Experiences of a teacher of English

  Something practical for today. At the school where I worked before, in another town of the south of Spain, namely Jaén, until 2002, we had a student council, which turned out so fine. Every group-class had one. Now I live in a different city, in Granada, since 2004. The student council had three representatives. It was so fine an idea, for they could reach farther than what their head teacher could reach. Each head teacher had such a student council. Each class had a student council. They moved around within their classmates, and even they were able to help their classmates better than what their teacher could, up to some extent. They had been voted and elected democratically by their classmates, at the beginning of the school year. It was so helpful a team. Besides they were learning to work as a team, something pretty useful for their lives as grown-ups over time! Their head teacher used to meet up with them from time to time, at an office, and they c...

  I can see you TeacherLingo teachers provide with a lot of interesting material and lesson plans, and that’s so interesting for our actual classes, definitely. I would like to provide you with rather more humanistic topics and issues, practical they may be though too. Something I’m concerned about is for the teacher to be human and humane, sympathetic and nice, toward his students and colleagues as well. And this is something to apply at every single class he teaches, for instance. Technical solutions are necessary and okay, and they’re so welcome, but you all know that teaching implies (has to imply) being a bit warm or nice, and rather close toward the youth – or the elderly, or grown-ups alike. I would like to add one more point, essential it is, even more today. We have to be elegant and at disposal for persons the other gender, but definitely and you’ll agree with me I assume, that we have to be delicate and cautious in order to avoid any bad comment we could ...

  Today I’ll say something about our high-achiever students. We have to care and look after them. From my experience I can say that they can progress so big at the learning and acquiring of English. They can go fast, for they’re pretty concerned about their learning and acquiring. We should be cautious: they could get terribly bored and disappointed and distressed for they see they don’t progress, because all what’s taught in the classroom they already know it. I used to give them extra material, for example from Cambridge examination texts and drills, especially from First Certificate (B2 level in the CEFR, Common European Framework reference for languages), and even Advanced (C1). I’m referring to students aged about 14 years. They got extremely motivated. They worked out this stuff at home, but also it might be handed out when those students have finished what assigned to do at classes. Something so nice about these students is also that they can become so moti...

  We teachers obviously have high-achiever students and also low-achiever ones. The ideal would be to have individual tutoring sessions, where we could help and assist low-achievers (and high-achievers too!). Tomorrow I could write about high-achievers and what we can do for them so as not get them bored and disappointed because they’re learning nothing new – at the school subject of English or a second or another foreign language. The core point here now with low-achievers is understanding and comprehending them and their poor situation. I think that in low-achievers’ case we have to praise and get those students awarded with pass grades always counting on their effort and struggle to progress as far as they can. In some way we should evaluate their effort, and if they need to get pass grades we perhaps could push them up a bit and give and award them with a pass grade. There are some cases in which they cannot give more, and we could, as I said, push their grade...

  Probably many of you are on vacations now. Okay, teens, adolescents often don’t like imposed rules, right? So something we can do is explaining the reason why such and such rules should be followed. I knew a teacher… well, honestly it was me, anyway. In an English summer camp some years ago, a nice number of years ago, in Málaga, Costa del Sol, south of Spain, one of the first class days I said to a kid that he had to leave the classroom, because of some serious disruption, now I don’t remember what... However he wouldn’t leave the classroom. I think I repeated the mandatory order, but he kept sitting at his desk. Now I guess I would do different from that. Kind of I would set some rules, okay, and in such summer courses I would try to empathize with the kids as well, out of the classroom alike. And I’d try to know them well. And in the class itself I would try to carry all the conducting more peacefully, always in a respectful way toward the kids – besides they...

  I would say homework is just necessary. All of us had homework when at school, didn’t we? Someone said that if the kid is attentive in class and makes good use of time, he has 60% of the learning already accomplished. For the school subject I teach, English, revising, studying, reading more peacefully, doing drills and more creative work… are just necessary, as I said. However we teachers should take into account that the kid has other school subjects to work on! Some teachers leave time in the classes for the kids to carry out their homework, and they only have got to do it at home if they couldn’t finish at school. Nevertheless at home, at a peaceful place, the kid can progress a lot. If his parents help him do that assigned homework, they ought to know they have to let their son (their children all) do homework on his own, little by little. I know a family where the eldest kid has changed and shifted school some few months ago – they had to change the s...

  The teacher, for example an English-language teacher, is like an orchestra conductor. He has to have his students contribute and intervene to the class. He must otherwise cut off every disruption spark, when that one shows up for a little bit. He will try for every student to contribute at a precise moment. He should have every student to participate, and not only those who are eager to participate, say for instance high-achievers. At the same time he will take these latter ones into account. When I was teaching kid classes, sometimes I used to give extra material to high-achievers lest these ones got terribly bored and disappointed and even a bit distressed perhaps, for they were learning nothing new! For example I gave them material – texts or multiple choice drills – of a B2 level of English, namely from the First Certificate in English of Cambridge University. B2 is the intermediate level, since there are three letters A, B and C, according to beginners ...