How to effectively teach children in a 20-person class?

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ZachWang
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How to effectively teach children in a 20-person class?

Post by ZachWang »

Now, I am going to teach children English in a class where there are about 20 students at age of around 6 or 5 in July 14th. There are more than 100 classes like this in our corporation/company, training institution. I have seen and observed 10 classes of how their teachers taught and how students responded. I have found that there really existed some students who just didn't listen and did their own things during the class no matter what the teachers said. Usually to deal with such students, teachers would fear them through yelling or shouting at them or let them stand by their seats or the worst case would let them to go outside(I haven't seen, only heard of). Of course, there would be no beating or any other physical doingness onto children. And of course, no matter what they want to do onto the children, all teachers must know what their parents attitudes are, without their parents permission, shouting or yelling at the not-listening children would probably cause consequences.

And I also saw that in the whole class all children were listening but there were some children who were a little introvert or passive because they seemed shy and just didn't want to talk, yet most of the students were active.
So, in such a class teachers would not need efforts to control or direct the students to listen. On the contrary, teachers need to encourage them to be active.

Teachers tried their best to make their presentations/teachings interesting and attractive, which played the most important role to lessen the children's boredom or distraction. But on children's side, there may be some kids who just talked around or moved around, not giving the teachers a shit. To deal with such students, are there any other methods besides FEARING THEM? Because I really saw a class where the teacher was very nice to the students, she didn't say anything aloud just gave a slight/gentle order to the students. But the students just didn't buy it, it was like 'giving them an inch, they wanted a mile'. They became even more out of control, of course there were only a few students who were quite disturbing to the whole class. Most of the others were like followers.

So, the children were sent by their parents here to learn English. So, the starting point and the purpose were both learning English. But there were also many other things to deal with when it came to CONTROLLING/DIRECTING the children to learn English. Because for them, I am sure they are quite confusing why they should learn English. The reason is none other than their parents' idea.


So, how can I teach a 20-person class effectively to supervise and support those who are over-active and over-inactive students? Thanks.
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Leila
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Re: How to effectively teach children in a 20-person class?

Post by Leila »

Have you had a read-through of some of Anna's blogs? If not, I suggest you read the following one where she shares how she approached this schooling conundrum: http://teachersjourneytolife.com/2015/0 ... ystem-103/

Let us know if this assists
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Anna
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Re: How to effectively teach children in a 20-person class?

Post by Anna »

wangzhangkai wrote:Now, I am going to teach children English in a class where there are about 20 students at age of around 6 or 5 in July 14th. There are more than 100 classes like this in our corporation/company, training institution. I have seen and observed 10 classes of how their teachers taught and how students responded. I have found that there really existed some students who just didn't listen and did their own things during the class no matter what the teachers said. Usually to deal with such students, teachers would fear them through yelling or shouting at them or let them stand by their seats or the worst case would let them to go outside(I haven't seen, only heard of). Of course, there would be no beating or any other physical doingness onto children. And of course, no matter what they want to do onto the children, all teachers must know what their parents attitudes are, without their parents permission, shouting or yelling at the not-listening children would probably cause consequences.

And I also saw that in the whole class all children were listening but there were some children who were a little introvert or passive because they seemed shy and just didn't want to talk, yet most of the students were active.
So, in such a class teachers would not need efforts to control or direct the students to listen. On the contrary, teachers need to encourage them to be active.

Teachers tried their best to make their presentations/teachings interesting and attractive, which played the most important role to lessen the children's boredom or distraction. But on children's side, there may be some kids who just talked around or moved around, not giving the teachers a shit. To deal with such students, are there any other methods besides FEARING THEM? Because I really saw a class where the teacher was very nice to the students, she didn't say anything aloud just gave a slight/gentle order to the students. But the students just didn't buy it, it was like 'giving them an inch, they wanted a mile'. They became even more out of control, of course there were only a few students who were quite disturbing to the whole class. Most of the others were like followers.

So, the children were sent by their parents here to learn English. So, the starting point and the purpose were both learning English. But there were also many other things to deal with when it came to CONTROLLING/DIRECTING the children to learn English. Because for them, I am sure they are quite confusing why they should learn English. The reason is none other than their parents' idea.


So, how can I teach a 20-person class effectively to supervise and support those who are over-active and over-inactive students? Thanks.
Ultimately, this is an impossible situation and ironically one that teachers all over the world face every single day. One teacher cannot effectively 'steer' 20 5-6 year olds whose bodies need constant movement and who learn best from play. There are some who manage to do it with fear and control as you say, but mostly there will be noise and disturbances and it is a big part of teaching to even be able to 'manage' the class.

So first of all I would suggest to work with your own reactions, both towards fearing children and towards seeing them in a judgmental and negative light. Them you can place yourself in their shoes, and even remember what it was like for you in that age - and ask yourself what kind of teacher would've supported you to learn the best and from there can experiment and see what works best. It is not about being 'nice' or 'strict' but about WHO YOU ARE in the room as you meet the children.
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ZachWang
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Re: How to effectively teach children in a 20-person class?

Post by ZachWang »

Thanks, Leila and Anna, I see.
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ZachWang
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Re: How to effectively teach children in a 20-person class?

Post by ZachWang »

By the way, can anyone change my account name from 'wangzhangkai' into 'Zach', thanks, I think this will be more convenient and simple. @Anna @Leila
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barbara
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Re: How to effectively teach children in a 20-person class?

Post by barbara »

Hey Wangzhangkai,

the name Zach is already in use and the system does not allow for two users of the same name. Is there another version of the name that works for you?
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YoganBarrientos
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Re: How to effectively teach children in a 20-person class?

Post by YoganBarrientos »

Hey Zach,
so I would focus on bringing the point to self. This means to introspect and reflect on oneself, one's reactions, or simply who one is. To describe that to yourself. To put yourself into words. So right now in the preparation phase, write out who you are right now in relation to what you know or think, or feel about this future position.Right now you are not in the situation yet, so you can't know exactly what you will be facing. When you do face the moment then you can write out who you are in the moment.

So you will, during your first day there, write yourself. Describe yourself to yourself. What you feel, thought and experienced. But you can't know for sure what you will experience your first day until that happens. That is the reality of things. So the best thing to do now is to prepare yourself by writing who you are right now. And right now the content will be things that are like thoughts, feelings, motivations... etc... whatever is HERE, just write it out for yourself. Put it into words. Describe you to you.

Here is what I would expect, though its not necessarily so. I expect that right now you have expectations about the future, about the job and position. I expect you may have fears, worries, as well as desires and motivations. I expect you might have past childhood memories in relation to school, to other children, to parents, and teachers. What I do know is that whoever you are in relation to the position right now, this will determine who you will be and what you will do, and how you will respond to things that happen that first day of school and the rest of the days. So its best to get to know yourself, who you are, right now. So put yourself into words, describe yourself to yourself.

By getting to yourself, understand yourself, that is the best way to prepare yourself for the position, and then when you are in the position, to then write out who you are during the first day and the next days, as that is when more of your and let's say the real relationship to the position reveals itself. Understanding is the first step in change. You don't know if you are really prepared for the position unless you know yourself, and know what you don't know and know your limitations. You can't change your limitations if you don't know what they are. You don't know what you don't know, unless you see what it is you do know and don't know. So write yourself out. Put it into words. Describe you to you.
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ZachWang
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Re: How to effectively teach children in a 20-person class?

Post by ZachWang »

barbara wrote:Hey Wangzhangkai,

the name Zach is already in use and the system does not allow for two users of the same name. Is there another version of the name that works for you?
Thanks, barbara, how about Zachary ?
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ZachWang
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Re: How to effectively teach children in a 20-person class?

Post by ZachWang »

Thanks, Yogan.

Who am I right now?

In relation to ME&THE OTHERS

I define myself according to what the others judge and say about me, which covers all aspects of my existence from within to without.

In relation to ME&SELF-IMAGE

I define myself according to how I look as pictures seen by the eyes or taken by camaras.

In relation to ME&THE WORLD

I define myself according to my nationality, culture, money, education and fimaly background.

In relation to ME&MONEY

I define myself according to the amount of money that I.have. I will feel inferior or superior because of money.

In relation to ME&PARENTS

I define myself according to my resistence towards what my parents' expectations are and what they hope.

In relation to ME&SEX

I define myself according to my thoughts of perceiving sex as evil and bad or embarrassing. I define sex according my energetic reaction towards pictures.

In relation to ME&CONFLICT

Whenever there is a conflict within me or without me, there will be extensive anxiety. Especially outside conflict with another person in one way or another, I will become afraid and fear of facing the person that I had a conflict with. I define myself as powerlessness, inferiority and self-victimization when it comes to conflict. I will immediately link any conflict to suffering, violence and death in my mind.

In relation to ME&WOMEN

I define myself according to what women say, think or judge about me....I will continue next time.
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Rebecca Dalmas
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Re: How to effectively teach children in a 20-person class?

Post by Rebecca Dalmas »

In my experience with a classroom of twenty students one must always give a structure for the children to move within. The known model of introduction of new material together, with practice, and then the children practice it, and then each individually is fine. Within this, one must be flexible, as each new ‘ form’ as information will require different degrees of practice and investigation within each level of practice, the introduction, the group practice and the individual practice towards ‘ ownership’ or integration, or understanding.
In my experience, the teacher has to hold the structure within the room in open ways, as forcing something creates the same opinion still, meaning forcing something builds fear, as will slow down that natural learning ability, that ability to freely conceptualize, a more perfect practice of the imagination.

It is to say that structure is your friend, use it to build and to ground yourself. Allow the children to help you within this, because once they begin to understand that the structure is your goal, where there are no value judgements, they will begin to trust you and aid you in this being the collective endeavor.

On another level, this means sensing the patterns of lack that can come up as personalities, where a child allows frustration, and insecurity, and reckless giving up to direct them because within these behaviors they have lost a sense of the structure. These behaviors of lack, or resistance, of uncertainty, of feeling overwhelmed can take over. As a teacher, you can sense this growing and can redirect before it gets too big and then takes more attention on that individual issue, thereby upsetting the room, because others who are insecure , their insecurities will begin to come out, and everything will become a huge juggling game. In such moments, go back to a structural thing, start with something they all know, something that can all do, because a child gets a sense of comfort from what they know how to do. This can be used in the sequence of teaching too, if a sense of something is not moving into a clear structure, then go back to the known to calm and then move into adding more understanding. You can use what are cool teaching structures to stabilize what is essentially unstructured practices within each child, that is their limitation and fear coming out.

Also, realize that the present school design is limited, meaning it is hard to address each humpty dumpty n the room, and that there is no hands on learning, it is all done abstractly, using imagination only. Yet, in a sense, we all learn the same way, we bring our presence into understanding form and function. Yes, some have developed more hands on ways to understand, and some have learned to draw pictures about everything- there are programs out there doing this and the parents think it is so cool, because their three year old is drawing picture and writing words. There is nothing wrong with the parts, yet this is a reference to imagination only, and not a reference to what is real. Processing the memory with pictures and words only, limits real living because there is a lack of physical practical reference. What is within ends up not fitting into what is without. This is how ideological camps develop that have cool points within them, yet miss conceptually because that idea cannot address every measure, every variation in reality in terms of the what is an imbalance of that memory of experience and imagination of structure in relation to actual physical living. Here we end up spending more time talking about what works and what does not work than actual living.

Yet, there is a wealth of information and understanding in the anecdotal stories of other teachers in relation to directing a child’s behavior effectively. Each one has faced a ‘ lack of self directive structure’ in children, and each story can give insight into how to direct that many variations of this theme of a lack of self directive structure, or help you to learn to recognize such things in children. lol, perhaps it is to describe the benefits of a clear structure within to the children, they may get this right away, and that within this a perfect practice makes perfect!

Thus, within this limited design, the teaching models can help you direct, they are not a bad, as they are a reflection of how we learn. They can also allow you to frame self directive questions, such as; ‘ where am I going?”, “ what is my goal?”, “ what is the design I am imparting and practicing and handing to the children?” , “ What activity could I use intros moment to get the children back on track, where they can settle themselves in the known, or into security, so that i can move forward?”

The Deconstruction model, where there are many ways to practice information integration, such as change the practice form with the group, is cool. By this I mean things such as allowing two to work on something together, move to 5 working together, creating a form hat moves within the group, like Round Robin etc. This is cool because it creates looking at structure from different perspectives, or seeing patterns moving in different ways. It is actually playing with space and time.

I hope this was helpful. In the end, no one can teach this, you must discover this for yourself.
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