Teaching ESL Students Essay Example for Free

Teaching ESL Students Essay In the summer of 2008 I worked in a private college for girls in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. ( Due to the college’s policy, I was asked not to reveal the name of the college). This College offers continuing education and extension courses to meet the needs of women in the community for professional development and personal enrichment programs. In summer it offers a 4 week Intensive English Language Program. I was asked to teach two levels; level one and level three. In my level one class, I had a total of 9 students, and they were all Saudi’s: four of them were 15 years old, 2 of them where 11 years old, 2 were 13 years old, and one of them was 24 years old. All of them came from Saudi government schools. I met with them 5 days a week for 2 hours. The books used for the course was interchange level 1. However I also used Word by Word Picture Dictionary. Reading, writing, grammar, listening, speaking, and vocabulary were skills I taught in the program. Puzzle Area Generally, as an ESL teacher, I never use Arabic in class in order to expose students to the new language. However, I very quickly realized that the students were not responding well to my use of English only. I could see that the students felt insecure and confused. Even the simplest question â€Å"What’s your name? † was answered with head nodding or a crooked smile. So I used the Tarzan method, â€Å"I AM JANE†, but it was not effective. This response was a sign to change my method. I remembered the days in Pakistan as a child I tried to fit in while my classmates spoke Urdu and I felt like an alien lost and confused listening to gibberish from my perspective or rather trying to solve secret codes and guess what is being said. My focus automatically shifted not to learn the words but to try and understand body language. And this is what I saw in my students’ eyes i. e. they lost track of words and focused on my facial expressions and body language to try and understand what was going on. The look on their faces always seemed to say â€Å"What an earth is she saying † Thus, I puzzled over how I could best meet the needs of these very low level learners and whether or not I should use Arabic in class or not. Exploring the Puzzle Area I decided to experiment with using Arabic minimally to encourage learning English and to especially create a comfortable atmosphere for the beginners to express themselves. For instance when I introduced the vocabulary words, I allowed them to use Arabic. It was more or less a co-operative learning strategy. I gave them the word and defined it in English and some students said it out loud in Arabic helping each other understand the new words fully. Moreover, I felt the need to use Arabic myself when it came to teaching abstract vocabulary because I wanted to ensure induced errors would be avoided. I would ask my students to tell me what the word means in Arabic. Saying the word in Arabic myself was my last resort for I did it to spot check on the students and to further avoid their frustration. In grammar it was a different issue. I decided not to use Arabic, but eventually I realized it was big mistake and a waste of time. Explaining the grammar rules only in English was causing lots of problems with understanding the lesson, due to the low level of my students. I repeated the lesson many times speaking slowly with the simplest words believing that they at least understood something from the lesson. But my efforts were in vain because once I asked the class to start practicing the exercises orally, no one responded. Whereas when I used a bit of Arabic as well as English in the same lesson, it was more effective. For example, Arabic generally follows the verb- subject structure. In English, however, the general structure is subject-verb-object. So pinpointing such basic factors and presenting model sentences in both languages clarified their misuse of a simple sentence in English. Thus, the passivity in the beginning changed; the students suddenly got interested and active, and started to work in groups to combine many sentences on their own. I realized that using L1 for beginners was beneficial grammar because students could understand grammatical structures and practice their application gradually as their level improves. Teaching reading was basically an individual effort that depended on the students’ efforts. To improve their reading skills they were asked to read aloud simple passages to improve their reading and pronunciation of words. However, for critical thinking skills, I asked them to silently read paragraphs and then asked questions about the part they read to check their perception and understanding of the topic. In reading, I allowed them to use Arabic to express their thoughts about a topic, because if I depended on English alone the class would be unresponsive. Gradually, in two weeks time the class began to open up and feel comfortable with using English in their responses. For example, in a reading lesson after silently reading the passage, one of the students knew she understood the topic but admitted that she was shy and afraid to answer the questions in English. This phobia is a general problem in Saudi students especially beginners. There is a fear of being wrong or feeling embarrassed. So, the fact that she was allowed to start in Arabic and include some English was a comforting experience. A student for instance would respond with broken sentences: â€Å"exercise it about exercise†¦ † and form discussions with their classmates in Arabic and ask the teacher for the correct form of answering, mimic it, and in turn learn it. Hence, they initially began with participating in L1 but grew to use L2 too after a while. The most difficult part of L2 learning that many beginners face is writing. In the first writing class I started with the basics, such as brainstorming then classifying their ideas. The problem that arose was the students’ limited vocabulary. They were able to participate using L1 and began asking the words meanings and jotting them down. It was not an effective process because the class turned out to be a vocabulary lesson. So I had to change plans. The next class I assigned them to read short paragraphs and focus on the structure, sentence order, words meanings and punctuation. Then in class we worked on a similar paragraph but with mistakes and edited it together. The students enjoyed this activity and used L1 to tell me the mistakes and why it is wrong. Gradually, I encouraged them to copy the forms they took but with a different topic. For example, they took a paragraph about fishing, and I asked them to write about swimming. The students copied the exact paragraph with a few changes. They got to learn a lot gradually when they wrote a paragraph on their own. L1 was used minimally just as a comfort zone for discussing topics and explaining rules, and they did learn the basics of writing in L2 at the end. Students don’t ask each other about particular words and structures and get it much easier. In upper-intermediate group we talk in English and that’s not a problem we don’t have to explain vocabulary or grammar in Arabic. So it’s the matter of the language advancement in English. This way of teaching is much more efficient. Conclusion Whether to use native language when teaching ESL students is a matter of constant debate and when choosing education method the teacher should consider students’ background, their primary knowledge and their abilities to learning. It is known that the more differences between languages the most difficulties students are faced with. The same situation is observed with Arabic and English as languages are completely different. Nevertheless, from the very beginning I was against using Arabic in teaching English as, in such a way, I hoped to achieve the higher level of commitment and I expected students to learn faster. But education process showed that it is normal to use Arabic when teaching students with low level of English because many students simply didn’t respond to my speech and efforts to explain some rules. I see students were confused as they couldn’t understand what I expected from them. The method to focus on facial expression, not on learning words failed as well. When I decided to use Arabic minimally I saw that such encouragement appeared to be more effective in creating more comfortable atmosphere for students to express their ideas. Therefore-, I concluded that co-operative learning strategy is the best method of learning beginners. Native language can be used when explaining abstract vocabulary, explaining new grammar and ensuring that all rules are understandable.