How to teach from the beginning?

[Leeqn]

I have been teaching ESL to Adults for five years now. And I still have difficulties in teaching students who speak, no to almost no English. Students who have literally stepped off the boat.

It runs two and a half hours, twice a week. My class is made up of students of varying levels. From beginner to advanced.

Can anyone tell me how to begin? What do I teach them? How do I teach them in a class of varying levels.

[Tara B]

Why are they all in the same class?

[Leeqn]

They are all in the same class because that is how the course is designed.

[Sally Olsen]

Have you found the post in this thread called "Looking for ideas!" It covered some of the same topic.

[Shannon M.]

I am in the process of getting my ESl certification. I was just asked to tudor a 15 year old kid who doesn't know any English. I have no idea how to start, I need all the suggestions I can get. Please, if you have them please post them.

Thanks a lot.

[Leeqn]

I am perplexed at the bewildering array of answers that I have received. I was under the impression that this is a forum to exchange ideas. I pose a simple question. How to proceed with a student and I am getting answers that read as if I am suppose to know them all and I shouldn't even be on this website. Have I posted this in the right forum? Maybe I should try another forum where people gladly share ideas without the animosity.

So I guess if I am posting on this forum then I must be open to new ideas. And since when does 5 years of teaching mean I know everything. May I ask why someone would take the time to write such a hostile reply? Wouldn't it have been easier to simply share the idea?

[joshua2004]

I think that the problem stems from the situation you are in. Myself, I have taught classes with people at extremely different levels and found the situation very difficult and not efficient.
My pessimistic advice is to split up the levels but, since you cannot do this I really don't have much to offer.
The only way a situation like this could work, that I know of, is if the students get to know each other extremely well, accept the differences in ability level, and are willing to do a give and take for when they are practicing at high levels of English and at lower levels.

I once put together native Spanish speakers and a native English speaker to learn each others' languages. The encounter worked beautifully since both had something the other wanted and the same goal of achieving language proficiency.

So the questions is what can a low ability student offer a high ability student. The answer is a lot, if the working relationship between them is strong. The high ability student can teach a lot to the low and in that exchange learn a lot more and also reinforce what she or he already knows.

There is also a great satisfaction that comes with teaching that sometimes is worth more than money or your own personal wants or needs. This is all however, dependent on a strong professional working relationship. The problem as I have encountered is that it takes too long to develop this; the students would probably quit out of frustration before cooperation within the group became the dominant type of interaction.

I understand peoples' replies to your post, in that dealing with this type of situation is very difficult. I would like to see some helpful responses to your situation as well, but I don't expect to see any silver bullets or even a cup half full.(I don't expect to see any solid, good advice)

If you don't find a solution that works for your class, I wouldn't blame yourself either! It sounds very difficult to say the least. If you teach to the high ability students, it will be incomprehensible to the low ability students and you risk them becoming disenchanted with learning English. If you teach to the low, the high ability student will get bored and see the class as a waste of time.

My advice: Negotiate with the class, explain how you have varying levels (with interpreters if necessary) of ability and that you wish to find a solution that meets everyones' needs. You would like to set up tutoring partners with high and low ability students where the high will be learning by teaching the low. Set out various objectives for the high to teach the low such as saying introductions, or questions asked in a restaurant, identifying numbers or letters from listening to them.

I would try to set up time for the high ability students to work together and the lows together and such to get a fair amount of challenge for everyone.

I would also like to fly around the world, but I don't expect to do it right away and setting up a class like I have said is not a matter of just writing up a lesson plan and go for it. Like I said, you need to build the relationships between the students in order for them to be able to make it a successful transaction and for them to be willing to put forth the effort to help each other.

I hope I don't sound as cranky as I feel right now from working all day with middle school kids. If I do then let me just say sorry and that you are a noble person for just asking how to handle the problem and the fact that you did shows you are a very caring and thoughtful individual.

To answer the question about how to teach people with none or almost no ability in English, I have found that the best teachers for them are their fellow students who have recently been through the rough experience of starting to learn a language. They are the ones who are most successful in making that student learn. So setting up group tasks where no one is finished until everyone is done.

If you are filling out a worksheet or practicing a dialogue or whatever, no one is done until everyone at their table is finished and understands. You can walk around and randomly quiz people to make sure everyone is being attended in the groups. Once the students learn that this is how the class is, they settle into this cooperative mindset and don't "feel" finished until their friends understand it.

It feels wonderful when you can achieve this type of cooperation. Even partial achievement is better than nothing. And if you don't try anything, then there's no sense getting up in the morning.

I hope I have been some help. I wish you the best in your difficult situation.

Josh

[Sally Olsen]

I am all with Josh for using groups and getting in tons of volunteers who will help the students individually. I was in this situation and felt that I was the facilitator of the program rather than teacher, arranging matches between volunteers and the students and providing the programs or projects for them to work on. Advanced students were often volunteers for beginners. There are a ton of retired people who like to be volunteers, nuns, housewives whose kids are school, people between jobs who need a reference and so on. If you put up notices in the community bulletin boards and in high rise apartments you will likely get a lot of responses. We always had to have a police report from the volunteer which is easily obtained saying they are free from any restrictions on their contacts with people and I always supervised them closely and told the students not to meet with them outside of the classroom situation. Of course, those boundaries were often crossed when we found we could trust the volunteers and the students became friends with the volunteers and vice versa but it useful to warn everyone in the beginning just in case.
If you read over the former posts in this thread for working with beginners you will get a ton of ideas of activities to do with them or for the volunteers to do with them. I used this web site a lot http://esl.about.com/library/weekly/aa022101a.htm
There are some great workbooks for beginners as well depending on your finances.

[Macavity]

Hello Leeqn,
you could use lots of realia to support your first few steps with your class. Lots of photos are ,I find, always a good thing to have. If you cut them out from magazines they are varied, interesting and cheap! (stick them to card and they'll last longer). You can make the mixed ability situation work for you. Putting stronger students with less able ones will lighten your load; 9 times out of ten they will direct and help the weaker students. One thing that you should try to do, if possible, is to split up any students that have the same mother tongue. If you have the unhappy situation where they all have the same first language, then you are going to need to be firm about how much use of this you'll allow. I Teach in Germany and for lower level students I try to foster the idea that we will use as much German as is needed, and as little as is possible - when they get to elementary level I no longer tolerate this use of L1.
Using posters is good. I use posters made out of old calendars- this has the advantage of having a slight cultural edge ( I use calendars and posters of English landscapes, American skyscrapers, Australian opera houses, etc.) The students, we shouldn't forget, are probably in the first stages of culture shock - and will need time and support to adjust to their new surroundings.
Using a bit of TPR is good in the early stages. It is something that you can join in with too, and this will help to build up a bond between you and your group. Lots of games and activities lend themselves to this.
Using flash cards with students is one idea to get you started on new vovab and grammar, and they can also be used in a lot of games!
Music is something worth exploring, if only to give the class a breather at first. But mood is going to be very important, especially early on, so one tip is to try and have a few plants in the room. A little greenery goes a long way in ESL!!!

Hope this helps a little
BW
Macavity

[Don La Bonte]

If the students have little ability to speak, help them out by identifying for them the most commonly used English conversation patterns. By helping them to focus on what they will hear the most and use the most will quickly accelerate their use and enjoyment of English.
Have a free list of these patterns at
www.geocities.com/don_labonte2001
Thanks
Don

[Jenny Miller]

Hey there! I'm feeling for you as I've been in a bit of the same situation. I've taken grad courses in second language acquisition and taught both Spanish and ESL, but I'm teaching true beginning ESL for the first time here. I had mixed levels to start, but fortunately they've split them up upon my request. For the beginners, I've been using a lot of visuals. I use pictures of their families and mine to work with vocabulary. I cut pictures out of ads for household items: I write the word on one index card and paste the picture on another. This way we can play matching games such as memory. For physical descriptions, we used the game "Guess Who?" (I stole this idea from a friend). I recently came across the book "Games and Butterflies", and it's been very helpful. Gees, though, if you have ideas, send them my way too, as I'm always wondering if I'm teaching appropriate vocab. I keep thinking I should teach them phone conversation, restaurant conversation, etc, etc., and not "he is short", "I am tall", but I guess you've got to start somewhere!!

AH, by the way games can be a great way to work with different levels in that some of the students can play a game while you work with other students - you know kind of the idea of setting up different stations. It's a lot of prep though, and I hope that you don't take too personally some of the comments that you received as my heart truly goes out to you!!!
Mua mua and best to you!
Jenny