I Don't Speak The Language

Federico Riva TEFL Information Alumni Experiences Firstly within your lessons do always use English as the language of instruction. You need to speak slowly and you need to reduce the amount of teacher talk time by using gesture and mime as often as possible. Do play games as often as possible but bear in mind that the games that we're suggesting here are interactive communicative games that have some educational purpose. Do try to make yourself aware of any problems that they do have, either within school or outside of school because they can affect the way that the students behave and interact with each other. Do try to change the dynamic of the classroom as often as possible and this can relate to the actual seating...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences Many Chinese students face the common problem that although they spent 10 years studying English at school, they can't pronounce an English sentence correctly, and they are not confident enough to communicate in the language. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Mengru W. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. Our students struggle to speak in English, they are good at writing and reading, but cannot speak, even though they studied the language from third to 12th grade. Most of the students also study English at a language center, but they still find it hard to completely reach the goal, even when they go to college, speaking English...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas Grammar is not only about vocabulary and sentence structure but also can improve our communication and ability of logical thinking. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Meiheriayi M. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. Some people always ask a question that what is the point of learning grammar? Foreigners never learn grammar, but they speak better English than us when they travel abroad. Also nowadays, more and more young students go abroad to further their studies. Most of them worry that they can't understand what the teacher says or they can't communicate with foreigners. Listening and speaking are indeed very important, but you...  [Read more]

Linda Dunsmore TEFL Information The nomadic lifestyle is getting more and more appealing for many people wanting to escape the dry 9-to-5 trap back home. More and more people are packing their bags and heading off traveling around the world, making a living on the go. A great way to afford this lifestyle is teaching English, either online, at a physical school or to private students abroad. As this is getting increasingly popular, online English platforms, employers and English students are now expecting their teachers to be TEFL certified. But how do you find the time to study when on the road? Taking an online TEFL course might just be the answer to your problems! Here are 4 tips for getting your TEFL certificate on the road and for staying...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences As we know English is a very important language, which is also very practical and helpful in our lives. If everyone in the world could speak the same language, it would be so convenient for us to communicate with each other, and we could go anywhere without worrying about communication barriers. Here are some of the benefits that I think English globalization brings to us. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Ying S. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. I think that whether it's traveling abroad or reading English magazines at home, you will realize that knowing English language is so useful, even when you go to some Asian...  [Read more]

Gökhan Yilmaz Alumni Experiences After the coronavirus, schools all around the world started switching to online classes. Even before the pandemic, there were a lot of people already recognizing the benefits of the online classroom and when the corona crisis began, more people were convinced of the many benefits of learning online. The first reason I would like to mention is that online learning is incredibly flexible. Students are usually able to choose their own study times. Not only that but online learning also allows you to study at your own pace. This is extremely beneficial for students of different levels and with different needs. Comparing this with traditional schools, it's quite clear that online learning takes the lead here. Maybe at...  [Read more]

Federico Riva TEFL Information Teaching Ideas What are ice breakers and when and where do we use them? In this blog post, we will cover these issues and give actual examples of activities you can use with your classes. Icebreakers are games or activities that are designed to ‘break the ice’. Typically you would use these kinds of games or activities at the beginning of a new school year, when you have a new set of students, or a new class that you don't know and they don't know you. You also can use icebreakers to get your students going at the start of the lesson speaking in English and that's really important as you don't want to come into the classroom and say, “Open your books to page five” and then start studying....  [Read more]

Mary Blancaflor Alumni Experiences I have been teaching English to local and foreign students and for the most part, I noticed that no matter how much the learners would like to polish their English, some things hinder them to accomplish their goal in speaking the language. Studying a foreign language in a non-native speaking country requires more discipline and motivation. Learning a foreign language is not acquired overnight. It has to undergo a specific type of training and the amount of time to learn. For this reason, I came up with a list of why students find it hard to learn a foreign language and what they must do. Students who feel afraid to commit a mistake never learn. It's easy to understand the fear that might envelop the learner...  [Read more]

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Elizaveta Pachina TEFL Information Alumni Experiences Teaching Ideas There is nothing comfortable than being in your comfort zone, especially when speaking your language (native language). The feeling that comes with it, how you pronounce words, the use of jokes and proverbs, idioms, and other slang within it, no one can take that joy or even compensate it because it naturally comes from within. It makes you feel safe at home and confident even when speaking about topics that you have never seen or heard before simply because your brain is already rich with enough vocabulary. So it allows you to navigate, swim and tackle the issues from all possible angles. As the world is changing and experiencing different...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences Good communication skills, I can say this is an important quality someone can be so educated but communication skill zero so the education can be useless. Communication skills like visual, nonverbal, verbal by using body language, speaking and so many more. The biggest part of the classroom is communication. Also explaining well if there are activities or assignments and also a good teacher through communication will know which student does not understand and will make an effort to talk to the student and help him or her individually. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Qiuyan G. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. when you have...  [Read more]

Federico Riva TEFL Information Teaching Ideas Student feedback and correction are an integral part of our teaching methodology. In this blog post, we introduce some general concepts. Many teachers either neglect giving appropriate feedback or they are not sure how to do so. In this blog I'm going to share some opinions and some data so that you can think about it and maybe implement some strategies of giving effective feedback. Our students actually need it and the whole learning process is aimed at getting some feedback. When you start thinking about your feedback and thinking about the whole concept of giving feedback you have to consider what effective feedback actually is. In general, is it correcting all students’...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas What is phonology? Most students have not even heard about it. Whenever I ask my students whether they know or have ever learned about phonetics, the same answers come out, “No, we don’t know about it at all”. It is no wonder they reply like this because there is no phonetic teaching lesson in English classes from KG to high school here in my country. As for me, I got to study about this only when I attended college. Even then, it wasn’t taught comprehensively and I only learned very little. So I couldn’t read nor write phonetic symbols very well. Thus I thought it was the most difficult part of studying English. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Thein G. Please note that this blog...  [Read more]

Kavinna Batra Alumni Experiences Teaching Ideas English is a fun language to learn; however, it can even throw off the most professional learner with complex spelling rules and difficult grammar. Learning English quickly could seem difficult, even though it is considered to be accessible and reasonably easy for many to learn. I'm here to tell you that as long as you have the right plan, you can learn English quickly and easily. If you start to feel like you're not making ground, which at some stage happens to all learners, don't say, "I don't speak English," or "I'm never going to get this." Honestly, ban those words from your vocabulary! They just blur your comprehension of the progress you are making and remind you that it is...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences Panama is a small country located in Central America with few people, but a bold culture and unique historical background. It is most notoriously known for the Panama Canal, which was controlled by the United States until quite recently. Naturally, because of the USA’s role in Panama, one would presume there are many English speaking citizens in the country. However, there is a large number of Panamanians who never had the privilege of being able to speak another language due to a wide variety of factors embedded in Panamanian society. Contrasting division of social and economic class, tough labor, and the mark the USA left on the country, are three of the biggest factors that cause problems for English...  [Read more]

Federico Riva TEFL Information Alumni Experiences In this blog post, we will consider a pre- TEFL interview checklist, so what's really important for you to organize before you do the actual online interview? Every interview is a unique experience so here we offer general advice only. First and foremost you should find a quiet and well-lit spot. Regardless of the time of the interview (day or night) most interviews are via Skype (or similar platforms) so you will be in your home country, at home. You need to make sure that you are in a quiet and well-lit spot in your house, so that the picture and sound quality is great. If you don't have a well-lit place in your house you could buy one of those ring lights for example, they're...  [Read more]

Federico Riva Alumni Experiences Do you know what is the largest language by several speakers in the world? Yes, it is, in fact, English, so according to wikipedia.org, over 2 billion people speak English(1), now that statistic might have sounded huge but the real fact is that nowadays, since we live and depend on global economy, almost every country in the world is worried by the fact their people can’t speak English, this is basically because almost every country makes business with the United States. Now, based on that fact, a lot of foreign Governments are implementing English teaching methods in public schools from the early stages of the study. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Alex D. Please note that this blog...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences Pronunciation problems in El Salvador is very common, as many know Spanish is the main Language in this country, people in El Salvador tend to speak their native Language all the time because this is what they feel more comfortable with, as there is not any other dialect, other than Spanish, they are taught English in school, English Is the only language taught in El Salvador in public schools, but only for those that can attend one, this is because there are many people that can't attend a school due to economic matter, family problems or due to the work that is done in their household many don't have time to study and there are kids that can't attend school because they have to work, but there are many...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas Teaching beginner students is a very challenging task for anyone. Personally, I have always found teaching English to beginners as a tough prospect, whether it is monolingual group and you know nothing of their language or it’s a multilingual group and the only common language is English. However, with some work and knowledge, everything is possible to teach beginners the English language. And I believe this is one of the most rewarding to teach. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Melinda K. The question now is How to teach English to beginner students? Here are the basic tips and techniques. In making instructions clear and simple, don’t use or say ten words if you can say or use only...  [Read more]

Federico Riva TEFL Information Alumni Experiences Teaching Ideas Here we consider some of the things you should do and some you should not do within the Business English setting. Firstly you are not going to know everything about their particular business and you could actually use your ignorance of that to your advantage. For example if you're teaching a group of banking employees you may not know about some vocabulary of their particular areas of work. When they're using terms that are used within the banking system then you can say, “I'm sorry I don't understand, can you explain that to me?”, so they're actually getting more language practice using the terms within their role. Secondly it's very useful...  [Read more]

Linda Dunsmore Alumni Experiences Vocabulary has a direct impact on written and spoken language comprehension. All students come to school with differences in their vocabulary knowledge, and part of teaching them how to be successful in English is to teach them vocabulary. Vocabulary development plays a critical role in helping English language learners increase their ability to communicate in the receptive and expressive domains in English. This is why vocabulary must be explicitly and systematically taught. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Gina A. Research suggests the following three big ideas about teaching and learning new words: Also read: 4 Super Easy Tips for Teaching Vocabulary to Young Learners There are two main...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas Learning is always hard especially learning something new such as English learning. English is a different new language compared with Chinese, so when we are learning, definitely we will meet all kinds of difficulties in listening, speaking, reading, and writing. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate XIAO J. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. Due to the lack of vocabulary, beginners can not get the main idea of a story. They usually expect to know every single word and if they miss some words, they will become extremely nervous so that they lose their confidence at all. The best way to avoid it is to pre-teach some potentially...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas There are about 6500 spoken languages in the world today. 11 of those are here from my home country of South Africa. The most spoken language of them all is Mandarin. Language is what defines us. It is what divides us. It what we are taught and brought up to understand and one day pass on to the next generation. It is like being a unicorn. When there are none left, you will only read about it in books and professors who learned and studied about it. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Jacq-Pierre B. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. But as time went on, people started to migrate to other parts of the world and taking their language...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences One of the most basic aspects of life is learning, we start learning the moment we are born, the first thing we learn is how to breathe and after that, the learning process just keeps going on. On most families kids grow up listening to just one language and that language becomes what we call as mother tongue or native language, this language is the one that the kid will always hold on into and have it as his/her primary language, so we as English teachers in foreign countries have to be aware of this, because this native language is going to have a huge impact on the learning process of the students, for example if you are teaching in a class that the student’s native language has a different grammar or...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas Language is a medium of communication that helps to express our feelings, desires, and queries to the world around us. The ability to use language distinguishes humans from other animals and when we know a language, we can speak and be understood by others who know that language. Effective communication requires an understanding and recognition of the connection between a language and the people who use it. The ability to use a language requires profound knowledge that most speakers don't know that they know. Language is considered to be an infinite set of well-formulated sentences and it can be deduced by the grammar. Hence grammars are the theories of language composed of hypotheses of the structure of some part...  [Read more]

Charlotte Lam Destinations TEFL Information Alumni Experiences Are you considering teaching in Hong Kong as a native English teacher (NET)? If yes, do you know who you are going to work with? Here are some ways you can effectively prepare yourself and collaborate with the local teachers in school. Most of the teachers are local in Hong Kong kindergarten. Therefore, you are very likely to partner and work with a local class teacher. As a new teacher in school, it's absolutely important to listen to your local partners because each school has its own culture and working style. Therefore, take some time to observe other teachers when you are at work. It helps to observe a lot on classroom management strategies...  [Read more]

Federico Riva TEFL Information Alumni Experiences Teaching Ideas Online teaching has much in common with teaching in a traditional classroom. There are however some fundamental differences, particularly in class make-up and the use of equipment. By considering a number of “Frequently asked questions”, we will look at some of these issues. In this blog post, we will consider four questions that are the most asked questions about teaching online, for those who are just starting out and who don't really have a lot of experience about the topic. Online teaching involves either, one-to-one or group lessons. Most of the time you only teach one-on-one, with one student, but there are also platforms where group...  [Read more]

Linda Dunsmore Budget and Salary TEFL Information Do you want to live abroad and experience a new culture? Studying abroad is a wonderful opportunity for university students to do just that - but it’s not the only way! Many students are eager to head overseas to study at a foreign university because they think if they don’t they will miss out and never have another chance of living in a foreign country. This is simply not true. The worldwide demand for qualified English teachers is through the roof giving everyone who wants to teach abroad the opportunity to find a position. Here are 5 reasons why teaching abroad is better than studying abroad. It’s no secret that student debt is an incredibly heavy burden for a lot of...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas The native language in Ecuador is Quichua, an Inca language. It is spoken by the Indian population, but Spanish is the most common, widely spoken language. Besides Spanish, ten native languages are spoken in Ecuador. English is the most spoken foreign language amongst tourist providers and professionals. For this reason, English is taught in most schools as a Foreign Language. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Jemma W. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. Most students find it very hard to learn English in Ecuador as there are very few people to practice with. It is only the most dedicated students who put the effort in to studying...  [Read more]

Anna Bondar Alumni Experiences Teaching Ideas I’ve had to attend numerous meetings throughout my career, and it wasn’t always a pleasant experience. I’d often get bored, start looking around or doodling. Today, I want to discuss which meetings are the best to attend to ensure one’s personal growth, development, and usefulness. Each educational institution or organization has staff meetings approximately once a week. Some even have it 2-3 times a week, which is a bit excessive, in my personal opinion. Educators need time to reflect, analyze and act upon the received information, so, therefore, three times a week can take some valuable working time. Let’s break down the most common ones. In most instances, one will be...  [Read more]