Job Discussion Forums

[durks]

Hi

I was wondering what advice anybody could give me as to what books to look out for in order to prepare my lessons effectively.

I have no experience at all in teaching and am concerned from reading other posts that training provided in Korea is limited!!

Is there a specific book or website that I can use as a guide that might help me in the classroom and to prepare before I depart... I can't seem to find the idiots guide to teaching in Korea!!!!!!

Also being new to teaching am I best to teach younger students?? Or is this down to individual confidence...... How much more demanding is teaching to varying age groups? And being new to teaching could I handle teachging a variety of ages from the off or should I concentrate on one age group in particular? Will I even have a choice??

[Glenski]

Teaching the younger kids might involve a lot of physical activity and music. Are you prepared for that?

Teaching older people might involve refreshing a lot of grammar points, or teaching some specialized lingo (if you teach business people, for example).

For some book ideas, look at Penny Ur stuff for large groups (works well in smaller ones, too), and Basic Grammar in Use (by Murphy; Cambridge publisher).

[Kent F. Kruhoeffer]

These links might ?




TEFL BOOKS & SOFTWARE


http://www.longman-elt.com/ (Longman ELT)

http://www.altaesl.com/index.cfm (Alta Books)

http://www.oup.com/teach/ (Oxford University Press)

http://www.cambridge.org/elt/ (Cambridge University Press)

http://www.market-leader.net/ (Market Leader / Business English)

http://sdkrashen.com/main.php3 (ESL Books by Stephen D. Krashen)

http://www.eflbooks.co.uk/ (Cambridge International Book Centre)

http://www.esldepot.com/ (ESL Depot / software, games & books)

http://www.ets.org/ (ETS Homepage / GRE, SAT, TOEIC, TOEFL)

http://www.esl.net/ (ESL Books & Software by ESL.net)



* reposted from The Master Index Thailand

[angrysoba]

"How to Teach English" by Jeremy Harmer is pretty good both in terms of methodology and ideas. I would start there.

I second the book by Murphy but only as a grammar text. When it comes to conversation lessons in Korea it wouldn't be advisable to use it in class. At least until you have got to know your students better.

[Cdaniels]

I know you were joking about the idiots' books, but don't look for country/lanugage specific books for teaching English, at least not yet! There's not enough out there (English for Spanish-speakers is a different story)
Also at this stage you might want refer to books with Activities.
I found my imagination gets strained when I'm tired and studying a lot- and its nice to have a reference of a bunch of stuff for students to do. And you can plan lessons around the activities, rather than the other way-round. And I think it might be easier to guage time for activities than the other lesson parts (you never know what will come up around vocab and other parts of the lesson, but usually a game is a game.)
Most teachers say that teaching of different age groups, experience levels and settings is a personal preference. No way to know until you try. There's also a good chance you won't have much of a choice at first.
And relax! Try out fun things like names and tastes of Korean food rather than studying at this point.
Harmer is good, but a little dry if you can't relate it to personal experience.
Maybe brush up on Your English grammer, just to build confidence and so it sounds like you know what you're talking about in class!

[durks]

Thanks everyone!!

[Scribble]

[saint57]

[gabes65]

I teach in public schools in Korea and for the little ones I use:

www.genkienglish.net

It's chock full of songs and games and the kids absolutely love it.

For the middle schoolers I use:

http://www.finchpark.com/books/tmms/index.htm

It has tons of activities appropriate for grades 7-9.

Good luck.