Job Discussion Forums

[denise]

Apologies if this topic has been tackled before--I don't recall seeing it.

What do you think is the hardest thing about teaching? (not the "living abroad" aspect, for those of us in EFL, but the actual job)

For me, it's gotta be grading, especially subjective things like papers and speeches. I have been dragging my feet with my grading project for the weekend--speeches for my high-level speaking class. It's so hard to try to apply the same criteria to different students! Some of them are naturally more talkative and do not balk at the thought of standing up in front of class and speaking--these "talkers" can also wing things quite well. Some are more shy and have quieter voices, but that does not mean that they put in any less effort or crafted a less-organized speech. !Ay!

Plus, I just hate to give low grades! (unless the students just fail to show up or do anything--then the grades are perfectly justified and I almost, ALMOST feel no guilt)

My school promotes students based on both their grades and on their TOEFL scores, with TOEFL scores often getting more weight (as they need a certain score to start getting college credit). Given the weight of the TOEFL, I generally give high grades, knowing that in the end they might not make that much of a difference anyway. High grades + low TOEFL score likely means that the student will have to repeat a level.

So what is difficult for you folks?

d

[Glenski]

Hands down...teaching mixed level classes, even if there are only 2 students.

[johnslat]

Usually the administration - who are so often clueless about what actually goes on in a classroom, what's important and what's not. All sorts of misguided and downright dumb directives can come down from on high.
Plus, administrators are ( almost ) always totally concerned with quantity ( how many students you can squeeze into a classroom ) than quality.
That administration that governs least, governs best.
Regards,
John

[Roger]

In my first college in China, I had reportedly the most challenging job - teaching English Literature. Was it really hard?
Yes and no! If you make this subject into an academic exercise you end up producing frustration on both sides of the fence, and this I thought I was not trying to do. I tried to instill in my students some curiosity about the world at large and past epochs, and I am confident I succeeded in this endeavour to a modest extent with some students.
But, they had been exposed to Chinese teaching for too long, and many were not at all inclined to cooperate. They would never read up or prepare any lesson, and yet, they expected to have plain sailing through to the exam.
The school eventually decided the students did not need to study "so hard" - just a brief encounter with each author was enough, and in the exam, they should know "who ws the best writer in the 16rth century, the second best, the third best; the best in the 17th century, the second best, the third best...."

In later years, I had dealings with considerably younger learners. My most difficult problem is - CHinese parents and their mindset!
Here you are, an expat working with kids and trying to enthrall them, at which you succeed fairly well (acknowledged by your peers and superiors), and you feel you are interacting in a natural way with them. Their communication skills get a major boost - they listen to you, obey, act and reply.
But their parents complain: "This foreign teacher is NOT following THE BOOK. My son cannot read aloud pages 14 through 41..."
Yes, it's true - I feel their textbooks are best left out. These dialogues have nothing to do with how I ever interact with anybody.
Problem is, the parents can't accept this! They probably think I need to learn English the CHinese way...

[Stephen]

John and Roger

You have my top two.

John
Admin. definitely a pain and usually clueless. I'd only add pointless paperwork to your comments.

Roger
Chinese parents couldn't agree more. I noticed that when you have direct contact with the learners as in adults, it is much easier to deal with stupid misconceptions and knock them out of them (well at least some of them). However, when you have management who do not know anything about education who deal with such misconceptions then problems really develop.

Regards
Stephen

[Jess_Laoshi]

[Stephen]

The mixed ability class thing is a good point, but how many times does this end up happening due to poor admin. or either student misconceptions about their own ability or what is required to learn English? Jess's example is a perfect illustration of the kind of problem bad academic management creates. It's not even good business because the likelyhood of long term student retention falls under such conditions.

Stephen

[scot47]

Unrealistic expectations from students, parents and employers. "Mohammed needs to do TOEFL. He is going to the USA next month. You will teach him TOEFL"

This, when Mohammed has zero English, is a fairly common scenario in language schools in the Middle East.

Employers who have staff with zero English and expect me, the English Language Instructor, somehow to impart a knowledge of English sufficient for them to have instruction in Accountancy or Car Mechanics through the medium of English. In many cases the staf with zero English have been exposed to 6 years of English in school and have acquired absolutely nothing from that.

[Wolf]

Hardest thing, eh? I've narrowed it down to one:

Students' (or their parents') preconceptions of what Engish speakers look like/are like. I remember one class in Japan where I happened to tell the students that I wasn't a Christian and never drank alcohol. They were DISAPPOINTED in having such a teacher (or should I say "foreigner.") They were sad that I didn't fit their idea of what "foreigners" are like (I'm not sure which of the 200+ countries that happened not to be their own they meant by that term.) I've also seen ads for schools that have been reduced to asking for teachers that are white only, men only, women only, Christian only (I have no clue what's with that - Jews, Muslims, Baha'is, Wicca, Communists, Bhuddists, Hindus and others are incapable of teaching English for some reason?) etc based on, I can only guess, the "needs" of the students. A lot of the schools in Japan have a fairly lenghty sales pitch to prospective students. Why not include some population demographics of different countries? [I find this particularily odd in China. There are millions of Chinese or people of Chinese descent not living in China - and the Chinese know that. Is it really such a surprise, then, if the chilren of these "overseas Chinese" can speak English as a native langauge?] EFL teachers might be subject to the whims of these forces, but what if these students in the future have to deal with, for example, an African-American business representative? Or one of Chinese decent who is British? Are they going to phone the other company's head office and demand a "real foreinger" or "real Amercian" be sent over?

This isn't something I personally have had to deal with, but I find the above attitude very, very hard on my head.

[denise]

I find it very interesting that so many of the responses have focused on macro-level/institutional/cultural issues--administration, parents, what a foreigner should be, etc. My own response was more micro-level, I think--one of the daily mundanities (is that a word?) of the job.

Hmmm... Let me see... Something "larger"...Regarding administration--so far I've been very lucky in that the administration that I've worked with has either a) been competent or b) not had too much of a role in the classroom, so I never felt their presence. Administration has thus not been a problem for me--except for a couple of incompetent DOSes ("native speakers," if that matters) whom I just chose to ignore. Parents? Honestly they do sound like a nightmare, but again not something I've had to deal with (yay!), as I typically teach adults. What a foreigner should be? Externally, I fit the bill, I think. (Internally is a whole 'nother story, of course.) Well, damn, I must come up with something...

d

[FGT]

Back to micro:

Intonation. I either don't teach it at all or I sound REALLY stupid. Any hints?

[shmooj]

Well FGT, I'd have to list intonation as one of the hardest things. But not for me to teach rather for my students to pick up. They feel they sound stupid.

Personally, I feel intonation is a necessary topic for the classroom in Japan where students often sound really flat in their intonation or they overuse one or two intonation rules they have learned somewhere back in the Jurassic period and sound terrible anyway. Intonation is essential for communicating concepts like enthusiasm, excitement, anger, surprise, hurt, delight etc etc. There are also important tonal patterns that communicate whole concepts to a native speaker when applied even to a single word. For these reasons it is good at least for students to be aware of all this in a passive sense. I also try to help my upper intermediate and above students communicate using intonation patterns that are natural and to eliminate ones borrowed from Japanese such as the infernal ehhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. If you've ever heard been in Japan longer than 24 hours, you know what I mean!

Trouble is, they say they feel really stupid using these patterns so most just play along with me for the class before reverting to their tried and tested lack of intonation. Ah well... can't say I didn't try.

[Dr.J]

shmooj - same experience; you teach them, they learn, but when it comes to use it, all their friends are watching so the old "aimu fainu sankyu" comes out. ah well.

Grading. It doesn't actually have any teaching benefit for the students, ie they don't get any better at English just by getting a good test mark. Perhaps you could apply your own standard, eg would they be understood in a roomful of native speakers? if yes, they get the marks, if no, they don't. It's important for students to be aware of their own progress, as long as it doesn't demoralize them. But then the system puts such an onus on marks...

[denise]

[Capergirl]

The hardest thing for me is teaching one-on-one. I prefer classes with 8-12 students, ideally. Even two or three students is better than just one.

I agree also with the grading aspect of the job, though. My Kuwaiti student complained yesterday because I took points off for misspelled words and missing articles.