Job Discussion Forums

[jimi1999uk]

Hi all.

I was hoping I could vent, gain some perspective on my troubles and maybe get some advice from you old dogs

Less than a week ago I accepted a job offer to work with teens in E. Europe.

A bit of background.

I gained my Trinity CertTESOL qualification some months ago and rather enjoyed the teaching aspect FAR more than I thought I would. Fair enough, my technical teaching skills were poor and abit simple but the classes themselves felt pleasant, had good engagement, rapport, etc, even if I had a tendency to be a bit hedging and nervous occasionaly.

So I know I can get up in front of a class and not flounder too badly with adult learners.

This knowledge hasn't helped in the past 5/6 days though when I'm trying to prepare a few lesson plans, figure out the type of discussion I might have...

I've been unable to do any of this. I keep opening my cookbooks and I've so anxious that my brain can't function enough to A (decide what I'm going to choose/do) and B (do the neccessary prep for my choosen lesson).
It's as if my eyes are looking at these ideas for activities but the brain in otherwise occupied with thoughts like "you're going to crash and burn", "teens are *beep*, this is going to be the most painful thing in...", "just cancel..."

It's ludicrous! If I can't calm down and prep a bit I'm going to have to cancel due to the fact that I will have NO clue what to do for lessons in the first few days.

I REALLY want to go into ESL, I've a good knowledge of English (almost finished an Eng degree), I ENJOYED all my teaching practice lessons pretty much. It's just that my anxiety has turned off my brain.

Do any of you have any advice, help or your own prework nerves stories? Thanks

[uh huh]

Good on you for reaching out. I just PMed you.

[spiral78]

Tell us a bit more about your students and the goals of the class and we can offer some specific ideas for lessons

Everyone gets nerves. Most of us survive the experience

[Glenski]

You need to get into a rhythm of how you present your lessons. Then you can feel secure knowing what should come after each step.

Step back and ask yourself whether the lesson plan itself was clear. Ask another teacher to check. Ask yourself if it was too hard. Instructions that cause a native speaker to pause and think about will be too hard for students. Are you trying to cover too much at once? Do you review lessons to check whether students actually learned them?

I also suspect that you might be doing too much talking yourself in the classroom. Students need the time to practice speaking, you don't. Give them the opportunity to make mistakes so they can learn from them. If you ever learned a foreign language yourself, you will appreciate that.

[spiral78]

Glenski, I don't think he's got started yet.

OK, checked with your other post and now I can assume you are teaching 'conversational' skills to Central European teenagers - correct?

I'd start with introductions - begin by asking what information the students need to know about each other for class. Possible items:
how long have studied English?
ever travelled abroad to an English speaking country? Which one/how long?
what are his/her goals for English
(NOT NEEDED: ages!!no need to set up an age hierarchy)
Tell them they will introduce another student to the class (not themselves - too easy!) Give them a few minutes to get the info they need.
If they are lower level, you can also put standard intro phrases on the board in advance: 'This is (name). He/she has studied English for.....
etc.
When intros are finished, invite them to ask questions about you as a teacher. Tell them that this gives you a good opportunity to assess their question-formation skills - asking questions is sometimes difficult and always important!!
Depending on class size, you now have a relatively small chunk of time left to tackle something else. If they are higher-level, this could be something along the lines of small team discussion of future goals, followed by a report to the class. Lower level, could do the same small-team followed by report regarding places students have/would like to visit. They could also come up with questions regarding those countries that they would like to know the answers to, perhaps.

[Glenski]

spiral,
Yes, I see/saw that he has not started teaching yet. I think the advice still holds, though:

* establish a comfortable routine (rhythm)
* don't talk more than your students
* always try to be sure they understand what you presented (asking them is not always the way)

[spiral78]

Sorry - this language led me to believe that you thought the OP was having a problem being unsuccessful in his current lessons, rather than asking for advice in planning his first real-life lessons with a new group of students:

[jimi1999uk]

agggghhh my browser crashed after spending 40 minutes on my reply. EDIT. IT WAS IN ANOTHER BROWSER WINDOW YOU FOOL HAHAHA. You now get the abridged and likely typo filled version

Thanks for all the replies and pm's you kind people.

Yes spiral. I'm due to teach "conversational" classes in Hungary as a Lecktor (no, not of the Hannibal/Manhunter variety sadly but I think the term for language asst.)

Another teacher will be teaching the grammar (a Hungarian I assume) so I'll have no real brief to work to unless the grammar teacher wants to say to me, "do x, y".

I'll have to teach twenty 45minute lessons a week and all the students will be between 14-18 and in classes of ~15 learners at a secondary school. Does anyone have any ideas of what I can expect and difficulties from this age range? Or any other tips?

I've also decided I'm going to email my contact at the school and ask if I can get a few days "settling in" time. I arrive on a Sunday and should get to my flat at around midnight and I was getting massively stressed out at the thought of just getting thrown into a class on Monday, sleep deprived, no clue about anything and be expected to start right away. That seems reasonable right? A few days meeting pupils, preparing lessons, guaging L moods, meeting a couple of the other native speaking TEFL teachers and most importantly deleveraging my stress levels. They surely couldn't begrudge me a few days in a possible 7/8 month contract could they? I'd be in the school loads and could be unpaid if they wanted.

Thanks for the other advice too. The understanding of my demonstrations was something I had a couple of snags with during my Cert. Routine/habit is HUGE for me. Change "a'la" this job are the things that scare me

I must say I'm very nervous also about lesson planning and material prep. I'm hoping that I can recycle lessons with lots of different classes. The thought of doing a 30 hr/wk at a private language school and creating 30 lesson plans seems impossible.

Thanks to Uh Hu too. I'm so glad you said it was pretty difficult to write (good) lesson plans unseen as I was getting very disheartened there.

[jimi1999uk]

Spiral, you know about these "conversational" lessons? What can I expect? I shouldn't be presenting much. What do you mean?

I've tried to make inferences about what I'm expected/not expected to do but I'm not certain. Your understanding of things would probably help me loads.

I'm a bit less stressed now but I know I'll be a wreck again very soon. I couldn't wait to go a few days ago

[Glenski]

[spiral78]

Glenski, I'll send you a pm.

[jimi1999uk]

Ok. I'm extremely close to the time I should be packing/getting organised and I'm a wreck. I've done NOTHING that counts as ANY sort of prep. I keep looking at my cookbooks and my brain has completely left the building. Pfffffffffffff

[smithrn1983]

[General Disarray]

I'm going to take a guess and say you will be working in Szeged?

I love working with teenagers, I get nerves when teaching adults, so much energy in the classroom with the right lesson plan.

First lesson I always walk in serious, slam my bag on the table, look around the room, get some paper out and shuffle them on my desk looking very strict.

Then walk over to the mirror, look in it, take my tie off, untuck my shirt and say lets have some fun with English. Relaxes the atmosphere a whole lot and they like to be in a classroom where there is fun and ends up making them want to speak to me.

Get to know their names, throw a ball around the classroom and the person has to say their name while dancing, the rest of the class has to copy the dance and repeat their name. This gives you a chance to see which kids are shy and which aren't. if the class as a whole would be open to improvising role plays in front of each other. It also adds an aspect of fun, I wouldn't recommend doing this in a class of over 18 kids though!

BANG BANG is a good game to get to know their names. Stand in the middle shout bang bang at someone, that person has to duck, the two people either side have to shout the other persons name, the last one to do so is dead and out of the game like a western style shoot out. Kids love this game.

Get them to speak to each other although I guess they know each other. Hungarians aren't very technical so you may have to bring in a laptop/cd player.

I usually get them to talk in pairs in the classroom, play some music like YMCA everyone has to dance, stop the music they have to find someone else and talk to them.

There are various ways for them to get to know you, different ones work for different classes that you have to gauge in the first 15 minutes to see if they would work.

If you can see the class is quite fun, get them to write 5 interesting questions, to ask you. Get the two funny kids to stand up and answer the questions pretending to be you.


That is the start to my first lesson with kids, I much prefer teaching children to adults though, I can't put my finger why I just feel so much comfortable in a classroom with children than adults.


Good luck!!!

Any questions about Hungary/Budapest dont hesitate to ask, a fantastic country/city.

Stay away from Palinka though, horrible drink.

[Xie Lin]