ESL Teacher and Learner

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TEACHER AND LEARNER

Teachers:

What makes a good teacher?

A good teacher should resemble the following:

a. Kind and patient
b. Caring
c. Lively and entertaining (especially ESL)
d. Motivate learners
e. Good knowledge of taught subject matter
f. Good rapport and interaction with class
g. Involve all students equally within a lesson
h. Correct students in a kindly manner
We can say that a teacher cares about her/his teaching and about her/students even more.

The role of the teacher.
We know that teaching can be teacher-centered and student-centered. We have been seeing more classes being taught with a student-centered focus, especially when teaching ESL. However, we also know that the class lesson cam be focused at times on the teacher and the students, depending on the lesson, activities and area of English being covered.

Teacher as manager
As a teacher in a classroom it is necessary to manage and control the classroom. The flow of the class depends on the ability of the teacher to conduct a class without disruptions. This can be difficult with especially with younger students of ESL. Most ESL teachers expect and allow some minor disruptions and noise. It also depends on if you prefer an energetic class compared to a very quiet and non-responsive class. Somewhere in between may be best. More here on Classroom Management.

Organizer
A teacher must prepare her/his lesson before hand with a lesson plan. For small private English academies there is not much preparation needed or the usage of lesson plans. It is still useful to be prepared and organized for teaching lessons. This will allow a teacher to organize a class lesson, opening, new topic delivery, or student and group activities. I have often felt like a director in the class, orchestrating the flow of a lesson.

Assessor
Giving some feed back on students progress or at least assessing students in some way is important to see how they progress and learn the English being taught. Small quizzes can work, but also activities are great as well, with less pressure on students. Students can present a small task to the class as a group or in pairs allowing a teacher to informally assess.

Prompter
Often students may stumble or get stuck on a task, such as speaking allowed in class. Teachers can either allow the student to try and continue on their own of give some small help and prompt them along. If a student makes a mistake, a teacher can disrupt their flow if correcting them during their mid speech and a teacher can correct at the end of class. This entirely up to a teacher.

Participant
A teacher can also take part of a student activity within a lesson from within a group. Be careful not to dominate any activity.

Tutor
The teacher also acts as a tutor, helping students when performing group or individual activities or tasks.

Learners:

What makes a good learner?

Some general characteristics include:
a. A willingness to listen to the language
b. A desire to experiment with the language
c. A willingness to ask questions d. An ability to think about their own learning process and methods
e. An acceptance of error correction
f. A desire to learn
g. Willingness to work hard at learning

Motivation
Adult learners can be much more motivated to learn English than most younger students. There is a real desire to learn. For example, adults who pay for a private school English class will want to utilize their time in the classroom and often outside class for learning English.

Nervousness
Many people will claim that adult students show more nervousness and shyness when learning English. This has to do with ‘keeping face’ and is especially true for beginners. In my opinion, I have seen very shy students in English who are especially beginners in at any age level. Middle school students seem to show just as much shyness and not wanting to ‘lose face’ as adults in general. Elementary students seem to be less shy in general, with their ability not to care as much as what others think of them. There is generally more energy as well.

Language awareness
Adults will generally want to translate and match new language to their native language, whereas younger students generally absorb a new language. One adult leaner once informed me he did not have to translate Korean into English in his mind anymore and could naturally just think and speak in English. I believe that is fluency or at least very close to achieving fluency.

The information above is taken from TESOL, CELTA and experience.

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