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There are lots of resources available to English teachers today: from textbooks to online teaching tools, they can all aid and enrich English lessons. Many ESL teachers also introduce authentic English material into their lessons to expose learners to the language as it is spoken in the real world.

Authentic material is any material written in English that was not created for intentional use in the English classroom. Using this content for teaching English can make the teaching experience even more engaging, imaginative and motivating for students. It can also be useful to elicit genuine responses from English language learners.

The great thing about using authentic material is that it is everywhere, which makes it easy to find, and simple for learners to practice English in their own time. Remember that it isn’t limited to articles from newspapers and magazines. Songs, TV programs and films, radio and podcasts, leaflets, menus – anything written in English constitutes authentic material.

Selecting authentic material

The best content to select depends on the learners, their level of English and the course content the English teacher wishes to focus on. It’s also a good idea to find out the learners’ interests – after all, there’s no point trying to get students fascinated by a text on the latest sci-fi movie if they’re all fans of action films.

The materials should reflect a situation that a student may face in an English-speaking environment – this will help them transition into a world where English is the norm. In this world, people use abbreviations, body language is important and they’ll use 'filler' sounds – such as 'ummm' – when they are speaking English – and learners will encounter these in authentic material.

It’s important not to overwhelm learners with the first piece of authentic material. So, choose articles, songs or sections of TV programs or movies that aren’t too difficult to understand or take too long to get through.

There is a strong link between well-being and friendship, which is just as accurate for children as it is for adults. that children with stable friendships are happier, more able to cope with stress, and have higher self-esteem. Moreover, too, and children who experience friendship adjust more easily to school and perform better academically. School friendships are also a valuable way of learning social skills like sharing, resolving conflict, and engaging with peers positively.

Having friends is an important part of school life, and teachers can play a significant role in creating a positive classroom culture and helping children and young people to form friendships. How can you promote friendships between your students? Here are some ideas:

1. Make friendship a central theme in your classes

If there is an example of a good friendship in a book you are reading with students or in your lesson materials, draw your students’ attention to it. For instance, The Jungle Book is an excellent example of a story about friendship. Encourage your students to think critically about the friendships that they read about. You can ask questions like:

• What are some things a good friend does?
• What are the qualities of a good friend?
• What words do you associate with friendship?

By discussing friendship regularly in the classroom, your students will learn about the behavior and characteristics of being a good friend.

2. Create opportunities for interaction

You can create lots of opportunities for students to build friendships with one another during class time. Design activities that call for pair or group work, and include at least one or two in every lesson. Focusing on a common goal or problem is a great way to encourage your students to bond with one another.��As a bonus, this collaborative way of working promotes important 21st century skills like communication and problem-solving.

Another way of promoting friendships between different groups of students is moving them around. Adjust your seating plan regularly to ensure that all your students interact with and work alongside different classmates, to promote positive, friendly classroom vibes.

3. Discuss and model good behavior

Friendship is a social skill that children need to learn – and you can help by teaching them. Be explicit about exactly what you expect from them. Saying, “Be kind” is an abstract, vague concept that children might struggle to put into practice. Instead, give them concrete examples of behavior, such as:

• take turns when playing
• speak respectfully
• share pens or other resources

When you see a student engaging in these behaviors, draw attention to them and praise them.

But to really convey the importance of school friendships and kind behavior, it’s not enough to tell them. As the teacher, you must model the behavior you’d like to see in your students. Be consistently positive and upbeat in your interactions with students, thank your learners when they offer help with something, and try to refrain from sounding impatient (even when you are!). All these steps will help to build a positive classroom culture where students feel secure, supported and happy.

4. Help to navigate difficult situations

Conflict is an inevitable part of school life, but you can help students to navigate arguments and other difficult situations in the classroom. If two students argue, you can help them to resolve it with the following steps:

• Separate the students to give them time to calm down.
• Have a conversation with them. Ask for their perspective on the conflict, and find out how their day has been in general. Sometimes, you can better understand a student’s reaction when you look at the bigger picture. Ask them how they feel, and how they could resolve the situation.
• Bring the students together again to discuss things and find a resolution together. Reconciliation is the goal.

Following these simple steps teaches children a framework for resolving conflict and gives them the tools to process strong emotions.

5. Do some friendship-focused activities

An excellent way to promote a positive classroom culture is to do friendship-focused activities with your students:

You could do a Venn diagram activity, where students work in pairs to discuss and write down things they have in common and areas of difference. It’s good to pair students who don’t spend much time together for this activity.

Another positive activity is a 'Honey Roast'. Give students enough squares of paper to have one for each of their classmates. Get them to write their classmates’ names on the paper, and then, on the other side, write down a compliment or something they like about that person, for example, “I like your handwriting”, or “You always use kind words”. Collect the pieces of paper and read out some nice examples to the class. Alternatively, give them directly to the students to read to themselves.

It’s more important for teachers to help students find ways to practice their English outside the classroom. The more efficient students become at autonomous learning, the better they’ll be able to overcome interruptions and make up for lost time.

It will be even more challenging if you're a self-learner as you do not have a teacher looking over you and steering your learning. But it’s helpful to learn from the teaching world and pick up teacher tips that you can apply to your own studies and techniques.

Why are learning new words so challenging?

Students learning new words in English generally progress steadily up until the pre-intermediate and intermediate levels. But after that, they start to struggle.

This is because there’s a big difference between the volume of the vocabulary that intermediate students and upper-intermediate students need to know.

• Intermediate (B1/B2 level) students need to know about 2,500 words
• upper-intermediate (B2/C1 level) students need to know about 7,500-9,000 words.

That’s a big jump in numbers. But the real challenge is that those 5,000+ new words are not very frequent. Consequently, students don’t encounter them very often, making it difficult to recall them and leap from one level to the next.

While there’s no simple answer to this problem, there are ways to help students overcome it. The following framework can be a big help in any classroom:

1. Focus on the most important words:��Always teach appropriate words for the levels your students are currently at.
2. Provide memorable first encounters:��You never get a second chance to make a first impression. So, ensure your student's first encounter with a new word is as memorable as possible.
3. Teach effective word-learning strategies:��Provide your students with valuable tools, tactics and resources so that they can learn new words outside the classroom, too.
4. Organize repeat encounters:��Vocabulary works on a “use it or lose it” basis, so ensure your students encounter the vocabulary you want them to learn repeatedly.

How to teach effective word-learning strategies

There are three steps to teach students how to learn new words effectively:

1. Help learners maximize their exposure to English and find opportunities to use English outside the classroom

Thanks to the internet and technology, there are many ways that students can engage with the English language outside the classroom.

However, simple exposure to a new language is not enough – it takes much longer and is less effective than active learning. When students do something with the language they’re exposed to; it is far more memorable.

That’s why it’s crucial for teachers to help their students seek out English in their own time and use the language, turning passive exposure into active learning.

• Encourage students to read, listen and view things that they’re interested in or passionate about in English. For example, introduce them to new blogs, podcasts, YouTube videos, or TV series that fit their interests – since personalization leads to more effective learning.
• Help students find ways to use English in different ways. For example, they can start a learning diary, make to-do lists in English, write social media posts, and create word cards to practice their writing. For speaking, they can record voice memos or video stories, take part in Zoom discussions, or participate in speaking projects and live classes.
  

2. Provide ways for students to discover the meaning of new words

It’s crucial to help students improve their guesswork. Instead of asking online translators to translate every time they encounter a new word, they should be able to guess the meaning of new vocabulary differently.

• One approach is to look at the morphology of words and consider word families. For example, you can ask your students to brainstorm words with a common root. Or, you can have them identify and practice common suffixes.
• Explore “true friends” or words that are similar in English and your student's native language.
• Help your students figure out how to guess the meaning of a word from the context. To do this, you must ensure that your students don’t just hear or read new words but also put them into use.

One way to get students to learn and retain vocabulary is to get them to create word cards:

• Ask students to collect ten new words that they’re exposed to throughout the week and bring them to class, like a “show and tell” for words.
• Then have a debate about how useful each of those words is.

This helps to connect learning inside and outside the classroom, and it’s fun!

3. Provide students with strategies to consolidate their knowledge of new words

Finally, teachers should give students ideas on how to memorize words outside the classroom. You can have your students produce word cards and use a Word Store booklet to practice tasks like matching words with images or definitions.

Lastly, it’s important to teach students memory tricks or mnemonics so they can retain the new words they encounter.