English Teaching (Possible Impacts & Other Aspects of the Project)

As my classmate concluded after his first lesson – teaching adults is nothing like teaching children. He, having some experience in the latter, was able to contrast these two. I am definitely not good with children, and therefore establishing a bond with them, strong enough to allow me to teach them would certainly be a challenge. I believe Andrzej had the exact opposite – and therefore felt uneasy. I don’t like to think of my approach to students as formal, especially after the first month of teaching, when only two students kept attending the lessons. As my partner quit as well, I started considering such small amount of pupils more of a reward than failure. Besides, I wouldn’t be so sure about the success of this project without their cooperation – and these two that have stayed were great, really. They revised regularly and seemed really eager to learn. I like to think I have established a very important bond with them, when it comes to productive teaching – despite my age, a bond basing on mutual respect and, simply, liking. Such thoughts were reassured by my supervisor after one of the lessons she had to cover for me, informing me that my students were asking about me. Even though I’m afraid it’s just the difference in teaching styles and that they preferred mine, along with the fact that I’m a Polish native, I must admit I’ve grown very fond of them throughout the whole project.

At first, my attitude was limited to following partly intuitional guidelines – to act confident, be patient and smile a lot. I believe that was one of the aspects allowing me for establishing a suitable bond, lesson-productivity-wise. As the group was becoming increasingly intimate, the relationship has changed slightly – we even managed to smuggle some Polish jokes past my supervisor’s attentive ear. That has not altered the teaching style I imposed upon myself, however – I started including some anecdotes, seeing that they serve as great ice-breakers and mnemotechniques. I have learnt lots of things from my students, too – especially during those lessons when my supervisor was absent (every single one of which spent efficiently!). I must admit one of my greatest fears about this project included not being able to find common ground; and without that, as I have thought before and know now, productive teaching is impossible. During the project, such problem didn’t even arise.

One of the issues I encountered and was obliged to deal with was the in-group tension, almost tangible at times. Sometimes I could sense strong competition between my students – as both of them are very ambitious, conscientous and a tiny bit proud. One of them is brilliant at grammar – understood the syntax, even though we didn’t cover that much of it; the other student turned out to be very good at pronounciation and speaking. From time to time, one could feel as the tension’s arising, both of them, especially during individual work, are trying to do their best. I believe this played a very important role in their motivation to study – it does so in my case, as they let me realise.

Also, as their skills and knowledge were improving, I could see that they were getting increasingly confident – at the same time enjoying the lessons more and more. That also indicated the rise of in-group competition, yet no longer appearing to be noxious. Seeing as, through the aforementioned rivarly, they were keeping the same level, I realised why our former students might have resigned – maybe some of their colleagues appeared to be quicker learners than them. During these lessons I have learnt a lot about interpersonal relationships, too – observing all these nuances from the distance.

Due to my rather poor recent physical condition, I was forced to miss a couple of lessons recently. Mrs Fran covered for me, in order to keep up the regularity of the sessions – we agreed, however, that whenever I’m not in, the students do revisions only. After two weeks in a row, when I couldn’t come to school, I was forced to ignore my health and attend the lesson – I consider this an area of development, as commitment to duties was never my strong side.

I must admit that this project was a one big surprise for me. Frankly speaking, I enrolled in these lessons to polish up my speaking skills, check whether I have the necessary abilities to explain things to others, and treating it partly as work experience – as I imagine my part-time job to be teaching English precisely. I never even thought about finishing it with genuine sadness, getting excited before the lessons at times, and sometimes staying afterschool on Friday seemed like the worst idea ever – yet always after the session I was coming out of the classroom much more energetic than an hour before. I never expected it to be such a success, too – and seeing my students using the knowledge they obtained during these lessons makes me genuinely happy. And a little bit proud.

• June 16, 2013
• Creativity, Service
• 1 Comment