Re: I don't kow how to teach

(Feburary 20, 2005) April said,

"I am teaching one class in my cream school now. The students are about 2~3 grade students who have been learning English for 2 years. Because their first teacher who has 10 years experience was fired by my boss so I replace her position. I have pressure when I teach English because the students get used to their first teacher's style already(very fast teaching style). Including my boss,they think the tempo of teaching English should be as fast as possible.Do you agree or not? They think when teacher's tempo of teaching is fast, the students can pay much attention to the class and also they can learn more .....Should I be like her or just be myself?"


Dear April,

I think it is more important for you to make sure that your students comprehend and learn well in the class. Whether you teach fast or slowly is less important.

If the ex-teacher was a good teacher, and your boss liked her way of teaching, how can she got fired? So maybe you want to find out what went wrong in the teacher’s class that made her loose this job and try to avoid making the same mistakes.

I do not agree that when you teach fast, then the students pay more attention. Actually, if you teach faster than the students can follow, they will get lost in your lessons easily and sooner or later they will stop listening to you because they can’t understand what you are saying.

One more thing, isn’t there a curriculum for you to follow? A good school should always have a curriculum for the books it’s using. Find it and look it up. Go with the curriculum, and if it’s a well-written one, then you should not have to decide what kind of path to go with for teaching this class.

PS. Don’t worry about teaching the class with your style, but do make sure you have a good/strong theory to explain why you are teaching them the way you are.

CJ/Joy aka Josifina