Learn English
One of the most important things I have learnt about teaching young learners is the need for routines. There are many things that can be used in the classroom for many reasons, but today I'm interested in discipline routines.
When I started teaching, until not long ago, if I'm honest, I would send a child outside the room for a minute, though I did't like it and don't use this method at all now. Other teachers have a 'naughty' chair, ask a child to sit out of an activity to calm down or perhaps make a student sit next to them at the front. The important thing is that the teacher is consistent.
There are teachers who are consistently wrong. I have heard that a teacher before me put students in the classroom store room for 10 minutes, I was told all about it by my students this year. No further comments required, I think, but there are teachers out there doing similarly crazy things, I'm sure.
One of my current classroom routines is one that I really don't like. I find it works to an extent, but is difficult to manage and is a pain in the arse, to be frank. I have the students names on cards that they designed and move them between areas of bad, good and excellent, depending on their behaviour during the lesson. At the end of the week, the students in the 'excellent' area get a sticker. I employed this method for three main reasons: 1) The whole class was loud, easily distracted and talked in Spanish too much; not just one student, 2) I had to do something and 3) I couldn't think of anything else.
Hopefully, a few of you out there will recognise this scenario, I'm sure I'm not the only one. I don't think it's very good, I probably don't 'police' it well enough for one class in particular (I use it with two) and I hate seeing the faces of the kids who don't get stickers, regardless of how annoying they've been.
Another teacher at my school is very strict and has a system tied to the end of term tests, but I'd prefer not to have anything attached to results. There are methods using traffic lights, football style yellow and red cards, teams with points and more. All in an attempt to ensure these things - that the class is quieter, they don't talk over each other or the teacher, the use English, they don't annoy other kids and that they don't break any other classroom rules. There's a lot to think about.
How do you manage your young learner classrooms? It's a great cause of stress for many teachers, yet I haven't come across too many methods that really work for me. What about you?
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Learn English
Classroom Routines
One of the most important things I have learnt about teaching young learners is the need for routines. There are many things that can be used in the classroom for many reasons, but today I'm interested in discipline routines.
When I started teaching, until not long ago, if I'm honest, I would send a child outside the room for a minute, though I did't like it and don't use this method at all now. Other teachers have a 'naughty' chair, ask a child to sit out of an activity to calm down or perhaps make a student sit next to them at the front. The important thing is that the teacher is consistent.
There are teachers who are consistently wrong. I have heard that a teacher before me put students in the classroom store room for 10 minutes, I was told all about it by my students this year. No further comments required, I think, but there are teachers out there doing similarly crazy things, I'm sure.
One of my current classroom routines is one that I really don't like. I find it works to an extent, but is difficult to manage and is a pain in the arse, to be frank. I have the students names on cards that they designed and move them between areas of bad, good and excellent, depending on their behaviour during the lesson. At the end of the week, the students in the 'excellent' area get a sticker. I employed this method for three main reasons: 1) The whole class was loud, easily distracted and talked in Spanish too much; not just one student, 2) I had to do something and 3) I couldn't think of anything else.
Hopefully, a few of you out there will recognise this scenario, I'm sure I'm not the only one. I don't think it's very good, I probably don't 'police' it well enough for one class in particular (I use it with two) and I hate seeing the faces of the kids who don't get stickers, regardless of how annoying they've been.
Another teacher at my school is very strict and has a system tied to the end of term tests, but I'd prefer not to have anything attached to results. There are methods using traffic lights, football style yellow and red cards, teams with points and more. All in an attempt to ensure these things - that the class is quieter, they don't talk over each other or the teacher, the use English, they don't annoy other kids and that they don't break any other classroom rules. There's a lot to think about.
How do you manage your young learner classrooms? It's a great cause of stress for many teachers, yet I haven't come across too many methods that really work for me. What about you?
- What Makes An Ideal Teacher
What makes an ideal teacher. Give your opinion (Qualities of a good teacher) An ideal teacher is a friend as well as a teacher to his students. A good teacher should also be a good friend. In the classroom, he looks grave and solemn but he is a man of...
- Problems, Problems
from blackborder.com I've got a really difficult class (or two). I would like to write about it in order to share my problems and ask for advice, but also because I don't think there is enough blogging about problems and failure. At the...
- Let's See What The Magic Bag Thinks
We've all been thereSometimes in class we want to choose one child to do something and often this can be difficult because the kids get annoyed if they aren't chosen. What criteria do you use to choose which child is going to do whatever it is,...
- A Little Happiness Can Go A Long Way
One of my students posted a great video on our class blog site today. He states that it's the best video he's ever found on the internet and I think it's certainly worth a watch. I really enjoyed it, because I'd been having a bad day and...
- English Learning Made Easy Through Fun Esl Games
Learning a second language is no easy task, but ESL games can be the open doorway to a greater understanding of the English language. You should leave this article knowing where you can find English Learning Games and just why they are useful to those...