Methods of Teaching English As an International Language to Senior Foreign Students
The seminar took place at Lyceum 1525 on the 13th of October 2009. Teachers from Russia, Germany, India, Indonesia and the Anglo-American School participated in it. They discussed the difficulties which senior students experience while studying the language. The common problems are: spelling, pronunciation, verb tenses and word order.
Sylvia des Tombe from the Anglo-American School described her methods of teaching English in detail.
Students are given a list of words and learn the way of reading sounds at the beginning of the word (the, zone, up), in the middle of the word (book, fur, shut, tour) and at the end of the word (too, my, boy, photographer). The students try to say words and remember the correct way to pronounce them.
Another task is devoted to spelling. Sylvia asks her students to write their names properly, to write the date in the pattern, or days of the week with a capital letter.
Sylvia des Tombe works on the verb tenses with the help of a special chart. The students fill it in with the proper form of the verb according to the examples: Present Indefinite (I go to school every day.), Past Indefinite (I liked my trip to Africa.), Present Perfect (She has gone.), Past Perfect (He had seen the film already.), The Conditional (I would like to go shopping.), The Unreal Conditional (If I were you I would…) etc.
Much time is spent on oral speech. Students are provided with active vocabulary and then talk about their daily life, favourite sports, culture, history, traditions, English speaking countries and their own country.
Sylvia des Tombe has worked out some rules for correcting students:
1. Correct them in a way which will not hurt their feelings.
2. Do not let them say things which will embarrass them if they learn what they are saying.
3. Help them be understandable so that their meaning shows clearly.
Mrs. Kumar from India mentioned that her students have a good command of English as it is the second state language. That is why teachers work on English sounds and creative writing.
For example, students pronounce tongue twisters: “a proper copper coffee pot”; “a big black bug bit a big black bear”, etc. They are given tasks to write about social problems e.g. why do people smoke? (fear of giving up, fear of gaining weight) or an essay about their family background.
Another task is to look at a picture, to read the text under it and to re-write the sentences so that they match the picture. For example: At the market I saw an old woman sitting in a chair. She was selling eggs. It was raining. The correct answer: At the market I saw a young girl sitting on a small rug. She was selling jugs. It was sunny.
Mr. Dahm from Germany said that German students are taught to speak English as fluently as possible. They talk to each other in teamwork. Students read texts and study grammar, looking for structureal patterns in them. After that, students use these structures in context.
All teachers consider the four basic skills (speaking, listening, writing, reading) equally important.
Irina Karkhina from Russia (Lyceum 1525) spoke about senior students who come to school with a good knowledge of English. But they have problems with phrasal verbs, idioms, tenses and sounds.
Teachers try to give them tasks to help them overcome these difficulties.
Every lesson begins with tongue twisters.
Good monolingual dictionaries, which students use, help them to find information about word meaning, word formation, grammar and collocations.
The students are given idioms and are asked to explain their meaning in English. For example: “to keep body and soul together” – to be very poor; “to be at a loss” – it is when people don’t know what to do; “to be safe” – to be out of danger, etc.
The students are taught reading (skimming and scanning) skills so that they can read complex authentic texts and discuss them.
This seminar was useful as it gave us an opportunity to get acquainted with methods of teaching English in different countries which help students to come over learning difficulties.