Building up a teacher identity: How we felt as students

Today we've decided to share our thoughts about our own experience as EFL learners.We all agree that there are good and bad techniques, and all of us have learned more under specific contexts or with a specific type of exercises. But what are these exercices?

What to do:

A relaxed atmosphere is key to encourage learning

Something very positive is the combination between the L2 and the L1 in case problems arise. We feel that the classes can be conducted in the foreign language except if some problem arises. We've all gone through this switch between languages: We would have to speak in English but we weren't pushed. So long mistakes aren't seen as something negative and the teacher acts encouragingly, students can feel at ease. If activities carried out in class are entertaining and updated, and the topics interesting, students feel encouraged and relaxed at once. Carrying out activities to do at home and then showing them to our classmates promoted collaborative work and a relaxed atmosphere.

Hanging posters

Another good technique we've come up with is that of hanging posters in the classroom with pictures of the vocabularyof the unit. The posters are displayed for two weeks approximately, so that the learning of words happens smoothly and almost unconsciously, it is just a natural consequence of seeing these posters every day. A very useful follow-up of this technique would be mentioning one of the words displayed in the posters so that students run and touch the poster (very positive for kinaesthetic learners) where the picture is. That way, students have fun while learning in a relaxed and motivated way.

Speaking in small groups

A further positive technique is small-group work, especially for speaking activities. Having an extra half-hour lesson can improve oral skills. Students would pick up a topic from a list with some questions meant to activate their background knowledge. This can be followed by a 1 or 2 minutes monologue, a speaking exam drill. A relaxed atmosphere with few students and no pressure because of marks can encourage students to engage into improvised conversations, helping in terms of fluency and providing a more 'natural environment'. 

WHAT NOT TO DO

Long lists: Long lists of vocabulary without any context whatsoever. Rewarding because of memorisig such lists or punishing because of failing to do so made students feel very uncomfortable. We memorised everything but after doing the exam we forgot what we had been learning because we only studied to pass the exam and not to improve our English.

Above all, no senseless and purposeless memorisation of lists!

Above all, no senseless and purposeless memorisation of lists!

In-class drills: Repeating words isn't always useful. Rather than learning English, by repeating dialogues or enacting them, students simply learned fixed structures which make no sense. It probably has to do with the fact that it isn't comprehensible input. Nonetheless, it may be useful in terms of intonation.