Teach English in QishAn Jiedao - Shantou Shi

Unit two of this course describes the theories of teaching young learners, the differences of grade levels and hints of what activities work better for different age groups. There were four types of theories implemented when teaching young learners (around ages five through thirteen): maturationists, environmentalists, constructivists, and other (cognitive developmentalists). These four types of theories seem relevant to the overall nature versus nuture argument through teaching. This unit also highlighted the acquisition of a language versus formal teaching of a language. From early on before humans are able to speak full sentences, infants mimic sounds and repeat words in their native language. Therefore, learning a second language is difficult and sometimes needs external motivation to pursue the second language. In general, everyone has a different stance on teaching as well as how to teach their students regardless of how previous knowledge of the language was acquired. Another important part I learned was to keep the wide age group into two smaller groups of ages five to nine and ages nine to thirteen. Each age group has a different attention span, interest in knowledge, varied way to be engaged, and so forth. In general, the classroom environment for these groups should be manageable by a specific desk group selection (circle, group, rows of seats, etc.) This lesson also reviewed the ESA structure for teaching English. Overall, I learned some new things such as theories and hints on activities styles. Not in regards to, some information from the previous TEFL course such as the ESA structure and how to set up the classroom environment.