Teaching
Vocabulary building in young learners
(933 Words)
For this writing task, I was asked to give my response to 5 statements about how young learners can help build their vocabulary. I will answer true or false statements 1- 5 and explain why.
1. In a young child, a single word may constitute a considerable degree of meaning.
Is this True or False?
2. Words categories and concepts normally exist in isolation from each other.
Is this True or False?
3. Vocabulary development comprises at least three stages.
Is this True or False?
4. All languages have the same relationship between time and tense.
Is this True or False?
5. Where possible we should draw upon as many of the senses as possible when teaching vocabulary.
Is this True or False?
1. In a young child, a single word may constitute a considerable degree of meaning. T/F
This is true. The ability to use words is partly tied to the young child’s ongoing cognitive development, so the use of words will have a degree of meaning. Thus, for a child, a word stands for a concept, but that concept is open to interpretation in that they select a category of relatively similar objects and apply the lexical item throughout. A child can learn the word dog or as a young child puts it ‘doggy’. This refers to a four-legged animal. This word can exist for any type of dog either big or small or type of breed. For example, a dog may refer to beagles and scotties, but not to poodles. This aspect of children’s thought associates a word with an object, but they may then, in the future, use that word to describe a number of other similar objects in their environment. The child can also use the word ‘doggy to mean ‘there is a dog’ Notwithstanding, it can mean ‘come here’ said with a rising tone. Young children tend to utilise rising intonation to signal yes-no questions.
2. Words categories and concepts normally exist in isolation from each other. T/F
This is false. Words do not live in isolation, individual words can be categorised in many ways that remove the word from the original meaning or at least a child’s only idea of the meaning. The word ‘game’ can be attached to words such as card (game), ball (game), Olympic (games), and also football (game). As such the Olympic Games conjure up thoughts of many competitors from around the world competing together, although a ball game can involve one person banging a ball against a wall. This looks at two ends of the game spectrum. Winning the Olympic Games has men and women getting gold medals; the ball game respectively has no winner or loser. Furthermore, the game of poker has skills of a different kind compared to kicking a football around the football pitch as well as less physical energy.
3. Vocabulary development comprises of at least three stages. T/F
This is true. Word learning is the product of a set of cognitive and linguistic stages that include the ability to acquire concepts, an appreciation of syntactic cues to meaning, and a rich understanding of the mental states of other people. These capacities are powerful and early emerging. Firstly the child must make sense of new vocabulary. When words are first met by young learners, there are concepts that are given labels in English and may be new to the child, or only partially developed. The teacher or parent may not be merely teaching vocabulary, but teaching concepts. The labels and concepts need to be incorporated into schemas that already exist. The child has to learn this new vocabulary. Learning and retaining new vocabulary is made easier by grouping words together into families. While learning all this new vocabulary the child has to retain and recall this vocabulary for the various situation they will find themselves in. The single most effective way of helping students build vocabulary is by increasing the amount that they read. The child revisits the groups of words; adding to them and reorganising them provide ways of giving learners both the repetition and the development that is needed as they grow into English through the primary years and stages.
4. All languages have the same relationship between time and tense. T/F
This is false. Various countries of different lexis in different parts of the world that have relatively little contact with each other, will have experienced a different environment. Each country will invent words for the things in its environment that matter to it, and naturally, they find words for different things in their country. England has four seasons, other countries have three. Some countries are dark for many months. Learners from different countries don’t have some words in their vocabulary because they have never encountered such aspects of life. Basically, the learners have to develop categories and concepts for the new words they encounter. For this situation, when children encounter new words teachers need to provide support for understanding. New vocabulary needs to be presented in a context that helps the child understand the meanings and associations that help explain time and tense.
5. Where possible we should draw upon as many of the senses as possible when teaching vocabulary. T/F
This is true. Children learn words by seeing, feeling, tasting, listening, enjoying, and experiencing. These various means at a teacher’s disposal bring the reality of words to the fore. For example, a child can know the word ‘apple’ but this does not show the learner every aspect of the object. They can learn that it is a fruit and other fruits are in the same family. They can see pictures of apples so they see the shapes and colours. They can eat an apple then they know the taste and feel. Is it soft? Is it hard? It can be shown that the apple starts going rotten after a while, but it is also good for your health before going rotten. An apple pie can be cooked for the child to show how apples can be used. Granny Smith apples come from England. Other apples come from other countries. They can go on a field trip and see apples growing. The child realizes they grow in trees. They can go shopping at a supermarket and buy apples. They can be shown they are bought in weight.
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What are ‘Instructional Objectives’ in the class?
(926 Words)
As any self-respecting teacher would know that in class if you do not know where your class is heading you will never get there. This is true for any teacher who enters a classroom intending to give their students an education that will further expand the students’ knowledge. This means that objectives need to be set. This means instructional objectives need to be attained. The methods and training that the teachers will implement during the class should be incorporated in reaching everyone’s goals and objectives. The teacher has to discover whether the students leaving the classroom have demonstrated their language/skills acquisition. It has to be clear in the teacher’s mind that the students will exit the class having broadened their ideas/knowledge in while being able to talk about something new.
There has to be a teaching approach that the teacher utilizes to formulate the students’ learning that enhances aptitude. One way is for the teacher to state what they would like the students to be able to do at the end of the class although the ‘in-between’ phase needs to be verified. This also relates to the students who should know what their objectives are. This is by stating exactly what they should be able to achieve in the specified time. This is done by explaining the objectives to the students. Objectives need to be stated. The first step is to write an objective. The teacher must know what they want the students to be able to do. Objectives are clearly stated using action verbs like ‘define’ and ‘describe’. Objectives look at the students showing/defining what they have learnt. The teacher will never know unless they see and hear for himself. The students’ learning is imperative and making objectives that are not achievable will not help their learning. The teacher must be clear in their head what the measurable objectives for the students are. An objective is a written statement, defining in precise terms, what the learner will be able to do at the end of the training and how well. A teacher is faced with setting out understandable objectives. A verb like ‘know’, which clearly does not allow the teacher to define the student’s capacity of knowledge, will not help achievement. So, many verbs can be open to interpretation such as ‘know, understand, and think’ clearly do not prove to the teacher that the student is in command of new expressions and terms. Verbs like ‘define and describe’ will undoubtedly illustrate to the instructor the depth of the students’ language acquisition. This means that teachers do not just have objectives per se but clear objectives that define the learning outcome. There has to be some form of accomplishment at the end of the class or term. A factor that has to be taken into account is; are the objectives achievable? It acceptable to have objectives but if they surpass what the student level is at, the objectives will not work. These have to be arranged in a format that will allow the students to learn. These objectives have to be measurable and observable.
The teacher also has to determine the domain in which the objective can be classified. There are generally 3 domains cognitive, affective, and psycho-motor. Benjamin Bloom and his colleagues (1956) developed a widely accepted taxonomy for cognitive objectives. The main domain is cognitive. Bloom further classified the cognitive domain into 6 levels. The lowest level is knowledge. This is the students’ ability to recall information. The teachers can the students to state, recall, tell, and define. The next level is comprehension. The students must be able to grasp meaning, explain and restate ideas. There is also evaluation during the course of learning where the teacher has to see how far the students have developed. Of course, teaching and student’s acquisition of language is not as straightforward as would seem. Some students need that extra bit of tuition which is standard. This is where feedback comes in. The teacher has to evaluate the students. The students have to develop through the instructional process and if this does not work first time the teacher has to have a plan to reinforce the objective and set the students on the right path. The students need to improve so as not too elongated learning where it becomes tedious. This also helps the group where everyone is working together. For a group/class, task analysis is used a lot by many institutions which progressively test the students to evaluate their level of acquisition and are they achieving the objectives. Robert Mager defined three conditions of objectives. Learning objectives determine the outcomes and how they are to be assessed with the all modules having clear, defined objectives, practice exercises, and mastery tests. A good learning objective has to have three primary components of an objective:
- An objective always describes the important conditions (if any) under which the performance is to occur.
- An objective always says what a learner is expected to be able to do; the objective sometimes describes the product or the result of the doing.
- Wherever possible, an objective describes the criterion of acceptable performance by describing how well the learner must perform in order to be considered acceptable.
I have shown how teachers should not only look have objectives but also make those objectives quantifiable for the students. This means that the teacher will get an enhanced picture of the students learning. This, of course, means that the teacher can focus not only each lesson but the whole term to achieve certain objectives.
Motivation for a varied life in teaching
(1385 Words)
What motivates a teacher to start in the profession? For sure many reasons make someone begin a career in teaching. Is it pay or job security or is it a fall back option? This being said, initial motivation does not mean that years later the same can be said. The fact of the matter is the evolution of the new teacher into a mature tutor. This is then the professional person who has recognized the true meaning of teaching. This person recognizes their role in helping to shape young minds and impart moral values through education. Teaching has to be a vocation. In part an autobiographical story highlighting aspects of Asian teaching and also analysis, there are many aspects that any teacher has to realize to fulfill true potential.
Certainly, ongoing professional development highlights certain challenges in teaching that a teacher has to face up to. A focal point has to be the realization that students do not really know how to learn. How can any teacher, great as they may think they are, not realize that the students are naive about how to get the most benefit from a lesson? Any teacher has to look at the students’ own learning traits in light of today’s imperative that they both foster lifelong learners in their classrooms as well as become lifelong learners themselves. It’s the teacher’s inspiration that plays a huge part in a student’s education although every student and the class as a whole have to progress to help the teacher get the most out of them.
Different countries have varying approaches to learning and teaching. How does a foreign teacher survive in another country’s learning environment? Any foreign teacher working abroad has to adapt and work within the culture. It can be hard to change teaching methods to what has been ingrained from school through to university. Motivation to rise above some of another country’s inequalities as you see them is paramount. In some of these cultures, students tend to be passive and may be reluctant to participate in communicative exercises. A change in the style of teaching to suit these learners’ needs is essential because completely following an Asian model would be alien to any foreign teacher; a balance has to be met. A new foreign teacher would think it is strange to see no encouragement given to the students to think independently while just following the examples of the teacher, who is held in high esteem. Progression as a teacher means drawing attention to many facets of teaching. Inspiration has to come from somewhere. Breaking the barriers that slow students’ learning and build foundations that provoke students’ development has got to be a motivator.
Of course, any teacher would not automatically change their style of teaching. The question is: should they focus more on themselves as a teacher or the students? Which one deserves more thought? It must be believed that deeper thinking about the children’s role in learning is paramount. It’s just when you see children who have so much energy, who are not lazy per se, using their energy into ignoring the learning process. This does not mean every one of them is mentally challenged; it is the direction they are taking. For example, a fifteen-year-old student kept saying the word ‘brio’. What it meant in his language or English language was not clear, but he would say things like ‘do you brio?’ and ‘I am brio’. This was actually when ‘present tense’ was being taught. The co-teacher thought this student was being disruptive and after class, she had a word with the teacher about it. She went on to mention that he was a hyperactive kid who had problems at home and she was sorry. Basically, that was the end of the story. Many factors come into one’s learning and potential, but there was a child who had energy. He was contributing in his own way. It was the way the teacher dealt with this child’s attitude that had the major factor in his learning. The teacher was glad to have this student taking part. He felt it was a bit negative just to put him down as having problems and forget about it. It was felt the teacher just had to channel that liveliness and educate him to use it properly. To put in bluntly teachers need to see what role the students actually play in the classroom. Similarly, Beth Buchler, educational consultant and director of New-Learning Educational Services wrote that you need a ‘student who is responsible, who takes charge, and who self-regulates in the context of today’s changing learning environment’. A teacher does not change these children overnight and many will take time. Every student has potential. The issue for the teacher is how to overcome their learned behaviors they have in class that is being detrimental to them.
So, why are they not performing? One other factor could be a boring teacher. How can any teacher help a student change their learning style if the students (or even the teacher) do not have any interest or enthusiasm? Referring to Alexandra Frean’s piece written in the Times newspaper about ‘boring teachers blamed for rowdy classes’. It seems obvious that students will show their bad side when they are bored, but according to Ofsted, at that time, this was a problem in English schools. The report drew an angry response from the National Union of Teachers which was understandable but it happens. An example of a disruptive class comes from watching an Asian teacher conduct a lesson. The students were naughty, but why were they naughty? Was it because they were disobedient or because the lessons were not so interesting? The teacher was shouting at the noisy students at the start of the lesson. They were quiet once the teacher started shouting, but after that, they were back talking again. The teacher asked them to look at the questions in their book and find the answers in the reading. It seemed a very easy lesson plan. Were the children interested? Maybe, they were not interested. All they needed to do is fill in the blanks which were being done by a couple of people, namely by the best students. The others were just waiting for the answers happily relaxed talking to each other. This teacher was not making the class interesting, no wonder the students were back talking. After exiting the classroom for five minutes then entering an ‘okay let’s check the answers’ loud voice, the teacher went through the answers. The teacher started speaking in their native language then asking for one English word answer at a time. The English teacher’s speech was mixed with their native language. The answers were now being given anyway so the ones who did not bother can just fill in their book. What was the teacher’s purpose in this class? Where was the motivation to learn? If you had filled in the answers you would have finished. It must be said that “Yes, you have finished but isn’t the purpose of learning a foreign language for using it in a context that is valuable for the future. The weaker students are just copying the answers while laughing about something not involved in the subject at hand. This new information they should have learned will stay in their minds for a short time”. Basically, it is hard for a native English teacher to see this whole episode and not feel sorry for everyone involved because everyone walks and carries on regardless.
The irony of all this is that the more the students become independent learners; a process “in which individuals take the initiative, with or without the help of others” (M. Knowles), the teacher’s job will hopefully become more manageable. Motivation and interest will take over idle chat and disruption. Teachers can then confidently feel that they are succeeding and be motivated to take their teaching to another level. This will be not only with themselves but also with the other students. Hopefully, the pride the teacher feel from making these students ready for the world outside school and their future will show them the true meaning of teaching and encourage them for many years. Hopefully, this piece of writing has tried to open teachers to this fact.
References
Bernard-Powers, J., Darling-Hammond, L., Der Ramos, A., Kass, M., LaBoskey, V., & Markowitz, M., et al. (2000). Principles of high quality teacher development. San Jose, CA: The Teacher Quality Collaborative. Retrieved January 23, 2002, from http://www.jointventure.org/initiatives/21st/tqc/principles.html
Boring teachers blamed for rowdy classes
By Alexandra Frean, Education Editor
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article624308.ece
Critical Issue: Terms of Engagement—Rethinking Teachers’ Independent Learning Traits – Beth Buchler, M.A., educational consultant and director of New-Learning Educational Services
http://www.ncrel.org/sdrs/areas/issues/educatrs/profdevl/pd400.htm
Malcolm knowles, informal adult education, self-direction and andragogy
http://www.infed.org/thinkers/et-knowl.htm
Supporting and Facilitating Self-Directed Learning
http://www.ntlf.com/html/lib/bib/89dig.htm
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Teaching Reflection: A Critical Incident
(554 Words)
A “prudent understanding of variable situations with a view to what is to be done” (McCarthy, 1984, p.2) encapsulates that moment when a teacher is met with new experiences that need resolving. Teachers are met with acts that define their personalities. While working in Asia, I was faced with one such dilemma as two students had complained to my manager that I was rude to them. I had mentioned, after class on the first day of a new term, that they had entered late, ignored me as they walked in across the class and sat down to subsequently talk with friends. Contemplating Asian culture which may ignore this kind of attitude, I still felt the need to deal with it. What is called a ‘technical rationality’ (Schon, 1983), my reaction, I hoped, was a means to an end by telling them, in not so many words, that I would like them to respect the learning students and the teacher teaching. In this given situation and given they were both adults, who was right as we both had views? For this piece of writing, I would like to like to draw on Gibbs (1988) model of reflection with the hope of using the six steps to examine this classroom experience.
This ‘critical incident’ (Flanagon, 1954) emphasizes a direct observation of human behavior to examine the point of myself, the teacher, keeping two students behind after class to talk about their behavior towards the learning process. This is also the ‘concrete example’ (Peters, 1984) where we have to step back and test ourselves. One test is my ‘feelings’ (Gibbs, 1988) towards the students’ attitude of nonchalantly arriving late and traipsing past me. I felt somewhat annoyed as the class had been disturbed, I was disrespected as a teacher and unfortunately unsupported by my manager who told me to apologize to them.
Moreover, to ‘evaluate’ (Gibbs, 1988), the third stage of Gibbs’ model, which highlights the good and bad, is first to say that I chose a quiet moment to explain myself to the students after the class. The bad would be the students’ reaction to a situation they felt was nothing to be worried about which in Asian culture may have made them lose face. So, to make sense of the situation and ‘analyze’ (Gibbs, 1988) it, I was left feeling that I was in the wrong. My manager was now telling me to apologize and forget about it although I felt he was driven by the Asian culture and business ethics of the customer is always right and do not say anything bad.
The “conclusion” (Gibbs, 1988) is to highlight and reflect on what more could I have done, seeing as I had to apologize (or jeopardise my job). Culture was an issue, but also I think attitudes to lateness of another teacher to which they had had the previous term. My ‘action plan’ (Gibbs, 1988) is now to see if the situation arose again what I would do. Of course, there are reasons for being late, and also for reactions to negative things said about someone. Culturally, maybe I was too abrupt and too serious. Finally, laughter and a smile work in Asian culture and also getting the students’ personal feelings as to the right behavior instead of pushing my personally held beliefs. Hopefully, this essay creates more reflection.
References
Peter Scales, 2008. Teaching in the Lifelong Learning Sector. 1 Edition. Open University Press.
Geoff Petty, 2009. Teaching Today: A Practical Guide. 4 Edition. Nelson Thornes.
Yvonne Hillier, 2005. Reflective Teaching in Further and Adult Education. 2 Edition. Continuum.
Andrew Armitage, 2011. Developing Professional Practice, 14-19. Edition. Longman/Pearson.
What makes a good (English) teacher working in Thailand? – Thai class survey
(817 Words)
Any new foreign language teacher in Thailand can feel that they have studied and acquired the knowledge to feel confident in a classroom full of excitable children. This knowledge lies at the feet of the teacher having the foresight to know how the students might react in any learning situation. One of the most important factors of teaching is the students who have to be in the right frame of mind while having the willingness to learn. This said, a confident teacher still has to change course when their best-laid plans do not seem to be working because of uninterested/reluctant students. For this report, I based my research on what a good teacher should have and do in class. I surveyed 50 Thai students who were between 15 and 17 years of age. This was done by way of a survey during the class where I had the chance to circulate and talk to the students.
My initial thought was to use a list of factors I thought the students would empathize with that showed the character of a teacher.
