Simple Past Rules

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas Teaching grammar is one of the most challenging things for a teacher of English. As a student, it is essential to learn grammar as this gives you accuracy both in writing and speaking. This applies to every language, not only to English. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Adrian D. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. In many ways grammar can be compared to Mathematics; they both have a set of rules and exceptions that have to be known and practiced until you become so familiar with them that you don’t have to think about them when solving problems in everyday life (for example when you make a simple calculation like 7x8) or,...  [Read more]

  In this episode, we cover the pronunciation of the word inflammable. This word is used as an adjective and refers to something that is easily set on fire. The word originates from Latin inflammare. Below you can read feedback from an ITTT graduate regarding one section of their online TEFL certification course. Each of our online courses is broken down into concise units that focus on specific areas of English language teaching. This convenient, highly structured design means that you can quickly get to grips with each section before moving onto the next. When it comes to revision of the Past tenses (Past Simple, Past Continuous, Past Perfect Simple and Past Perfect Continuous Tenses) it is always a refreshment to go back to the basics and refresh the memory on the...  [Read more]

  In this TESOL review, Chris from France shows us the classroom he teaches in and talks about his experience on ITTT’s 120-hour TESOL course. Chris found that the course helped to structure his lesson plans and improved his teaching skills. He recommends the course to anyone considering teaching English as a second language. Below you can read feedback from an ITTT graduate regarding one section of their online TEFL certification course. Each of our online courses is broken down into concise units that focus on specific areas of English language teaching. This convenient, highly structured design means that you can quickly get to grips with each section before moving onto the next. I think this was also a challenging chapter to work through for me, particularly...  [Read more]

  Another TEFL trainee shares his experiences of completing his TEFL/TESOL in-class course in Sydney, Australia. In this TEFL review he talks about some of the course components and why he would recommend others to do the course. ITTT's intensive in-class course meets all international standards and our TEFL/TESOL certification courses are internationally recognized and accredited. No matter which of our training centers you select to complete the course you will receive the highest standards and support. Below you can read feedback from an ITTT graduate regarding one section of their online TEFL certification course. Each of our online courses is broken down into concise units that focus on specific areas of English language teaching. This convenient, highly structured design...  [Read more]

  In this episode, we cover the pronunciation of the word deter. This word is used as a verb and means to discourage someone from doing something, usually using doubt or fear. Synonyms for deter include prevent, stop and avert. The word comes from Latin 'deterrere', a word formed with de- ‘away from’ and terrere ‘frighten'. Below you can read feedback from an ITTT graduate regarding one section of their online TEFL certification course. Each of our online courses is broken down into concise units that focus on specific areas of English language teaching. This convenient, highly structured design means that you can quickly get to grips with each section before moving onto the next. In this unit I have learned a lot of grammar points. I have found useful tables. I...  [Read more]

  A TEFL qualification allows you to teach English almost anywhere in the world, some countries are more popular than others for differing reasons. Some are popular because of the salary and benefits offered to teachers, others are popular because they offer a better quality of life and others are popular because they provide teachers with plenty of opportunities. The top most popular countries are all in Asia as the demand for English is so much higher here than elsewhere in the world. Below you can read feedback from an ITTT graduate regarding one section of their online TEFL certification course. Each of our online courses is broken down into concise units that focus on specific areas of English language teaching. This convenient, highly structured design means that you can...  [Read more]

Linda Dunsmore Alumni Experiences The tense system of English is probably one of the most daunting areas for many speakers of other languages. Multiple tenses should be taught through explaining strict grammar rules while allowing the students to practice proper structure, as well as evaluating themselves with quizzes and examples. There are three different tenses in English: the past, the present and the future. Each of these tenses has four aspects: simple, continuous, perfect and perfect continuous. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Zhong B. The past tense expresses or indicates a time that is in the past. For instance, if we want to say that an event occurred or something was the case at a particular time in the past,...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas In English, varying tense forms will change the structure of a sentence and verb conjugation. When studying English grammar, learning different tenses can present a great challenge to learners as well as teachers. English language learners may have to adjust to a greater number of tenses in English than in their native tongue. According to ITTT course materials, experts will state there are twelve tenses in the English language. The changes informing English verbs which mark past, present and future tenses are a key concept for learners to grasp to communicate effectively. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Corey B. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs...  [Read more]

  Have you ever considered completing an online TEFL/TESOL certification course? Why not become one of the hundreds of people who each month do an online course with ITTT, just like Sacha from the United States. In this TESOL review video Sacha talks about her happy experience of studying the 120 hour tutor support course. She talks about how the course has given her a firm foundation on which to build her career as a successful English language teacher. Below you can read feedback from an ITTT graduate regarding one section of their online TEFL certification course. Each of our online courses is broken down into concise units that focus on specific areas of English language teaching. This convenient, highly structured design means that you can quickly get to grips with each...  [Read more]

Linda Dunsmore Alumni Experiences I have had the pleasure of living and teaching in Brazil over the past 2 years and in my time in this country I have learned a great amount about the difficulties that are seemingly unique to native Portuguese speakers trying to learn English as a second or even third language. There seems to be deeply ingrained assumptions within the way Portuguese speakers approach both the pronunciation of words based on their spelling, and their understanding of grammatical structures and the usage of said structures. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Brian P. The first and foremost point to address with respect to what the typical Portuguese speaker has ingrained as an instinct with respect to the...  [Read more]

  Kim is living in America and in this TEFL review she discusses the 120-hour online TEFL course with tutor support and videos from ITTT. Kim took the course without any prior teaching experience and was initially worried that she would find the course very difficult to complete. In the end she found the experience to be very enjoyable with plenty of information provided in the online course materials. Kim also found the tutor support and feedback to be helpful and would definitely recommend the course to those planning on teaching English. Below you can read feedback from an ITTT graduate regarding one section of their online TEFL certification course. Each of our online courses is broken down into concise units that focus on specific areas of English language teaching. This...  [Read more]

Linda Dunsmore Teaching Ideas The simple past is one of the most important tenses in the English language. As it describes past actions, it's quite an easy tense to teach using a variety of fun and interactive activities. Here are 7 activities for teaching the simple past for the ESL classroom. For more activities check out: 10 Exciting Activities for the Past Simple For this activity, the students think of significant accomplishments in their lives. After sharing with the class what they have accomplished, the students should describe what they did in order to achieve this goal, for example they graduated college, studied English, took classes, etc. It’s important that the students use the simple past to talk about these actions. Also read: 7...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas In the early lessons of the course, I was able to better understand the components of the sentence, and the knowledge about word types was expanded. It includes a definite article, adjective, noun, verb, preposition, adverb, conjunction, gerund, personal pronoun. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Phuong P. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. In unit 4, we have started talking about tenses in English. I looked at the four present tenses; the present simple, present continuous (sometimes called the present progressive), present perfect and present perfect continuous. Summary, the tense system is probably the area of the English...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas Grammar is the rules governing the composition of clauses, phrases, and words in a natural language. Simply put, grammar is the general rule of a language. Language is logical; grammar tells us in which order we say words. It’s about how words become phrases; how words and phrases become sentences and how sentences become language. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Yang S. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. Some of these rules are acquired naturally in childhood while others are acquired in the learning process under the guidance of a teacher. While most of the time, people don’t know which grammatical rule they are following...  [Read more]

  The two words "lay" and "lie" are often confused for each other, which is why we decided to break down the differences in this video. "Lay" is what is called a transitive verb. That means, it needs to be followed by one or more objects. A good example sentence would be "I lay the book on the table". As you can see, lay is followed by ""on the table"". We couldn't only say "I lay the book." as it would be incomplete. This means it is transitive. "Lie" on the other hand is an intransitive verb. That means it doesn't take an object, for example "I lie down". Most errors have to do with the past tenses of the two verbs, as the past tense of "lie" is "lay" while the past tense of "lay" is "laid". Below you can read feedback from an ITTT graduate regarding one section of their online...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences The English language is a peculiar, fascinating beast to teach and to learn. It comes with a long legacy of Anglo-Saxon and Norman invaders, empire-building, and globalization of the 20th century. With multiple layers of rules and culture, it overflows with idiosyncrasies and peculiarities to confound native and learning speakers alike. Whether it’s pronunciation, grammar, or even just the system of time, English is a welcoming lingua franca and an intimidating coil of strangeness at the same time. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Zachary L. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. Any language has their culture imprinted on...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas English is one of the most dynamic languages on the planet, which develops every day. Therefore, there are a lot of variations of the English language. Which kind of English should we learn? This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Olena K. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. We used to know that there are British, American, Australian, and even Scottish English. Moreover, this is not a full list. This diversity complicates the process of learning a language. After all, who will help you to choose which particular English variant you need? What's more important to know: American or British English? On the one hand, it seems easy. We...  [Read more]

  Our second example sentence 'I am playing football at the moment.' is the present continuous tense. This has a different structure as the subject 'I', the verb 'to be' in the present tense 'am', 'is' or 'are' plus the verb with an '?ing' on the end. So here: 'I am playing football at the moment.' Whereas the present simple tense is used to talk about habits routines and facts, the present continuous tense is used to talk about actions in progress at the time of speaking or around the time of speaking. Our third example sentence is the present perfect: 'I have played football twice this week.' Here, the structure is the subject 'I', auxiliary verb 'have' or 'has' plus the past participle. The past participle is usually formed just by adding '-ed'- on to the end of the base form of...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas The English Language is universally derided for its difficulty and the absurd number of exceptions to every rule. To teach English effectively in an EFL setting, it is important to make note of these difficulties and teach students both the rules and the plentiful exceptions. My personal experience as a teacher and the knowledge I’ve gleaned from this course illustrate the importance of incorporating games and group practice so that students feel motivated. I want my students to find learning English fun rather than frustrating. It is key, especially when teaching young learners, to pick one’s battles: a pedantic mindset will only breed frustration and lead to a classroom full of anxious students. Therefore,...  [Read more]

Federico Riva Alumni Experiences We can quote people through what's called direct speech. In written form it would look like “Corey said we're moving house next week”. We've used quotes and we've quoted Corey directly, i.e. used the exact words that he used. There is however another way we can quote people, and this is through reported speech. We don't quote their exact words, but we simply let people know what has been said. In English we often have a need to quote people. We can do so through what's called direct speech. In written form it would look like “Corey said we're moving house next week”. We've used quotes and we've quoted Corey directly, i.e. used the exact words that he used. There is however another way we can quote people,...  [Read more]

  When considering Teacher Talk Time, we can perhaps look at the major advantage and disadvantage of the teacher actually talking. The major advantage is that you as the teacher are usually the only real model for the language, the source of correct English. So at some stages, your talking time is very important to the students. So when you?re modeling language, that use of Teacher Talk Time can be very advantageous. There are major disadvantages to overusing Teacher Talk Time, however, and perhaps the major one is that whenever the teacher is talking, the students are listening and if the students are listening, then they themselves cannot be talking. So, Teacher Talk Time reduces the opportunity for Student Talk Time. So, we should try to minimize the use of Teacher Talk Time...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences Over the last month and a half, I have been completing a TEFL course. I am currently working as an assistant language teacher at a Japanese high school. Overall, I have found the experience to be very useful. The following reasons are why a TEFL course should be completed. Firstly, you gain a better understanding of how English grammar works. Secondly, from my perspective, it has reinforced and improved my current teaching strategies and practices. Thirdly, it gives teachers a structural theoretical framework to create lessons. Finally, completing a TEFL course gives you lesson ideas and activities. For these reasons, it is important to complete a TEFL course. This post was written by our TEFL certification...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences In this blog post, our recent TEFL graduate shares their thoughts on the advantages and disadvantages of online education in the ESL class. Jon ITTT Teaching Ideas This ITTT TEFL article looks at 10 activities you can use in your classroom when teaching the past simple tense. Jon ITTT Destinations This ITTT TEFL article looks at Etiquette rules in 4 different countries in the popular TEFL region of Latin America. Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences In this blog post, our recent TEFL graduate shares their thoughts on why Japanese students...  [Read more]

Mark Crocker Alumni Experiences Teaching Ideas Teaching multiple tenses might sound frightening as teaching a single tense can sometimes be a challenge on its own. However, while it might seem difficult the first time you try it, it isn’t as daunting as you would think. When teaching more than one tense at a time there are two main factors to consider: which tenses to teach together and what language level you are teaching. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Ferenc M. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. The general rule is that basic tenses are for lower level students and harder ones are for intermediates and above. Despite this, many higher...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences Although many ESL teachers do have foreign language experience, many are not aware of how much this experience benefits them. Sure, if they are teaching English in Japan, having Japanese language experience is helpful for daily life situations, but how could it bleed into the classroom as well? And the language experience doesn’t necessarily have to involve the first language of the students, either. Having foreign language experiences allows the teacher to understand just how hard learning a language is, can understand where certain errors may come from, see English from a different perspective, and gives them a stronger grasp on English grammar. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate...  [Read more]

  Also in the 1970s la señal came up with a new methodology called "Suggestopedia". As psychological theory was developing, one of the ideas that came up was something called ?the effective filter?. Basically, the effective filter is a barrier to learning. It's the reasons why we inhibit our learning of a particular language. There are two main elements to the effective filter, two sets of factors, if you like, those are known as internal and external factors. The external factors to learning, the reasons why we have barriers to learning, may be just simple things such as external noise. So, people talking to us while we're trying to learn and so on and so forth. Perhaps more important are these internal factors and the internal factors one of the main things here is our previous...  [Read more]

Shirin Sophy TEFL Information Teaching Ideas Second or foreign language learning, which appears to be an ever-present hurdle for many, has constantly been a topical issue with numerous Hypotheses centered around it, including language acquisition theory or monitor model with its sweeping effects on language learning in classrooms around the world. This well-known theory, first presented by Stephen Krashen in the 1970s, is initially based on six Hypotheses ( The Acquisition-Learning Hypothesis, the Natural Order Hypothesis, the Monitor Hypothesis, the Input Hypothesis, the Affective Filter Hypothesis, and the Reading Hypothesis) that will be discussed in this article. According to Krashen, in terms of foreign language...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Alumni Experiences When I first made the transition from primary school to university, I knew that my lesson plans were clearly going to have to change. As I began to come up with ideas for my new job, I was disappointed that most of the content I previously used had no place in the university. Games, such as Hangman and Pictionary, worked excellently in capturing the interests of my young students, but I didn’t think these childish games had any place in a university classroom. I found out weeks later how wrong I was when I used Pictionary at the beginning of one of my courses to ‘preview’ the vocabulary we would be covering in class that day. I discovered that day that games can support a lesson if the educator...  [Read more]

Elizaveta Pachina Teaching Ideas I did not realize how difficult English is until I became fluent in Spanish. I am currently studying French and I am pretty good at French. I have a basic knowledge of Esperanto. This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Wayne K. Please note that this blog post might not necessarily represent the beliefs or opinions of ITTT. I will just touch on each of these since a book could be written about each of these. Also Read: Teaching Young Learners vs. Adult Learners - The Differences You Can Expect I have found many poems(1) and articles on the internet discussing the insane way English is spelled and pronounced. On the previously sited website(ibid) an English instructor states that he has very often...  [Read more]

Jon ITTT Alumni Experiences When starting a career in teaching, regardless of age,gender and nationality, a prospective teacher should always bear in mind one fundamental skill:patience. This particular talent is what I personally believe distinguishes a competent teacher from the incompetent one, and is crucial in establishing the overall success of each and every student. So, how patient should teachers be and, particularly, how patient should the teachers at beginner levels be? This post was written by our TEFL certification graduate Katarina K. I have been a TEFL certified teacher for a short time. However, I have been teaching for the past 5 years. I distinctly remember how every level of teaching used to be hard when I lacked the proper...  [Read more]