Section 6.

The Teacher Must Be Aware of Different

Learner Levels
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6. The Teacher Must Be Aware of Different Learner Levels

Levels of competence in English

Different terminology is used in TEFL when describing a student’s

proficiency/competency in language as compared to mainstream English classes in
the UK.
As you’ll already know, measuring a student’s proficiency in language is not an
exact science.
No universal system of rating exists.
The Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR or CEF) is
our best guide.
Some organisations adapt the CEF levels to suit their particular levels.

Fortunately for you, nearly all course books will identify which level the materials are
intended for and schools will have similar class labelling to indicate what level the
students are studying. So, there’s no need to worry!

The Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR or CEF)

The Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR or CEF) is a

standard, international scale of levels for language learning. It has 6 levels in ascending
order from A1 to C

Language testers and examination boards are increasingly using the CEF as their scale of
levels, though many give each level their own name.

The table shows the 3 bands (A-C) and the 6 levels of the CEF within these 3 bands. It also
describes (descriptors) which represent what a student should be able to do at each
level.

Study this well. It’s not difficult. It’s an excellent guide, an aide-memoire, which will keep
you on track when you start on your TEFL journey.

Band Level Descriptors

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C2 Advanced Level: English for Special or Academic Purpose

Can understand with ease virtually everything heard or read. Can

summarise information from different spoken and written sources,
reconstructing arguments and accounts in a coherent presentation. Can
express him/herself spontaneously, very fluently and precisely,
differentiating finer shades of meaning even in the most complex
situations.

C1 Advanced Level

Can understand a wide range of demanding, longer texts, and recognise

implicit meaning. Can express him/herself fluently and spontaneously
without much obvious searching for expressions. Can use language
flexibly and effectively for social, academic and professional purposes.
Can produce clear, well-structured, detailed text on complex subjects,
showing controlled use of organisational patterns, connectors and
cohesive devices.

B2 High Intermediate Level

Can understand the main ideas of complex text on both concrete and
abstract topics, including technical discussions in his/her field of
specialisation. Can interact with a degree of fluency and spontaneity that
makes regular interaction with native speakers quite possible without
strain for either party. Can produce clear, detailed text on a wide range
of subjects and explain a viewpoint on a topical issue giving the
advantages and disadvantages of various options.

B1 Intermediate Level

Can understand the main points of clear standard input on familiar

matters regularly encountered in work, school, leisure, etc. Can deal with
most situations likely to arise whilst travelling in an area where the
language is spoken. Can produce simple connected text on topics which
are familiar or of personal interest. Can describe experiences and events,
dreams, hopes & ambitions and briefly give reasons and explanations
for opinions and plans.

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 A2 Pre-Intermediate Level

Can understand sentences and frequently used expressions related to

areas of most immediate relevance (e.g. very basic personal and family
information, shopping, local geography, employment). Can communicate
in simple and routine tasks requiring a simple and direct exchange of
information on familiar and routine matters. Can describe in simple
terms aspects of his/her background, immediate environment and
matters in areas of immediate need.

A1 Beginner/Elementary Level

Can understand and use familiar everyday expressions and very basic
phrases aimed at the satisfaction of needs of a concrete type. Can
introduce him/herself and others and can ask and answer questions
about personal details such as where he/she lives, people he/she knows
and things he/she has. Can interact in a simple way provided the other
person talks slowly and clearly and is prepared to help.

However, in our experience, the most frequently used labels for the different levels, both
for the learner and coursebook, are (in ascending learning level from Beginner):

Advanced
Post-intermediate
Intermediate
Pre-intermediate
Elementary
Beginner

Get to grips with this labelling structure too. Note that under this structure, there is an
additional level for Elementary and a different heading of Post-intermediate compared to
Higher Intermediate on the CEF levels. The two different structures have much the same
descriptor content – it’s just that they have been moved around a bit.

So, a few tweaks may have to be made. However, as we have said, nearly all course
books will identify which level the materials are intended for and schools will have
similar class labelling to indicate what level the students are studying. Remember! Don’t
worry about this.

Just for interest, and to see a different approach to bands and descriptors, you could also
research the American Council for the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL)
performance descriptors for language learners at

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http://www.actfl.org/publications/guidelines-and-manuals/actfl-performance-
descriptors-language-learners . There’s a pdf at the bottom of their web page which you
can download.

Remember! Fairly quickly, you will be able to determine what language items should be
presented to your class, and in what order. Until that time you would be best advised to
use the grading of items provided by the class coursebook as a guide to the language
that you should be presenting.

Practical tips for teaching the beginner/elementary level

Unless you have had TEFL teaching experience before, it’s likely you will be involved first
in teaching learners at the beginner or elementary levels. So, how should you approach
this?

Study these tips carefully and this will get you off to a very good start.

Remember: learners in these groups could be any age – not just children.

Absolute beginners and false beginners

Note that at the beginner level, a distinction is often made between teaching false
beginners and absolute beginners.

False beginners are those students who have perhaps had a little English learning, or
who have picked up English more informally and inconsistently, perhaps through
travelling.

False beginners may give the appearance of knowing some English, which initially
makes them easier to teach. However, their superficial knowledge can present
some teaching challenges, as these learners may have developed early bad
errors/habits. Their classroom motivation may also be affected, as they may think
that they already know the material just because they recognise it. Look out for
false beginners.

Conversely, absolute beginners have a high intrinsic motivation from day 1 and will
catch up to the false beginner learner very quickly.

Look out for false beginners.

Keep it simple

Work hard at grading your language to these groups. Keep it simple and try not to use
complex structures or complex vocabulary, e.g. Most definitely, if I were you…. You’ll need
to speak slower but not too slow and deliberate such that it sounds like you are talking
to a baby, otherwise the learners may feel patronised.

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But don’t miss out simple but important words and structures. Don’t say Ah, you to go to
party tonight. Learners need to hear certain structures even if you haven’t reached that
learning point with them. Otherwise they may think that’s how English really is spoken.

And, if you are teaching adults at these levels, it’s important to utilise or create material
that is relevant to an adult. Avoid using books or materials that are too childish.

Prepare more

You’ll need to be ready to use a wider variety of materials and shorter activities that
involve them in communication – more drawing on the board, more pictures and
diagrams, more role plays, more ways for getting the message across. Also, make good
use of gestures and mime to help get the message across.

Encourage interaction

Use pair or group activities that encourage interaction by providing learners with
situations in which they must negotiate language with partners or group members to
complete a task.

Focus first on personal connections

Delay the scripted lesson plan and make the first classes about people getting to know
one another. For example, learn not only the students’ names, but also the names of
their family members. In other words, talk about what matters to the students first.

Use interruptions and unplanned activities as great teaching moments

If a student arrives late, use that as an opportunity to allow the class to discuss public
transportation, numbers or as a review on telling time. If a student brings in photos of
his or her family, use that to springboard into a discussion about family. The bottom line
is to be spontaneous. The students will remember and learn real-life language as it
unfolds naturally, far better than they will recall a pre-planned lesson that is more
abstract.

Try to minimise the students’ cognitive burden

‘Cognitive’ as you may know is the fancy word for the mental action or process of
acquiring knowledge and understanding through thought, experience, and the senses.
When teaching these groups of students, it’s best not to write a lot of information on the
board and have students copy it down while you continue to explain concepts. We can
easily forget these students cannot multi-task with their current language proficiency
level and it is important to break down tasks into smaller components. Do one thing at a
time.

Can they see and hear?

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Make sure students can see and hear the lessons. Some students may never have had
their eyesight or hearing checked. A student who appears resistant to learning may
simply have needs that have not been expressed.

Learn a bit of their language

Make an effort to learn words or phrases in the students’ L1. They will appreciate your
effort to learn their language, and they will see you more as a partner in the learning
process rather than someone who has all the answers. The students will enjoy helping
you learn a few new words each day; by learning bits of a totally new language you will
have more empathy for your students’ struggles to learn English.

Review constantly

Remember that with beginners you are your students’ textbook and study guide as well
as their teacher. Provide review sessions at the beginning of every class so students will
practise what they’ve learned and acquire the language.

Be animated

Don’t be afraid to make sound effects, play music, and take walks around the
neighbourhood to reinforce concepts. Sometimes the best learning doesn’t even take
place in the classroom, and it doesn’t have to be serious to be effective.

Example lesson for the beginner and/or elementary level

You will see that this is not too challenging for you but you will need to adhere to the
points above and prepare a variety of materials to embed the learning..

This lesson is for any age group at the beginner and/or elementary level (level dictated
by the course book and school syllabus, but likely to be beginner level). It will last around
50 minutes. It is an introduction to basic adjectives, comparatives and superlatives (but
you won’t use these words with them). You will use basic adjectives they have already
learned.

1. Get their attention by using what we call a warmer (or warm-up) activity. The learners
already know the words big and small, so this will be a good and easy warmer (warm-up)
for the lesson. It will get them involved and will make them feel good when they get the
answer correct. Hold up two differently sized objects. Ask: Which is big and which is small?
Confirm and praise. Now do this with several objects, e.g. pieces of paper, making the
difference in size smaller each time, so eventually you may get different answers and a
bit of disagreement. This is all just to get them focused and have a bit of fun. Then tell
them you are going to focus on the word big.

2. This is now called the presentation stage. Now you present your lesson. Draw a fairly
big character on the board. Nothing fancy-a stick character will do fine. Put his name
above (John). Leave space to the right of this, where you will eventually draw 2 more

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characters. You could use learner names where you have already identified 3 learners,
one who is big, the next who is bigger and then one who is the biggest.

3. Now draw out the word big from them through questions and gestures (this technique
is called ‘eliciting’). Carry on until the word big comes out, asking a number of learners.

4. Write the word big under John.

5. Now draw 2 characters to the right of John – one which is bigger than John – let’s call
him James – and then an even bigger to the right of James – let’s call him William. Write
their names above the characters. Ask them to notice the difference amongst the
characters – using gestures. Point to John and James. What can they see? Answers will be
something like James more big. Confirm and praise. Tell them, Yes James is bigger than
John. Write bigger under James. Get them to repeat bigger as a class and ask learners at
random to repeat the word. Now draw their attention to William. What can they see? Is
William the same as John or James? Use gestures. The answer will be something like
more, more big or more bigger. Confirm and praise. Yes, William is the biggest. Write the
biggest under William. Get them to repeat the biggest as a class and ask learners at
random to repeat the words.

6. Now bring out your previously identified 3 learners and put them in height order in
front of the class. Ask the class at random. Who is big? Who is bigger? Who is the biggest?
Confirm and praise.

7. Now demonstrate from your board work that for the comparative (don’t use this
word) we generally add –er and for the superlative (don’t use this word) we add the word
the before the word and tag on –est to the end of the word.

8. Now hand out a previously prepared worksheet. It has a table of three columns.

You can’t head them up basic, comparative and superlative as this would just be
gobbledegook for them. So, you have already pre-printed it with big, bigger, biggest in the
columns.

You have also added in basic adjectives they already know. We have given a few.

You would likely add more.

Stick to single syllable words.

big bigger the

biggest

tall

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 9. This stage is called the practice stage. It’s time for
small
them to practise the new learning. Get them to work in
pairs, completing the table. Then correct them, asking
thin pairs at random to give their answers, confirming each
pair got it right and checking pronunciation by class
drilling (the whole class repeating) and by random
old
selection of learners. Confirm and praise. Clear up any
mistakes.
young
Remember what we have called the ‘cognitive burden’
above. They can only take on so much during this
poor introductory lesson. If you attempt too much, it won’t
go well. So:
rich
Ignore spellings where some words have a double
letter in the comparative and superlative, e.g. taller,
thinner.
Use only single syllable words as longer words with more syllables are formed with
more and most, as you know, e.g. beautiful, more beautiful, the most beautiful
Don’t be over-zealous and try to tell them that we can use the superlative without
the, e.g. John is big, James is bigger and William is biggest.

These points will gradually be covered in follow-up lessons.

10. This final stage is called the production stage. This is where they put the new learning
into usage.

Step 1: Give each pair a handout – a copy of a world map with country names clear and a
range of country sizes added in. You may choose just to use a map of Asia or Europe or
the USA if you need more space to put in the sizes. Identify who is A and who is B in the
group. A is to select 3 countries, tells B what they are and A writes in his workbook, for
example, India is big, Australia is bigger, and Russia is the biggest. At the same time, B does
the same for 3 countries but must choose 3 different countries from those that A chose.
A now reads his sentence to B who reads and checks the sentence and country size and
then B does the same with A. Those who have finished faster than others can do another
three countries.

During all this time you will be walking about, listening, answering a few questions, giving
help as necessary, but not teaching or interrupting the flow.

Ask some of the pairs to read out their selections. Monitor the structure of the sentence
and the pronunciation of big, bigger, the biggest. Confirm and praise.

Step 2: Then ask A and B in each pair to select 3 objects and describe them to their
partner, e.g. an eraser, pencil and school bag. Or they can point to objects or other
students in the room. Tell them that this time they must not use big. They must use
words they already used in the table, e.g. tall, small, thin, old etc.
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Again, during all this time you will be walking about, listening, answering a few questions,
giving help as necessary, but not teaching or interrupting the flow.

Ask some of the pairs if they would like to come out to the front of the class and do their
activity in front of the class. Include other pairs, though, who can read out their attempts
whist seated.

11. You will already have decided whether you feel they need to do a homework activity
based on this lesson or whether you will wait until you have covered the other points
mentioned under Point 9 above.

So, as we said above, this lesson would not be too challenging for you in terms of
explaining structures, grammar etc., but it would require a lot of preparation - and
energy.

Note that the learners have been involved in speaking, listening, writing and reading
during this lesson, which is what we should aim to achieve as much as possible.

Remember! Follow our process outlined above when you start teaching. You may
need to tweak it here or there.

Tip: Apart from our recommendations in the course introduction, feel free to search YOUTUBE
for - TEFL: Teacher Roles or TEFL: Syllabus

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