Most learners assume that learning ESL means reading grammar rules and memorizing words. They overlook the fact that they do not learn a foreign language. They acquire it. Acquiring means that they 'pick up' skills. It's like swimming. Learners must not only understand the ideas and concepts, have information at hand but they must train their bodies, too. In the case of language acquisition, the physical activity involved is listening, speaking, reading, writing and paralanguage. Learners 'pick up' language skills. They must study every day, learn from their mistakes, use the language in different situations, develop the four basic skills - speaking, reading, listening and writing. It is very important to know how to study. To learn how to teach students to study English, click HERE...
How to Teach Listening
Listening skills can be acquired only with lots of practice. Students can practice their listening skills both in class and at home. They should listen to the radio news, watch movies; use a tape-recorder and a computer. ESL teachers should advise their students to get learning tools such as electronic dictionaries, textbooks and software. Good quality electronic dictionaries as well as i-phones are very convenient and students like to use them. In the process of listening students learn how to pronounce English sounds and use proper intonation and rhythm. Listening and pronunciation can be very frustrating because there are no clearly formulated rules of listening or speaking as in grammar and vocabulary teaching. Listening skills can be developed best if they are integrated with speaking skills. It is important to record students' speeches, ask them to listen and compare their own speeches with the native speaker's speech; by replicating this procedure students can achieve excellent results; students can practice this activity both in class and at home. It is also important to teach students the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) which was developed by the International Phonetic Association as a standardized representation of the sounds of spoken language. The IPA is widely used by ESL students. To learn how to teach listening, click HERE...
How to Teach Speaking
There are two ways of speaking, face-to-face communication and public speaking. Both skills are difficult to develop for ESL learners. Face-to-face teaching can be very effective if an ESL teacher organizes the teaching process properly: selects suitable topics, considers TTT and STT, selects suitable partners for conversation, never wastes time on grammar, and never interrupts students to correct their errors. Public speaking is related to fear. Even some experienced professionals would rather die than speak in public. However, everybody can develop the skills of public speaking and attain remarkable results. To learn how to teach English speaking, click HERE...
How to Teach Reading
Reading can be intensive and extensive. Intensive reading courses provide students with basic reading strategies to enable them to achieve fluency in the areas of vocabulary recognition and to develop critical thinking skills. The objectives of intensive reading courses are usually achieved through a number of activities such as skimming, scanning and interacting with a variety of texts for different purposes. There are many good textbooks which can help ESL teachers to develop intensive reading skills. Also, there is excellent software for this purpose.
When we teach writing we need to consider the age of the students, their motivation level, their aims of learning, their language level, as well as the objectives of the course. Teachers can involve students by choosing topics carefully, by considering their interests and focusing on a specific area which needs to be improved such as structure, tense usage or creativity.
The basic difficulties include spelling, cohesion and coherence. Structure of text is related to cohesion and coherence. Cohesion includes mechanical links at a language level - all grammatical and lexical links in the text: pronouns, tenses, synonyms, etc. It establishes connections within a text at such levels as paragraph, sentence and phrase. Coherence establishes connections of denotative and connotative meanings and sequences of ideas that relate to each other - at an ideas level. These are step-by-step logical sequences from general to particular, from statement to example, from problem to solution, from question to answer, from dilemma to choice, from anticipation to outcome, and so on. Sentences should contain no unnecessary words and paragraphs should contain no unnecessary sentences. To learn how to teach writing, click HERE...
How to Teach Punctuation
Every ESL teacher should come into the classroom with fresh punctuation and syntax teaching ideas, activities and resources. Punctuation marks are symbols that are used in sentences and texts to make the meaning clearer. What should ESL teachers tell their students about English punctuation marks? To learn how to teach punctuation, click HERE...
How to Teach English Grammar
Grammar in academic environment focuses on the basic principles and rules of the language. Grammar is the study of how words combine to form sentences. Grammar also focuses on the study of structural relationships in a language, the system of inflections, syntax, and word formation. There are different types of grammar. To learn how to teach grammar more effectively, click HERE...
How to Write Course Outlines
An ESL course outline identifies the expectations and the basic components of the course which the student receives from the ESL teacher and the school. It is the principal means for course planning: highlights the required components of the course, provides coherent information and skills that are needed to prepare students in a particular subject, contains the prerequisites needed to take the course and acts as an agreement between the school and the student. To learn how to write a better course outline, click HERE...
How to Write Good Lesson Plans
There is no recognized way of writing a lesson plan. Many lesson plan templates are complicated and require a lot of time to be filled in. They are too formal and too much structured, and are not suitable for a busy ESL teacher who teaches more than 20 hours per week. A lesson plan is a good idea if it helps the teacher to teach. However, it often happens that teaching without a lesson plan is more successful than with a thoroughly prepared lesson plan. A lesson plan should be concise and clearly organized. To learn how to write a better lesson plan, click HERE...
How to Teach English for Specific Purposes (ESP)
ESP is English as a second language acquisition in specialized contexts. ESP courses are usually designed for adult learners. ESP usually meets specific needs of the learners, and quite often courses are designed for specific fields such as English for Medicine, English for Logistics, English for Marketing, English for Tourism, English for Arts, English for Chemistry, English for Aviation, English for Computers, English for Engineering, English for Police, English for Academic Purposes, English for Biology, English for Secretaries, English for Nurses, English for Journalists, newspaper, and English for many other special purposes. To learn how to teach ESP, click HERE...
How to Teach Business English
Business English teachers must know that in addition to teaching how to write business letters, memos, minutes of meetings, how to give presentations (face-to-face, telephone and public speaking) and how to read effectively (intensive reading and extensive reading), it is important to focus on business cultural differences such as negotiation, conflict resolution, consumer behavior, product perception and product distribution, advertising and promotion, miscommunication issues, planning, perception of time and space (proxemics, time management), business etiquette (table etiquette), and more... To learn how to teach business English, click HERE...
How to Teach Medical English
Doctors, nurses, health care workers and university or college medical students who are non-native speakers of English need to attend medical English courses. They need to learn to speak (also write, read and listen to lectures or their patients) about medicine in good English. Colleges and universities worldwide need qualified teachers who could teach medical concepts and terminology. Teaching medical English is becoming a popular business and medical English teachers are becoming high in demand. Medical English students’ needs vary but there are also many common features. To get useful medical English resources, click HERE…
How to Use Newspapers for English Teaching Purposes
Newspapers can be used in ESL classroom with learners at all levels. The good thing about a newspaper is that it provides readily available and regularly changing original texts at an appropriate language level. In addition, a newspaper deals with topics of current interest and contain modern words, phrases and expressions which are used today; some newly coined words may still not be included into dictionaries but they can already be discovered in the newspapers. To learn how to use English newspapers in ESL classroom, click HERE...
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