Course Topics

English language teaching has undergone great changes since the classical training of Greek and Latin. The major thrust of this module is to familiarize you with the history of TEFL teaching, its research and teaching strategies and to consider how to relate to identifying and applying the best practices of the Post Modern era.

The Field of TESOL/ELT
Learning Styles
The Teacher's Role
Roles and Qualities
The Classroom: The Physical Environment

The Classroom Environment

The goal of this module is to familiarize students with the field of TEFL and EFL Teaching. Each teacher has their own personality in the classroom and the ways they like to teach English. This module will help you relate to your experiences as a student and how they relate to your own teaching style and classroom persona. We will also consider the learning styles of students and the significant effect learning styles have on the process of learning. You will study the physical environment of the classroom and consider how something such as seating arrangements has a profound impact of the relationship of the student's ability to master content.

A brief history of Language Teaching
The "Designer" Approaches of the 1970s and Beyond
Communicative Competence and The Post Modern Era
Communicative and Audiolingual Comparison of Major Features
The Psychological Learning Environment: Teaching and Learning

Teaching Speaking and Listening

This module provides information on the principles and components of teaching English as a foreign language. We'll look at the difference between language items and language skills, as we explore some possible ways to teach them. The fact that teachers spend almost as much time planning lessons outside of the classroom as they do inside the classroom is surprising to some beginning instructors. Lesson plans are extremely important. They provide a road map that shows teachers where they are going, how they will get there, and where they expect to end up at the completion of a lesson. Effective lesson planning is a skill that takes a time and practice. This course will prepare you to develop and write effective lesson plans.

Students Needs
Principles of Learning a Language
A Framework for TEFL - Presentation, Practice and Production
Presentation Practice and Production Lesson Plans
PPP Conversation sample
Classroom strategies
STT/TTT and Giving Instructions

Listening and Speaking

Have you ever studied a foreign language in school and arrived in a foreign country not understanding others or being understood? This is a common experience for many students of any standard language training program. Unfortunately much language instruction in the past has had very little emphasis on actually teaching listening and speaking for real communication. Many teachers who teach English abroad are non-native speakers of English themselves and may not feel comfortable teaching listening and speaking. For that reason, you may find your students are well schooled in grammar and writing, or very capable of reading in English, yet in need of support and encouragement when it comes to listening and speaking. This module is dedicated to these two skill areas. You will learn that listening is an essentially a repetitive skill, whereas speaking productive. We discuss them together since they are interdependent. Another aspect common to both the areas of listening and speaking is that of pronunciation. English is a complex language and we will provide you with the necessary skills and tools help get you through this process.

Teaching Listening
Teaching Difficulties and Types of Activities
Types of Listening Exercises
Listening Lesson Plan
Developing and Conducting Speaking Practice
Teaching Vocabulary and Forms-Oral Drills
Open Class or Small Group Vocabulary Drills Procedure
Oral Vocabulary Production Activities
Desert Island
Vocabulary Review Activities
Pronunciation - Intonation
Minimal Pairs

Reading and Writing

We will explore what it means to read and write in a second language, as well as how to teach reading and writing using authentic materials. It includes strategies for preparing students to read and write in Conversational English.

Reading as Experienced by Many Students
The Goals of Reading Instruction
Reading Strategies
Ten Things To Do Before Reading
Teaching Reading Skills Chart
Reading Lesson Plan
Teaching Literature
Developing Writing Skills
Writing Systems Different Languages
Types of Writing
The Components of Writing
Providing Written Feedback
Writing Lesson Plan: Based on Needs Analysis
Writing Lesson Plan: Patterned Poetry

Grammar

A large part of teaching EFL is the teaching of grammar. English has an extremely complicated set of rules and exceptions for its syntax, or grammar. Part of the complexity arises from the history of the language itself. Languages are generally not static; they change over time, adding new words and expressions as well as spellings etc. For teachers of English abroad, a general understanding of why the language operates the way it does is essential. We will take a look at how well you know your grammar and how to teach grammar. Grammar will be taught in relationship to the four areas of Listening, Speaking, Reading and Writing. At the end of this module, you will have a better idea of what you may need to consider as you plan your lessons.

More History of English work
English Structure and Grammar as Compared to Other Languages
A Functional Approach to Teaching Grammar
Word Order in English
Parts of Speech
General Grammatical Structures for TEFL
Verbs
The Twelve Main Verb Tenses of English
Phrasal Verbs
Reported Speech
Conditionals
Passive Voice

Professional Development

By now in the course you have a really good idea about the profession and the teaching skills regarding the four skill areas and you have created many lesson plans. We've also discussed with you at length the importance of including a context in which to present new language items and grammar concepts. In this module you will learn to use visuals as a means of providing context and opportunities to develop students' skills in Listening, Reading , Writing, and Grammar. You'll learn just about anything that encourages communication is fair game. That means teachers should include all kinds of resources for students. Even though there are many textbooks to cover the subject, there are also supplemental resource books, computer software programs, ESL websites and even great movies that may work well for the class that you teach. Finally we will take a close look at assessments, both formal and informal, and what effective assessments might look like in your classroom. You will cover:

Visuals
ESL Textbooks and Supplemental Materials
Online Resources
Games for the Classroom
Assessing Student Performance
Standardized Testing