This is a bit of a touchy issue and I apologise in advance to anyone who thinks I'm resorting to stereotypes but...
I teach mixed nationality groups in the UK. I'm noticing that there's one particular group that always struggle: young men from Saudi Arabia. I know everyone's different but I've taught men and women from other countries in the middle east and while they have their own problems, they don't stand out as finding it harder than everyone else. In my experience, young Saudi males consistently just don't seem to get it even when my explanations work for everyone else in the group.
Does anyone else find this group especially hard to get through to, and what do they do about it?
Teaching Saudi men
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fluffyhamster
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LarryLatham
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Although I really can't say that my experience with Saudi males is extensive, lolwhites, I do have some. I find your comments to be familiar sounding. In fact, in my experience they would also apply to young men from several middle-eastern oil-rich countries. I've had a total of, maybe, 100 such students.
Here is what I concluded about them, but someone with greater experience here (Stephen Jones, for example) might have a sounder point-of-view: Many such students do not seriously want to learn English, but have been sent, by their parents or by their governments, to English speaking countries in hopes that something will rub off.
One incident that helped me come to this conclusion was a single student from Saudi Arabia who was a young officer in the military, and who had been sent by his army bosses to learn English. He was serious, and he learned as well and as quickly as anybody. His motivation seemed to be the key.
Larry Latham
Here is what I concluded about them, but someone with greater experience here (Stephen Jones, for example) might have a sounder point-of-view: Many such students do not seriously want to learn English, but have been sent, by their parents or by their governments, to English speaking countries in hopes that something will rub off.
One incident that helped me come to this conclusion was a single student from Saudi Arabia who was a young officer in the military, and who had been sent by his army bosses to learn English. He was serious, and he learned as well and as quickly as anybody. His motivation seemed to be the key.
Larry Latham
It's reassuring to hear I'm not the only one, Larry 
I also agree with what you say about other gulf states - I once had to teach EFL to a group of young men from the UAE who had been sent by the military to learn aeronautical engineering. Again, everyone who taught them found all bar one or two of them to be very hard to motivate; the two keen ones coped pretty well. Interestingly, although they were all in their early twenties, I was warned I would have to treat them like teenagers.
I wonder if there is some cultural barrier going here, though it's strange that it should apply particularly to young men from oil-rich gulf states.
I also agree with what you say about other gulf states - I once had to teach EFL to a group of young men from the UAE who had been sent by the military to learn aeronautical engineering. Again, everyone who taught them found all bar one or two of them to be very hard to motivate; the two keen ones coped pretty well. Interestingly, although they were all in their early twenties, I was warned I would have to treat them like teenagers.I wonder if there is some cultural barrier going here, though it's strange that it should apply particularly to young men from oil-rich gulf states.
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Stephen Jones
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Keen Saudi students are excellent, among the best you will ever have.
There are a considerable proportion who really are not keen. What they also seem to have is an incredible ability to switch their minds off. I have students (and I am talking about up to 20% of a class) who maybe will do two minutes work in a week. The rest of the time they just sit staring into space.
With the average student one thing you must bear in mind is that they are slower at getting themselves organized. Say "open your books", put the page number on the board, and wait two minutes. They also get confused when you go from one activity to another. They feel they should be working at their own pace, not yours, and so you will find they are still finishing off what your were doing ten minutes beforehand, and haven't even clicked they should be doing something else with the rest of the class.
With average students also bear in mind that they vary greatly in their wriiting speed, since it is a different script, and that this is possibly the first time many of them have actually had the opportunity to see a woman, apart from their mothers and sisters, and this can exacerbate the tendency to be distracted and to daydream.
And finally remember that their idea of learning something is copying down what you have written, and memorizing it. It is difficult to get them to realize that language is an activity, not a subject.
There are a considerable proportion who really are not keen. What they also seem to have is an incredible ability to switch their minds off. I have students (and I am talking about up to 20% of a class) who maybe will do two minutes work in a week. The rest of the time they just sit staring into space.
With the average student one thing you must bear in mind is that they are slower at getting themselves organized. Say "open your books", put the page number on the board, and wait two minutes. They also get confused when you go from one activity to another. They feel they should be working at their own pace, not yours, and so you will find they are still finishing off what your were doing ten minutes beforehand, and haven't even clicked they should be doing something else with the rest of the class.
With average students also bear in mind that they vary greatly in their wriiting speed, since it is a different script, and that this is possibly the first time many of them have actually had the opportunity to see a woman, apart from their mothers and sisters, and this can exacerbate the tendency to be distracted and to daydream.
And finally remember that their idea of learning something is copying down what you have written, and memorizing it. It is difficult to get them to realize that language is an activity, not a subject.
I've stumbled into your forum through googling the web for international students forums, but I couldn’t help myself from the interesting discussion that been going on regarding the Saudi men, and I would like to post my thoughts about the matter (though I am not a formal teacher)…
I can’t say anything about your observation for, as I said I am not a teacher, and it can’t be the old time saying that men are usually *slower*, if that was an appropriate word to use, than women in taking up teaching in general, because I am sure that the observer was compaing men to other men of different nationality, but what I think, which again you can be the judge in that (as lolo have posted the different nationalities of the students in her/his class), that most if not all, these nationalities are speaking a latin language after all… the letter to start with are the same, plus the many similarities that follows from that reason…
I wonder if someone tried to learn a totally different language, like for example learning Arabic? It would be more challenging than you think, as per the comments of the Arabic students of a latin speaking origin (amerincans). If you never learnt a new language, then think about it like if you are decoding these symbols on the pyramids!… I for one enjoy leanring different languages, and have come to the conclusion that you can only be a best teacher when you try being the student yourself…
I can’t say anything about your observation for, as I said I am not a teacher, and it can’t be the old time saying that men are usually *slower*, if that was an appropriate word to use, than women in taking up teaching in general, because I am sure that the observer was compaing men to other men of different nationality, but what I think, which again you can be the judge in that (as lolo have posted the different nationalities of the students in her/his class), that most if not all, these nationalities are speaking a latin language after all… the letter to start with are the same, plus the many similarities that follows from that reason…
I wonder if someone tried to learn a totally different language, like for example learning Arabic? It would be more challenging than you think, as per the comments of the Arabic students of a latin speaking origin (amerincans). If you never learnt a new language, then think about it like if you are decoding these symbols on the pyramids!… I for one enjoy leanring different languages, and have come to the conclusion that you can only be a best teacher when you try being the student yourself…
I'm sorry if I gave the impression that Saudis are the only Arabic speakers in my class; I've also taught Syrians, Jordanians, Libyans and Emiratis of both sexes and none seem to struggle as much as Saudi men. There seems to be more to it than just a language barrier, though I readily concede that the numbers make it hard to say anything statistically significant.