Teacher Discussion Forums

I had been teaching English In Korea for two years, mostly in academies for children, with the odd adult thrown in, but I decided to make a change and come to Thailand to become a diving instructor. I am currently studying for this and have had the luck to to be in a school with a large number of Korean and Japanese students.

I have been asked to start running English conversation classes, which I am really happy to do. It will be a good earner and i hope will help with interaction between the Asian and Western diving students. (I know how friendly Korean people are, but here they are often very shy and it saddens me as they tend not to mix socially.)

So, i need some help with lesson planning, course structure, ways of assessing level etc. The island I am staying on is very small and there is little/no access to teaching materials. The classes will start on June 1st so i have some prep time. I have given them a questionnaire to fill in beforehand to try and find out a little about their abilities. I am planning to spend the first 1 hour class with introductions, I thought maybe team them up to ask each other questions, then introduce their friend to the class.

As previously suggested I will also do a survey about how they want to be taught.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated, unfortunately i have no formal teaching qualifications, just two years of classroom experience. The students are mostly in their early twenties with university level English.

Thanks for your help and taking time to read my very long post!!!

First, let me congratulate you on your almost ideal gig - teaching conversation by the beach! Sounds sweet.

You want a solid book with plenty of conversation materials - questions, quotes, and exercises covering a wide range of topics. You might check out www.compellingconversations.com which provides several free lessons. The book, designed for sophisticated adults like your Korean and Japanesse students, will provide hours of material with 45 self-contained chapters. There is even a chapter on the beach!

Good luck. And consider me a bit jealous!

Shalom

Eric
[email protected]
www.compellingconversations.com

Wonder how the classes are going?

We studied with PADI http://www.padi.com/padi/default.aspx and they had excellent materials - a book with questions, vidoes and tests. I thought the material was really well laid out for my Canadian students who couldn't read. He was able to see the video first and he viewed it many times and then he could figure out the words or at least knew enough of the subject to pass the oral tests. I'm sure your students could do both reading and writing with enough repeating and the subject matter would be relevant to them.