The subject is "What I would do if I were a teacher". He freely admits that he has never been a teacher and doesn't know how to teach, but he is giving his opinion merely as a language learner who has had lots of experience from the receiving end of L2 teaching.
It's interesting to get student feedback in this way, as perhaps teachers do not put themselves in the shoes of the learner often enough.
To paraphrase the podcast, he says that if he were a teacher he would outline to Ss in the first lesson that the onus of L2 learning responsibility lies completely on their shoulders. This is what he would say....
- My job is to make myself unnecessary.
- You (the Ss) must be independent of me.
- You should not expect ME to teach YOU the language.
- My job is to give you the habits and attitude for YOU to learn the language yourself.
- You cannot learn the L2 only in the classroom and I cannot teach it to you only in class
I think that this is not only good advice, but would make all language teachers' jobs much more interesting (than they already are, of course). Imagine having a class of rabidly motivated students, that bring the lesson to you, in terms of new vocab, phrases, idioms etc etc.
My in-company business students could do with a little bit more of this student ideology!
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I really like that approach, but doesn´t anybody feel as if one is firing one-self at the very beginning?
ReplyDeleteWell, yes I had the same reservations.
ReplyDeleteBut I have started trying to be a 'guide for new student self learning habits' in addition to teaching.
So, I have told some of my groups that I can't teach them English in 90 mins a week. They must take responsibility for their learning outside of the classroom. The response from students was, "Yes, you are absolutely right. We need to do more."
In addition to normal homework, I have given a 'voluntary' homework, where everyday students think of a word in L1 that they think they should know in English. Then they write a sentence containing that word.
So far (and it's only in the early stages), every student has done this voluntary homework. Everyone has been eager to show me their new words. Students want to know the words that other students thought were useful etc.
Good vibes all round.
I don't think this negates the role of the teacher. It has given a bit more motivation to my students and made them think in English for at least 5 more mins everyday.
So far, so good.