Thirty pairs of eyes stare up at me from the floor. My voice is cracking slightly after the fifth rendition of incy-wincy spider. After five weeks I sound like a broken record, but my critics play along quite happily, clapping and laughing at my foreign words.
I remember back to my first week of teaching and how knackered I was come Friday; every lesson preparing for a performance like an amateur actress. I would lap the classroom impatiently, peering over my students shoulders desperate for them to write the right things and understand my instructions. I'd hurry them along, dismissing wrong answers and clinging to the stronger students in the class to carry my lessons through to the end.
Today, the combination of too much singing and not much food (a lunch of chickens feet and noodle soup wasn't a favourite) means that I'm slower in my lesson. We're doing families and I've scribbled out a family tree with grandparents, aunts, uncles and parents. For the first five minutes even the brightest in the class are hesitant to put pencil to paper and I ask P'Om to translate, nervous that they haven't understood the lesson. Ten minutes I think exact copies of my own family are appearing on the pieces of paper in front of me...I panic. I write more English on the board thinking about steering the lessson onto more productive things.
"Teacher Lizzie" rings from the back of the class and I sit down with some of the naughtier students prepared to start from the beginning. What I find are wonky trees, smiling cartoon faces, and eager children wanting to boast at how many aunts and uncles they all have.
We count together and they laugh as I mispronounce names. I realise that actually they are taking something away from the lesson and that actually the worse student in the class is me. Impatient to see huge leaps in progress, I've rushed through wanting the most exciting and glamourous teaching performances; desperate for my students to like me and my lessons. I've totally underestimated how important it is to have patience with my students, to let them learn for themselves.
They don't finish the sheet, in fact they're nowhere near finishing. I set it as homework and I sit down straight away to write out my own: My top five tips of foreign language teaching.
1. Never underestimate repitition.
It might sound stupid to you but it really does take a long time for a new peice of vocabularly to be introduced, learnt and remembered. I'm embarassed how many times I've asked for P'Om to repeat certain Thai words and exactly the same goes for my students. Learning a second language is hard. Repitition is golden.
2. Be patient.
Languages aren't learnt in a day. Sometimes a silent few minutes in front of a working class can feel like hours, but don't be scared to leave time for students to think things through for themselves and work it out.
3. Always have an escape route.
Sometimes it's just too hot or everyone is just too tired. Having a few games or songs as back up are so useful to re-energise or re-focus the class if they're flagging.
4. Don't be scared to ask for help.
It still feels like a privilege as a teaching assistant to be left alone at the front of the class to teach, but it can be a burden too. Never feel like you're failing if you have to ask for help - it helps the students more than anything and helps develop a good relationship with the other teachers at the school.
5. Don't rely on worksheets.
A worksheet can be a blessing and a curse. If they are well planned and given out at the right time in lessons they can be really useful. If they aren't, students are used to copying and completing sheets without actually digesting much of what you are teaching. Make sure you think through the worksheet thoroughly. Try to make sure that the sentences have been covered orally before the student encounters them in their writtten form. Then test after the worksheet has been completed; it's only another means for the students to practice, by the next lesson you're pretty likely to need to revisit the topics from the previous session and check understanding again.
I remember back to my first week of teaching and how knackered I was come Friday; every lesson preparing for a performance like an amateur actress. I would lap the classroom impatiently, peering over my students shoulders desperate for them to write the right things and understand my instructions. I'd hurry them along, dismissing wrong answers and clinging to the stronger students in the class to carry my lessons through to the end.
Today, the combination of too much singing and not much food (a lunch of chickens feet and noodle soup wasn't a favourite) means that I'm slower in my lesson. We're doing families and I've scribbled out a family tree with grandparents, aunts, uncles and parents. For the first five minutes even the brightest in the class are hesitant to put pencil to paper and I ask P'Om to translate, nervous that they haven't understood the lesson. Ten minutes I think exact copies of my own family are appearing on the pieces of paper in front of me...I panic. I write more English on the board thinking about steering the lessson onto more productive things.
"Teacher Lizzie" rings from the back of the class and I sit down with some of the naughtier students prepared to start from the beginning. What I find are wonky trees, smiling cartoon faces, and eager children wanting to boast at how many aunts and uncles they all have.
We count together and they laugh as I mispronounce names. I realise that actually they are taking something away from the lesson and that actually the worse student in the class is me. Impatient to see huge leaps in progress, I've rushed through wanting the most exciting and glamourous teaching performances; desperate for my students to like me and my lessons. I've totally underestimated how important it is to have patience with my students, to let them learn for themselves.
They don't finish the sheet, in fact they're nowhere near finishing. I set it as homework and I sit down straight away to write out my own: My top five tips of foreign language teaching.
1. Never underestimate repitition.
It might sound stupid to you but it really does take a long time for a new peice of vocabularly to be introduced, learnt and remembered. I'm embarassed how many times I've asked for P'Om to repeat certain Thai words and exactly the same goes for my students. Learning a second language is hard. Repitition is golden.
2. Be patient.
Languages aren't learnt in a day. Sometimes a silent few minutes in front of a working class can feel like hours, but don't be scared to leave time for students to think things through for themselves and work it out.
3. Always have an escape route.
Sometimes it's just too hot or everyone is just too tired. Having a few games or songs as back up are so useful to re-energise or re-focus the class if they're flagging.
4. Don't be scared to ask for help.
It still feels like a privilege as a teaching assistant to be left alone at the front of the class to teach, but it can be a burden too. Never feel like you're failing if you have to ask for help - it helps the students more than anything and helps develop a good relationship with the other teachers at the school.
5. Don't rely on worksheets.
A worksheet can be a blessing and a curse. If they are well planned and given out at the right time in lessons they can be really useful. If they aren't, students are used to copying and completing sheets without actually digesting much of what you are teaching. Make sure you think through the worksheet thoroughly. Try to make sure that the sentences have been covered orally before the student encounters them in their writtten form. Then test after the worksheet has been completed; it's only another means for the students to practice, by the next lesson you're pretty likely to need to revisit the topics from the previous session and check understanding again.