Teach English in FengxiZhen - Chaozhou Shi

In this Unit I have a greater understanding of the role of teachers and a general understanding of how learners may differ from each other. To be a productive teacher it is important that they possess characteristics of respect, kindness, organization, a knowledge of the material and most of all to be attentive and fair to all students. Also to have a natural desire to be a teacher is very important because if there is a desire to be a good teacher, I believe the rest of the positive aspects can be developed over time; although being a motivating and entertaining or engaging teacher may be a talent. I say this because in my own early youth past experience many teachers were not motivating. But now, I have teachers that are very engaging and motivating!! I also learned about the different categories of learners from 2-7 yrs. 8-13 yrs and 14 - 18 yrs. and also the Adult Learners. All of these varying age ranges poses its own set of challenges and rewards. One of the biggest differences amongst all of these categories for me would be the level of discipline that must be given. I believe this is true because I feel it is self evident that trying to teach a 2 yr old versus an Adult Learner would be completely different experiences. Also, in the chapter it states that discipline would be covered in its own section. I also learned the about the different characteristics of good learners such as: good listeners, ask questions, being in comfortable in error correction and to have a willingness to understand their own learning style. This was interesting to me because as a language learner myself in Spanish, I find myself to do these very things as a good learner, and upon reflection, I remembered some acquaintences of mine who had no motivation to learn another language because #1 it is a lot of work and number #2 they were very sensitive to being corrected and did not like making a lot of mistakes and so therefore felt they were too old to learn a language (ages 40+). I also learned about the A1,A2,B1,B2,C1 and C2 categories. Interestingly enough I had only just heard about these categories 4 months while on a language immersion trip in Mexico. One of the other students expressed that he had to pass a C1 Level Language Exam in Spnaish for a job in law enforcement. That was my first time ever hearing of a \"C1\" category and I had no idea that something like this even existed. After reading this chapter I now understand much better the Levels and what they mean. I also asked my Spanish Tutor what level I was. He said for Speaking and Writing I was a B2 and for Listening, Comprehension and Reading I was C1. That was so awesome! I have had my tutor for more than 8 months but did not know to ask him my levels because I had no idea about this kind of language assessment system. To have this understanding had an immediate personal effect and application for me; and it felt good to know that I was at these levels in learning Spanish, it was a huge motivating force to encourge me that I am effective in my approach to studying a second language! Thank you so much. These are the major concepts that I have learned from this unit.