Job Discussion Forums

[vikdk]

[kev7161]

When I taught "oral" English, we used the New Interchange books. 80% of classtime was used for acting out dialogues, pronunciation and enunciation, talking about the meanings of words and trying to use them correctly in sentences, reading aloud, covering grammar rules, etc. Some group work was thrown in as well. About 20% of the time was "self-study" (working in the workbooks). Some of my students were whiz-kids who almost always finished quickly. After checking their work, I'd generally have a few (age-appropriate) English magazines on hand, some word search puzzles, even my portable CD player with headphones. The CD player was the most popular, but first come, first serve. The students were really good at sharing though and the word search puzzles came in second. The magazines were good for a flip-through, but most didn't want to make an effort to read the "complex" English!

[Gregor]

I did this for a while in Dalian, being sent from my small private school to a middle school. The classes are tiring, but not difficult.
Once I realized what I was supposed to be doing, I stopped planning lessons for them at all. You just need to have a topic to talk about, use the chalkboard a lot, and direct your lessons to the few who want to pay attention (which will be the smallest fraction of the 60 kids there). Take the advice of being strict with humor, and cut a deal with the kids who don't want to be there - "Go ahead and sleep, do your homework, whatever, but try to keep the noise level down, OK? We just have to get through this." That goes over pretty well.
So have your topics, think of things to mark on the board, and just hang out and talk with them. If it's the slightest bit interesting, you'll be fine.
Specifically what can you do? Anything. Once I drew a bunch of pictures on the board and taught the kids about the tectonic plates and geology in general. Another time, Geography (continents, countries, capitals, etc.) . One time, I did the solar system. Any of these topics lend themselves to drawing on the board.
Remember two things - First, they do not expect you to TEACH the kids. The kids will have a Chinese English teacher to teach them wrong (which they need to do to pass their tests). Second, even if you end up "teaching" them something they've already learned in another class, well, that's all the better, because you're showing them how to talk about it in English. After all, sure, they know that the second planet from the sun is called 金星, but they didn't learn that it's Venus in English.
Again, it's tiring but easy. Don't worry about it.

[Steppenwolf]

Gregor - that was a good post! Miss you a lot...

[englishgibson]

Yes, it's a great post Gregor and I've missed you too.

Cheers and beers to all hard working teachers or laowais in China

[vikdk]

[Gregor]

Yeah, well,
Vicdk, whatever. You can still make your life a lot easier if you take your gig for what it is.
What was described by the OP was not a teaching position. ALL of us here who have done that job knows this full well. It's a dancing monkey job, by design. If you take it, the pay is fairly good, and it's easy to do. We all know that if you knock yourself out trying to teach these 60 kids in this class - a class with no test, no homework, no progress evaluation whatsoever - you will drive yourself out of your mind and do the same to the kids, make all the other teachers there hate you, and basically be a complete failure at the job you were handed.
This is not meant to get into a battle against vickdk again. Y'all won't hear from me again on this thread. I just want newbies, and the OP in particular, understand what they're getting into. This is NOT an ESL job. And no matter what the FAO or whoever says, you are NOT giving lessons in any conventional sense. You just need to keep the kids who care to pay any attention to you engaged. Bonus points for getting a laugh, or engaging other kids, the ones who didn't think they wanted to pay any attention. But those are bonus points, and not necessary. If you don't like being the dancing white monkey, then don't take the job. If you go into it knowing that's what it is, it earns an easy living while you're in China and maybe you'll like it, or else maybe you can find something better later on.
That's all.
By the way, this advice goes for the JET program in Japan, and other similar gigs in Asia.
In no case, though, is the "I'm-a-teacher-not-an-entertainer" attitude EVER going to work to your benefit, especially in China, but anywhere in ESL.
Yes, when you have a manageable sized class of students who want to learn and are going to be tested and so on (in a McSchool or anywhere else), you need to plan lessons and pay attention.
In what the OP described? NO. That would just be idiotic and self-defeating.
Also by the way, in ANY ESL gig anywhere in the world, or any teaching gig for that matter, you will be a much better and effective teacher if you drop the ""not-an-entertainer" pretension and get the students engaged in what you're teaching. Think about it - who were the teachers YOU learned the most from? The ones with the pedagogy and intolerable seriousness about the subject at hand, or the ones who were fun, funny, and would go off-topic and digress now and then?
No one is going to be a good teacher taking the job too seriously. This is what I have learned in ten years of teaching. Don't take as long to learn the lesson, or you will hate life.

[vikdk]

[mondrian]

[englishgibson]

[vikdk]

[Steppenwolf]

[vikdk]

Question answered - and your professional reflections on my posts

[englishgibson]

i love your emoticons

cheers and beers to 1.3 billion students in one classroom

[vikdk]