Korean Job Discussion Forums

[renzobenzo1]

Do you view your English teaching as merely a language consisting of grammar and vocabulary, or as encompassing an entire culture?.....

What do you spend the majority of your time teaching/talking about when the text book work is fisnished....do you sing and play games or choose other English activities to do...all of this is well and good also....

I guess what I am getting at is, is it our job to purely teach nuts and bolts English to help our students pass this oh mighty test at a later date.....

or are we also obliged to give them a walk through British, American and even other English speaking nations history and draw on these environments by introducing celebrities, customs, places, fashion, music, movies, sports and all these kinds of things....

it sure as hell makes it more interesting for the students...

I remember when I learnt (not that long ago) Latin and French at school we learnt about the whole spectrum of things.....

or then again is it at the teacher's perrogative to have this freedom and flexibility at their discord....

or am I barking up the wrong tree asking a generalised question I should be asking my head of English...?!!!

however, one thing in common is that we all need to keep our teaching interesting and keep the students attention and a desire for them to keep learning English and not drop their heads or give up....

Anyone else have some input?....

Cheers

[Jizzo T. Clown]

Very thoughtful post! My approach is very simple. I do whatever I can to choose material that I think will be appealing to my (high school) students. The best way to do this is to engage them in conversation, asking about likes and dislikes. They think I'm just making small talk but I'm really hoarding lesson ideas.

Of course, in the beginning stages I've had to teach them how to respond to my questions: "What's your favorite teacher like?" "What's the hardest / your favorite subject?" "What do you have 5th period?" "Who's your favorite musician / band?" "What do you like to do on the weekends?" "What do you talk about with your parents?" "What are mornings like at your home?' etc... Each of these was a lesson plan!

[schwa]

I relate to Jizzo's approach -- whatever connects with student interests.

Public middle school, classes of 36 or so. I endeavor to spend several minutes up to half my classtime just engaging the kids in smalltalk. With the right encouragement they love to tell stories, even the most english-challenged among them. We laugh a lot.

I dont teach western culture per se but a bit of it comes out through sharing my regular doings. I'm more interested in helping & encouraging them to tell me about their traditions & usual activities. Isnt that what they'd first want to express to a new foreign friend?

Halloween, Christmas, etc, bah. Grammar, double bah -- thats what their Korean teachers already teach them, to the point theyre largely afraid to open their mouths.

Just get them talking. Thats what public schools hire us to do.

[Juregen]