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Teach English in Hengkou Zhen - Ankang Shi

Do you want to be TEFL or TESOL-certified and teach in Hengkou Zhen? Are you interested in teaching English in Ankang Shi? Check out ITTT’s online and in-class courses, Become certified to Teach English as a Foreign Language and start teaching English ONLINE or abroad! ITTT offers a wide variety of Online TEFL Courses and a great number of opportunities for English Teachers and for Teachers of English as a Second Language.

Many people choose teaching as a profession but not all of them teach after graduation. One of the reasons for not using their major is that they do not feel comfortable and confident in the classroom. Unfortunately, students notice this lack of confidence quickly and once they do, they lose their trust in the teacher. As teachers we all want to have successful and great lessons which give us confidence. Thus we can say confidence and effective lessons are interrelated. Confidence breeds effective lessons and effective lessons boost our confidence. Anyhow, confidence is not gained immediately after a teacher enters a classroom. This may take time to build and for this one should be very hardworking and persistent to acquire, because if after several lessons you feel your students are bored or you can not achieve the lesson goals, there is no way you can feel confident. During my teaching time I came to realize and single out some points which help me to be confident. Preparation- the first and perhaps the most important point is how well you are prepared. Here you can not do anything more but to know the subject as well as possible. Once you are sure about your level of knowledge, you do not fear about this. Perhaps, this is the major cause teachers are not confident as they are afraid to be asked a question the answer to which they may not know. The teacher should always think what possible questions he/she may be asked. So, thoughtful preparation is the pledge to your confidence. Panic- this is what one should try to avoid in the first place. As the Greek proverb says "When at a loss as to how to go on, cough". Even if you are prepared well, your students' curiosity and creativity may be greater than your knowledge and experience. You may be asked a question you did not consider at all. If so, just pause for a minute and think of solution. Once I found myself in a panic, when during a Business English class discussion a student asked me to explain why the participants should choose to sell the company over taking a loan from the bank. I just tried to explain my personal point of view because truly I did not know the answer to this question. Later, when I was doing my TEFL BE course, I learned that the teacher does not have to teach business but his/her task is to teach English. There can be questions the answers to which the teacher may not know. The teacher can just explain that he/she does not know the answer to that question ( in case of BE and other brunches of ESP) or simple say "sorry, I am not sure about this question. I will make it clear and answer you during the next class". Enthusiasm- McKeachie noted: " Probably no one thing is more important than the teacher's enthusiasm and energy". I taught a lesson very actively and enthusiastically and had a great lesson but taught the same lesson when I had fever, which means I could not be so active, and had a boring and dull lesson. Even when the lesson point is not very interesting to students they become somehow interested when they see the teacher's enthusiasm. They themselves become excited of that energy and try to take the language point. As Emerson said " Nothing great was ever accomplished without enthusiasm". Feedback- one way to better yourself is making clear your strengths and weaknesses. It is always a good idea to ask your students, colleagues and supervisors to give you written comments. But the teacher shouldn't fear from negative feedback, instead he/she should try to correct them. In order to have a real view of your work, it would be better to ask students to write comments without mentioning their names. Like this the students will not fear/shy and will be absolutely sincere in their comments. The teacher may ask them to write what they like/dislike about the lesson/teacher and what they would like to change. Good comments in their turn will increase the teacher's confidence. Like students, teachers need to be praised as well, in order to be sure they are doing a good job. Appearance- the last but not least on my list is appearance. Personally for me this of vital importance. In order to feel comfortable and confident during the class I must look tidy wearing appropriate clothes and make up with nice hairstyle and shoes. All students like to have nice teachers and admire them. But this should be different from what is nice and beautiful in everyday life. Your look must be appropriate for a teacher. All these points are the keys to my effective lessons and accordingly to my confidence in the classroom.


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