What makes speaking difficult for EFL learners?
Diary submitted by Lorena R. Madrid
What are the typical components that should be considered while teaching speaking?
(I’m studying to become a French teacher abroad but took part in the TEFL programme too, in parallel.)
Until I found my TEFL Trainer internship, I hadn’t heard about TEFL certification, while it seems very useful to teach English around the world.
First, I was looking for an internship as a French teacher, in line with my university career, and when I applied, I could also get the courses online to obtain the TEFL certification. Even if I wasn’t as confident in English than I was in French, I thought it could be a challenge and a way to discover how to teach English.
Part of my experience was with the courses online, organised by chapters, with grammar, tenses and practical points. I was glad to have a review of all the language skills through the videos because although I had practised English abroad, I wasn’t confident enough to teach the theoretical skills to the students. At the beginning I thought it would be a huge workload to watch all the videos, and to learn all the points that were inside. However the videos were short and clear, so it wasn’t too tedious. In fact, online courses, also known as « e-learning » are developing nowadays because they are useful if you can’t go to university (for example if you work), or if you want to gain new knowledge. It suited me well because I could manage my time as I wanted to. It is easier when you are busy, instead of having precise deadlines. However, on another hand it was hard to focus on the online courses and at the end I needed to work more. I had to ask for a deadline extension for the final task and the diaries because I wasn’t ready to hand them in.
These reflective diaries are particularly interesting, from my point of view, because they incited me to think about some experiences that I had had during my internship, and to ask myself how I could, in the future, improve myself in teaching languages.
The second part of my TEFL experience was practical because in the school I could give English classes and I got advice from some teachers, as in French. I gained confidence in speaking English and I became able to help other people learn, through the online courses because I had strengthened my language skills by studying and also through the classes that I gave.
The only negative point is that my internship lasted 2 months, it would have been better if it had lasted longer. I could have improved even more my knowledge with the TEFL courses and will have focused on it more.
References:
- E-learning : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E-learning_(theory)
- What is TEFL certification ? https://www.internationalteflacademy.com/faq/bid/102043/what-is-tefl-and-what-is-tefl-certification
- Student HandBook TEFL Trainer : file:///C:/Users/flori/Desktop/Stage/TEFL%20Handbook.pdf
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