Good TESOL Certificate

Teaching Skills in the ClassroomAfter reading Unit 1 and Unit 3 of the course materials, as well as the article titled, "TESOL ARTICLES: Learning Teaching Skills," from www.tesolcourse.com, I have come to the conclusion that teaching, and the skills needed to be a successful teacher in the classroom, is so multi-faceted that teachers must be some of the most dynamic, dedicated, hard working, and creative people in the world. I am sure that to an outsider of the teaching profession it appears that a teacher may only just have to be knowledgable of a subject, and able to present that subject in a clear and understandable manner. However, this is not the case at all. That simple description of knowing and presenting information does not even scratch the surface of what skills are required to be a teacher, and how challenging and rewarding working in the classroom can be. I am personally pursuing teaching english as a foreign language for the two following reasons, in no particular order. First, I want to see the world and live amongst different cultures to learn and grow from my experiences and make connections with people all over the world, and teaching EFL is a great way to help me achieve that goal. Second, I am thrilled at the prospect of helping other people reach their personal goals of learning to speak english, build cross cultural bridges, and help people achieve greater things for themselves through knowledge and skills that I can teach them. The fact of the matter is that my heart is in my teaching goals, and I think that is a great place to start when talking about teaching skills in the classroom because my enthusiasm will come through in my physical presence and will show students how happy I am to be there in the classroom with them, learning and growing together. The realm of skills a teacher uses in the classroom seems to be endless. Defining english language needs and goals, making lesson plans, designing and choosing learning materials, and working closely with students creates a wide variety of diverse skills and roles to be fulfilled by the teacher. I would like to approach this discussion on all of these classroom teaching skills by grouping them into the following categories: Physical skills, motivational and engaging skills, presentation of information and creative skills, organizational skills, and correction and feedback skills. Physical teaching skills involves presenting a professional, neat physical appearance, appropriate facial expressions and tone of voice, posture, attitude, clarity of speech, vocal volume, and ability to express one's self physically with gesture and mime to overcome language barriers. The first step in letting a class of students know that you care and are excited to be in class is physically presenting yourself as not only a teacher, but someone students can feel comfortable with. A teacher should smile, stand straight, be warm and kind, have a positive attitude, and a generally pleasant and enthusiastic tone of voice. Also, a teacher should be confident and comfortable with making hand gestures, exaggerated movements and facial expressions, and even miming to better get ideas across to non-english speakers. Physical skills lead into motivational and engaging skills. A teacher's physical presence gets the ball rolling on engaging the students. Engaging students in a lesson is a skill essential for every lesson, specifically at the beginning, but actually to be maintained all throughout the lesson. Connecting with students and learning their interests to better develop lessons that will be engaging is key to a successful teaching and learning experience because an engaged student will be most motivated to learn. It may not seem like it, but being able to connect with students is an extremely important skill when it comes to establishing a comfortable teacher student relationship and classroom environment. Motivational skills are necessary for a teacher, as well. Students need to feel comfortable and confident and enthused about what they are doing to make learning enjoyable, less stressful, and successful. Engaging interest, and motivating confidence and hard work will lead to productive and progressive students. A teacher can be very motivational by having students set goals, get them excited about reaching those goals, and point out when progress is made toward the achievement of those goals. Letting students know that they are doing well, paying attention to progress, taking interest in students' interests and needs, choosing activities that will be enjoyable, materials that will really capture attention, and creating an environment that students want to keep coming back to are all a part of the engage and motivational skills a teacher will use in class everyday. A teacher must always remember that there are no bad students, just bad teachers. Even if a student is getting discouraged a teacher needs to make sure that they encourage students to trust in the learning process and design activities that will allow students to see how much they are progressing to keep their confidence and motivation levels very high. A teacher should also make a point to make themselves available to the students outside of class to address any issues they may be having, but are not comfortable with addressing publicly. Obviously, an english teacher must be not only knowledgable of the english language, but also well versed in the presentation of this knowledge and well equipped to answer questions, all in an exciting and creative fashion. When presenting information in the classroom a teacher must take into consideration how much time is going to be spent having student teacher talk time and student on student talk time. While it may seem that it is only the teacher's responsibility to present material, it is actually even more important to have students practicing and presenting information to one another to increase the use of the english language throughout the lesson in a conversational manner. Certain topics will call for a teacher to be the main focus in the presentation of certain lesson points, but in other situations a teacher will need the students to do a lot of the work in order to get comfortable with the material through practice. A teacher needs to plan creative ways to get students to have high levels of student on student talk time before the lesson, but in the classroom a teacher must be skilled and creative to actually get the students to want to participate in the activities. This can be done by being clever with the use of presentation materials such as the over head projector, the white board, vcr, dvd, computers, pictures, objects, tape recorder, music, and any other materials that will get the students interested and involved. A teacher must not only be skilled in planning the use of these aids and implementing them in class, but also in the technical side of things to make sure everything is working properly in the class room. The skill of presenting materials in class also involves being able to think on one's feet and roll with the punches of what may come up in class. There may be times when a teacher will have to think of new examples and activities on the spot in order to give students more practice with difficult topics or use up extra time at the end of class. Being able to spot good opportunities for elaboration, fun in class, good examples, and so on are all part of the skills that are needed to present information to the class in an effective and creative manner. The presentation of so many materials, and using different teaching aids requires a great deal of organizational skills inside the classroom. A teacher must come into class well prepared and organized and maintain that organization throughout the lesson. Beyond organizing learning materials and presentation of those materials, a teacher must keep the students organized both physically and mentally. Giving very clear instruction and demonstration of what the teacher wants from the students is a key skill for a teacher to master. Certain activities will call for students to pair up, change seats, and even move furniture to be most effective. A teacher must be a strong and firm guiding force in this process as students could get distracted or confused as to what they are supposed to be doing. Also, keeping students mentally on track, especially during social activities, can be challenging for a teacher, and again, will demand a firm but kind manner to keep the lesson running smoothly. Minding the time and deciding when it is acceptable to get slightly off track or not is also an important skill a teacher must have. It is easy to get caught up in class conversations or certain fun activities that may not be productive to the lesson, but on the other hand there will be times when a teacher will make the decision to let the class get off track if it will benefit the ultimate goal of the lesson. And finally, a teacher must keep the organization of the classes total progress, meaning, keeping track of individual students needs, problems, and progress to make sure that no one is getting left behind. The last set of skills I am going to discuss are probably some of the most important, and they are giving feedback and critique. Mastering the art of feedback and critique is difficult because students will be sensitive and the teacher does not want anyone to get discouraged. Feedback should be given mostly during the study phase of the lesson and only when needed in the engage and activate stages. A teacher's criticism must be kind and constructive, mostly focusing on what the students did well, and guiding them to find and correct their own mistakes instead of pointing them out and potentially embarrassing the students. There will be times when a teacher will have to decide that it is appropriate to quietly ask a student to meet them privately to work on certain lesson points that they are struggling with, or explain to the whole class that they will be having to extend a lesson to the next day because the class is struggling with the material. Ultimately, a teacher's judgement with feedback and critique must always be focused on keeping student morale high. A good way to buffer a student feeling bad about making a mistake is to tell students form the very beginning that every "mistake" will lead to greater learning, and that no one should feel ashamed because even the teacher will make a mistake every now and then. Also, peer review will be an important tool for a teacher to use in helping students to understand what they are doing right or wrong without feeling like they are being put on the spot by an authority figure. As stated previously, teaching is a multi-faceted profession that calls for dedication, patience, hard work, and a personal investment. Teaching skills in the classroom are probably the most important because that is when the students , the material, and the teacher all cross paths to make learning happen, and it is up to the teacher to create, establish, maintain, and grow a wide variety of classroom treating skills to provide the best education for their students at all times.