Teaching English as a Foreign Language for Dummies (22 page)

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Start off quite strict and ease up later if you can
. Set the right tone from the word ‘go’. Students expect you to be in control, so they won’t find you unfriendly just because you impose rules. In fact, once they know the rules you won’t have to keep reminding them because they remind each other. In this way you’re not cast in the role of the bad guy and can get on with making the lessons enjoyable.

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Start and finish on time.
If you don’t respect your students’ time, they won’t respect yours either. Stick to the scheduled time and apologise if, for some reason, things don’t go to plan.

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Respect your students.
Treat your students as clients and remember that just because they don’t know English doesn’t mean that they’re incompetent or unintelligent.

Hold your students’ cultures in high regard too. There’s more than one way to skin a cat and the way you’re accustomed to in your own land is not necessarily the best.

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Maintain a sense of humour
. This is one of the single, most important factors in running a memorable course. Laugh at yourself, laugh with your students when they laugh at themselves, and laugh just to have a good time.

Chapter 9: Who’s The Boss around Here? Managing Your Classroom
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Organising Your Classroom

The layout of your TEFL classroom depends to some extent on the resources available to you. What you do with them is largely up to you. Even if the chairs are fixed to the floor, you can introduce less regimentation with creative wall decorations.

Considering basic equipment

The basic equipment is, of course, a place for your students to sit and a board for you to write on. However, you need to think about a few other considerations such as:

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The size and shape of the room.

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The number of students.

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Equipment such as electrical items that need to be connected to a power socket.

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Special and individual needs your students may have. A partially sighted student needs to be close to the board, and left-handers may need extra elbow room – just two examples.

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The surrounding environment including noise from traffic or other rooms. Check whether you can have the windows or door open.

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Lighting. Make sure that there are no dark corners or a glare on the white board.

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The versatility of the furniture. Some schools nail their furniture to the floor, whereas in others cases you may have a choice of the items to use.

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Where students put their bags and coats. Get a few hooks put up, especially if you want your students to have the freedom to move around.

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Heating and cooling. There should be adequate ventilation and temperature control to enable your students to concentrate.

Most teachers like to personalise their classrooms when it’s appropriate by putting up posters, reminders, notices and examples of students’ work.

Hopefully your school has a self-access centre for students to do extra work in but if not, make an area of your classroom a mini self-access centre where students can pick up a novel or magazine and use a computer to research their work. If the budget is tight, try using free literature such as holiday brochures for English-speaking countries there, along with some extra grammar and vocabulary exercises.

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Part II: Putting Your Lesson Together

Arranging the room

When it comes to tables and chairs, each style has its own advantages. I show you the various types of arrangements and talk about their good and bad points in the next sections.

Circling the horseshoe

The most popular layout is a horseshoe formation, shown in Figure 9-1.

Figure 9-1:

The horse-

Key

shoe puts

you at the

centre of

Board

attention.

Individual chair (or desk and chair)

Teacher

The advantage of this layout is that everyone in the room can easily see everyone else and the board. In addition, students usually have room to stand in the middle for more energetic activities.

This layout gives an informal atmosphere to the class but is not for very large groups (much more than 20). It functions well when students work only from their chairs (without a desk) or with tablet chairs (where a mini-desk is attached to the chair).

Grouping students together

Another style, shown in Figure 9-2, is particularly suited to group work. In this case students work at a desk in pairs or fours.

Chapter 9: Who’s The Boss around Here? Managing Your Classroom
129

Key

Figure 9-2:

Gathering

students

into groups

Board

aids

Teacher

Desk for

interaction.

4 students

Make sure that you’re able to walk around the desks (large desks or groups of desks) so you can interact freely with students and monitor their work.

In order for students to see the board and you, they can sit sideways on.

Going for traditional rows

The most traditional classroom layout, shown in Figure 9-3, is mainly suitable for exams and tests.

Students in this kind of layout are less likely to feel relaxed and part of a team.

You’re likely to find classrooms set up like this unless you ask for something different, but don’t accept the room as you find it. Arrive early to set things up in the best way for you and your students.

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Part II: Putting Your Lesson Together

Figure 9-3:

Traditional

rows don’t

generally

Key

promote

active

engage-

Board

ment.

Desk

Teacher

Establishing Classroom Rules

Many language schools have rules for students set out in their terms and conditions, which takes some of the pressure off you because students read and agree to them before entering the classroom. However, as teachers and classmates vary it’s a good idea to establish rules at the beginning of the course that reflect the situation of the class. The students can get involved in agreeing some of the rules.

Some common classroom rules are:

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Latecomers must not disrupt the class. In some cases you can set a time limit after which the student may not enter the room. In any case, students should display good manners instead of barging in.

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Students should bring their own materials (books, pens, paper to write on).

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Students should avoid behaviour that’s offensive to their classmates and to their teacher. This includes swearing (in English or their mother tongue), styles of dress (highly inappropriate compared with the local culture) and body odour.

Chapter 9: Who’s The Boss around Here? Managing Your Classroom
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No smoking in the classroom.

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No eating during the lesson.

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Mobile phones must be switched off or on silent. If a student leaves the room to answer a call, he’s only allowed to re-enter at the teacher’s discretion.

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Students shouldn’t speak to each other while you’re addressing the class and only one student can speak to the class at a time.

Keeping Order

Once you’ve set up the course and the classroom you need to think about managing the people. Your aim is to build confidence in your students so that they respect your guidance and instructions. At the same time, you should encourage a learning environment that sees all the students treated fairly by you and their classmates. When a student is disruptive you need to deal with the matter efficiently so that there’s minimal distraction from the lesson.

Learning English is the priority so other matters that students choose to raise shouldn’t use up valuable lesson time.

These tips can help you set the right tone and expectations for your students:

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Teach classroom language.
Tell students the words they need to communicate their learning problems to you. It’s easy to lose control of a class when they stop speaking English in favour of their mother tongue, but if they know how to say things like, ‘I’m sorry, I don’t understand.

Could you repeat please?’ they can let you know when things are going wrong. You can put phrases like this up on the wall or ask students to write them at the back of their course books.

I teach words such as stationery, classroom furniture and several polite requests too. One example is
Would
you excuse me for a moment?

because when students lack this kind of vocabulary they fall back on their own language again.

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Don’t start until everyone is listening
. There’s nothing worse than shouting over boisterous students in an attempt to teach the other quieter ones. It’s best to ask for silence and wait for it. Those who want to learn actually help you to maintain order.

Some cultures find speaking over one another acceptable so you may want to point out what you consider to be good classroom etiquette at the start of the course.

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Part II: Putting Your Lesson Together

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Establish the rules clearly.
If you need to get the rules translated or represented in pictures, go ahead. It’s only fair that your students know when and why they’re out of line before you pull them up. (The preceding section offers suggestions for rules to set.)

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Don’t let problems escalate
. Nip problems in the bud because this helps to maintain a pleasant environment. (I offer troubleshooting advice in the next section.)

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Give ample warning of the consequences of continued rule breaking
. In other words, don’t throw a student out for a first misdemeanour.

Remind him of what will happen if he does it again. Agree how many warnings you’re prepared to give before taking action, a bit like the yellow and red cards in football.

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Be consistent.
There’s no point making idle threats. Just do what you say you intend to do. This is one way of gaining respect.

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Be fair and don’t hold a grudge
. It isn’t right to let one student off and not another. Try to treat your students equally and avoid giving the brightest ones all your attention.

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Don’t let other students get involved
. Resolve problems privately in the corridor or after the lesson when others have left. People always react better when they’re allowed to save face and when they’ve no mates around to egg them on.

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Lean on the school for support
. The director of studies should advise you of disciplinary procedures for students and the rules they’re expected to abide by. Actually you should only be handling minor misdemeanours yourself. In most cases adult students have a copy of the terms and conditions and as a last resort they can face expulsion.

Troubleshooting

If your course doesn’t seem to be flowing, there may be various reasons for this. Teachers find that, typically, a number of difficulties recur.

Some common problems include:

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Students don’t bring their books.
Don’t keep photocopying everything.

If students are slightly inconvenienced by having to share resources they’re more likely to bring their own copies.

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A student fancies you or vice versa.
Wait until the course finishes to make your move because things can get very heated if you end up with a spurned lover in your classes. If you don’t want to accept the advances of a student at all, allow him to feel that you’ve rejected him for professional reasons. It’s less embarrassing.

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The class is too big.
This comes down to school policy but if you happen to have a class of 30 or 40, identify the more capable students and make them group leaders. Ask them to help you by organising the other students. They may enjoy being used as assistant teachers too.

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Your school says that you have to use a particular course book but it’s
as dull as ditchwater.
Follow the syllabus but supplement the book with your own ideas whenever you can.

Dealing with disruptive students

Students are disruptive for various reasons. The most common problem is that they’re bored because they don’t understand or because they don’t have enough to do. Students who really are too smart for the level, or not competent enough for it, should move to another class. Ask the school for help arranging this.

Keep a few extra activities on hand to keep the faster workers busy.

Disruptive students come in some familiar forms:

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The ‘clever-clogs’ who asks questions to show off or just to catch you
out.
One solution is to ask them to do their research at home and report their findings to you after the next lesson. They won’t be playing to a full house after the lesson so may not bother but if they do and their findings are correct, you can try involving them in presenting the information to the class at an appropriate time.

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The student who wants to have a personal consultation in the middle
of the lesson.
These characters ask questions that no one else in the class is interested in or that have no connection to the lesson (or even the course for that matter).

I recommend that when a student says, ‘Can I ask a question?’ you find out whether it’s directly relevant to the situation. You can reply by asking whether the student’s question is about the lesson because if not he can ask you later (when he’ll probably have forgotten it anyway). If you make it a habit to open up questions to the class, this lessens the focus on you and reinforces the community setting, reminding everyone to do what is best for the group.