begun. And today I’m going to let you know about something I lately do when lesson planning, in case it may help you out.  I teach English to adults. And when I start to plan a new lesson, I wonder, Okay, what should I do to really help my students learn that language? Because each and every class should be one step forward in their learning and acquiring English.  Secondly I also could wonder, Okay, what can I do next class to make my students become autonomous learners? For those autonomous learners are the ones that actually accomplish to learn English.  Thus we have two points for when we have to plan a lesson.  Now I’m trying to give you some examples of those two points, which we can bear in mind to improve our lesson planning. Well, they have to be brief, each one could take few minutes to think about.  Some examples, I was saying. Let me think. Even I’m trying to give an example that co...

  Are you a foreign or second language teacher? If affirmative, let’s think of some points that may help you, both if you are a novice teacher or an experienced one. With experts’ help, of course, and what they put into teaching debates.  We language teachers ought to have the main goal for lessons as mastering that language, so we can foster activities which foster communication in that language, yet bearing in mind that those activities should have interesting contents, respectful toward our students’ ways of being and what their parents wish for them.  Now I want to focus on those language activities.  They should promote communication in the target language, thus we create an atmosphere in class where that tongue is the communication vehicle.  That said, like a web is created in class where the normal thing is communicating in, say, English – which is the tongue I teach.  Something essential is planning each and every lesson. And thus when planning a le...

  Both a novice teacher and an experienced one as well must know that it’s the active student the one that really learns, for example a second or a foreign language. I have seen it in our school.  Students should not confine themselves to solely and superficially fulfill what their teacher sets as homework for example.  Successful language learners are the ones who actually wish to learn.  Otherwise they could pass the school subject of for instance English, yet they would not actually learn and acquire that language.  They do not confine to merely attend the language lessons and see what their teacher will say in class: they attend the lessons with the desire and will of getting the most of each lesson. And they will do more than the sole set homework.  They are autonomous learners.  And they work on the course-book on their own and not only on the set activities for homework. Even they access the Internet in search for videos – really useful ones – w...

  Okay, let’s start the new school year, 2022-’23. With some enormous “ilusión”, we say in Spanish, with great excitement and eagerness.  On the very first class day, hopefully I will introduce the syllabus or program or curriculum to my dear students, thus at that moment I am involving them up to the core of what we are about to do along that school year.  I will do it in a mild tone, but with great enthusiasm.  It’s up to the teacher: he or she is the main resource of activities and knowledge. I am getting my students into the marvelous task of learning English. And I hope they will do it by sharing my enthusiasm, I will speak in a mild tone, though.  In class each individual, each student is unique. And their teacher has to view the thing that way. Each person is suitable of being original, and most of them may provide some originality to the class.  I will not address a mass of people on that first class, I should address individuals, though.  I ca...