You likely love teaching English, it’s fun, dynamic – almost chaotic at times – and provides the kind of autonomy necessary to be creative and driven.
Some lessons are far less enjoyable than others - case in point: exam courses. Who gets excited about taking, not to mention preparing for, an English exam?
Nevertheless, it’s all part of the job and requires finding ways to make exam courses effective for students and enjoyable for teachers.
Job satisfaction is heavily dependent on our effectiveness as teachers and feeling like we actually accomplish something in the classroom - and is a key factor in avoiding burnout (Maslach & Leiter, 2016).
While passing an exam is a concrete, achievable goal - a task we are able to accomplish - it also serves as a stressor, a general source of tension and anxiety. So how can we turn this around and enjoy teaching exam courses?
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There’s no magical way to stop students from feeling stressed about an upcoming English exam, so the best strategy in the classroom is to prepare them as best as possible.
As well as using exam preparation course books, you should show them videos of the speaking exams or direct them to online resources such as .
Outside the classroom, encourage language students to take a break and not leave everything until the last minute. They could even try the to help them focus.
All language teachers have a few tricks up their sleeves: a bank of activities we use on a regular basis that we know are effective and enjoyable.
This also applies to exam courses - just because your students are studying for an exam, it doesn’t mean you can’t have fun in class!
Try games like ‘ to review vocabulary, or do a to make reading papers more interactive.
Whatever your favorite classroom activities are, try them out. Just remember to give them an exam twist.
It's important to always be finding ways for students to take part in teaching activities. Asking students to create their own exam tasks is a great way for them to exercise autonomy, and learn more about the format of the test.
Allow students to find their own texts and create comprehension questions to go with it. Alternatively, they could turn it into a Use of English exercise by removing words from the text and having their partners try and complete the gaps.
If you’re struggling to find interesting or relevant photos for the speaking paper, get students to bring in their own pictures - or use the ones they have on their phones. Once they know how the exam works, they can even try creating their own questions to go with them.
Tutorials are a great tool, where students feel comfortable sharing their feelings with the teacher about how they are progressing.
Get them to write down three things they like about the course and one thing they think could be better.
You can use this in your 1-to-1 tutorials or use it to spark a group discussion. There’s a good chance they’ll all say similar things, and it will allow you to do more of what they love and also to address any doubts they have.
Don’t overload language students with exam tasks, especially at the start of the school year. Many students won’t, in the beginning stages of the course, be prepared for these tasks. Failing or getting bad scores early on can be demotivating and can impact their confidence long term.
Like taking sips of hot coffee, exam practice should be dished out in small doses, with frequency increasing as the exam approaches.
Instead of marking each mistake on every piece of writing, identify common and repeated errors, and focus on those as a whole class. Not only will this lead to better results for students, but it significantly reduces marking time too.
Along with this strategy, having a clear system that our students understand is also highly effective for saving time and reducing stress. Create a checklist they can use to assess their own work before submitting it, or create a code you can use so they can easily identify what your feedback relates to (grammar, vocabulary, register, etc.).
Remember to also give feedback on things they do well, and always give them the opportunity to submit a final draft with your feedback taken into account.
The energy you bring to these lessons is often shared by the students. On days when you feel lethargic or don’t exactly love your job, students may express similar emotions or behavior. This also applies to the days when you love your job and feel energetic. Enjoyment is contagious, like a yawn or laughter. The more we, as English teachers, can enjoy our work, the more our students will enjoy their lessons.
Maslach, C., Leiter, M.P. (2016). World Psychiatry, 15(2), 103-111.
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Stories can make us laugh, cry or tremble with fear. They can teach us valuable life lessons and transport us to other worlds. They've been around since the beginning of language itself, but can they actually help us learn a language?
Stories are one of the most useful toolswhen teaching childrenEnglish. Not only do they help with listening and reading skills, but they can also support speaking and writing skills by providing context, language and structure.
Very young learners may already be familiar with stories – they may hear them in daycare, school or at home with their parents. Therefore, incorporating these into their language classes may help them to feel more comfortable in their surroundings. And if children feel comfortable, they are more likely to be receptive to learning.
Storytelling usually happens as part of a group in the classroom. This means that it becomes a bonding activity for children where they can communicate and subconsciously pick up the key language. While having fun listening and interacting with the story, theysoak up information without even realizing they’re learning.
So, what storytelling activities can we use with younglearners? Let’s find out.
Often, we think of storytelling simply as reading a book aloud to children. Yet, there are other activities you can do. These include:
To get young children interacting with the story, first read out a sentence alone. Then, have the children repeat the line with you as a group. Repeat as many times as necessary, until the children feel confident with the language.
If your learners are happy to, ask them individually to repeat the sentence after you. Make sure each one has a turn and praise them for being brave and trying to use the language.
An activity that works well with children is to act out the story’s characters. For example, there may be animals, fairies, monsters or other exciting characters that they can each act.
Ask them to make the noises of the animals, the wind, or the scenery to create an atmosphere while you read. This gets them interacting with the story and the rest of the group, which will help their communication and listening comprehension skills.
Young learners react particularly well to visual aids and realia. Why not use puppets or dolls to act out the characters, or even ask students to have a go with them? They will engage more with the story and the language.
Children’s story books are usually quite visual with illustrations and pictures. Make the most of these while telling the story. Try asking students questions about the images to get them using the vocabulary.
You could ask them, “what can you see?”, “what’s he wearing?” or “can you find an apple?”. This is another great way to reinforce the vocabulary they’re learning in class.
Use these activities individually orincorporate a mix into your lessons. Either way, storytelling will help your learners with more than just developing their English language skills.
While we often think of storytelling as a pastime for children, it can also be a useful language learning activity for adults.
Stories are part of our daily lives, from news to social media to books and movies. Therefore, they can be extremely beneficial tools for English language learning.
Yet, the way we approach storytelling as a class activity for adults differs to that of young learners. While we typically read fairy tales to young children, we can bring in a much wider range of content for adults, such as:
Storytelling can be a wonderful language learning tool for both children and adults. If you’re looking for a new way to engage, inspire and motivate your learners, why not try it in your next class?
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In this post, we uncover the benefits of language proficiency, particularly in English, backed by relevant statistics and insights from app's recentground-breaking new research.
