TEFL Marshall New York

I have gained a great deal of information upon completing this course. Although I had previously taught young learners for a number of months during the past year, I had the impression that this course would be more a review of what I had previously learned through experience. However, I was extremely mistaken. Although I had previously taught in a monolingual and multilingual environment, I realized that efl students are drastically different than the students I taught, for most of the students I taught already spoke english and were learning the basic mechanisms of grammar. Completing this course opened my eyes to the fact that teaching in an efl setting comes with its own set of challenges and barriers that must be overcome with patience, understanding and very specific techniques, all of which have been provided during the duration of this course. Completing this course has shown me that every single classroom has a different dynamic and each class must be handled in a very different way. From the initial few units that I completed, I learned that there are multiple levels of language ability that differ quite drastically from each other. It did not seem that way at first but as I progressed throughout the units, I realized how much care and consideration has to go into the level of english the students possess and how different the lesson planning must be to cater to their different needs. In Unit 3, I learned the basic tenants of ESA lesson planning and began my first attempt at structuring a lesson plan that incorporated the three phases; engage, study and activate. I learned how different these phases are from each other and what each must possess, but more importantly I learned that they cannot be left out of a lesson plan; each initial phase is a transition point into the next and is a cumulative lesson that builds up over its foundation. I was unaware that general feedback and correcting student errors is not appropriate at any point in the lesson but must be relegated to certain phases in order to keep students motivated and eager to continue forward. Units 4, 6 and 8 was where I learned how to properly explain verb tenses to students, how to juxtapose them against one another and properly incorporate them into a lesson plan in a way that explains these difficult areas in an easy-to-understand way. I believe this was a very important lesson I took from this course; I always felt that I made grammar lessons too complicated on the students I had taught in the past and did not know how to teach them in a way that wasn't overly complicated. I feel that I have taken away some very important key points related to grammar that make explaining verb tenses much easier for both and any future student I may teach, and I am very grateful that I have gained this knowledge. Unit 5 was very teacher focused and brought to light the fact that the basic physical presence a teacher exudes impacts the students in a very critical way. While completing this particular unit, I was constantly thinking about my own past experiences while reading the PDF and realizing that I had been guilty of a few basic errors with both physical presence, giving equal attention to students and teacher talking time. It was very humbling to read through those pages and answer the question in a way that made me learn from my own previous mistakes, due to my inexperience as a teacher. I feel like I took a great deal of information from Unit 5 that I can apply to myself particularly, to essentially be a more available, fair and better teacher in the future. Unit 9 was where I finally began creating actual lesson plans, which included straight arrow, patchwork, boomerang and the basic ESA structure. I was a bit nervous at this point but I read back onto the previous units I had accomplished and was able now to pool all these different points of information together to understand how they all interconnected and wove into a concise, structured lesson plan. Unit 9 was an extremely important point in this course for me, for I had now taken everything I had learned cumulatively and incorporated them into an ESA lesson plan. The Unit 10 video was an extremely eye-opening section of the course as well; visually seeing a poorly taught lesson versus one where the teacher exuded a positive physical attitude with positively reinforced responses and realizing that the instructor does in fact hold a great deal of power, and the utilization of that power can influence students severely depending on how the instructor wants to go about using their influence. I realized at this point that the teacher is the main determinant of how well a class will be taught; the lesson plan, activities and assignments are critical aspects of the class, but a teacher's presence alone can almost negate everything else if is one of negativity, disinterest and neglect. During Unit 12, I was taught a great deal about accuracy and fluency. I had not thought about how different reading and writing activities really were and how differently they must be handled, as well as commented upon. Generating interest and motivating students, I would say, was one of the more abstract aspects of this course, most probably because there is no certain way to predict how to engage particular students in a lesson. Each and every student is their own unique person and the role of the teacher is to build rapport and relationships with students in order to understand who they are and what they are interested in so those aspects can be applied in the lesson planning. There is no absolute way of teaching this concept however. Generating interest in topic is something a teacher must tackle using whatever means they are most comfortable utilizing, which is what made Unit 12 so interesting to me. I kept thinking back to my own experiences and how I got to know my students on a personal level, and realizing that many other teachers probably used very different methodologies to reach the same goal. Learning the International Phonetic Alphabet was great! I had never studied or learned about this alphabet at all, whatsoever and was absolutely thrilled to have gotten to actually study and utilize it so quickly. Unit 13 was probably the most challenging for me, but I feel extremely rewarded as a result. I had never studied phonology at all and had not realized just how detailed and difficult to explain intonation and stress were. These are aspects of the course I will probably need much more dedicated study in, but I am thrilled to have gotten the chance to be exposed to it. I learned that phonology is an absolutely critical aspect of an efl student's learning experience and cannot be omitted. I have come to the conclusion that I will be giving phonology a deeper look and analyzing it much more closely in the future. It is an absolutely abstract concept for me, but that I feel if I can teach even a bit of, will positively impact the students I am teaching and given them a more thorough grasp of english as a result. Overall, I have learned a great deal of information from this course. Many topics I refined my knowledge of, for instance verb tenses and certain grammar concepts and learned how to explain them in a more effect way. Other concepts, such as an ESA lesson plan, the three phases, the specifics of these phases and what they should include, and the entire study of phonology were completely new concepts to me and have challenged me in a very detailed, critical way. I feel as though I am leaving this course with such a broad, specific overview of knowledge that is also detailed in nature. I feel that I have truly gained an entirely new view of myself and my own abilities as a teacher and cannot wait to utilize every single piece of knowledge I have learned thus far. I plan utilizing the lesson plan format and the phase structures very carefully, as to not overuse them but to use their general structure to shape any future classes I may have. Most importantly of all, I hope to improve my physical presence and my feedback approaches in a more gentle, positive way to help students gain motivation and self-confidence in themselves and their abilities.