When Students Don't Follow Instructions
This piece takes a look at the repercussions of when students fail to do what’s expected and what can be done to prevent such instances from getting out of hand. Examples are taken from teaching Business English to adults in the Netherlands.
Common Sense?
Taking notes is a given right? Wrong. In this day and age there are those who seem to have forgotten the importance of note taking, as ludicrous as it may sound. In one case, during a business vocabulary exercise, the class was clearly told that there were two stages; one, they had to match the phrases with the definitions, and, then, answers would be checked first before moving on to the second. After the first part had been completed, one individual had not written down his answers stating that he could not manage the task. As a result, the class had to wait a little longer until all the answers had been read out once more so he could do what he should have done moments before. The gentleman, the oldest member of the class too (early 60’s), which makes him prone to fossilisation, making it all the more important to write down information to help absorb language. Could it have been apathy, laziness, relinquishment, rebelliousness or stupidity? Anything is possible. This is one way to give himself an uphill struggle. With a push in the right direction, it is possible to help those who are not well-organised or need a little extra tutelage. Even though, it is more difficult to reach out to individuals online; where there’s a will there’s a way.
Link in the Chain
Giving presentations is crucial for some businesspeople who need to present in English at work. The premise is simple enough: choose any work-related topic, you have 10-15 minutes to present, you can use power points, handouts, images or videos as you will be made presenter (online), use the linking language in the handout to structure your presentation, look back at the presentation skills handout from lesson 5 and watch videos about body language and presenting statistics provided. The one that is often not thoroughly utilised is the signalling language. What tends to happen is some people try to use a few phrases at the beginning but then it wanes and there are no intermediate summaries and even no conclusion. Feedback after their first presentation, for example, gives them the opportunity to remedy this in the next, but some still fall some way short. Again, any of the reasons in the first paragraph for not fulfilling the requirements is anyone’s guess. Consequentially, their work can be disjointed, lack structure, lose the audience’s interest or understanding, seem unprofessional, and, at University, unlike lessons via language centres, they would lose marks. Reiterating the importance of discourse markers along the way (i.e. during a creating rapport brainstorming activity), and making it clear during feedback of what needs to be remedied can help to prevent it from happening again.
Self Study Sloppiness
In the first lesson, you advise everyone to watch and listen to as much good quality English on television. For business English some examples would be Dragons’ Den and The Apprentice UK. Next, for general English, read quality newspapers online, i.e. The Guardian and listen to the news (i.e. BBC). It is quite incredible how often students admit to not watching any English language television later in their course, but if they do keep abreast with current affairs it is in their own mother tongue. The same applies to reading news, which comes in dribs and drabs via telephones and social media posts in their L1. Clearly, this is a wasted opportunity and shows a lack of discipline or even understanding of the importance of maximum exposure to the target language. As a teacher, you can try to convince, remind and even sound like a preacher doing so, but, the reality is, students generally seem to prefer the easier option; to be exposed to their own language. They are used to doing so and it is a habit they are often unlikely to adapt. This is a shame indeed as a language course is a temporary fix and needs hard work both in class and in between lessons, otherwise maximum progress will not be achieved. Students will not reach higher levels with this attitude. In other words, they can improve, but not realise their potential. Recommending programmes, showing enjoyable clips, rationalising and using humour to make them realise what they are missing out on can work with a bit of luck.
Write & Wrong
Depending on the learners’ objectives, writing is often an essential skill that needs to be worked on. Some write emails, memos, presentations, proposals and reports, by way of illustration. One of the most effective ways to teach writing is to set assignments each lesson. For one-on-one lessons, the teacher can go over any mistakes in real time by sharing screen online and explaining why mistakes were made. In groups, a random selection of errors including a writing overview can be looked at the beginning of each lesson; this learning process is a shared experience for all the students. Still, problems such as meeting deadlines, failing to inform the teacher if work will be submitted late or not at all are commonplace. Students who do not hand in their written work may not enjoy doing it, they may be lazy, may not see the point in the first place, know they will not get into trouble (i.e. some language centres only advise doing homework without any repercussions) and so on. Writing combines grammar, sentence structure, vocabulary and punctuation all in one. Each piece of writing, which can be a continuation of discussion topics in class or specific to business as mentioned earlier is varied and there should always be a choice of assignment. Most language learners cannot afford to ignore writing unless they are very short on time and are at a higher level, wishing to focus on other skills, which does happen. As a freelancer, for example, if you are supported by your client and homework is a must then you can turn to a colleague (i.e. an account manager) if you have already sent warnings that went unheeded. Otherwise, online, you can try and write a message individually stating why writing is important for his/ her progression, but if that doesn’t work, you are out of options. F2f, (which you may need to wait some time for), you may have more luck speaking after a lesson.