HELP! How can I teach adults that NEVER study???

[monseul]

Hello All,
So, here is my situation: I work for a business as an English teacher. I teach about 40 adults and I have them separated into five different levels. Since they are so busy with their jobs, I am only able to have class twice a week with them. Example:

First day: 1 on 1 class for 20-30 minutes
Second day: Group class

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Originally, we were gonna do one chapter a week, but since they don't study I think it doesn't work. But at the same time I don't want them to be bored with the review. Do you think I'm being too anal if I expect everybody to know the chapter before moving on to the next? I'm actually thinking about ditching the books and I am overwhelmed with where to start. I want them to know everything Here are some ideas I was thinking to incorporate all aspects of the English language:

Listening:
Advanced: NPR ***Does anybody know of a program where you can watch the broadcast news? Kind of like DemocracyNow, but not with politics?
Elementary: VOA Special English

Speaking: Give an oral review of what they listened to.
Although, I also want to teach them natural expressions. Such as phrases to express interest (oh really? i see. that's interesting)

Vocabulary: Here I need help. Do you think it's better for me to ONLY review the vocabulary from the news program? I want them to also learn idioms and phrasal verbs, but I don't know how many per week is good.

Writing: Not sure how to do this one either? Maybe have them write a journal or review a different program they listened to?

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Could anybody suggest a schedule that I could follow? This is my idea:

Monday
Due: A written summary of program they listened to from Thursday. I will give some questions that they have to respond to.

Tuesday
Send new article to listen to as homework.
With me: 1 on 1, review vocab that'll be in the news article

Wednesday
E-mail grammar exercise that is due Thursday.

Thursday
With me: Speaking test related to program from Tuesday.
E-mail them new program
....not sure what else I could do here for class

Friday
Phone conversation (so they can practice talking on the phone). I'll ask random questions about the two previous programs.

Thanks in advance for the help.

[beergirl]

Hi Monseul,

I am very interested in your question here, and actually your teaching programme is very good and detailed. But if the students do not want to learn, then we have no idea, i understand. Maybe you can try to change your teaching modules according to their actual levels and try to make the lessons very active and let the students put their hearts into your lessons, that's success.

By the way, i want to know what the most important is for teaching adults, for instance, how to make them impress the lessons and how to remember what i teach them. Do you have some ideas?

i have added you in my MSN, we can exchange online if you like, thanks.

[Superhal]

adults are terrible students.

imho, start out small, with basic activities here and there, and slowly get them used to studying at home.

generally, if you assign reading outside of class, it takes them hours to do it. try assigning activities or practice of classwork rather than preparation.

[monseul]

I agree, adults are not my favorite to teach, especially when their half-assing it. Sigh, if only I could teach a different level, but I'm binded.

I found this great website: www.breakingnewsenglish.com that I have my advanced students listen to, but before I have them go over some exercises to understand the vocab.

I just really want my students to understand listening and be able to express their opinions with minimal grammatical errors.
Ah...if one can dream.

[strider]

Hi monseul,

It sounds like you have a tricky problem here.

I, too, teach in a company, with about the same number of students. Here's an exercise that seems to work well, without expecting too much of the students.

During the lesson, write between 10 and 15 sentences on the board. These could be your target sentences, corrections of mistakes or linked to other events during the lesson. At the end of the lesson, dictate the sentences to the students. Then ask each student to e-mail the sentences to you before the next lesson. (You can correct the sentences by return e-mail, if you want). At the start of the next lesson, you go though the sentences one more time as a listen and repeat exercise.

It means that the 'essential' elements of the lesson will be read, typed, heard and spoken by the student. This helps to consolidate so you can move on.

Once you get them into the habit, you can exploit the sentences more. For example, you could say a sentence to a student and ask him to repeat but change from affirmatice to negative, from active to passive, from second to third conditional, etc, depending on the level.

Let us know how things develop!

[revel]

Hey all!

Why are your students in class in the first place? Ask each of them to clearly state why they are studying English with you (the boss makes me, I want to review what I studied in school, I need to write a lot of emails in English for work, I'm going on vacation to New York City, I really like the guy who works in the cubicle next to me but during work hours we never get to chat and he signed up for this class as well and I want to sit next to him and maybe get to know him better....etc).

Ask them to define home study for you. Many may say that it is sitting for an hour with the book reviewing classwork or doing homework. Others may say that they don't have time to study. Others simply don't have any idea how to study.

Reduce their study periods outside of class to fifteen minutes or less and on a nearly daily basis. No working person has time to sit down for an hour every day. However, all working adults can find a minute or two to practice some detail or other if they have material to practice that only takes a minute or two.

Frequency Adverb Placement (for example). Write five sentences with frequency adverbs (I always have breakfast at seven.) on a post-it note and stick it to the fridge for a week. Every time you go to the fridge, before opening the door and reaching for a fermented grain beverage, repeat those five sentences five times. Shouldn't take more than a few seconds. The reward is the FGB.

Brainstorm with your students different moments in their day that they can use for such short practice sessions. Give them short exercises that they can use. Encourage them to move that post-it note around the house so that it does not become invisible. Ask them where they keep their ESL materials, in a drawer (very bad), on their desk but under a pile of papers (bad), in the middle of the livingroom on the coffee table, next to the remote control (a bit better), on the night table (ok).

I just don't think that they never study but rather that they easily find ways of not studying and then explain those ways as if they were excuses. Without regular study they won't get very far very fast.

peace,
revel.