Ten Characteristics of a Good Teacher

Ten Characteristics of a Good Teacher

This article was first published in Volume 25, No. 1 (1987).

       From time to time during the 15 years I have been working in the field of English language teaching and training, I have put myself in the position of language learner rather than teacher. In addition to enjoying language study and finding the process fascinating, I find it beneficial to view the process through the eyes of a student. Even though I have felt at odds with some teachers and their methods, I have learned something from every teacher I have ever had,even the worst of them.

The ten characteristics

       There is a line in Saint-Exupery’s The Little Prince that applies to any endeavor, but especially teaching. It reads: “That which is essential cannot be seen with the eye. Only with the heart can one know it rightly.” The essence of teaching is difficult to qualify, but that line leads directly into my most essential criterion.

•  I want a teacher who has a contagious enthusiasm for his teaching one who, as Richard Via says, loves his students and his work. Mr. Via is an educational specialist in using drama techniques to teach EFL at the East-West Center in Hawaii. I was fortunate enough to attend his teacher-training seminar in Korea in 1976. It was a pleasure to be in his audience. His enjoyment in transmitting knowledge and participating in the seminar was apparent and infectious. His passion for teaching instilled a passion for learning in all the participants. For me, the most crucial factors in effective teaching are who the teacher is and how he acts in the classroom. This influences the way the students react toward the target language and, therefore, their success in learning it.

• I want a teacher who is creative. Teaching must be more than simply opening a book, doing exercises, and following an outline written by someone else. In the tedium of repetition, the student can go through the motions of doing the exercises without his mind being engaged. What can a teacher do to engage the student’s mind? There are a myriad of techniques that the creative teacher can employ information-gap exercises, games, songs, jazz chants, problem solving, and other techniques that allow the student to utilize the skills he has already developed in his first language.
• I want a teacher who can add pace and humor to the class.The humor of one of my teachers had the effect of alleviating my nervousness of reducing my effective filter. There was a rapport among the students and the teacher because we were all laughing together. We had a good time learning, and we made a lot of progress because we were not afraid to make mistakes; we could take chances. As Krashen would say, the effective filters of the students were low, facilitating acquisition. Another teacher that I had maintained an excellent pace in the class. She never lost an instant consulting a list or thinking about what to do next; she had prepared that was evident and she was going to capitalize on every second. I was somewhat nervous in her class, but I didn't have time to worry about it because events moved so quickly. I was literally sitting on the edge of my seat so that I wouldn't miss anything,and my adrenalin was a positive force. I should add that humor is a double-edged sword: it can backfire, for what is funny to one person may not be funny to another. Humor across cultures can add a layer of difficulty to communication.
• I want a teacher who challenges me. I had several teachers who always spoke to me in Spanish, both in and out of class. I felt they were showing confidence in me and challenging me to speak Spanish. The student’s passive knowledge of the target language is always greater than his active knowledge. There is no reason why a teacher should use any language other than the target language except possibly for purposes of expediency. When a teacher reverts to the native language, he is showing a lack of patience with the students’ struggles in the target language. In addition, switching codes is confusing. I was given a test in which all the instructions were read to me in English, so that I would be sure to understand everything. Then I had to answer in Spanish. But the test had three parts and I had to continue switching codes back and forth from English to Spanish; I found this very confusing. It is like going off a diet once you cheat a little, then you want to cheat a little more. If someone speaks to me in English, this activates my English channel and I am prepared to think in English. Speaking in the target language to the learner prepares and challenges him to speak in that language. In addition, I want a teacher who can maintain a level of difficulty high enough to challenge me, but not so high as to discourage me.
•  I want a teacher who is encouraging and patient, and who will not give up on me. Some of the teachers that I have had demonstrated incredible patience with all of their students, never allowing even a shadow of displeasure to cross their faces in reaction to continued incorrect speaking after endless correction (which may say something about the policy of correction). When the teacher is positive encouraging initial and repeated attempts the students will apply themselves more diligently. Motivation thrives on success. One teacher I had appeared on several occasions to give up on me. She would struggle to have the other members of the class repeat the combination of an indirect object pronoun followed by a direct object pronoun  the nemesis of the Spanish-language student. They would have numerous chances to supply the correct combination in various tenses, but I often was given only one opportunity. For the life of me, I do not know why the teacher gave me only one chance. Was it because I was struggling and she wanted to spare me any unpleasantness? Or was it because in her mind I didn’t need the practice? I felt that I needed the practice and wanted at least a chance to try. I felt that the teacher was discouraged and had lost confidence in my ability to progress. As a result, I lost my incentive and became unsure of myself.
• I want a teacher who will take an interest in me as a person one who will try to discover discussion topics that interest me. When I was teaching, one of the first things I did was to try to find out what my students’ interests were: hobbies, past employment, family, travel, etc. The easiest, most accessible area of conversation is oneself. The initial and intermediate stages of development for the language student do not abound with opportunities for coherent self-expression. Most of the time, we language students feel fairly incompetent because we cannot express ourselves adequately, as we are accustomed to doing in our native language. Thus, if we can discuss some little accomplishment we've had, or something that we take pleasure in or are proud of, so much the better.
• I want a teacher who knows grammar well and who can explain something on the spot1 if necessary. I also want a teacher who is realistic and has the simple courage to admit that he doesn't know an answer if indeed he doesn't. I have had some teachers who, probably as the result of the de-emphasis on grammar explanation in the structuralist tradition, did not provide enough explanations. It seems to me that a more eclectic approach would take into consideration the needs of the adult learner, who should be given some insight into the intricacies of grammar.
• I want a teacher who will take a minute or two to answer a question after class, or who will take five minutes to correct something that I have done on my own. I had several teachers who did this willingly and who encouraged the students to do extra work on their own. I also had a teacher who made some corrections for me at my request, but somehow I felt as if I had encroached on her time. Is teaching to be exactly 50 minutes of the hour and no more? First, we as teachers need to encourage students not only to study what is required, but to pursue on their own areas in which they are interested. Acquisition is facilitated when it concerns information that we need or are interested in. And second, we need to appreciate our students’ efforts.
• I want a teacher who will treat me as a person, on an equal basis with all the members of the class, regardless of sex, marital status, race, or my future need for the language. In some of my classes women were given discussion topics relating only to the home and family, and men were rarely asked to talk about their families. Men were also given more “talk” time than the women. This can be discouraging to the student, and that is not conducive to progress. As teachers, we must look carefully at our classes to be certain that we are including everyone equally. I know that I have probably been guilty of bias toward the brighter and more energetic students they’re more challenging for the teacher and more interesting for the class. But now  that I have been a victim of bias myself, I will certainly be more aware of treating my students equally.
• Finally, I want a teacher who will leave his emotional baggage outside the classroom. The classroom is a stage, and to be effective the teacher must in some cases be an actor. I do not want to interrupt my concentration by worrying about what might be bothering the teacher. Nor do I want a teacher who sustains himself through ridicule or sarcasm, playing havoc with the emotions of his students and thereby blocking any learning/acquisition that might take place.

อ้างอิง:http://americanenglish.state.gov/search/solrf[0]=bundle%3Aresource&f[1]=im_field_resource_categories

สิบลักษณะของครูที่ดี

       1. ครูที่มีความกระตือรือร้นในการสอน
       2.ครูที่มีความคิดสร้างสรรค์
       3.ครูที่สามารถเพิ่มความเร็วและอารมณ์ขันในชั้นเรียนได้
       4.ครูที่ให้ความท้าทายกับนักเรียน
       5.ครูที่ส่งเสริมนักเรียนและมีความอดทน ยกย่องชมเชยนักเรียน
       6.ครูที่ให้ความสนใจแก่นักเรียนทุกคน ไม่สนใจแค่คนใดคนหนึ่ง
       7.ครูที่มีความรู้ในหลักไวยากรณ์ และสามารถอธิบายจุดสำคัญได้
       8.ครูที่มีเวลาตอบคำถามและแก้ปัญหาให้กับนักเรียน
       9.ครูที่ปฏิบัติกับนักเรียนเหมือนกันทุกคน บนพื้นฐานที่เท่าเทียมกัน
       10.ครูที่มีวุฒิภวะในการควบคุมอารมณ์ของตนได้อย่างดีเยี่ยม

        ประสิทธิภาพของครูขึ้นอยู่กับการแสดงลักษณะอารมณ์ สิ่งเหล่านี้นั้นเป็นมาแต่กำเนิดในบางส่วนของเรา แต่พวกเขายังมีอยู่ในความเข้าใจของครูเป็นส่วนใหญ่ ระกอบด้วยหลักวิชาอันถูกต้อง ที่แน่นแฟ้นกระจ่างแจ้งในใจ รวมทั้งความฉลาดที่จะพิจารณาเรื่องต่าง ๆ ตลอดจนกิจที่จะทำ คำที่จะพูดทุกอย่างได้โดยถูกต้อง ด้วยเหตุผลอย่างหนึ่งได้แก่ ความดี คือ ความสุจริต ความเมตตากรุณา เห็นใจและปรารถนาดีต่อผู้อื่นโดยเสมอหน้า อีกอย่างหนึ่งได้แก่ ความสามารถ ที่จะเผื่อแผ่ และถ่ายทอดความรู้ความดีของตนเองไปยังผู้อื่นอย่างได้ผล ความเป็นครูมีอยู่แล้ว ย่อมฉายออกให้ผู้อื่นได้รับประโยชน์ด้วย ผู้ที่มีความเป็นครูสมบูรณ์ในตัว นอกจากจะมีความดีด้วยตนเองแล้ว ยังจะช่วยให้ทุกคนที่มีโอกาสเข้ามาสัมพันธ์เกี่ยวข้องบรรลุถึงความดีความเจริญไปด้วย

Lessons from the Other Side of the Teacher’s Desk: Discovering Insights to Help Language Learners

Lessons from the Other Side of the Teacher’s Desk: Discovering Insights to Help Language Learners

        In my experience, most language teachers become teachers because they are fascinated by language. We like the way languages work, we are intrigued by differences between our native tongues and other languages, and we enjoy the process of helping our students learn. And I believe that most language teachers have had positive experiences as language students themselves somewhere along the paths to their own classrooms. Positive experiences learning a foreign language certainly contribute greatly to the attraction of teaching one. Most language teachers have learned a language in a classroom setting (and many of us have also learned a second language in more nontraditional settings, such as immersion in a new language either because of travel or while living in foreign countries).

       I am an English language teacher who fits most of the categories above. I have been teaching English as a Foreign Language (EFL) for many years. However, until recently, it had been many years since I had learned a foreign language in a classroom setting. And that is what I did for six focused months. As a requirement for a job, I studied in an intensive language training program. It was a fascinating and often difficult experience that gave me a renewed understanding of language learning: there will always be a distance, however subtle, between teacher and student, even in the most student-centered classroom.

       That experience of once again being a student in a language classroom caused me to reexamine my beliefs about classroom practice. Some of my beliefs were confirmed, and some were challenged. In this article I examine those beliefs. The language that I studied was Russian, but I believe that my experience as a language learner can be generalized across most language learning experiences.

L1 versus L2 use in the classroom

       One of my most strongly held beliefs has been that the use of the students’ native language (L1) in the classroom should be avoided. My reasoning has been that although the use of the students’ L1 can be a useful tool at times, it can quickly become a crutch for the students and the teacher.

       In my language-learning classroom, I saw this belief both confirmed, and in some instances, challenged. The Russian language has a complicated grammar structure that is significantly different from that of my native language, English. At times my Russian teacher explained the grammar very clearly in English; that was especially helpful for constructions that are nearly impossible for the student to decipher without help because of how much Russian grammar differs from English grammar. However, at times I was more successful in understanding grammatical forms when I was given many examples in Russian and had the opportunity to generalize the rules on my own.

       My classmates, who were not language teachers and perhaps had never studied a foreign language before, were sometimes frustrated by the use of only the target language in this context. Despite their frustration, I observed that they grasped grammatical structures introduced in Russian, not in English, more quickly than when a structure was explained in English.

       Not only does using the target language to teach grammar help students develop their own analytical skills in identifying structure; it can also keep students from translating everything word-for-word back into English, which can be troublesome. As teachers, we know that direct translation into English (or any other language) can be confusing for students. I myself got into trouble by trying to use English to decipher a complicated Russian grammatical structure. For example, conditional sentences are constructed very differently in English than they are in Russian. I tried to apply the English rules when writing a conditional sentence in Russian, and the result was a sentence that would be incomprehensible to most Russians. I caught myself doing this and had to take a step back and try to think only in terms of the target language.

       Like most teachers, I see the communicative benefit of using only the target language in the classroom. For one thing, it can help students to develop creative communication strategies. As a beginning student, my Russian vocabulary was limited, as were the grammatical structures that I could use comfortably. I found myself really reaching and using what I did know to express my ideas. Often my results were inaccurate, especially at first, but I could usually make myself understood using simple vocabulary ungrammatically. This sense of being able to communicate is quite thrilling to students; it bolsters students’ confidence in using the language and can lead students to continue to take risks when speaking—an important attitude in learning to communicate in a new language.

       Using students’ L1 in the English language classroom can be a conscious choice on the part of the teacher and can at times be appropriate. For example, with students just beginning to learn English, the use of L1 can be helpful in clarifying instructions. And one benefit of the use of L1 in the classroom may be that in some instances, the use of L1 early on in the classroom cycle can help form a good relationship between teacher and student (Macaro 2001). Nonetheless teachers may feel conflicted about their use of L1 in the classroom because the Communicative Approach de-emphasizes the use of it quite strongly. However, some research shows that a teacher’s limited use of L1 does not necessarily result in less student production in the target language (Macaro 2001).

      Of course, using only the target language in the classroom helps mimic the “real life” use of that language. I learned the value of that because I learned Russian in the United States. The moment I left the classroom, I essentially left that language behind and was surrounded by English, so to have my time in the classroom as much as possible devoted to the language I was learning was important.

Pronunciation focus

       The use of pronunciation drills or exercises was something I, as an EFL teacher, never stressed. I was more concerned with students being able to communicate in English, and I often felt that pronunciation drills were not an important part of communicative learning. Reflecting on my past teaching, I realize I did not focus on pronunciation issues enough.

       Although simple pronunciation drills can be emphasized too much, and they are no substitute for students learning to use the language, I now believe that focused pronunciation work is an important part of learning to communicate, especially in a foreign language context. Understanding and being able to apply linking, word rhythm, sentence rhythm, melody, and emphasis are all important aspects of communicative competence (Gilbert 1994). The Russian language has different sets of sounds than English, and the intonation is very different. Word stress is important for meaning, and many words are long and difficult for English speakers to pronounce. I found that I absolutely needed specific help with the pronunciation of this language.

       In fact, one of the most frustrating aspects of my language learning experience was my seemingly complete lack of ability with Russian pronunciation—which prevented others from comprehending my speech. It was only by practicing full sentences and phrases over and over again that I could train the muscles of my mouth to pronounce the words and phrases correctly; and by correctly I mean that they could be comprehended by a native speaker, not that my pronunciation was by any means perfect. Without the pronunciation practice, I would not have been able to communicate in Russian; I am quite sure of this.

       The fact that once I left my foreign language learning classroom I was surrounded by English did not help my Russian pronunciation. My only exposure to Russian was in the classroom or other learning environments (such as the language lab) at my school. Comparing this experience to language learning experiences I’ve had outside the classroom, I see how difficult it is to learn to speak correctly using letter combinations and intonation different from one’s native language without being surrounded by the target language. I have had several experiences of living in a country where initially I did not speak the language. Eventually I was able to pick up the language through necessity, and when I did, my pronunciation and accent were understandable to native speakers. Being immersed in the language gave me the input necessary to pronounce the language successfully. My Russian learning experience highlighted to me the importance of exposing EFL students to as much English as possible in the classroom, through speaking exercises, authentic language in reading, audiovisual methods that expose students to various accents, and even posters and language charts on the wall to surround the students with English.

       Teaching pronunciation in the English language classroom can extend far beyond mere drills. Helping students with the suprasegmentals of the English language, such as syllable stress within a word, or even word stress within a sentence, will lead to increased communicative competence. Using songs or games where students emphasize word or sentence stress through clapping or some other physical movement is helpful with some learners.

       Changing the focus from pronunciation drills to linguistic competence then makes the use of pronunciation techniques a natural part of a communicative curriculum. Using a communicative focus when working on the pronunciation of English should become a natural part of activities in the EFL classroom. A communicative focus places emphasis on students using English to communicate in realistic situations that have some relevance to the students. Communicative language teaching supports students using English in the classroom as a way to help them prepare to use English outside of the classroom. Most communicative exercises are practical in nature and (as much as possible) mimic the types of English that students will use in the real world. An integrated approach, using a variety of methods that address issues with both suprasegmentals and discrete word pronunciation issues, can help English language learners not only communicate more effectively, but more confidently as well (Morley 1994). Often we place such emphasis on communicating with the target language that we can forget that comprehensible pronunciation, in whatever form, is an important part of this, and should not be sacrificed (Morin 2007).

Acquiring lexicon

       As an English teacher, I was careful to limit the number of new words I introduced to my students to only a few each day. I also always introduced any new vocabulary within a context, indicating how each word or phrase is used—how it helps communication. In my Russian class, my teachers supplied appropriate context for some of the words we were supposed to learn, when there was time. My Russian language learning experience was intensive; due to the fast pace of the course, we had a great deal of language to learn in a short amount of time. One way this impacted me and my classmates was in vocabulary acquisition. We were left on our own to learn a great deal of vocabulary very quickly. While the textbook we used was rich with texts using the target vocabulary, it covered quite an overwhelming amount of material.

       Reading in the target language is also a good way to introduce students to new vocabulary, and the use of reading plus vocabulary enhancement activities has been shown to be effective in helping students to acquire and retain new language (Min 2008). For example, students can use target vocabulary to write a short story or poem. This gives the students an opportunity to interact with new lexis in a different way, and in doing so to personalize the use of that target language. My Russian program did include a lot of reading, but the use of more vocabulary enhancement activities (prohibited by limited time in the classroom) would probably have helped me learn new vocabulary more effectively.

       Native speakers also acquire new vocabulary when reading. A native speaker encountering a new word in a text usually has the contextual knowledge to decipher meaning without consulting a dictionary: the reader can use the words around the unknown item to help figure out what the unknown word means. English language learners, especially beginning students, may not have the ability to discover meaning through context clues. This is something that teachers need to overtly teach. In my EFL classroom I taught students to figure out the meaning of an unknown word by identifying information about that word, such as what part of speech it was and what words surrounded it. I also showed students that sometimes they can guess the meaning of an unknown word based on the topic of the text. Those techniques I had taught helped me a great deal when I was reading in Russian. I was often able to figure out the meaning of a new word, without resorting to the dictionary, by using contextual clues.

       In my language learning, one challenge was the acquisition of vocabulary, especially moving vocabulary from passive to active knowledge. As a student I found (and I observed this in my classmates as well) that much of the new vocabulary was really only accessible in passive form. By this I mean that I could recognize many words when they were spoken or in a written text, but I didn't have the ability to use those words in creating my own speech or writing. I found myself asking the teacher to help me prioritize which vocabulary was going to be most helpful for me when communicating, and I focused on those words and phrases. Without the teacher’s guidance, the number of lexical items would have been simply too overwhelming.

       Thus, my EFL teaching practice of being selective when it comes to introducing new vocabulary has been confirmed. In the future I will pay even closer attention to the amount of new material I introduce to students and to the need to continually review and encourage them to use the new language, a good way of helping students be able to actively use the new vocabulary in other contexts. Having passive knowledge of vocabulary is certainly helpful (we all have a great deal of passive knowledge of our native languages)—it’s an important part of being comfortable with a language. But I believe that EFL teachers need to help students develop active vocabulary.

Pair and group work

       As an EFL teacher, I used pair and group work regularly, for many reasons. When my classes were large and I couldn't interact directly with students enough, pair and group work gave the students the opportunity to use English with each other. Often students feel more comfortable taking language risks with their classmates than they do with the teacher. The careful pairing and grouping of students can set up a situation where a strong student can help a weaker one (and the stronger student benefits from the opportunity to teach what he or she knows). Using pair and group work allowed me to observe my students more carefully: quietly monitoring the interaction often showed me what language was problematic for students and gave me a noninvasive way to assess how the students were progressing.

       My Russian class consisted of only one or two other students. While such a small class gives learners a great deal of individualized attention from the teacher, it does not provide opportunity for group and pair work with different sets of classmates. Much of our language interaction in the classroom was between student and teacher. While we did ask and answer questions of our classmates, the teacher gave us few tasks where pair and group work was necessary to accomplish a goal while using the target language. I think that had we been given the opportunity to complete cooperative tasks using Russian, we might have taken more language risks. The teacher might have seen and heard some more varied language production. This is just my hunch. I do know that I enjoyed asking questions of my classmates in the target language, and I wish we had had more opportunity for student to student communication without the teacher’s involvement.

       The use of pair work, especially, can be helpful when students give each other corrective feedback, as long as such a situation is carefully scaffolded. The usefulness of effective corrective feedback can be influenced by students’ language level and learning styles. Students are sometimes more receptive to feedback from their peers—it can be less intimidating to some than correction by the teacher. The use of pair work in student-generated corrective feedback can, however, be an effective way to include less teacher-centered correction in the classroom. Students have yet another opportunity to interact in English when providing each other corrective feedback. The teacher in this case is a facilitator of the students’ using English together.

       Pair and group work can also be helpful in vocabulary acquisition. Students who work collaboratively to complete a task involving new vocabulary have each other as a resource: working with another can give students an opportunity to interact with a new word more frequently than if they simply complete a task on their own (Kim 2008). An important part of new vocabulary acquisition is repetition, or the opportunity to work with a word more than once. Using pair or group work in a vocabulary enhancement activity gives students the opportunity to hear others use a new word, which in turn may lead to better retention on the part of all students involved in the activity.

Emotional quotient

       During the years I was behind the teacher’s desk, I had sometimes lost sight of how learning a language can be an emotional experience and how those feelings of students cannot be discounted. Learning a language can be difficult (especially for older learners) and extremely stressful.

       Different emotions are aroused at various stages of the learning process. At first, a new language can be exciting, and the early stages can be quite enjoyable. Then, as the language being introduced becomes more challenging, students can feel frustrated and overwhelmed. I personally hit a stage where I felt my Russian language skills were regressing, not improving. Fortunately, my teachers were wonderfully sensitive to all the human feelings that surround language learning and dealt with our frustration as carefully as possible. They were encouraging and supportive.

       The phenomenon of communicative anxiety (CA) has been well-documented in students studying a foreign language. CA can range from mild symptoms, in which a student feels slightly uncomfortable using a foreign language, to severe symptoms, where a student will go to great lengths to avoid using a foreign language. Many factors can influence the level of CA of a particular student, including (but not limited to) a level of self-perceived proficiency in a language, students’ previous language learning experiences in the classroom, and the students’ ability to interact with speakers of their target language outside the classroom (Dewaele 2008). The age of acquisition of a foreign language also can have an effect on CA: some research has shown that CA levels were higher for students learning a language later in life than those learning a language at a young age (Dewaele 2008). This is an important fact for teachers to keep in mind, especially for teachers of older learners. Being aware that CA is real and that it affects most students is an important step toward helping students work through the instances when they experience it.

       Knowing that my frustration and anxiety as a student were normal did not make it any easier to deal with those feelings; however, I think that as a teacher I will now be far more sensitive to student issues at various stages of learning English. The fact that I was learning Russian in an intense way magnified to some degree all the feelings surrounding the learning experience, but I do believe that all language learning contexts have the potential to be stressful.

       The relationships between student and teacher and between student and classmates are particularly charged ones. No matter how we intellectualize our jobs, we teachers are human, and we are often going to react to our students in a human, emotional way—but a good teacher is able to control his or her emotions in the classroom. Students have enough to worry about without a teacher injecting his or her negative emotions into the classroom. As a learner I found myself looking to my teacher for support and encouragement. I looked to my classmates for camaraderie and help when needed. I was lucky to have excellent teachers who were also accessible and friendly. For me, having a friendly atmosphere in the classroom made a big difference, and I believe it helped me be a successful learner.

          อ้างอิง: http://americanenglish.state.gov/resources/english-teaching-forum-2011-volume-49-number-1

บทเรียนจากอีกด้านหนึ่งของโต๊ะครู: การค้นพบข้อมูลเชิงลึกเพื่อช่วยผู้เรียนภาษา

       

        บทสรุปของจุดที่สำคัญที่จะได้เรียนรู้ในฐานะนักศึกษานั้น ที่คุณจะดำเนินการกลับเข้ามาในในชั้นเรียนเหมือนครูสอนภาษาอังกฤษคือ:

 L1 versus L2 use in the classroom       

        L1 กับ L2 กับการใช้งานในในชั้นเรียน: มุ่งเน้นการใช้ภาษาอังกฤษให้มากที่สุดเท่าที่เป็นไปได้เพราะมันเป็นสิ่งสำคัญสำหรับการพัฒนาภาษาของนักเรียนโดยเฉพาะอย่างยิ่งในสภาพแวดล้อมภาษาต่างประเทศ วิธีการที่เคยรู้ว่าใช้งานที่ จำกัด ของ L1 จะมีประโยชน์ที่จะทำให้คำอธิบายสั้น ๆ เมื่อนักเรียนไม่สามารถเข้าใจวิธีอื่นใด

Pronunciation focus

        โฟกัสการออกเสียงไม่ละเลยการออกเสียง: มุ่งเน้นไปที่การออกเสียงรวมทั้งบางหน่วยเสียงได้อย่างมีประสิทธิภาพและในบางกรณีที่จำเป็นสำหรับนักเรียนที่จะพัฒนาความเข้าใจในผลผลิตทางภาษา

Acquiring lexicon       

       การแสวงหาศัพท์: เข้าใจว่านี้เป็นกระบวนการที่ซับซ้อนที่ต้องใช้เวลา ใช้เครื่องมือต่าง ๆ เช่นกิจกรรมการเพิ่มประสิทธิภาพของคำศัพท์ร่วมกับการอ่านเพื่อเพิ่มการเข้าซื้อกิจการของนักเรียน

Pair and group work

       ทำงานคู่และกลุ่ม: ใช้การทำงานคู่และงานกลุ่มที่จะช่วยให้นักเรียนสามารถให้และรับฟังความคิดเห็นการแก้ไขจากคนอื่นที่ไม่ใช่ครู ใช้การทำงานคู่และงานกลุ่มในการเรียนรู้คำศัพท์ในสถานการณ์ที่จะช่วยให้นักเรียนได้มีปฏิสัมพันธ์กับคำศัพท์ใหม่ โดยใช้ภาษาใหม่กับเพื่อนร่วมชั้นของพวกเขา

Emotional quotient

       ความฉลาดทางอารมณ์: แจ้งเตือนไปยังสภาวะอารมณ์ของนักเรียนของจิตใจ ทำสิ่งที่คุณสามารถทำได้เพื่อลดความวิตกกังวลของพวกเขาโดยการสร้างสภาพแวดล้อมที่ผ่อนคลายและปลอดภัยในห้องเรียน การเรียนรู้ภาษาเป็นอารมณ์และความวิตกกังวลการสื่อสารเป็นจริง

Thinking Skills

Thinking Skills

   
 เบนจามิน บลูม ได้ให้ข้อสรุปของทักษะการคิดไว้ 6 ประการดังนี้

1. Knowledge (ความรู้)
2. Comprehension (ความเข้าใจ)
3. Application (การประยุกต์ใช้)
4. Analysis (การวิเคราะห์)
5. Synthesis (การสังเคราะห์)
6. Evaluation (การประเมินผล)

รูปแสดงทักษะการคิดของ บลูม

  Anderson & Krathwonl ได้เสนอแนวคิดทักษะการคิดฉบับแก้ไขของบลูม ไว้ดังนี้

1. Remembering (การจำ)
2. Understanding (ความเข้าใจ)
3. Applying (การประยุกต์ใช้)
4. Analyzing (การวิเคราะห์)
5. Evaluating (การประเมินผล)
6. Creating (การสร้างสรรค์)