| Pity The Poor English Language Teacher? | | | | institutes and primary / secondary schools, the class |
| The poor English teacher of today, with so many | | | | room contact hours are going down. Many such |
| demands on their time and expectations. At times we | | | | places now pose learners with only three hours or less |
| hardly know where to turn. There are more and more | | | | per week of actual language instruction. |
| students in fewer and fewer classes and even those | | | | Insufficient resources |
| classes are expected to be taught with less and less | | | | "How many of you have all the resources you need to |
| resources or fewer and fewer hours. The results | | | | teach your English classes?" When I posed this |
| however, both on the part of learners and the | | | | question to a group of my students in an EFL Teacher |
| administration, is to produce better and better English | | | | training course, none answered to the affirmative. Not |
| language production skills. | | | | only do they lack sufficient contact hours, but are |
| Some Critical Impact Factors | | | | lacking sufficient teaching resources as well. |
| Some of the key factors English or Foreign Language | | | | Mixed ability students |
| teachers face can include the following:o Large class | | | | No matter what level you may teach from pre-kinder |
| sizeso Limited timeo Insufficient resourceso Mixed | | | | to kinder, from primary to secondary school or at the |
| ability studentso Students with learning disabilitieso | | | | university and adult levels, learners within a particular |
| Behavioral problemso Administrative demandso | | | | course group will be of varying or mixed ability. There |
| Personal restrictions | | | | is virtually no such thing as a "homogenous" group of |
| Briefly, let's consider the first four of these in turn and | | | | learners in a class. Even when learners come from the |
| how they can negatively impact an English EFL, ESL | | | | same socio-economic background, are from the same |
| or foreign language teaching and learning class room | | | | country, ethnic or language group there are bound to |
| scenario. | | | | be vast inequalities in their abilities. |
| Large class sizes | | | | These four factors can have a substantial impact on |
| How many learners are in your EFL or ESL classes? | | | | the effectiveness of the English EFL or ESL language |
| 10, 20, 25, 30, 35, 40, 50 or even more? Average class | | | | teacher. With more and more students in fewer and |
| sizes continue to sneak upwards as administrators | | | | fewer classes and even those classes are expected |
| attempt to extract the maximum profits from gross | | | | to be taught with less and less resources or fewer |
| institute or departmental revenues. The EFL or ESL | | | | and fewer hours. The results however, both on the |
| teacher then is caught in the middle struggling to teach | | | | part of learners and the administration, is to produce |
| English or foreign language skills to a growing number | | | | better and better English language production skills. The |
| of learners in each class group. | | | | need then is for solutions to an ever-worsening series |
| Limited time | | | | of problems. This will require the full cooperation of |
| Ouch! According to statistical data from language | | | | both teachers, administrators and to some extent, the |
| research institutes, the minimum number of hours for | | | | learners themselves. Additional factors which can |
| an English EFL, ESL or foreign language class to be | | | | negatively impact the EFL or ESL class room, teaching |
| successful is around five - that's the minimum, they | | | | and learning will be addressed in the next part of this |
| say. In an increasing number of universities, language | | | | series. |