14 What if?

What if students are all at different levels?

Students at different levels:

-some with quite competent English;
-some whose English isn’t very good;
-some whose English is only just getting started.
Possible ways of dealing with the situation:
Use different materials/technology(differentiation , treating some students differently
from others.)
Do different tasks with the same material/technology (encourage students to do
different tasks depending on their abilities)
Ignore the problem (the danger of this position is that students may either be bored by
the slowness of their colleagues or frustrated by their inability to keep up.)
Use the students (Some teachers adopt a strategy of peer help and teaching so that better
students can help weaker ones.)

What if the class is very big?

In big classes, it is difficult for the teacher to make contact with the students at the back and it is
difficult for the students to ask for and receive individual attention.
Despite the problems of big classes, there are things which teachers can do:
Use worksheets ;
Use pairwork and groupwork (maximise student participation)
Use chorus reaction;
Use group leaders;
Think about vision and acoustics;
Use the size of the group to your advantage (they are bigger, so that humour, for
example, is funnier, drama is more dramatic, a good class feeling is warmer and more
enveloping.)

What if students keep using their own language?

If we want students to activate their English, they won’t be helped if they talk in a different
language instead.
However much we sympathize with this behavior, the need to have students practicing English in
such situations remains paramount, and so we will need to do something to make it happen. Here
are some ways of doing this:
Talk to them about the issues (overuse of their own language means that they will have
less chance to learn English);
Encourage them to use English appropriately (a speaking exercise will lose its purpose
if not done in English)
Only respond to English use (ignore what students say in their own language)
Create an English environment (Teachers themselves should speak English for the
majority of the time so that, together with the use of listening material and video, the
students are constantly exposed to how English sounds and what it feels like)
Keep reminding them (gradually change most students’ behavior over a period of time.)

What if students don’t do homework?

Ask the students- ask the students what they think about homework and get their
agreement about how much we should ask for. We can find out what their interests are,
and try to ensure that we set homework tasks which are relevant to them (not only in
terms of their interests, but also in terms of what they are studying).
Make it fun- We can give out homework tasks in envelopes or send them in emails. We
can have students do some serious things, yes, but include some slightly crazy tasks too.
Respect homework- Students need to know that the effort they make in doing the tasks
will be reciprocated by the teacher.

What if students are uncooperative?

There are a number of ways teachers can react to problem behavior:
Remember that it’s *just a job*- Instead of interpreting the behavior as an attack on us
as people, we need to view it as something ‘the teacher’ has to deal with.
Deal with the behavior, not the student( face-to-face discussion has a much greater
chance of success than a public confrontation in front of all the other students)
Be even-handed (The way we deal with problem behavior has an effect not just on the
student who is causing trouble, but also on the whole class. All the students watch how
we react to uncooperative students and come to their own conclusions about how
effective we are. If the class sees sarcasm used as a weapon, their respect for the teacher’s
professionalism may be diminished. If they see one student getting away with behavior
which others are punished for, they will resent such favoritism.)
Go forward (work out what will happen next);
 Enlist help (talk to colleagues; get a friend to come and observe the class to see if they
notice things that the teacher him- or herself is not aware of; higher authority and the
school or institute’s behavior policy)
Prevention or cure? - making a language-learning contract in which both teacher and
students say what they expect and what is unacceptable.

What if students don’t understand the audio track?

There are a number of alternatives to this scenario which can help:

Preview interview questions;
Use ‘jigsaw listening”
One task only
Play a/the first segment only
Play the listening in chunks
Use the audioscript
Use vocabulary prediction
Have students listen all the time

What if some students finish before everybody else?

Should we stop the activity (which means not letting some finish) or let the others finish (which
means boring the people who finished first)?
provide some extra material( group who finish)
stop the activity anyway (only one group is left without having finished)