Every teacher does everything he can to make sure that his/her activity is a success. Although, sometimes there are situations that hamper what you had planned.
However, there are many ways classroom teacher may use to get success in this activity.
One of these is grouping students.
Groupwork and Pair work
Groupwork is a way of distributing tasks by splitting the class in groups. I have found it very useful to students’ learning. It increases the speaking opportunity among them. ü
In complex activities, students have chance of sharing opinions, stating their different positions related to the question.
Generally, I use groupwork to promote students autonomy by allowing them to decide what to do on their own.
In a debate, for example, I give them an issue and it is up to them to develop the subject and organise their own ideas.
On the other hand, in dialogue practice, listening activities, studying a text or taking part in information –gap activity, I may use pairwork.
With this kind of activity I can promote cooperation, create friendship in the classroom.
It can permit the students to share responsibilities rather than carrying the amount of activity alone. It allows students to interact independently without the guidance of the teacher.
How to organise it?
First of all, I have to consider their interest in the activity by questioning them. Then, I must concentrate on choosing better tasks that are of interest to them. I can group the class respecting the following principles: friendship, mixing group, gender, - considering different factors. ü
Discipline
To ensure successful behaviour in the classroom, the teacher must know the students particularities. Must create interesting things to do, must know how to engage them in different activities.
You should set up some rules to be respected, but be flexible. Develop the capacity of praising the positive actions of the students; it helps them to get motivated. Not show obvious favouritism to some students rather than to others.
As a teacher, I must respect some norms of keeping order and different approaches to make the classroom disciplined.
1- A reward system- teacher can reward the student according to their behaviour.
2- Project work – can also be very useful to them. It gets them involved in the activity without having time to relax.
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Homework
Homework makes part to my teaching activity. I have to set a required amount of homework for my students to do. The kind of homework I give them should be that which is accordingly to the subject they learned.
A real purpose to assessing the students, is to know how well they have understood what they have learned. It also can help me improve my teaching methodologies. As to avoid monotony in homeworks, I have to vary activities by asking students to prepare an oral report, writing short compositions on different subjects, completing some gap-filling activities, etc.
Classroom Layout
The classroom layout contributes greatly in the learning process.
I work with different classroom layout. It depends on the school. In any case, I think that our purpose, determine what we can do to succeed in our activity.
In a more than 25 students in the classroom, I am used to forming the class in orderly rows. It allows me to have a clear view of the students and they also can see me. Some activities like: presentation, explaining grammar points watching video,
However, in small classroom, I am used to setting the horseshoe forms. Here there is more intimacy in the class. There is more possibility of sharing information and feeling through talking, eye-to-eye contact makes the student more confidents.
Group Size and Mixture
Generally, English language classes vary greatly in size. It has been rare in my country in particular, to have class with less than 10 students.
The techniques we use vary on group size. In small classes there is much more interaction teacher –student, vice-versa. The communication is facilitated and it is easier to find out the students concern.
In large classes, I have been giving my students a number of different responsibilities in the class.
Using pairwork, groupwork, maximising individualwork, taking on account of vision and acoustics and organising activities which can animate the group, has been very useful and successful to my teaching activities.
Teacher must also respect the difference of the students in the classroom. There must be a mixture in the classroom. It is up to the teacher to get a balance as to not take prejudice to any student of the class.
In situations like these: we may, for example, give different exercises to different students according to their level and interest. We could maybe give them different things to read or listen to. Although it has been difficult to achieve, sometimes we are expected to respect the individuality of our students.
Correction
Correction is a very important teaching activity. It is a vital part of the teacher’s role. It helps students discover their weakness and develop their skill in the process of language acquisition.
Teacher must be attentive to the student speaking time.
It is not correct to interrupt students in mid-flow as to focus grammatical, lexical or pronunciation errors. When the teacher intervenes in a communicative activity, automatically impedes students to express themselves, and consequently it raises stress level and the acquisition process as its tracks.
When students strive to overcome difficulties in communication as to be able to transmit their ideas, it helps them find out ways to get rid of this or that communicative problem. Thus, they will learn much more than expecting teacher to do everything for them. ü
Teachers should give students opportunity to learn. When teachers intervene trying to correct every mistake or supply alternative modes of expressions they are removing the need to negotiate meaning, and low the willing of searching the knowledge.
Therefore, teacher should be the last to speak in the class.
However, when introducing a new structure/concept then more correction is needed. Teachers need to find the fine line between too much and too little correction – a balance needs to be found.
Planning
Planning is a very important activity for the teacher. It gives the class direction.
Planning allows the teacher to know what subject to teach, at what pace, providing for a logical progression of activities.
There is no a successful activity without planning it before. I have it as an important tool for achieving my goals and satisfying my students’ interests.
There are very important aspects, which cannot ever be ignored when planning the lesson:
The lesson aim, the class, the methodology ( how to achieve the lesson aim), the unexpected( what we will do if something goes wrong).
If the teacher doesn’t consider these elements, lets down all his teaching effort.
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