Teach English in Yangying Zhen - Jining Shi

As a teacher building confidence in any classroom can prove to be a difficult task, however confidence in a classroom is vital to a student’s success in a subject. Confidence will provide students with the motivation to actively engage in class and foster their ability to grow. There are many ways for a teacher to build confidence in a classroom some of the most effective ways are building rapport between them and the students, being knowledgeable or prepared in the subject being taught, and lastly to be mindful about the frequency of correction occurring during class time. Teachers will find that they must begin building confidence in their students from the first day that they walk through the door. Every teacher will be confronted with a First Day of class and it should be noted that this day is the beginning of establishing a positive rapport with their students. So, on the first day of class instead of diving into a serious grammar lesson a teacher might actually want to begin with an icebreaker, or a simple warming activity. For example, starting class with a basic survey, or a pass the ball game. These kinds of activities will show the students that a teacher cares about student interest, and is also used to allow students and teachers to learn a little about one another. With these kinds of activities students and teachers can build trust with one another and help with the growth in confidence in their relationship. Confidence in a student teacher relationship will allow individual students to feel like they can come to the teacher with questions, or allow a teacher to make helpful corrections with out feeling like they may be damaging a student’s personal confidence or motivation. A teacher’s rapport with their students is extremely important and is the first building block to creating confidence in the classroom, but a lack of knowledge in the material being taught can cause students to quickly forget about the rapport that was built and minimize their confidence. Students will always look to their teachers as a model for the subject at hand. As any teacher should recognize it is impossible to know everything, however it is crucial to be well informed about the subject being taught. Showing a lack of knowledge will cause students to question the teacher’s ability, and their familiarity of a subject. So, it is imperative that a teacher uses resources such as reading material, or other credible online data basis in the case that any difficult or unfamiliar questions come up. Secondly, a knowledgeable teacher will come up with well thought out and organized lesson plan. This will help a teacher smoothly deliver a lesson and anticipate any issues or questions that students might have. A teacher in the classroom is the provider of knowledge so the must exude confidence when they are teaching. This kind of self-assurance will allow students to trust their teachers, and hopefully students will reciprocate that confidence while learning. A student’s ability to learn or retain information will be partially based on certain recognition given by the teacher. What this means is that a teacher will need to recognize when something is done correctly or when something is done incorrectly. However, in a classroom setting a student’s self-esteem can easily be reduced when a teacher is constantly addressing mistakes. It is important to make corrections for a student to get things right, but the frequency and delivery of each correction makes a big impact on confidence in the classroom. In order to boost confidence in the classroom and to help fix mistakes at the same time teachers can do a couple things such as allow the students to self-correct, speak to a student individually, or let another student make a correction. Students who self-correct will reflect on their mistake and come to fruition on their own. Allowing a peer to help find or fix a mistake is another way for students to find confidence in with one another and personally, however this technique should be used with careful discretion by the teacher. Both self- correction and peer- correction permit students to work through the problem themselves and make the lesson stick. Lastly, making a correction after class can be helpful if a student may seem embarrassed or uncomfortable during a lesson. A teacher needs to think carefully when choosing how and when something should be corrected as it can heavily impact the student’s level of confidence. Confidence is a key component to a successful classroom. A teacher must work out their own strategies to build that confidence and there are so many ways to do so. Confidence will boost student motivation and create a healthy and exciting learning community. A teacher can do this by creating a good rapport with their students, being knowledgeable, and thinking about how and when they make corrections in their classrooms. Without confidence in the classroom lessons will be less effective, and student engagement will be low. So, it is important to create confidence and to use it as a tool every day.