44. Guidelines for teaching one-on-one 7.1.

 Therapy session instead of the lesson

 Teacher plays a lot of roles: counsellor, communicator, coach and tutor, interlocutors, therapists,
mother/father figures, friends and confidants.
 More of a couch than a teacher

For a teacher it is important to make a good impression first of all as it lays a good groundwork for future
relationship between a teacher and a student. With no class to create the atmosphere it may be even
more important because individual courses are usually short in duration so there won’t be much time to
change student’s opinion about you. Being well prepared also adds up to your image as a teacher
because it shows how much effort you put into the interaction with the student. Boosting both your and
student’s confidence with being ready for the lesson as much as they are will improve the learning
outcomes. An important step is to find out who your student is and pretty much the introduction part is
important because it gives you enough information about who are you working with so you can shape
your lesson properly. It may be useful to know about student’s learning preferences and styles, their
expectations about the course, their future intentions and etc. It is important to give enough info about
yourself too so your student can feel comfortable and safe working with you. Another guaranty of being
safe in the studying environment is having explanations and guidelines so it is important to provide
them. Being flexible means that you can change the plan of the lesson that you had in the beginning to
suit the environment, atmosphere and the mood of the student, taking rests when needed and providing
additional activities to keep up the interest. Adapting to the student means exploring their abilities and
trying the methods and ways to teach that will suit them and maximize the positive outcome of learning.
Since the lessons are individual it is easy to modify and adapt the place change the location or position
so it would be comfortable both for you and you student. Listening and watching means that you have to
be aware of the progress that your student is making to be able to identify probable difficulties and
troubleshoot them in future or make the learning process easier by aiming the difficult parts in your
explanation. And lastly don’t be afraid to say no and especially if the student you are working with is not
matching your personality. Sometimes things just don’t work out so it is okay to stop the lessons. And as
said before sometimes students just don’t know when to stop and ask too much of their teachers and
forget that they have responsibilities too so don’t be afraid to remind them.

45. Ways of managing learners with mixed abilities 7.2.1

Sometimes it happens that in one classroom there are students with different levels of abilities. In
private schools it is solved by giving students placement tests so they can be placed in the class with
peers who have roughly the same level of ability. But sometimes students get just streamed without
taking into consideration their abilities and at this point it is hard for teacher to manage these
classrooms because of big difference in levels. Most of the times people think about low leveled
students but this may be hard even for “gifted” students. One of the ways to deal with it is to group
students inside the classroom according to their abilities and separate the tasks that you give them. This
is called differentiation where you adapt your approach to each student to match their level and try to
create an opportunity for the whole class to perform to their best ability.

Basically average students are satisfied with the explanation given and manage the tasks, weak students
get additional explanation and easier tasks, stronger students get more challenging tasks.
46. Different student actions in mixed ability classes 7.2.2

 Give different students different tasks. Example: one text but different groups do different
activities on it
 Give the students different roles/levels of support. Example: roleplaying with police officer
questioning a witness, the student playing police officer can have prewritten questions, but the
witness should come up with responses themselves.
 Challenge early finishers. Provide tasks for early finishers to challenge them further and don’t
demoralize slow students.
 Encourage different student responses. Open ended tasks to make sure that each student will be
able to find at least one answer.
 Identify student strength (linguistic/nonlinguistic). Switch the focus off the linguistic proficiency
to motivate the students who are good in different areas.

47. Teaching students with special educational needs 7.2.4.

Students with special educational needs include students with adhd dyslexia, autism, visually or hearing
impaired, students who find speaking, listening or writing difficult.

 Learners are learners. Student’s differences don’t define them, they are students first and
everything else second. Point out the strong sides, minimize the weaknesses.
 Find out what is going on. Identify the problem first to help your students.
 Be inclusive. You need to stay inclusive not only for the “special” students but also for the rest of
the class that also requires your attention.
 Calm and safe learning environments. Make sure that students are aware of what is going on or
is going to happen because the clear and transparent routines can soothe the anxiety which is
usually caused by the uncertainty.
 Memory tricks. Encourage kids to try different methods of remembering things.
 Be enabling. Adjust yourself to your students’ needs and try to provide as much support as you
can.
 Multi-sensory experience. Try to mix medias and methods to enhance sensory experience of
information.
 Personalize. Each student is different and we have to be aware of that so we can help each
individual student as much as possible.
 Avoid unnecessary distractions. It is difficult to pay attention as it is but if you have learning
difficulties it maybe ten times harder, so it is important to minimize outside factors and provide
proper learning atmosphere.
 Scaffolding is a technique where you break a bigger task to several small more do-able task. It
helps with concentration problems and makes it easier to complete the task.

48. Advantages and disadvantages of whole class grouping 10.1

Advantages

 Reinforces a sense of belonging among the group members. Involving everyone in the same
activity gives us a reason to bond together and a common topic to talk about. Engaging
atmosphere is achieved when everyone is focused at one point.
  Good way to show or explain things or when a teacher is a controller in class. When you teach in
small groups it means that you need to explain one thing twice and waste time by making other
groups wait.
 Good for understanding general mood and overall progress of the whole class rather than
individual groups or pairs.
 It is preferred way of grouping in many educational settings and gives both students and teacher
the felling of secureness during the work.

Disadvantages

 Everyone is forced to do the same thing

 Not much of a chance to say something on your own as a student
 Some may be reluctant to act in front of all class as it may bring the risk of public failure
 Frees the student of responsibility over their own work as the whole class teaching favors the
transmission of information from teacher to student.
 Not the best way to organize and practice communication and speaking as it is harder to
communicate in a group of 30 and more members.

49. Advantages and disadvantages of individualized learning 7.1.2

Advantages of the one-on-one teaching is that one student gets all the attention of the teacher. It also
means personalized study curriculum tailored specially for one student, which may aim the areas that
are difficult for this specific student but would have been easy and respectively paid less attention by
other students and because of it overlooked in class. In one-on-one teaching sessions one student gets
all the speaking time and it increases the amount of speaking practice. While working one on one there’s
no shyness or fear of performing in front of all class and if teacher is supportive enough it may help the
student to open up and speak freely. And lastly one-on-one teaching crates an opportunity for more
enhanced feedback and more effective learning experience.

Disadvantages and drawbacks start from the relationship with the student, if you don’t like each other
from the beginning it will be hard to work together. Another drawback is that teacher and student may
get bored easily from working only with each other, boredom may be unbearable even for teacher since
the active classroom dynamic is missing and student may get tired of being always the focus of attention.
Of course, it depends on the student but universally it is solvable by taking breaks and changing the topic
to the one of interest to both of you. Since there is only one student it is easier to find something that
interests them by simply asking and deciding on that in the moment. And in some cases, students may
be very demanding and expect that teacher will do all the work for them as they forget that individual
lessons are also lessons and may require even more work from the student.

50. Ways of seating whole-group classes 10.1.1

Whole group classes seating includes orderly rows Common one’s

 Orderly rows

Can be straight or slightly curved. Teacher has a clear view of students; students can see the teacher.
Easy eye contact while lecturing. Working with the whole class, activities like explaining a grammar
point, watching a video or presentation, using the board, or for a language practice. Easy to convey the
same message to the whole class.

 Circle or horseshoe

More appropriate for groups with less than 20 members. Teacher is positioned close to the board or
overhead projector, in a horseshoe most of the times it is at one end of it. The position of the teacher is
less dominating and it creates great feeling of equality (in a horseshoe a bit less than in circle). A lot
more intimate and comforting place for students to share their feelings through talking and eye contact
and expressive body movements (a lot more than in orderly rows).

 Separate tables

Gives the teacher freedom to walk around the tables and explain, prompt, help out students in small
groups at each table. Very convenient for classes with mixed-ability students, where each group has to
focus on different task at the same time. Promotes a lot of groupwork ofc because of the seating, but
students may be tired of being grouped with the same three students all the time (have to mix them up
constantly). Makes it hard to teach to children, but depends on the groups and class size.

Other ways of seating include Jim Scrivener’s arrowhead (V-shaped) formation, facing or double rows
(“House of Commons” formation), “swimming pool” where students sit outside the square formed with
tables. Sometimes students may stand or walk around the class for pair and group work activities. A lot
depends on the size of the classroom and space available. Sometimes we may rearrange tables and
chairs for one-time activity.