My thoughts on classroom management.

One of the most difficult parts of teaching for me is classroom management. What kind of teacher should I be, whether to be a "strict" teacher or a "kind" teacher? Should we "demand" homework from students or just "ask" them to do it? Should we be in touch with parents all the time or try not to contact them until they need to talk to us? Should we smile or put on a serious face? Should we try to make students think that we know everything or should we admit that we are not very experienced teachers yet and we are learning things exactly as they do? Should we write letters to their personal files at school or try not to do that? We, as teachers, face many challenges that make us ask ourselves many personal questions about our identity.

Escape room adventure

I would like to share with you an interesting experience I recently had. Last month, I celebrated my birthday. Every year I go out with my family to a restaurant but this year we decided to add something different. We went to an "escape room".

Thoughts on teaching vocabulary

As we all know, the importance of vocabulary acquisition in language learning has been shown in various studies - vocabulary is understandably considered the key to developing our students' reading and writing abilities. Our teacher's duty is to "take care" of student success, that is why we must make the process of learning unfamiliar words as engaging as possible.

Pele - the birth of a legend

Pele is by no means my idea of a good movie as football isn’t one of my favorite pastimes. However, I don’t remember exactly how l stumbled upon this movie, but I have a vague recollection of myself looking for something that would be interesting to my eighth graders gimel group. Since most of the students were boys and the girls were mostly interested in them, I came to think that “Pele” would come in handy.

“I don’t even know the ABC…”

Every year, the classes I teach can be divided  into 2 levels – the advanced groups and the weaker groups. This year I’ve got a ‘present’ – three of my classes are very weak in English, two of them are 11^th grade and one of them is a ‘Mekademet’ class. 

I'v been teaching girls like these for many years.The more I teach them,  the more I become exposed to their loe-self esteem and insecurity they have on themselves. That is why from the very beginning, I make a lot of effort to build-up their self-esteem and try to raise the girls’ confident in English. 

But – how?

 First of all, I believe they can make it! This strong belief always guides me and gives me the strength to keep going, and that is what the girls see and hear during the year.

Secondly, my lessons are clear and structured. Moreover, I demand my students to work hard. The girls know what their goals are and what they are expected to do.

Thirdly, from time to time, when I feel it’s necessary; I make speech! The girls love it and try to change their attitude towards the next lessons.   

Above all, I always try to pay attention to girls who are already in the process and praise them. That might give them power and more desire to continue it. For example, a girl who said in despair the above sentence -“I don’t even know the ABC…” She has been  saying it for more than two years. She never learns, never does a thing! In fact, it was very hard to make her believe in herself, due to the lack of successful experiences and some others problems she has… I’d almost given up… Recently, this sentence has been solved by the girl herself. Much to her surprise, she got 94% in a literature test. All her classmates cheered and were happy for her extraordinary achievement! 

In conclusion, I feel that teaching English is not only about learning in class- - - you actually can touch your students’ heart and give them a real chance to change and believe in themselves!

          How do you deal with students with low self-esteem?  

BUENA VISTA SOCIAL CLUB

My favourite film is "Buena Vista Social Club". I liked this film so much that I couldn't stop myself from seeing it several times.

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