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young learners vs adultsThe role of a teacher is a vast and varied one and there is a considerable amount of factors that will affect this role. One of the main factors that really effects how and what we decide to teach is the age of the students. When considering how we should teach different age groups we first need to take a look at the differences in the way that these age groups learn. The first one is the motivation: adults have made the decision to start a course so, apparently, they are motivated. Young learners haven?t made the decision to attend classes because someone else have made the decision for them, so they may be less motivated and diligent. But, it?s also true that adults sometimes start a course because they are compelled to attend by their employer etc. and they also can lose motivation rather more quickly than younger learners, especially if they feel that they aren?t making as much progress as they would like. The second one is the way of learning the language: young learners usually learn more quickly than adults because of the age and because they are attending school in the meantime and so they are used to study. They are able to learn words from the context also if they don?t know the meaning, while adults will always ask for the translation in their own language. This difference is also linked to the learning experience that adults and young learners have had. Adults have usually had several experiences about courses and lessons and they have a strict idea about the way of learning (they could not want to try different ways of learning, they usually are more traditional than the young learners); young learners, on the other hand, are more open-minded and not afraid to try new things so new way of learning. They usually are not afraid to make a mistake and they try to speak even if their pronunciation is not perfect, they often seem less embarrassed than adults at talking in a new language, and their lack of inhibition seem to help them get a more native-like accent. Adults are more anxious about giving the wrong answer in front of the teacher and others people and will tend to concentrate more on the grammatical structure of the sentence, trying to make it correct and coherent from the grammatical point of view. The teacher needs to understand the difference between young and adult learners in order to be effective. This includes their characteristics, how they learn, their needs and expectations. All these analysis should be reflected in the lessons prepared by the teacher. Some differences are obvious: children are often more enthusiastic and lively as learners. They want to please the teacher rather than their peer group, they will have a go at an activity even when they don?t quite understand why or how. Nevertheless, they also lose interest more quickly and are less able to keep themselves motivated on tasks they find difficult. The teacher has to remember that sometimes they see the english lessons like a quite boring activity and that they?d prefer playing computer games or staying with friends, so he/she has to overcome these issues. Besides, young learners children have an amazing ability to absorb language through play and other funny activities so if the teacher manages to make the classes as much fun as any other activity they do, they will come to class more willingly.
