Classroom Management and General Tips

Taken From ‘Practical Techniques for Language Teaching’ by Thomson & Heinle

There are 25 tips that should be integrated into any teacher’s ‘teaching repertoire’, some are self-explanatory, and some may require further explanation:

1. Arrange the seating to help
2. Stand up when you’re directing activity
3. Look at the students
4. Use your hands to encourage and direct students
5. Use the back of your hand to point
6. Use pauses to punctuate what you say
7. Vary your voice
8. Keep your language to a minimum when students are doing something
9. Don’t commentate
10. Don’t be afraid of silence
11. Don’t be afraid of noise
12. Use pair work to increase students’ talking time – even if it seems chaos
13. Use group work to increase students’ talking time
14. Be explicit
15. Don’t ask “do you understand?”
16. Don’t go ’round the class’ if individual can prepare particular example
17. Admit your ignorance
18. Consult colleagues
19. Consult students
20. Demonstrate, rather than explain, new activities
21. Exploit real events
22. Divide the blackboard
23. Use the overhead projector to control what students see
24. Machinery will not solve all your problems
25. Expand, don’t clutter

Those that need further elaboration are those that I thought help pretty important insight into the classroom teaching management, and those are:

1. Arrange the seating to help
…So students can interact with each other more easily, preventing the teachers from constantly becoming the center of attention.

2. Vary your voice
…To make your language easier to understand.

3. Keep your language to a minimum when students are doing something
Using voice to direct students may distract students

4. Don’t be afraid of silence
Silence is particularly desirable:
a. When students are doing something individually. Speech will break students’ concentration
b. An individual is hesitating during an exercise, or looking for a word. Jumping in will make the students lazy. The silent struggle to understand or recall is a natural part of language learning
c. In discussions, the students sometimes need time to formulate their thoughts.
d. Sometimes there should be silence for the sake of silence: there is to be a change in activities, or students need to get out a new book. A moment or two of silence means the teacher can return with renewed concentration to the activity which follows.

5. Don’t be afraid of noise
Techniques must be used to increase Students’ Talking Time. Anyone who is serious effort about teaching oral English must be regularly using choral work, pair work, and group work. The reason there is noise is because there is more constructive activity going on.
Carefully arranged noise does not mean disorder or that time is being wasted

6. (…therefore) Use pair work to increase students’ talking time – even if it seems chaos
Your pair work will be most effective if you:
- Divide the groups yourself, and that the students know who they are working with and what role they are going to take.
- Make sure everyone is clear about what they are meant to be doing
- Go around, listen, check that they’re doing it
- Stop the activity when it is clear that everyone is finished.
- Follow up the pair work with a demonstration of a summary from one of the pairs.
- Make it a habit

7. Be explicit
“Work in pairs now with the person sitting next to you please” is better than “can you work in pairs now please?”

8. Don’t ask “do you understand?”
Keep a regular eye contact to gauge students’ understanding level. If it IS necessary to ask, this should be done by asking specific questions that are short and require linguistically simple answers.

9. Don’t go ’round the class’ if individual can prepare particular example
- If students are using a guidebook in which questions are listed, they can calculate when their turns are going to be and which questions they need to answer. In preparing their answers, they may ignore completely the answers of the previous questions. Therefore, go random around the class so students can engage in spontaneous Q&A.
- For some types of work, like language games, it is easier to follow a pattern. Just keep this in mind: if the emphasis is on speed and students will remain involved because of the pace, it is more often to do it the “obvious” mind.

10. Consult your colleagues.
Admit your ignorance, and consult your colleagues rather than sticking your head into a pile of books.
(Checking up with online references is another good option).

11. Consult students
To see how much they enjoyed the lesson and whether or not there are practical problems with your materials (the tape recorder, etc)

12. Exploit real events
Say “Bless You” when somebody sneezes, and “many happy returns” when its’ somebody’s birthday. The point it to use spontaneous events to give more information and insight regarding the language you’re teaching.

13. Divide the blackboard
Use the Left for new words, Center for the main material, and the Right blackboard for scribbles.

14. Use the overhead projector to control what students see
- It’s easier to write on a transparency and they can be prepared in advance
- Important transparencies can be re-used
- Can be revealed slowly
Warnings:
- text size: keep them readable

15. Machinery will not solve all your problems
They’re expensive and may be difficult to master AND teachers must still develop their teaching skills: machinery can’t smile to students.

16. Expand, don’t clutter
Remember, the focus of the teaching-learning activity is not to give the most materials to students, but to take a material and use different teaching techniques to develop the material in interesting, varied, and effective ways to help students understand the material more.