Teach English in Loude Zhen - Tai'an Shi

Why do we do any of the things we do, as teachers in the classroom? What is our purpose? Our goal? What are we trying to achieve both personally and otherwise? If you ask this to question to any good teacher, the answer one hundred percent of the time, would undoubtedly be, for their students to learn, understand, and be able to apply the knowledge being presented to them in an effective and confident manner. Based on what students are able to produce at the end of a course, teachers would know the extent to which they have failed or succeeded and would know if relevant adjustments are needed for the future. Since our goal is for students to achieve all that was mentioned above, the question is, how is this all effectively accomplished? It is one thing to set forth goals, but another to actually see them come to fruition. In a perfect world, the teacher would stand at the front of the class, present the information to the students, the students would then understand and retain the information. But we do not live in a perfect world. More often than not, we are faced with mixed groups. There are students with short attention spans, ones who are just not motivated, students who lack confidence, differing intelligence levels, and the list goes on. In my time as a student, the most common method of teaching was for the teacher to stand in front of the class and lecture. I thought that this was the only way to teach, and success or failure mostly rested in the ability and discipline of the students. On one teaching experience a few years ago, some of my students asked for more fun classes. They asked for games. I honestly did not know how to go about that, I’ve never had that example set for me. The reason the students asked for this was because they were, at times, bored. And because they were bored, they couldn’t pay attention, and were therefore unable to understand or retain all of the information being presented to them. This was bad for both them, and for me, since it felt like my hard work went down the drain. This is one of the main reasons I believe that including games in a lesson is important. It combats a root cause for failure in learning, it combats boredom. Games help to keep the attention of the students because they are exciting and stimulating. Students are more engaged, and hence, the probability of success is greater. Another advantage of using games, is that it helps link the lesson to real life situations. This can have a motivating effect for the students, as they can see real purpose for them to take your class. This is important as one of the criticisms of school by students is that they fail to see the connection between what they are learning to real life situations. Using games can also help to build relationships among the students and also between the students and the teacher. This is very beneficial for students learning business English especially as practicing the language is important, and students are less inhibited by insecurities and lack of confidence with a group that they feel comfortable with. This leads to my other point. Even shy students are more likely to participate. This is so because, either the game is familiar to them, so they feel confident that they are competent, or that the atmosphere is a more relaxed one, so they don’t feel like they are under pressure. As humans we can be naturally competitive. Games facilitate that part of us. When used in the classroom, it can drive students to be self-motivated, and not depend on the teacher. Confidence is important. And even winning a game can boost confidence, which in turn has a positive effect when undertaking the course. Especially in a business English class, a good student practices with the language. A confident student is more likely to practice. All in all, the inclusion of games in a classroom setting is a great way to motivate and get students excited about learning.