Job Discussion Forums

[kev7161]

I've noticed that not many of us talk about our classes or our students. Oh sure, I talk a little about the bad kids or I go on about my school in general, but not real specific things. I tend to make sweeping generalizations when I talk about things. I would be curious to know what you think about your school, your fellow teachers, your students. How many classes do you teach? What level do you teach? Are you happy or do you think there is something over the rainbow that may suit your needs better?

I'll start with a couple of things, but I'm sure I'll be back to add more should this be a successful thread:

I average around 30 students per class. I have 10 different classes and teach Senior One, Two, and Three. I see Sr. 1 & 2 twice each week and my Sr. 3 kids once a week. Age obviously matures students as my Senior 3 classes are rarely any trouble at all. They are quiet, respectful, fun, and most do their work. The kids that didn't speak English last year pretty much don't this year as well. But a couple have surprised me. Senior 2 is up and down. They are certainly better than they were last year, but there are still some I struggle with. And Senior 1? I have five different classes: 2 really good groups, 1 so-so, and 2 that have a small percentage that really seem to want to learn, the rest want to play.

I teach from the New Interchange series. It's getting a bit outdated when it refers to current celebrities (Bonnie Raitt?), but I love the variety of activities and games it offers: from speaking exercises, pronunciation, dialogue starters to writing, listening comprehension, reading (and comprehension), workbooks, CD-Roms, etc. Last year I was doing a lot of things beyond the book, but this year I have almost 100 more students and 6 more classes than last, so I'm grateful to have this series. We still do a few things that are related to our unit, but I'm being a bit more overwhelmed this year.

I have my own classroom. I brought a bunch of posters and stuff from the USA when I went home this summer, so I've tried to make it as bright and colorful and interesting as possible. I have a whiteboard (and not a chalkboard, thank god!), a TV and DVD player, a cassette tape player and a CD player. When I want to use the computer, all the classrooms have them and they are very near my room. The desks can be easily moved around.

You've read about some of my frustrations in other posts but, overall, I have some really swell kids and I love them dearly. I'll be sad to say good-bye next June. Well, I'm interested to hear about your job!

[go_ABs]

Ok, sure. I don't know exactly why this is interesting to you, but ok:

I teach 5 classes a week, at an extra-curricular primary school. Each class is two lots of 40 minutes, with a 10 minute break in the middle.

Because it was a primary school, I naturally thought all my classes would be kiddies, but it turned out that two were not. I only teach one of them now, which is intermediate level. They're okay, but it took a while for them to get used to me. I teach from New Concept English 1, which SUCKS royally.

The other 4 classes are kiddies, at the very beginner stage. They are generally fun to teach, but it's amazing how quickly one or two naughty kids can spoil an activity or even a lesson for the rest. I teach from the Cambridge Young Learner's English textbooks, which were okay at first glance, but terrible to try and turn into lessons. I wouldn't use a textbook at all, except the parents want to know where there kids are up to, so I pay token attention to it.

I was pretty happy with my classes when I first arrived. My contract says 16-20 hours and I only ever got 14. I get free Chinese lessons, from a Chinese colleague.

All in all I'm pretty happy. But 10 months into my 12 month contract, I'm dying to go home again. The countdown has begun!

Like you, Kev, I'll be sad to go, but happy to be home. I will return, though, but probably not to here. I want to go somewhere where there are more foreigners!!!

Glad to hear everything is not as bad as it sometimes sounds.

[Guest]

We are not supplied with any books to teach from - we prepare our own lessons - which takes as long as it does to actually give the lesson most times.

At first I was daunted by no resources, but now I simply love it - I am free to teach whatever I wish.

I have 16 classes of 490 minutes duration per week - which only amounts to just over 10 hours per week, I think - too lazy to calculate it.

I only see each child once a week, which is nowhere near enough time to actually teach them anything but I do try. This year I am teaching Junior 1 and Junior 2 (my choice) and I find them interesting and challenging.

[go_ABs]

[Roger]

My best times were with preschoolers. It is generally assumed that placing a native English-speaking face in front of a gaggle of children openes their mouths by some sort of magic; they even assume they don't need to provide us with any materials.
I soon found out that little kids need a different approach, as their bodies are less developed and need more action. Also, their attention span is considerably lower, of course. I soon found good advice and a lot of reliable hints and links to websites. Within two weeks I had an excellent teaching plan for the rest of my year there.
The kids responded very well and I never had to use Chinese in my classes. One approach is to demonstrate what they must say and do. Then, I found VCDs and I also taught them to draw and to write letters. My kids acquired a solid foundation of the English lingo using basic vocabulary andinternalising some recurrent structures and grammar rules. Yes, grammar (Subject-Verb agreement, certain tenses) were as imnportant as new vocables. In fact, they only learnt a few hundred words, but they learnt to use them competently.

My CHinese colleagues taught them many more words, often with mispronunciations; a lot of those words were totally irrelevant to the kids, for instance: "I like coffee. Please, give me a cup of coffee!"

Now I am working with supposedly-adult students aged 22 or thereabout; I find them more challenging to work with as they exude little enthusiasm. They learn with a view of passing a final exam, and no other consideration enters into their minds!
But I have relatively good vibes with them. They cooperate. This is, perhaps, because they are slightly afraid of my power of giving them grades that displease their parents; in fact, the university doesn't enter the grades they get from me in their degrees! The students don't know though...

[Old Dog]

First, let me say that I've been in China for quite a while so maybe I've become a little conditioned to things. Nevertheless, I think I'm working or have worked in situations that are pretty typical of the lot of most foreign teachers in China.
I teach in both Junior and Senior schools. Were there more of me, I'd see the classes more often - but there's a limit and I'm only asked to teach 20 lessons of 40 minutes each per week.
My classes generally contain between 53 and 55 students. All work hard and the greatest discipline calamity is a student who chooses to talk while another student is addressing the class.
I've learnt that, if you work in a Junior Middle School, the great obsession is with the final Grade 3 exam. And if you work in a Senior Middle School, then the one and only obsession is the National Exam at the end of Grade 3.
I've always been in schools where the obsession with exam results is pretty all-consuming - so that, even were there more of me, I doubt if I'd see inside a Grade 3 classroom.
Sad though it may be, if you're in China long enough, you come to understand the realities that produce these obsessions. You realize you can't "cure" them so, in order to assist in making students more able to deal with the speaking and listening aspects of English, you join the system.
I am entirely free to do whatever I choose - but I don't choose to teach western culture, strum a guitar or show slides of my travels or even to play "games", valuable though these may be in some situations.
I choose to focus entirely on the job at hand and that is to help prepare my students for the great challenges of those exams that lie ahead of them and to produce competent users of English into the bargain.
So what is my cunning plan?
I let the Chinese teachers get ahead of me by about three or four weeks in whatever texts they may be using. I come behind them, pretty certain that the students will have mastered the grammar and the required vocabulary. Then, with what creativity I possess, I attempt to transform all of this into new situations and to devise a range of activities that require the students to use what they have learnt in situations quite different from their texts. My aim is to transform rote learning into something that approaches real life.
I try to ensure that the students do something that is useful in real language learning terms but something that is also not so unrelated to the "obsession" that my lessons appear to be no more than time fillers or opportunities to make some use of the foreign face so expensively employed for PR purposes.
Teaching "foreign culture" is not one of my priorities. If the students just watch me and talk to me out of class for a few years, they learn enough foreign culture that way.
I must say, by the way, that I've been mightily impressed by Kev's postings.

[kev7161]

Well, thanks "Old Dog" - - nice to hear (or rather, READ) that.

[MyraG]

I was contracted to teach at a new language centre for children (after school and weekends), within 2 months I was running it. We only have 30 students, this is 6 months after oprning now. WE have only about 4 students to a class but we hope this to grow to at least 6 with maximum of 10.

We teach 3 to 12 year olds western years and we have excellent lesson plans already prepared. The lesson plans come from the owners school in Singapore. and were written mainly by one of their teachers who is a pommy primary school teacher of 30 years experience/
The lessons are one and a half hour long, no break, the kids have fun and arent bored but are taught the basics like recognising all the letters of the alphabet out of order, writing, phonics simple greetings. emotions and plus for the older kids we have creative writing, which also includes grammar. W have assessment about every 5 lessons and the homework is kept to a minimum and is fun

We have a lot of Korean, Taiwan, and Singapore Malay students as well as Chinese, about half half actually.

We are really well resoursed with over 200 kids books, and we work very hard to make sure the kids are learning, want to learn, like to learn, and are having fun learning English

Plus Suzhou is a very nice city to live in Lots of other westerners is very pretty and close to Shanghai to boot

[ContemporaryDog]

I teach 21 classes a week, three different classes, Grade 1. Last year I had less classes (16 a week) but two different grades, so I actually had more preparation to do.

3 of the classes that we teach are called 'activity' lessons, where we can do fun stuff, and teach them English skills using English - things like drawing, singing songs, poetry, downing a pint of beer in less than 10 seconds and how to get the coins out of a phone box.

I like teaching Grade 1. I did Grade 2 and 3 last year, they definitely weren't as fun to teach. Grade 1 can be more tiring, but equally more rewarding.

We use the book 'Chatterbox', an English book. Its not bad, hugely superior to the appalling one we use for our extra lessons on Sundays, the US book"Superkids", which really is a load of crud with some of the worst American accents I have ever heard.

This term I am trying to set and mark regular tests for the children, as last year I think I wasn't quite thorough enough. So I'm now doing one per unit (sitting marking at my desk as I browse the forum)...

I think kev is right, we should discuss our lessons more etc. I know there are other forums for that but many things that are done in typical ESL teaching in other countries, can't be done for classes of 800 people...

[The G-stringed Avenger]

I teach 1st and 2nd year students at my university - 7 classes per week of 100 minutes each with a 10 minute break in the middle. I have about 30 students per class, although my freshman class has 72.

And I am wondering how the hell to go about teaching these kids, most of whom are fairly attentive and want to learn. The ones who don't want to learn just sit up the back and sleep/read newspapers/listen to music - I leave them alone. After all, they are adults, the onus is on them to participate and if they don't, well, I'm not their mother. I don't take attendance either. This is not school.

I am using the execrable "Family Album USA" series book and DVD, an appalling series. My students complain that I don't use the textbook enough - part of the reason for this, they fail to appreciate, is that the book is in Chinese and apart from the script of the DVD, contains only some meaningless fill-in-the-blanks/look-at-the-photo/answer-True-or-False exercises. Stuff that is really suitable for children but not for university students.

I really need help here - I received no training in teaching classes this size, I need info on what sort of meaningful and engaging activities I can give the students in big classes that will actually help them. I've tried class speeches, group work, listen and repeat, role plays - results vary from class to class and person to person. I don't have time to listen to every role play, let alone correct mistakes in grammar and pronounciation. I feel like I'm getting nowhere!!! The feedback I get is mixed - the good students like the exercises I set, while the disinterested get more disinterested. To set up some kind of decent role play takes so long that there is no time for the role play itself. Then if I cut prep time and create a short role play, I get the good students finishing their task in 30 seconds flat, and then sitting around bored waiting for me to give them something else.

Are there any good websites out there? Any suggestions?

Thanking you,
the GSA

[burnsie]

Today I started a new class which isn't actually english teaching. I am now teaching finance and accounting. Though I have not worked in this area it is quite basic and I have done most of it in my former working life in business.

Before that I taught for 2 months teaching english to 15-16 year olds which I didn't really enjoy that much. I found that I was not motivated to teach english, though the students were reasonably good and I think enjoyed the classes I was not interested.

Now I am teaching business subjects I am alot more interested and enjoyed my first class alot more. Though I still have to talk about new words they are not sure of I don't have to teach grammar, conversations etc.

I remember back to my first class which I was really nervous and had the school principle, english head etc in the class which was my first ever class teaching with no experience. It seems so long since that time and I have changed alot in how I approach, perform and understand the teaching process.

[lagerlout2006]

Good posts:

To G-String Av in particular. I don't think there IS any sort of solution to it. I call students the "easy way outs." Set up a topic, debate, role play whatever. They will get in groups, speak Chinese and scribble down a few lines they think you want to hear. Of course there is usually 1-2 brilliant students who do everything well. I steal my lessons from the best in the business so I know.

Role plays take too long and most won't listen to the group "on stage." Lately I assign them something to do in pairs or groups and walk around. It helps that my classes are only 25-30. This seems better than trying to get the whole class together for conversation. In that case only a few (if you're lucky) say anything. Seems all you can hope for is they listen and speak...

[Roger]

To the G-stringed Avenger:
I am surprised to read "...execrable Family Album U.S.A...." I used this series too, and I had tremendous success and much more fun during those lessons. What's wrong with this series?
Let me clarify I used an English-only VCD, and the kids had an English only textbook.

My - mostly female - normal school studentsere awed and thrilled listening to those dialogues. They readily mimicked them.
I used this work in order to set them thinking. The book contains a number of very valid points that cause the students to think about what they had previously learnt about the West; in fact, some messages directly challenge their received notions of the West or the U.S.A. They put themn upside down.
That's what I wanted to achieve - to learn something they didn't expect.
Also, this series portrays a Western country in the most sympathetic colours. What's wrong with that?

It's true, of course, there are some abominable versions - bilingual ones! But I insisted on - and got - using a monololingualVCD and book!

[Ace]

Where do you guys, and Roger in particular, get the great students? If I could, I'd refuse books that didn't have any Chinese translations...I admit, I've been working in government colleges for a couple of years now...

What's the point when they just don't understand?

How can you make them do homework?

To be honest, I've had a few students not attending, and then, when I informed on them, attending and not opening their mouths...and then pointedly leaving before the end of the first lesson...

But I've read about acid attacks on teachers in my city, (I'm talking, LAST YEAR) and teachers being murdered by students ... and I'm not sure if I want to make too much of a big deal about absenteeism... let's face it, if they waste their time - and it's only a couple of them, they lose, not me...)

Typically, in the class after the naughty group left, I gave my students a lesson they loved...

I didn't mind Family Album (bi-lingual) because, although schmaltzy, I thought the vocab was pretty good (and I'm not American). My current book is all English and pretty darn dry. I've gone back to rewriting the dialogues in what I consider to be realistic English...of course I try to include a bit of humour and a hint of romance...I make them as long as the photocopiable page, for two or maybe three students...I make them generally simple vocab, but include vocab from the current units, and get friends to put Chinese translations of words I think they may not know, say 3 or 4 to a page...and my stduents really enjoy them.

I can't make them learn vocabulary ("I very like pingpong" "In my free time I like to sleep") so I figure, I'm working on their pronunciation (including syllable stress, word stress, tone and diction).

I got another unsolicited letter this afternoon - thought it was a composition, I guess it was, but it was about "our foreign teacher' and gave three reasons why he's so great... and not only did I leave my three classes today feeling warm and happy, (actually today turned out to be a major feedback day, and yet I gave listening comprehension tests for the first time, mainly because I'd like to help them with that part of CET) I also noticed some real progress...quite a few of my students were not only reading enthusiastically, with expression "mmm, baijmou...." they were reading phrases, putting words together...I don't think it was my explanations and examples and pleading so far this term, I think it was my 'real English' dialogues...

Half the time Chinese students seem to be on another planet (and it's in the 1950's too) but other times I feel that if they 'click' with the dialogue, or feel it's true everyday English (how could they know?) it can work! I've already complained once tonight about 'gentlemen' and 'ladies'...surely all this 'how do you do?' and 'not at all' and 'ladies and gentlemen' is only going to alienate true native speakers...it would certainly alienate western kids their age...

[The G-stringed Avenger]

Thanks for the replies, guys,

To Lagerlout - your teaching style sounds very similar to mine - assign group or pair work and then walk around checking on the groups. Not the most successful approach though, a lot of the students don't seem too motivated about it.

To Roger - yeah, I'm using the bilingual series. "Bilingual" being a loose term for an english dialogue followed by everything else in Chinese. While the students seem to enjoy the DVD I'm not sure if the book is very good for their level. I've started to write my own dialogues as well, using more modern/colloquial english, which may be the most successful approach so far. I then make the students use my script as a guide but create their own conversations. I'm really thinking of just turning my class into an English corner and letting them discuss the topics they're interested in.... Arrgh, I dunno! I had a class last Thursday which just didn't work, although I produced maybe the best teaching plan ever... still, it doesn't work if students are too shy.

Don't think there are any murderers in my class - still, that could change once I hand out exam results!

Is it true the marks we give are not entered on their degrees????