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5 Things I Wish I’d Known Before Teaching Teenagers

Just do the thing... The advice I got from a colleague early on in my teaching career.  Her advice while not exactly motivating, ended up being the best advice I was given for everything, not just teaching. At the time I was struggling to motivate a class of teenaged learners and went home each day feeling like a failure. Even back then, I knew high school students were not my preferred age group, in fact I didn’t want anything to do with them. All my experience had been with much… All categories, Certificate courses, Five ways to, ESL activities, How to...

5 things you didn't know about grammar

One of the more common beliefs that teachers and students bring to the classroom, especially in Hong Kong (which tends to favour classroom activities based on memorization and declarative, as opposed to procedural knowledge) is an obsession with grammar.  Yes but they need to know the grammar, teachers often say. Yes, the students didn’t necessarily write very much, but I taught the grammar well, they might suggest. My son really needs to work on his grammar, the father… All categories, Certificate courses, Diploma courses, How to..., Five ways to

5 Ways of Managing Problematic Behaviour

Following on from our earlier article on positive reinforcement, this week I look at how teachers can manage problematic behavior. If you’ve ever had the experience of a difficult student, you are not alone! It’s part and parcel of being a teacher. The only way you could avoid problematic behavior with students would be to only teach one student ever! When teaching young learners, and sometimes adults, you may often come across situations where the learner’s behavior becomes a problem for… All categories, Certificate courses, How to..., Five ways to, ESL activities

5 ways to manage behaviour using positive reinforcement

When I was 5, I had a piano teacher who rapped my knuckles and told me off sternly when I didn’t practice enough. When she asked me to be a part of her annual recital, I burst into tears and shook my head, overcome with fear at failing in front of an audience. When I was 12, I had a maths teacher who was ex-Army, who would scream at us if we asked our friends for help. He once was writing something on the board with chalk, when he heard someone whispering, and quick as an arrow, he turned and… All categories, Five ways to, How to..., Certificate courses, ESL activities

It all begins with context: getting your lesson off to a positive start

Set context, and carry on This ought to be the mantra for all teachers, yet it is often one of the most challenging components of any language lesson: set it well, and the meaning and range of language students can use appropriately becomes suddenly more accessible; set it poorly, and you’ll have the students (and possibly yourself too!) scratching heads with puzzled looks. But what is context? Context, in terms of language teaching, relates to the who, where, what, why of any communication… All categories, Five ways to, Certificate courses, Diploma courses, ESL activities, How to...

Does this sound right? Making the most of pronunciation

It’s not what you say, it’s how you say it. Right? In which case, it often makes me wonder why teaching pronunciation doesn’t take more of the focus in English language lessons.  That’s not to say that teachers don’t do it – indeed, it’s a compulsory component of most teacher training programmes. However, these often focus largely on segmental phonology (or the individual sounds of English phonemes) rather than more complex feature of phonology like connected speech and intonation. I… All categories, ESL activities, Certificate courses, Diploma courses, How to...

How to get better at your job

By David Kim, CertTESOL Trainee, 2016 Hey, you could teach them English!? What? Really? How? As a corporate sustainability practitioner, I am responsible for managing many aspects of my company’s environmental, social, and governance performance. The social component of my work often involves company-organised events and activities for under-resourced members of the community. A number of charitable activities are organised by my company’s volunteer team for children. The team strives to… All categories

5 ways to motivate your students

For many of us, our time at school is amongst the most memorable experiences we have of growing up. And for many of us, it’s not just going to school, but the teachers we had that impact us most strongly. And more often than not, it’s the memories of the teachers who motivated us to learn and engage with the lesson that stay with us. As teachers, we often come up against challenging classes and students. We all know that motivation is the key to successful learning outcomes – in fact I would… All categories, Certificate courses, ESL activities, Diploma courses, How to...

Classroom Management: How to take control of noisy students

My class is so loud! It’s Friday afternoon and your class of young learners (or adults!) are bouncing off the walls, not paying attention and talking away amongst themselves. What do you do? Raise your voice and try to shout over them? Many of us can attest to the fact that raising your voice never gets you anywhere, ESPECIALLY on a Friday afternoon. So what can you do instead?To calm a rowdy, noisy class, it’s important to engage them. Just like a hyper-stimulated toddler on overdrive, noisy… All categories, How to..., ESL activities, Certificate courses

Is TEFL Worth it?

A few months ago, we shared some top tips for taking the CertTESOL from a former trainee on the course. In fact, even before deciding to take a certificate course in TESOL, many people spend a long time simply trying to figure out the difference between TESOL, TEFL, ESL and ELT courses and choosing the best one for them. I often say that one of the best ways to guage the merits of a course is to look at the workload involved.  So, here we've asked two previous… All categories, How to..., Certificate courses, Careers in TESOL

How to Teach Grammar Creatively: moving beyond the basics

A few weeks ago we introduced you to the basic principles of how to teach grammar. The key idea behind the basics of teaching grammar relies setting a clear context, introducing the target form and then providing practice and production opportunities for your students.  This week we look at some alternative ways to deliver grammar lessons - some which you may be familiar with, some of which you may not.  Why not try some out and see how you and your students respond?  This… All categories, How to..., Five ways to, Certificate courses, Diploma courses, Teaching skills

Teaching jobs in Hong Kong: so you think you want to teach in a local HK school...?

Many of you will be gearing up for the new academic year, or looking for your first English teaching job in Hong Kong.  Aaron joined the CertTESOL at English for Asia course in 2016 after working extensively in various teaching contexts throughout the city. Here he gives us his honest insight into the ups and downs of working in the Hong Kong local school system as a NET teacher, and first-hand advice on finding your first teaching job in Hong Kong. So you think… All categories, Certificate courses, How to..., ESL activities, Careers in TESOL