Types of Learners in a Classroom

Types of Learners in a Classroom 

 

In any given classroom, there are at least four different types of learners. The variety of learning types that exist often makes it difficult for instructors to ensure that they are appealing to every student's unique learning needs. To be an effective educator, you need to understand the different types of learning styles.

Visual Learners

• Visual learners are those who learn best by data and information presented to them visually, in the form of demonstrations, charts and pictures. This type of learner characteristically talks quickly, has a tendency to interrupt people when they are speaking, and is very impatient. In order to teach this type of learner effectively, you should compile information into charts, maps, graphs and pictures.

Auditory Learners

• Auditory learners learn by listening and verbalizing data. Generally, this type of learner speaks slowly and thinks in a linear manner. They interpret and process information when it is spoken to them, and they tend to be natural listeners. In order to teach auditory learners effectively, you should plan your lessons around how you explain things. Organize your lessons so that it's delivered in a coherent and linear way.

Read-Write Learners

• Read-write learners prefer that data and information be given to them in writing. This type of learner does not process information well when it is represented in charts or graphs or when it is spoken to them. This type of learner generally enjoys reading and writing. In order to teach read-write learners effectively, you should present information in list formats and using multiple-choice tests to verify their absorption of the data. Allow this type of learner time to take notes, because he will learn the information more quickly if he writes it himself.

 

 

Kinesthetic Learners

• Kinesthetic learners are those who learn best through hands-on approaches. This type of learner usually speaks very slowly and is slow to make decisions. When they engage in learning, they enjoy using all of their senses. They generally learn by doing and solving real-life problems and through trial and error. When teaching this type of learner, you should structure the information around hands-on activities, like role playing and creating and performing experiments.

http://www.ehow.com/info_7851970_types-learners-classroom.html

REFLECTION:

It is important for teachers to understand that students have differences in many aspects and the style of learning is one of them. In my personal opinion

In my opinion is not enough only know the differences between the types of learning styles we need to use this information to create techniques which help our students. In my opinion teachers cannot use only visual materials, audio, lecture or be interactive in all moments. Maybe some students learn best by reading texts or writing notes rather than using charts or maps but I think that our mission is try to develop all the skills in the same way because in the real life they will find different situations, besides when the students take an exam they answer different kind of questions for example speaking and reading.

There are a lot of techniques of how to teach the types of learning styles but we need to be careful about what techniques we will choose because the student´s brain work in different ways and it is something that we have to consider in our lesson plan too.

Information Gap Activities

Information Gap Activities

Teachers are often searching for activities to make their classroom more interactive; language teachers in particular are also looking for activities that promote target language use. Info Gap activities are excellent activities as they force the students to ask each other questions; these activities help make the language classroom experience more meaningful and authentic. This section will explain in more detail what Info Gap activities are and why they are useful; it will also give some examples of Info Gap activities for any language classroom.

 

What is an Info Gap activity?

An Info Gap activity takes place between students, not between a student and a teacher, though a teacher can certainly demonstrate the activity. The two students will be asking each other questions to which they don’t know the answer; these questions are called referential questions. The goal of the activity is for the students to discover certain information, whether about the other person or related to a specific activity.

 

What are referential and display questions? A referential question is a question to which the person asking does not know the answer. For example, you might ask a new student:
“Where are you from?” or “What is your name?”
The teacher does not know the answer to these questions; the purpose of asking these questions is to discover information, similar to the Info Gap activities.

A display question is a question to which the person asking does know the answer. For example, you might ask a student:
“What colour is my sweater” or “Do I have long or short hair?
The teacher clearly knows the answer to these questions; the purpose of asking is to promote student speaking, or to prompt students to remember certain information (whether it be vocabulary, grammar, etc.)

 

Why are Info Gap activities useful?
Info Gap activities are useful because they are very meaningful; all students are involved in the process equally and they are all moving towards a specific purpose. Each student has the task of finding out certain information, and therefore must find a way in which to ask for this information. Motivation is usually quite high in these activities. These activities help move the students from working in a more structured environment into a more communicative environment; they are hopefully using lots of the target language, and in the process discovering where they have gaps. Knowing where these gaps are gives them a direction in which to improve.

What are some examples of Info Gap activities?

• 20 questions: Students work in pairs or small groups. One student chooses an object or person and keeps it a secret. The other students must ask yes or no questions to determine what that object/person is. The maximum number of questions is 20.
• Guess the card: Students work in partners. This is similar to 20 questions only the students already have the object chosen for them. One student holds a card so that their partner can’t see. The partner must then ask yes or no questions to determine what is on the card. Often teachers structure this activity to fit with the theme of a particular unit.
• Find your partner: Whole class participates. Students are each given a card with an image on it; there are two of each image. Students must circulate and try to find the person with the same image by asking yes or no questions. The students may not ask “Do you have an elephant” if their image is, for example, an elephant. They must ask more descriptive questions, for example “Does your thing have 4 legs?” or “Does your thing live in the jungle?”
• Words on back: Students work in large groups or as a whole class. Each student has a word attached to his or her back; the students must then circulate asking each other yes or no questions to determine what word is on their back.
• Same different: Students work in pairs. Each has a different picture that should not be shown to their partner. The students take turns asking each other yes or no questions to find out how the pictures are different.

Read more information:
http://www2.education.ualberta.ca/staff/olenka.Bilash/best%20of%20bilash/info%20gap%20activities.html

REFLEXION

In my opinion, the information gap activities are excellent for students to express their ideas and thoughts, it also help them to put in practice their knowledge about the language. In the information gap activity students talk with a partner in an interactive way because each student has to discover about the information of the partner by asking questions. In addition to that this activity can get the student´s attention.

We need to remember that strategies and activities are prepared considering the necessities of the students for example if they need to practice speaking we have to select an information gap activity in order to develop the skills of the students.

The Importance of Lesson Plan

Here are the essence of having a lesson plan:

·         It is a one step backward two steps forward approach. Although can be difficult to do and requires tonnes of effort to accomplish at first, it enables you to save much time in the coming years, since the lesson plans that you just made can be employed over and over again, but If updates is necessary do so though.

·         It allows you to manage your time, effort and resources efficiently.

·         It gives you a bird’s eye of view of things to be taught and learned everyday.

·         It provides the teacher many ways to keep the teaching process not monotonous and redundant. Keep in mind that the attention of your students and pupils is just equivalent to half of their age, and a lesson is the best way to keep the interests of students and pupils interests all throughout.

·         Since it is like a script in movies, lesson plans makes teaching mundane and easy.

·         It makes you organized whilst teaching.

·         You can able to determine when to insert icebreakers and interesting facts and lessons to keep your student and pupils glued to their lessons.

·         Variations in the activities are easily whipped out which will benefit your students. Bear in mind that you are dealing with a class that has multiple intelligence, and different activities will cater to all types of students and pupils.

·         Lesson plans will easily help you to achieve your goals and objectives, and same can be said on the part of your students or pupils.

·         Lesson plans helps you get rid of problems or avoid them.

·         It gives you a reality check of your everyday performance.

·         It improves the habit and attitude of your students or pupils.

·         It definitely improves your teaching skills.

Lesson plans is vital in teaching, it gives you the guide you need to pull through. Bear in mind that teaching is a difficult since you are dealing with children or teenagers with raw skills, knowledge, and wisdom. Finally, with lesson plans you will be able to impart the things they need to do the best of your abilities.

 

Resources: http://emilgen2011.hubpages.com/hub/The-Importance-of-Lesson-Plan

 

REFLECTION:

This article gets my attention for the first two lines “If the trademark of a doctor is the stethoscope, the engineer is the calculator, and the teacher cannot be able to teach without his or her lesson plan” for me that´s right because any teacher should not work without it.

Probably sometimes will be boring and tedious write a lesson plan for each class because it demanding time and you have search about what materials will be necessary for the lesson, however write a lesson plan is really important.

I think that the lesson plan is oriented to help the teachers because there are steps that we have to use for develop the lesson.  In addition to that it functions as a guide in which we can choose the methods and techniques that will be better for the students  and not only that a lesson plan help us to manage our time for each activity and help the students to develop their skills.

On my own experiences as a teacher I have to recognize the importance of the lesson plan because it helps me to develop an organize class and pay attention to the students learning process. I like write lesson plans for teach my students because       I can changes the methods and strategies or make different activities which are relate with the necessities and skills of my students. Although is a little different to write a lesson for ESL students is really interesting to discover How I can help them using a lesson plan too, now for me is a little difficult to write it but is not impossible and        I have to continue because I would like to be a good teacher who helps the students to improve their skills using a good plan.

 

How to Teach English Listening Skills

Teaching English listening skills successfully requires using a combination of different resources to expose your students to spoken English. The lessons can be stimulating, as you can use films, music, radio and language-learning CDs to improve their skills. Translating spoken English is challenging as the words cannot be read, and there are no accompanying pictures or gestures to help the students understand. Therefore, it is important to keep encouraging them and build up their confidence with easier exercises in the beginning.

 

INSTRUCTIONS

1.     Use dictation exercises to teach your students how to focus on understanding the context of a conversation. Play an audio clip of news from the BBC World Service website and ask the students to write down what was heard. Then, get the students to listen to one another's ideas while discussing the topic in English.

 

2.    Play a language-learning CD such as Rosetta Stone or English for Dummies, and work through the listening exercises with the students. Teach the students to focus on how sentences are structured by writing down the subject, object and noun heard during different clips, or answer the questions to puzzles.

 

3.    Write down a set of questions relating to an English-speaking film. Give them to the students to answer while watching the film together. Review the answers after the film has finished to assess their understanding of the plot.

 

4.    Allocate 10 minutes to listening to music with English lyrics. Use the music as a dictation exercise -- ask the students to write down the lyrics. This will engage the students and expose them to rhyming, slang and different accents.

 

5.    Teach your students to listen to one another by encouraging them to make English conversation or English-speaking friends. Use a website, such as englishconversation.org, to link up with English speakers, for example. Keep each conversation topic specific, such as hobbies, family or home town, to focus the students' attention, and to use vocabulary particular to that subject.

 

6.    Listen to English-speaking radio stations and teach the students about English culture, current affairs, music and listening simultaneously. Check out Radio Tower to access a number of different stations available in English.

By Philippa Jones

 

 

 

 

 

 

Reflexion:

 

In this article we can find not only recommendations for improve listening skills but also we can notice that there are another skills as a writing, speaking and reading which are inside it. For example when the activity requires listening the students can write about the main idea or specific details, another possibly activity after that is reported to a partner or a whole class.

 In addition, the use of the material is very important for try to avoid boring class and make the lessons dynamic; it also helps us to get the attention of the students. We can use CD, video, music, etc for improve their listening skills.

 

I agree with this idea:” Teachers need to keep encouraging the students and build up their confidence with easier exercises in the beginning” because the students could feel comfortable and there are more possibilities that they want to participate in class without fear.

 

In my opinion skills are used interactively and in combination, teachers have to provide students with opportunities to develop each skill: reading, listening, speaking and writing using real- life activities.

 

We need to remember the purpose of the learning language that is to enable the students to take part in the exchanges of information.

Finally, I would like to share with you an example about integrate skills.

      Self-introduction takes the answers to a series of personal questions (name, age, grade level, where you live, members of your family, favourite sports, animals, colours, subjects, etc.) and sequences them into a self introduction. The teacher can point to each picture while modeling a self-introduction (students are listening) and then invite learners to introduce themselves (speaking) to one or two if their peers. Some of the visuals can then be changed and the students can be invited to introduce themselves to others in the class to whom they have never spoken. This activity can be adapted to become a regular (daily, weekly) warm-up activity to get learners talking in the target language. Having covered listening and speaking in the oral self-introduction, a scenario can then be created where in learners must write a self-introduction to a potential homestay host. The same picture cues can be used, reconfigured to show a salutation, closing and signature. The picture cues provide learners with support without giving them a text to memorize.

 

      There is another activity that integrates the four skills- a reading and retell. First, learners select a story at their own level and read it. Learners are then given a template to follow to summarize their thoughts about the story (writing). The summary is designed to help learners gauge the amount of detail required in a retell. After additional practice reading the summary silently and aloud several times, learners are asked to select two or three illustrations from the book to help them tell the story. They then practice telling the story by using the pictures and remembering what they wrote in the template. Students find a partner who has not read the same story and retell (speaking) their story to one another using the selected illustrations. Partners not only listen to the retell but also complete a feedback checklist (writing) about the retell. After reading the feedback, partners switch roles.

 

"Theories and goal of education don´t matter if you don´t consider your students as a humas..."

Ann Lou

 

** WELCOME **

 

Learning to teach is a blog for language teachers in wich you can find estrategies and techniques that hel you learn to teach in more effective ways and also improve your lessons.

 

In addition to that, you will find methodology for teach students and learn how to use it. Also,we need to remember that students are not equal and they learn in differents way.

However, this blog is not only about the right way to teach, it is important to know that teachinf is ab interactive process between teacher and student. Besides, we need to be aware about how students are learning.

 

For that reason, this blog provide you some ideas and recommendations for create a possitive learning atmosphere in wich students migh be able to learn. Moreover, the students have to be the active person in the process of teaching and learning and give them the opportunity to make decisions and take responsabilities.

 

To encourage you to use this blog as a material that can improve your skills and became a better teacher for your students.

 

 

 

"The mediocre teacher tells, the good teacher explains, the superior teacher demonstrates, the great teacher inspires."             

 

 William Arthur Ward

 

 

 

 



HOW TO BE A GOOD TEACHER?

Being a good teacher can be the most rewarding and exciting job in the world - however, being a teacher that doesn't work effectively can be stressful, painful, and exhausting. Here are some great tips to being the best teacher you can be.

Steps

Classroom Management

1. Set the example. Remember that you are the teacher. It is important for you to be like a "superhero" figure in their eyes. Remember that your students look up to you and will thus try to mimic your dispositions. If you are rude or inappropriate, they will have an inappropriate model for their behavior. It is vital that students see you as a person with confidence, so that they follow your lead, and feel comfortable trusting you. Students, of all ages, need someone they can lean on, look up to, and be able to trust.
2. Be compassionate. Great educators form strong relationships with their students and show that they care about them as people. They are warm, accessible, enthusiastic and caring. Be open to staying at school after-hours to help students or get involved in school-wide committees and activities, and they demonstrate a commitment to the school.
3. Set some ground rules. You should have 3-5 rules that the students know about. These are the rules that, when broken, are subject to the consequence scheme outlined above. Try allowing the class to suggest the ground rules: have a class discussion and write ideas, it makes the class feel they are listened to and that you care about their opinions and input while also setting some groundwork that they will feel loyal to because they've made it. Act as a mediator to make sure that the rules decided upon are appropriate. Some may be, for instance, be quiet when the teacher is talking, respect each other, and finish the homework and classwork.

 

Lesson Planning

1. Have an objective. When you are planning a lesson, the most vital part is the objective. What do you want your students to take away from the lesson? If the objective is powerful, deep, and reflects what you really want students to learn, it will be reflected in the lesson.
    
2. Have a solid plan for your lessons. Each and every lesson should be divided into three simple parts that reflect your objective.
   • First should be the "lecture" part of the lesson. This is where you teach something new to the class (of course allowing for questions or comments when applicable).
   • Dedicate the second part of class to something that involves a collective group work element where students can work with whoever they want. Near the end of this part, you can have a discussion session where groups voice their findings/opinions, and give marks for adequate participation.
      
   • The final part of every lesson should be where the students return to their seats and work QUIETLY on one final task, such as answering specific questions written on the board, or drawing a picture related to something they learned that lesson. The students should only talk to you (if they have a question about what/how to do it) or the person sitting directly next to them. This is the wind-down part where students get a chance to work on and understand the material on their own.
      
3. Assign relevant homework. Rather than assigning something different every night, it is wise to assign one or two more substantial assignments on Monday and then collect these assignments on Friday.
4. Consider giving quizzes. You may want to have a quiz every Friday to assess how well the students are grasping the material. You can judge how well you are teaching by how well the majority of your students perform on the quizzes.

 

 REFLECTION:

 

             I think that teacher is a guide for students, we have the responsibility to choose the correct strategies in order to develop the student’s language skills, but what can we do?  How can we do? Those are questions in which I always have thought.

In this article we can find two important parts that could help us in our teaching.

First, the classroom management is very important; there can be no doubt that creates a positive learning atmosphere will influence en the student´s attitude toward language learning. Although, we can not be the hero that lecture mentioned because we are exposure to make mistakes too;  we can be friendly, enthusiastic and inspires confidence in order to increase the self- esteem of our students and being able to work with less fear of taking risks or facing challenges.

In addition to that we need to elaborate some rules with the student´s participation.

 Second, the lesson planning is a part of our work too. Every lessons should have an specific objective and be planned to give the students opportunities to practice and improve their language skills. Moreover, homework and quizzes is a good way to verify if the students understood the subject.

 

In conclusion, we have to be aware about the importance of the classroom management and lesson planning as an important part of our work as a Teacher.