Teach English in Longmiao Zhen - Suqian Shi

One of the most satisfying and fulfilling feeling for me as a teacher is to make a child/children learn a new language. Making them learn to read, understand and write a new language is the best feeling. Though it is only the basic, but everything starts in the easiest and the very basic. Years ago, before I moved to Norway, I was a first-grade teacher for almost 4 years who is very devoted to teach my pupils, and I always do up until now that I am working as an assistant teacher here in Norway. Back in the Philippines, I was teaching basic subjects like Science, Mathematics, Social Studies and two languages – English and Filipino. Aside from that, I also was a kindergarten teacher during afternoons just for almost 6 months. After work and during Saturdays, I was also was doing language tutorials, both English and Filipino, with those children who wants to learn advanced language teaching. We had 1 on 1 session for 1-2 hours each pupil. We had four grading periods during the whole year. In the beginning of the school year, during the first grading, my pupils are usually non-readers and has no writing skills yet. I always checked the level of my pupil’s knowledge and how fast is there learning capabilities are. Practising classroom rules and regulations. Giving them simple and introductory lessons. In my English session, it was divided into two sub-lessons, the language and reading. When we say language, we learn to talk, we learn to listen, we learn to read, and we learn to write. Language skills then include reading, writing, listening, and speaking. Since I was teaching grade 1 pupils, it was not as complicated as it seems it is. I was teaching for example the very basic some parts of speech like noun, verb, pronoun, preposition, adjective and even adverb at the end of the school year. Then the other parts of language which is: • The Writing. Writing the alphabet, writing words, phrases, sentences, and even short paragraphs at the end of the school year is the goal. I had pupils who cannot even hold a pencil yet. This is where the feeling of satisfaction comes, starting to not be able to hold a pencil to be able to recognize and write letters up to short paragraphs at the end of the school year. • And then the Reading. Usually, I put more time in teaching reading in the 1st and 2nd grading. It is because it is easier to teach the other parts of language after the children can already recognize and read words. Reading is not easy to teach. It takes time, motivation, a lot of effort, creativity and dedication. Our principal once said, “The best teachers can be found in grade 1 because they are teaching the fundamental stage which is the critical stage of child’s learning. In reading, I always start in letter recognition followed by corresponding sounds(phonemes), pairing of letters, until the pupils can read 3 letter words, phrases, sentences and short paragraphs. It is not just all about recognizing and be able to read. It must also have comprehension, without this reading is not considered effective reading. Visual aids one of the tools which is very effective in comprehension. Visual aids must be colourful, interesting and beautiful to arouse pupil’s motivation to learn. • And then the Listening and Speaking. Children love to hear stories and loves to answer questions about it. So, I always find time to tell short stories, asked questions for speaking and comprehension, do different activities that encourage pupils to listen and actively speak, and do games. Before I started my day as a teacher, I always make sure that the learning environment is prepared and effective for the pupils learning. I also made sure that I am prepared to teach. So all the lessons is prepared and are in place, time management is planned already, visual aids are complete and, most importantly my lesson plan, which I considered as my bible inside my classroom, is well prepared. We were using 3 different types of lesson plan back then. • The Detailed Lesson Plan  This is a complete and very precise lesson planning. It shows how the teacher is going to deliver the lesson from objective, introduction, lesson, activities, questions, games and of course the expected answers of the children. All is written in a very detailed way. Everything is in the lesson plan. • The Semi-detailed Lesson Plan  This lesson plan is less complex than the detailed lesson plan. It usually only shows teachers activity or plan. I personally is not very fond of using semi-detailed lesson planning, but I used it sometimes thou. • The Brief Lesson Plan  This shows brief explanation of how the teacher planned her lessons. When I already mastered the teaching skills as a grade 1 teacher and already has all the visual aids needed from the previous years of teaching, I usually and love to use brief lesson planning. This doesn’t take a lot of time writing a lesson plan just like the detailed lesson plan. It served as a very easy guide for teachers. My experienced as a grade 1 teacher, especially in English language is one of my best, satisfying and fulfilling experience in my whole teaching career. I enjoyed it so much. Even now that I am an assistant teacher here in Norway, I still consider teaching language as a second language gave me the best feeling and experience ever. It is an interesting career for me. I myself, learned another language which is the Norwegian language and my teachers before always told us, teaching another language to foreign students is a career that they chose and will always choose because of the feeling of fulfilment they feel after the students learned the language. It took me two years to master the Norwegian language and passed all the necessary exams needed for me to get a job here in Norway.