I've been told that I put too much time into creating and developing training materials. That I spend a lot on researching and customizing tasks. That whatever is in a textbook or workbook would suffice to fulfill most (if not all) of my teaching objectives. I beg to differ. That is why I've decided to add an extra task to my edublogging challenge and refer to this (apparently) nagging habit of mine: attempting to provide my students with meaningful as well as relevant learning experiences.
Whoever has worked with adult learners will agree that it is no easy task. Only by thoroughly understanding what triggers motivation and barriers in an adult learner can one truly facilitate language acquisition. And I myself am still "learning the ropes", so to speak.
There are intrinsic and extrinsic factors to consider each time you step in front of a group of adults: their "biography", their view on learning and personal or job-related endeavors, the fact that they need to know why they are supposed to learn something. Consequently, they display a more pragmatic approach towards learning than, let's say, children, who are unbiased and more spontaneous. Without meaning to oversimplify the differences between adult and young learners, I merely wish to point out that, believe it or not, it is advisable to tread even more carefully around adults; you need to pace yourself and be on the lookout for any sign of previous negative learning experience, waiting to rear its ugly head. Most adult learners were plagued by grammatical rules, while failing to grasp their applicability in context. They were ridiculed for not being able to provide an exact rendition of those rules, without any concern for developing communicative skills. For this reason, a training which focuses on receptive and productive skills, on task-based learning, on activities which test fluency and accuracy separately or on giving and receiving feedback, takes some getting used to. Once they do though, the new approach acts in a "therapeutic" manner. I've noticed students open up, become more aware of their skills, literally enjoy being able to... communicate in a language that was not their own.
However, this does not occur overnight. It is a complex process, with implicit ups and downs. When you hit didactic "rock-bottom", you can always draw on the students' professional experience, hobbies, various topics of interest. These are highly useful resources, which can contextualize a large spectrum of grammatical and lexical issues. It is namely much easier for students to relate to themes they are familiar with in their mother tongue and thus transfer certain skills onto L2.
Skeptical voices say it's too much effort, the input in preparing customized materials is not correlated with the output. That teachers have few resources and financial support as it is, so "accommodating" students' "stories" is futile. I have a bag full of counter-arguments. Regardless of that, I believe examples speak for themselves. Consequently, here's a list (for want of a better word) of some situations I've tailored to meet the needs of my students while teaching English, German and Romanian as a foreign language.
And they were not the only ones learning something in the process. ;-)
1. A former student of mine is a very passionate beekeeper in his free time. So I researched pollination, hives, maintaining honey bee colonies and apiaries. I could afterwards design all sorts of activities in order to teach articles and cases in German. He was both (pleasantly) surprised by this (he had gone through "traditional" approaches to learning a language) and more eager to use the required language structures to communicate. Later on, we could transfer his knowledge onto other subjects as well. But that first experience was crucial for his development.
2. Some time after beekeeping, I also "specialized" in fishing (rods, bait, Drop-shot technique etc.). This helped another student of mine to understand Passive Voice in German and to use Dative/Accusative correctly. Again, transferable skills.
3. Back during my teaching practice in schools, I had to teach 6th graders the Degrees of Comparison. Grammar and children don't always make the best mix, but I wrote a poem about a cartoon, which was very "cool" back then: Dexter's Lab. I had Dexter (boy genius) and his arch-enemy Mandark compare robots they had each built in their secret labs. We did role-playing while reading and identified all rules based on the poem.
4. One of my Business English groups is very fond of the fantasy and Sci-fi genres. In order to have more effective Communicating Across Cultures classes, we focused on fictional cultures as well: characters in Dune, Star Trek, Star Wars and even a game called Guild Wars. This particular group is still in for a surprise, as I've also started reading "Game of Thrones" and watching Dr. Who meanwhile. The sky's the limit.
I could go on. I'll probably do so. In my next articles.
To sum up: I firmly believe in personalizing the learning experience. Always. If this makes me a chameleon teacher (bee keeper - fisherman - doctor - fantasy writer etc.), then be it. Challenge accepted.
