An Introduction to Teaching ESL/EFL
Would
you like to increase your effectiveness as an English language teacher? Would
you like to go beyond the well-known methods that often leave teachers
frustrated with their one-size-fits-all approach? This course will take you on a
fascinating exploration of what it means to be a teacher, how to understand who
your students are and the needs they have, and how to choose the most
appropriate materials and activities for your classroom. You'll learn how you
can choose and fine-tune the principles that exactly fit your teaching
situation.
During the next six weeks, we'll rethink the traditional native vs. non-native
speaker distinction, see why teaching English is so different from teaching
other subjects, and explore innovative approaches like Communicative Language
Teaching and the lexical approach. You'll gain new insights and ideas for
teaching vocabulary, grammar, listening, speaking, reading, and writing. You'll
also discover what some of your options are in designing fair and accurate
tests. And you'll learn how to keep learning and growing throughout your
teaching career. Also, students who successfully complete this course will
receive a TESOL Certificate of Completion.
So join us on this journey of becoming a more reflective and effective English
language teacher!
To enroll in this course, click the Enroll Now button below:
Requirements:
Internet access, e-mail, and the Microsoft Internet Explorer or Mozilla Firefox Web browser.
Syllabus:
All courses run for six weeks, with a two-week grace period at the end. Two
lessons are released each week for the six-week duration of the course. You do
not have to be present when the lesson is released, but you must complete each
lesson within two weeks of its release.
A new section of each course starts on the second or third Wednesday of each
month. If enrolling in a series of two or more courses, please be sure to space
the start date for each course at least two months apart.
| Week One |
| Wednesday - Lesson 01 |
| The English language is everywhere—in music and
movies, classrooms and airports, newspapers and e-mail. It's the
language of both Shakespeare and Hollywood. So everyone knows what
English is . . . or do they? Is it British, American, Canadian, or
Australian? Is it harder to learn than other languages? In our first
lesson, we'll explore the native vs. non-native distinction people often
make about English speakers. We'll also look at how teaching English is
different from teaching other subjects. And finally, we'll see which
aspects of memory are most helpful in learning a language. |
| Friday - Lesson 02 |
| What exactly is teaching? Have you given much thought
to what kinds of roles you play in the classroom? Well, today you will!
Teachers have many roles, including lesson planner, friend, authority,
coach, assessor, and role model, just to name a few. In this lesson,
you'll reflect on the different roles you play in the classroom, the
role of English language teaching in your curriculum and community, and
what factors should shape your particular style. After this lesson, you
might agree that the best answer to, "What exactly is teaching?" is, "It
depends!" |
| Week Two |
| Wednesday - Lesson 03 |
| As an English teacher, you naturally want to choose
the most appropriate materials and activities for your classroom. But
how do you do this? First, you must answer the most important question
of all: Who are you teaching? In this lesson, you'll think about the
faces you see every day in your classroom. Are they younger or older?
What life experiences and intellectual abilities do they bring with
them? Why do they want to learn English? All these variables will impact
how you teach, shaping your approach and the activities you choose. One
thing's for sure: It's really not English we're teaching, but students. |
| Friday - Lesson 04 |
| In this lesson, we'll take a look at some of the many
methods people have used over the years to teach foreign languages. Some
are hundreds of years old, while others are fairly new on the scene. As
you'll see, though, all of them suffer from certain limitations. Are
they useless to us then? Not at all. Today we'll explore how, even
though the methods themselves may not help us much, we can still gain a
lot from understanding the ideas that led to their creation. |
| Week Three |
| Wednesday - Lesson 05 |
| If methods are too limiting, what can you use to
guide you in your teaching? In this lesson, we'll focus on general
principles that can guide your choice of classroom activities whatever
your situation may be. You'll learn about Communicative Language
Teaching, as well as a number of principles that experts have developed
along the way. Of course, you're not limited to what others have done.
Instead, you'll discover ways to select or even develop your own
principles. And you'll find the freedom to choose the principles that
are relevant to your teaching situation and let go of those that aren't. |
| Friday - Lesson 06 |
| How do we define what a word is? By its spelling? By
its pronunciation? By its dictionary meaning? As teachers of the English
language, words are our stock-in-trade. We must teach vocabulary,
because a language is made of its words. But we can't really teach the
true meaning of words if we teach them in isolation and out of context.
In this lesson, we'll look at several types of meaning you need to be
aware of and explore some techniques for teaching vocabulary items in
the most helpful way. |
| Week Four |
| Wednesday - Lesson 07 |
| No other aspect of language teaching is more
misunderstood and disliked than grammar! Like it or not, though, grammar
is the linguistic glue that holds words together. In this lesson, we'll
look at interesting ways to teach grammar, including using listening,
the lexical approach, the top-down approach, and context. These
approaches will not only be useful and relevant, but they might even
make grammar exciting for your students to learn! |
| Friday - Lesson 08 |
| Listening and speaking come so naturally in our first
language that it might seem hard to believe that we actually need to
teach these skills in a second language. Natural or not, these two
skills are exceedingly complex, and each demands special approaches and
techniques. In this lesson, we'll look at how these skills differ, and
then we'll examine ways to help students improve their listening
comprehension and speaking abilities. |
| Week Five |
| Wednesday - Lesson 09 |
| The majority of English learners around the world
need to learn reading the most, yet this skill is probably taught the
least. In this lesson, we'll look at different writing and spelling
systems, the problems that come with the irregularities of English, and
different types of reading skills. We'll also examine teaching
techniques like skimming, scanning, and transcoding that can help
students improve their reading comprehension and speed. |
| Friday - Lesson 10 |
| Millions of people around the world can speak
perfectly well but can't read or write in their own language. A person
needs years of schooling to develop strong writing skills—and it's even
more challenging to learn to write in a second language. So today, we'll
review the characteristics of good writing, and you'll get some ideas
about how to make learning this skill a little less daunting for your
students. |
| Week Six |
| Wednesday - Lesson 11 |
| Have you ever met a student who really likes to take
tests? Probably not. And with all the work that goes into them, teachers
like them even less! Yet we constantly need to assess, evaluate, and
test to know what progress our students are making and where they may
need help. In this lesson, you'll learn the key difference between
mistakes and errors, get some ideas about how to offer correction,
discover different types of tests, and see how to keep them fair,
accurate, and relevant. |
| Friday - Lesson 12 |
| In our final lesson, we'll explore how to become more reflective and effective teachers. You'll learn how to become more expert and efficient, and you'll discover ways to gain insight into your vocation through watching and learning from other teachers, observing and evaluating yourself, and journaling. Finally, you'll see the great value in continuing your professional growth, becoming the great teacher you were meant to be! |
To enroll in this course, click the Enroll Now button below:
Recommended Courses:
Students who enrolled in An Introduction to Teaching ESL/EFL were also interested in the following courses:
Differentiated Instruction in the ClassroomBig Ideas in Little Books
Grammar Refresher
Survival Kit for New Teachers
Writing for ESL
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