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Teach English in Tanba Zhen - Ankang Shi

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One of my favorite units in this program was when we watched two full classes and compared the two. I loved how the first one they showed was the poorly taught one. The teacher came in, formed no connection with the students, and just started teaching. We saw that the student really didn’t comprehend what the teacher was trying to teach them, but he just kept repeating his question over and over until he gave them the right answer. This abrasiveness and lack of empathy was wearing down on the student’s confidence and it was very visible. They were afraid to speak because anytime they got the answer wrong, the teacher seemed angry and had very poor body language directed towards them. Another factor that was hurting their confidence was that the teacher wasn’t setting them up to succeed. He would just jump right into the lesson and start teaching, no warm-up to get the students engaged, just drilling, and since they didn’t know the information they started off not being confident in the first place. Then at the end of the class they go into groups to do an assignment based on the lesson that was just poorly taught, and the students are barely talking with one another. They weren’t talking because not only did they not understand the instructions and not understand the lesson, they just went through a class where their confidence was ripped from them, so they are afraid to look like they are behind everyone else which will cause everyone to hold their tongue. The second class was functioning well on all cylinders. I enjoyed watching the kids gain confidence and being continually engaged. As soon as the kids sat down the teacher went around the class and made and effort to learn everyone’s name. This got them to break out of their shell a little bit and gave them the feeling that they have a bit of an individual connection with the teacher. This simple thing that the teacher did was such an important was to start the class, and when it comes to getting the students confidence started, it wasn’t so simple at all. Speaking up in front of your peers is one of the most challenging things to do for many people and getting the students to do this in a safe comfortable manner helps increase their confidence before the class has even begun. Next the teacher had a fill in the gap activity that the students had to fill in on the board. The teacher called on students by name and pointed at them when he wanted them to answer a question. When the students were called on they were more familiar with what was being taught so they were able to answer the questions with confidence. When the kids didn’t know the answer, the teacher helped them along by giving them familiar words or prompting them to the right word, then he gave them a way to remember the word. Instead of putting them down he encouraged them and lifted them up, so when he called on other student’s they were smiling and eager to answer his questions. At the end of the class the student’s got into groups to start the last activity. They were immediately talking, conversating, and tackling the assignment together. There wasn’t a beat skipped, the students were smiling, running to the teacher to show him that they had the right answer, and when they didn’t have the right answer they didn’t get discouraged because he didn’t put them down, he taught them in a comforting manner the right way to do it. They were smiling, engaged, and best of all full of confidence. This is how you build confidence in your students, you break the ice in a way that’s comfortable to them, you form some kind of rapport with them, and throughout the class you build them up, help them, and guide them to learning the material. Every student will be different of course, but this approach to building their confidence is definitely one to follow. They need to be comfortable with the teacher, and they need to feel like the teacher wants to help them, not just judge and test them. Building confidence in the students is key to having a productive, engaging class, and as the two videos showed, it makes a remarkable difference in the way the students learn the lesson.


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