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TEFL Krasnodar

Check out Tesolcourse.com about TEFL Krasnodar and apply today to be certified to teach English abroad.

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This is how our TEFL graduates feel they have gained from their course, and how they plan to put into action what they learned:

M.C. - U.S.A. said:
Every country has a different system for both teaching and learning, and while some countries may be similar in their styles and educational philosophies, no two countries are exactly alike. While we in most Western countries today tend to favor a more student-centered approach to teaching and learning, some other countries do not. This is the case in china, a country we spent some time teaching. We would therefore like to discuss some of the problems chinese students face when learning english. One of the biggest problems that chinese students face is that they grow up accustomed to many rote-learning practices. While rote-learning, repetition and reciting have some advantages in learning another language (especially in terms of vocabulary learning), it can also present some problems. One of these problems is that the students are very accustomed to reciting entire sentences and even speeches. They can be very good at reciting this to a point where they can even make it sound like their own work but when asked to engage in learning that requires creativity or ‘thinking outside the square’, this can present them with some difficulty as they are not accustomed to having to problem-solve or apply principles to a situation. They are very good at reciting grammar rules, but they may not be as good at applying them. A second problem facing chinese students in learning a language is that they do not like to ‘lose face’. While most students do not enjoy the prospect of making mistakes and even become embarrassed at doing so, for chinese (and many other Asian) students this can be particularly terrifying. This results in them trying to often avoid ‘risks’ with their learning and so generating class discussion or spontaneous speaking tasks can become very difficult indeed. This can also have the effect of students not trying to answer questions when asked, even if they may know the answer. An additional problem from this can be that the students will say yes to questions about comprehension, although they do not understand. This situation can be frustrating for a teacher and lead to difficulty in determining how much a student has grasped of what has been taught. A third problem facing chinese students when learning english is that there can often be a concern with motivation and enjoyment. Since the chinese education system is often built around competition and forced learning, many students equate learning english with mental ‘torture’ or anguish. They may have had bad experiences with learning the language in the past from overzealous teachers who may have even hit them for saying, writing or spelling a word or sentence wrong. It is a requirement for school students to learn english and they are often very much forced to do so by both teachers and parents alike. This can result in highly stressed students who are very hard on themselves. Some students are also used to being ‘browbeaten’ for their mistakes and so as a teacher, this can take a mountain of work to try and overcome. The positive side of this though is that many chinese students recognize the importance of english and if they have had positive experiences through school, motivation can be high for learning. There are of course other problems that face chinese students and these can include a willingness to cheat and copy others work, handing in plagiarized assignments, experience with incorrectly taught pronunciation and grammar, and so on. In addition to these problems, in terms of pronunciation, chinese students can tend to pronounce english words somewhat ‘hard’ and this can affect clarity and ‘flow’, along with the tonal nature of their language sometimes affecting phoneme stress and intonation when speaking another language. With reading, chinese students are generally quite good at comprehension but may have some difficulty with contextual words, though this can be common through learners of all backgrounds. As for listening, even advanced learners can have difficulty determining between some numbers and this can cause confusion. When writing, chinese students can often have very engrained grammatical errors that can be difficult for them to change, given they have perhaps learned these since they were very young. While these are some of the problems faced by chinese students learning english, they also have a number of factors that help them to pick up english as well and this can be advantageous to their learning. Students from every country and culture have their own background, skill set and educational history that can either help or hinder them. When all is said and done though, it is up to us as teachers to recognize these strengths and weaknesses and tailor our courses and lessons accordingly.


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