TEFL Chapter 1 Summary
Starting out
The main thing we want our students to do is use the language
themselves.
There are variety of ways you can set about learning, namely:
- self-study
- immersion (picking-up)
- classroom work
What is a teacher?
To found out what’s your basic image of what a teacher’s job is and how a
teacher should behave, it’s important to check if you have inbuilt
assumptions (aannames) about teaching from this exposure
(belichting/blootstelling) to hours and hours of observing your own
teachers at work.
It’s important to check out if the classes of an ’entertainer’ style of
teacher are genuinely (werkelijk) leading to any real learning. The
entertaining peformance may provide useful exposure to one way of using
language, but this isn’t sufficient to justify regular lessons of this kind.
There is a fine line between creating a good atmosphere and good rapport
in class and becoming entertainer. A good rapport is crucial but
entertainment is much less so.
‘’Traditional’’ teaching is characterised by the teacher doing most of the
talking and is by far the most active person. The students’ role is primarily
to listen and concentrate and, perhaps, take notes with a view to talking in
the information. Many students expect that a teacher will teach in this
way. In such cases, it’s important to remember that your choice of
methodology is not simply a matter of what you believe to be best, but it’s
also about what is appropriate in a particular place with particular people.
The process by which traditional teaching is imagined is sometimes
characterised as ‘’jug and mug’’ – It is often based on an assumption that
the teacher is the ‘’knower’’ and has the task of passing over knowledge
to the students, and that having something explained or demonstrated to
you will lead to learning.
The way the teacher related to the learners and how learners related to
each other was significantly different in different classrooms. So what’s
the importance of rapport between the teacher and the student? The
1
, problem is, whereas rapport is clearly important, it’s also difficult to define
(bepalen) or quantify (meten). Sometimes people equate it with ‘’being
generally friendly to your students’ but we need to find a wider definition
and involve many more aspects to do with the quality of this context.
Is it something natural or something that can be worked on and
improved?
There are three core teacher characteristics that help to create an
effective learning evironment. These are:
- respect
- empathy
- authenticity
When a teacher has these three qualities, the relationships within the
classrooms are likely to be stronger and deeper, and communication
between people much more open and honest. The educational climate
becomes positive, forward-looking and supportive. The learners increase
their own self-esteem and self-understanding and they take more
responsibility for their own learning. (Carl Rogers)
But the most important quality is to be yourself. Not to play a role of a
teacher, but to take the risk of being vulnerable and human and honest.
(Rogers and Frelberg)
Real rapport is more substantial than a technique you can mimic. It’s you
and your moment – by – moment relationship with other human beings. On
the contrary the three cores (respect, empathy & authenticity) are rooted
at the level of your genuine intentions. We need to look closely at what we
really want for our students, how we really feel about them. It’s our
attitude and intentions rather than our methodology that we may need to
work on.
There are obviously many ways of teaching. Andrian Underhill suggested
that there may be three broad categories of teaching styles, namely:
- The explainer
- the involver
- the enabler
Teaching and learning
The process of learning often involves five steps:
- Do, recall, reflect, conclude, prepare
Again it’s important to distinguish (onderscheiden) between learning and
teaching.
People learn more by doing things themselves rather than by being told
2
Starting out
The main thing we want our students to do is use the language
themselves.
There are variety of ways you can set about learning, namely:
- self-study
- immersion (picking-up)
- classroom work
What is a teacher?
To found out what’s your basic image of what a teacher’s job is and how a
teacher should behave, it’s important to check if you have inbuilt
assumptions (aannames) about teaching from this exposure
(belichting/blootstelling) to hours and hours of observing your own
teachers at work.
It’s important to check out if the classes of an ’entertainer’ style of
teacher are genuinely (werkelijk) leading to any real learning. The
entertaining peformance may provide useful exposure to one way of using
language, but this isn’t sufficient to justify regular lessons of this kind.
There is a fine line between creating a good atmosphere and good rapport
in class and becoming entertainer. A good rapport is crucial but
entertainment is much less so.
‘’Traditional’’ teaching is characterised by the teacher doing most of the
talking and is by far the most active person. The students’ role is primarily
to listen and concentrate and, perhaps, take notes with a view to talking in
the information. Many students expect that a teacher will teach in this
way. In such cases, it’s important to remember that your choice of
methodology is not simply a matter of what you believe to be best, but it’s
also about what is appropriate in a particular place with particular people.
The process by which traditional teaching is imagined is sometimes
characterised as ‘’jug and mug’’ – It is often based on an assumption that
the teacher is the ‘’knower’’ and has the task of passing over knowledge
to the students, and that having something explained or demonstrated to
you will lead to learning.
The way the teacher related to the learners and how learners related to
each other was significantly different in different classrooms. So what’s
the importance of rapport between the teacher and the student? The
1
, problem is, whereas rapport is clearly important, it’s also difficult to define
(bepalen) or quantify (meten). Sometimes people equate it with ‘’being
generally friendly to your students’ but we need to find a wider definition
and involve many more aspects to do with the quality of this context.
Is it something natural or something that can be worked on and
improved?
There are three core teacher characteristics that help to create an
effective learning evironment. These are:
- respect
- empathy
- authenticity
When a teacher has these three qualities, the relationships within the
classrooms are likely to be stronger and deeper, and communication
between people much more open and honest. The educational climate
becomes positive, forward-looking and supportive. The learners increase
their own self-esteem and self-understanding and they take more
responsibility for their own learning. (Carl Rogers)
But the most important quality is to be yourself. Not to play a role of a
teacher, but to take the risk of being vulnerable and human and honest.
(Rogers and Frelberg)
Real rapport is more substantial than a technique you can mimic. It’s you
and your moment – by – moment relationship with other human beings. On
the contrary the three cores (respect, empathy & authenticity) are rooted
at the level of your genuine intentions. We need to look closely at what we
really want for our students, how we really feel about them. It’s our
attitude and intentions rather than our methodology that we may need to
work on.
There are obviously many ways of teaching. Andrian Underhill suggested
that there may be three broad categories of teaching styles, namely:
- The explainer
- the involver
- the enabler
Teaching and learning
The process of learning often involves five steps:
- Do, recall, reflect, conclude, prepare
Again it’s important to distinguish (onderscheiden) between learning and
teaching.
People learn more by doing things themselves rather than by being told
2
