Teach English in Sunlaojia Zhen - Heze Shi

There are a vast number of subjects and aspects related to teaching, regardless of the language being taught or the age of the learners. Learning techniques, teaching technologies and Computer Aided learning, correction techniques and grammar related problems are just a few examples.Personally, i believe Learning teaching skills appears to be very interesting, as it is a useful subject that can cover a lot of issues about teaching and research on it would add a deeper understanding of teaching to one's knowledge. when discussing teaching skills and learning them, first step would be a vigorous search on different skills, discover what they are and how to achieve or improve them.Teaching skills are numerous: Patience,Adaptability,Imagination,Teamwork,Risk Taking ,Communication,Mentoring,Critical Thinking,Passion,Technical Skills,Confidence,Flexibility, classroom Management and many more. A teacher must have a lot of skills,play different number of roles and hold several responsibilities.Most skills are human-related and depend highly on the nature of human being and psychological factors, others relate to technical issues and organizational structure. Every single individual is the result of various environmental and biological factors thus, posses different set of skills and the degree of proficiency in each skill, varies from one person to another. Hence, not every teacher can have same set of skills and master each skill in the same level as others. However, some skills are essential to the characteristic of a teacher. In my opinion, this essential set of skill is consist of but not limited only to: Confidence and empathy . There is no doubt that a teacher must have sufficient knowledge of the subject , in this case teaching English. There is a direct relation between the level of knowledge and the confidence acquired. the more well-informed , the more confident one can be. However, confidence does not solely depend on the level of knowledge .There are various other elements that have significant impact on formation of confidence. confidence is the quality of having a clear vision. it is the result of knowing what your goal as a teacher is and how you are taking right steps to a direction leading to that specific goal.It boosts the performance of a teacher, helps to build strong rapport with students and colleagues and increases the level of trust between all parties.Thus in order to built confidence as a teacher, it is not sufficient to solely study further and increase the level of knowledge.What is important is to have a clear vision , to know one's strength and weaknesses and to know students deeply as a result of paying meticulous attention to their needs and interests. The next most important quality or skill a teacher should posses is empathy or any human affection attribute that differs a teacher-student interaction from any other types of interaction .The advance of technology has changed almost all aspects of human's life in many different ways. The availability of Technology at human's disposal has changed the way knowledge is learned.More resources are available and more people have access to a knowledge that once was reserved only for a certain group of people. This accessibility of knowledge has also transformed the process of language learning. A lot of people are relying on internet and self-study materials to learn new languages or improve their level of knowledge ,thus they are more interacting with machines .Although this alteration in language acquisition has certain benefits,it lacks the element of human interaction.Empathy is the most significant difference between a teacher as a human and a teaching device. Empathy is the assurance students require to know that a teacher is not just a machine but an affectionate human being who will support them throughout the language learning journey. Technology has improved human life outstandingly . science, medicine, transportation and many other fields have benefited the most.Like many, language and language learning have benefited the improvement of technology as well ,but in my opinion since language has an ancient nature ,it is still best learned in a human oriented state.That is the reason why, although having high technical skills can help a teacher notably, the soft skills or human related skills have more impact on the success of a teacher.To my way of thinking, to be an effective teacher one most learn to improve its quality as a human first, then as a teacher.