Learn to TEACH English with TECHNOLOGY. Free course for American TESOL students.


TESOL certification course online recognized by TESL Canada & ACTDEC UK.

Visit Driven Coffee Fundraising for unique school fundraising ideas.





Texas ISD School Guide
Texas ISD School Guide







ESL Teaching and Learning Tips

Via Lingua: International TEFL Courses

* Tip: Click on the link View Thread above to see the full thread of this post. *
Some students HAVE responded
By:Elephant
In Response To: RE; Some other Problems at my Thai School (Dr. Yanni Zack- ESL Tips and Strategies)

I probably make it sound like it's a 'hell on earth' at my school. It's not all bad, understand. Many of my students participate in the learning process, which means they are listening, writing, speaking, and reading.

The kids who are acting up the most are, believe it or not, those with the most potential and 'know' the most. You see, here in Thailand students are segrated by age, as I said in a previous post.This puts me at an extreme disadvantage.In my M4 class (equivalent to 10th graders in the US), proficiency is all over the place. This means I have to perform a 'balancing act' if I'm going to actually teach the proficient, the not-so-proficient, and the plain 'unlearned'. This means most of the time there are at some students in this class who are bored. At any moment, I'm either covering material most already know (to catch up the slackers/cheaters), or I'm teaching over most of the students' heads (trying to move the proficient ones forward).

When I focus attention on my slackers/cheaters, I have the behavior problems. It's interesting, as when I'm trying to move the proficient ones ahead, I don't have trouble at all....probably because the slack students feel like they're moving ahead as well.

Anyway, I'm finding this isn't the way to divide up students at a high school. It'd be much better for me if my students were segregated according to ability. If they WERE segregated according to ability, my 'non-learned' students would be placed with students several years younger than themselves. Sure, they wouldn't like it at first. But I think when they realized that the only way to rejoin their friends at the original level was through their own hard work, they would motivate themselves and do it.

Thanks for your support. I like reading your posts.

E







Go to another board -