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Teachers of English may find themselves teaching a wide-variety of students throughout their careers. Learners of English can be separated into the following categories: beginners, individuals, young learners, learners with a specific purpose (e.g. business), monolingual groups, and multilingual groups. These are only some of the classifications that can be placed on English learners and one learner may belong to more than one classification. I.e., a learner may be a young, beginner that is in a multilingual classroom environment. The students? needs must always be taken into account and therefore the students really are the ones who shape the class. Beginners are no exception to this. When teaching beginners, it is crucial to use simple, controlled language and employ mime and gesture often. When in doubt, opt for visual communication over verbal communication. It?s also imperative to abstain from using the students? native language. If the students perceive their teachers speak their tongue, they will have lost the need to use English and their motivation as disappears as well. If the beginner comes from a culture that use a writing script that is not based on the Latin alphabet, the basic skills of reading and writing have to be built from scratch and practiced often. It is important to formatively assess the students often in order to make sure they have retained the information; teachers often move to fast for the class and leave many students behind. With beginners, patience is the key to success. It is the teachers? responsibility to build their students? skills and establish a strong foundation in English. Listening skills, for example, take a while to develop. A lot of methods used to teach beginners can be applied to teaching young learners. For example, both of these groups need lots of praise and recognition. Building positive self-esteem in the language allows much greater success with the language. The students? native tongue must especially not be used for young children. Children also require a lot of change in dynamic and activities as their attention spans are quite limited. The same curiosity that helps children make rapid growth in language learning also creates the desire for a change in stimulus. This desire shortens the attention span and can result in boredom and behavior problems if a lesson isn?t well-planned. When teaching learners interested in business English or teaching learners in a one-on-one situation, the clients? needs must be first-priority. In these situations, the client should have a clear goal. It is the teacher?s job to help them reach that goal.
