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Many factors come into play to deliver a successful lesson, especially one that not only teaches but motivates our students to continue researching, to extend their knowledge. What distinguishes a good lesson from a successful one? Well, first of all, I consider there is a big difference between these terms, as one encompasses more than the other. I would define a good lesson as one in which the teacher is capable of delivering the entire content as scheduled in his program, but this, of course, does not necessarily mean the students retained all the information of said lesson. A successful lesson, on the other hand, has little to do with timing, and more with delivering an impact, giving the students something to internalize. Lessons should be way more than just reviewing content, they should reinforce our students' confidence in their abilities, and the only way to achieve this is by providing them with a safe environment in which they can practice what they have learned. This atmosphere is just as important as the content and is what we refer to as group dynamics. Group dynamics entail many things, such as the relationship among students, the relationship between the teacher and the students, and how we integrate group activities into our lessons. Acquiring a new language isn't just about memorizing a bunch of new vocabulary; it also involves learning about other cultures and its people. Therefore, we need to immerse ourselves in the language by practicing useful exchanges. The main reason we learn languages is to be able to communicate and interact with others or to satisfy a necessity. Some of the motives that inspire students to learn a particular language are having friends or relatives living abroad, further employment opportunities, studying in a foreign country, desire to travel, among others. Hence, the best thing we can do for our students is to expose them to as many situations as possible inside the classroom, by doing this, we will encourage them to experiment with what they have learned, and use the language to accomplish something. An example of this technique could be, teach our students restaurant related vocabulary, and later on, as a group activity let students role-play by allowing some to be waiters, while others pretend to be clients. Once done with the activity, our next step would be to encourage our students to visit a real-life restaurant that allows them to test their new skills. These situational group activities are essential for increasing fluency and the confidence of our students. Because now, they did not only learn and retain a new set of words but were able to accomplish something with it. This accomplishment leaves the students with an impact on their learning process and will motivate them to investigate how to adapt this new vocabulary to other means, which should be our primary goal as teachers. With this, we can conclude that group dynamics greatly benefit the learning process by proving the opportunity of a more natural and practical approach to the language in a safe environment, before applying it in real-life situations.
