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Teach English in Changle Zhen - Nantong Shi

Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified and teach in Changle Zhen? Are you interested in teaching English in Nantong Shi? Check out ITTT’s online and in-class courses, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English ONLINE or abroad! ITTT offers a wide variety of Online TEFL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language.

Over the course of 4 years teaching English to children from 6-10 years old, I realized that managing classroom is one of the vital keys to gaining successful lessons. Classroom management is not only organizing the class but also having a friendly, relaxed manner and maintaining discipline for students. In this essay, I am going to dig into “How to manage classroom effectively”. It cannot be denied that classroom activities are very important to help students get more energy and excitement to learn English faster and more effectively. Especially for those who come from Non-English speaking countries. Classroom is an environment to get closer to the new language as English. There are many factors affecting classroom management. In this area of this essay, I will discuss about four factors leading to effective classroom management including eye contact, gesture and the voice, grouping students, classroom arrangement and teacher talking time and Student talking time. Firstly, “Eye contact, gesture and the voice”, as we know, eye contact can convey messages, so good eye contact in the classroom is essential to establish good rapport with the students. For the first time I stood in front of a class, I never looked at students’ eyes, showing my lack of confidence. After many years, I have learned a productive way to use eye contact. For example, to encourage the contribution of students or to draw their attention to the lesson, or to stay disciplined in the class. I would change my eye contact following the situation, but I avoided using it when students were working in pairs or groups. In that case, I would better make them more comfortable and more natural. Like eye contact, gesture can be used as a tool to manage the class. For instance, I can convey the meaning of the language. Recently, I’ve taught my students a topic of: “ How to protect ourselves from Coronavirus” While explaining, I asked them some small questions then I made a thumb-up to sign that is a good idea for the students who had good answers. Or, I put my hand behind my ear to sign students who didn’t listen to the lesson. The last one for this part is the voice, the voice is powerful, so I practiced my voice to convey messages, knowledge and instructions. And I learned how to change my voice naturally according to the circumstance. For example, when I organized a game for the class, I would speak strongly and clearly to show them how the game would go. During the time I led the game, I also used the voice louder than usual. Beside the 3 very important things above, I also used my student’s names to hold any activities, indicating who is supposed to answer or respond and I think it helps us a lot as teachers. It helps create a close connection between teachers and students, making them a lot more intimate. Secondly, “Grouping students”: It’s another way to make a class more interesting and effective. There are no limits to how a teacher can group students. Depending on class size, furniture, level of the students that we have appropriate grouping ways such as whole class grouping, student working on their own, or pair-work. For each approach, we also have pros and cons, however, it’s related to the situation that we use. In my classes, I usually do “Grouping students” for a class of 15 members. Specifically, when I teach a new lesson, I need the whole attention from the class so I make a whole-class grouping to draw attention from students. When I give them some task, I let students work on their own for 5-10 minutes, and for the activities they incorporate to make a conversation of two. I let them work in pairs. For the most part, I make a group of 3-4-5 students to organize games. Thirdly, “Classroom arrangement”: This is the way we organize the position of students in the classroom. I always use this for class because I would like them to have different emotions, feelings moving around the space or talking to different people. As a result, my students really like it, they have different attitudes to work with different people, then they have better performance than usual. After the lesson of ITTT I have focused on orderly rows, circles and horseshoes, separate tables and the teacher’s position. I knew how to change the position according to the activity being used, the teacher’s roles and the student’s expectations. Lastly, “Teacher talking time (TTT) and Student talking time (STT) ”, They’re a vital part to manage a classroom. Balancing between TTT and STT can help overcome boring classes. On my first days teaching English, I spent most of the time talking, explaining but in that case, my students got bored and were sleepy. When I realized that, I avoided unnecessary TTT by increasing interaction. Instead of explaining too much I gave them a task and guided them how to give a talk in front of the class, instead of using TTT I raised STT through activities like games, group-work, group-presentation or debating between teams. I only used TTT for checking, modeling or giving instructions. And guess what happened, those things helped me create whole lot more amazing classes. In short, each teacher has various teaching methods. There is no limit for creativity. Most importantly, a teacher is supposed to be the key person who is always willing to learn new things, new approaches to upgrade and make the class always awesome. By mastering all of these techniques, teachers cannot only manage the class in the best manner but also help their students achieve their goals set for themselves.


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