How to teach english to spanish speakers

By María Teresa Orlando

Although there are several teaching methodology books for teachers on the market, there is little if anything specifically focused on how to teach English to Spanish speakers. The large and growing Hispanic community in the United States that wants and needs to learn English along with the daily-increasing demand for English classes in Latin American countries underline the need for an instructional text such as this one.
"How to Teach English to Spanish Speakers" is a comprehensive introduction to teaching . English to students with Spanish-language backgrounds. It provides practical step-by-step guidance for new teachers and offers fresh ideas for more experienced teachers. It is also ideal for English translators and native English speakers who wish to give English classes. his resource book examines straightforward teaching procedures, underlying pedagogy and fundamental principles of teaching English, and includes a considerable variety of classroom and research approaches for language instruction. It suggests practical pedagogic options while exploring various teaching methodologies, comprehensive strategies and effective methods for teaching and developing one's own distinctive teaching style. It analyzes the crucially important qualities of an effective English teacher.
The most critical reason for this book is to look into what we teach, whom we teach, where we teach and, above all, how we can most successfully teach. Through valuable insights and personal experiences of working with different learning styles, predominant intelligences and different ways of building confidence, it discusses teaching and the learning process, classroom management and different ways to improve learners' listening, speaking, reading and writing skills. It also provides clear explanations as well as examples of class observations, lesson and unit plans, and offers reliable procedures, practical tips and activities for teaching Spanish-speaking children, adolescents and adults from beginning to advanced language levels.------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Aunque hay varios libros sobre metodología de enseñanza para profesores en el mercado, hay poco o nada que esté enfocado específicamente en cómo enseñar inglés a los hispanohablantes. La numerosa y creciente comunidad hispana en los Estados Unidos que quiere y necesita aprender inglés, junto con la demanda cada vez mayor de clases de inglés en los países de América Latina, incrementan la necesidad de este práctico texto. "Cómo enseñar inglés a los Hispanohablantes" es una introducción accesible para los estudiantes de habla hispana que quieren enseñar inglés; proporciona una guía práctica paso a paso para los docentes que recién se inician y ofrece nuevas ideas para los profesores con más experiencia. También es ideal para los traductores de inglés y los nativos de dicho idioma que quieran ejercer la docencia. Este libro de consulta examina los procedimientos, la pedagogía y los principios fundamentales de los diferentes métodos e incluye una variedad considerable de enfoques de investigación para la enseñanza/aprendizaje de la lengua. Sugiere opciones pedagógicas prácticas mientras explora diversas metodologías de enseñanza, estrategias integrales y herramientas efectivas tanto para desarrollar como para aplicar el estilo propio de cada docente. También analiza las habilidades indispensables para ser un profesor de inglés eficiente y eficaz. El propósito crucial de este libro no es solamente analizar qué, a quién, dónde y para qué enseñamos, sino sobre todo, cómo podemos enseñar con más éxito . Se abarcan todos los niveles, desde principiantes hasta avanzados, para el aprendizaje de niños, adolescentes y adultos de habla hispana.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Colegio de Traductores Públicos de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires
• Release date: Sep 1, 2023
• ISBN: 9789871763429

María Teresa Orlando

Born in Buenos Aires, María Teresa lived in the United States, where she obtained her Master of Arts degree in Teaching English as a Second Language at Hawai’i Pacific University (HPU). After obtaining her Master’s degree she also taught two courses, Note-taking Skills and Analyzing & Writing Arguments, at the Center for English Language Programs at HPU. María Teresa returned to her native Buenos Aires in 2006, where she taught English in public and private educational institutions at the university, high school and grade school levels. She is the founder and director of her own language center, Lingualandcenter Associated with Linguarama, mainly devoted to individual and group language training programs. She currently works as an English professor at Universidad de la Marina Mercante and conducts various teacher-training courses for translators at the Colegio de Traductores Públicos de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires. She is also a free-lance translator and works as an interpreter in the law-court system. Contact: [e-mail] www.lingualandcenter.com.ar

Book preview

Portada

How to teach english to spanish speakers

How to teach english to spanish speakers

María Teresa Orlando, MATESL

With the cooperation of Joe Petrisko

Índice de contenidos

Portadilla

Legales

Acknowledgments

Introduction

1. Focusing on the Teacher

2. Focusing on the Learner

3. Planning Teaching Units and Lessons

4. Exploring Language Teaching Methods

5. Teaching Language Skills

6. Teaching Different Classes

7. Organization of the Classroom

8. Lightening the Class Atmosphere

9. Language Level Assessment

10. Teaching Materials

11. Putting It All Together: How to Combine All the Elements of the Course

References

© Colegio de Traductores Públicos de la Ciudad de Buenos Aires (CTPCBA), 1.a ed. 2011

Sede de Avda. Corrientes 1834. (C1045AAN) Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Tel./Fax: [phone]

Sede de Avda. Callao 289, 4.o piso. (C1022AAC) Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Tel./Fax: [phone]-7961

[e-mail]

www.traductores.org.ar

Hecho el depósito que dispone la Ley 11723.

No se permite la reproducción total o parcial, el almacenamiento, el alquiler, la transmisión o la transformación de este libro, en cualquier forma o por cualquier medio, sea electrónico o mecánico, mediante fotocopias, digitalización u otros métodos, sin el permiso previo y escrito del editor. Su infracción está penada por las Leyes 11.723 y 25.446.

Ilustraciones: Leandro Mazzitelli

Diseño y armado: Sector de Publicaciones y Diseño del CTPCBA.

Primera edición en formato digital: agosto de 2023

Versión 1.0

Digitalización: Proyecto451

ISBN edición digital (ePub): 978-987-1763-42-9

Dear Teacher,

Congratulations! Whether you are a new graduate, a beginning teacher, or a professional looking for different possible ways to improve the process of learning to teach, picking up this book is an important step toward your teaching success. This guide will help you along the path of your daily lessons, from the planning and preparation stages of your classes to the choice of strategies and activities to meet your students’ needs and goals. Almost everything you need to know in order to present top-quality lessons is right here in your hands.

As you read this book, bear in mind that practice is the best way to greatly improve your teaching skills. When you start teaching, you can rehearse your classes on your own or with one or more colleagues, anticipate possible student questions and prepare appropriate answers. You can read this book from start to finish or dip into it on an as-needed basis for practical suggestions on issues that you encounter in your training or work.

Please turn the page and begin your teaching journey.

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Acknowledgments

This book would not exist were it not for the enthusiastic support of my friend Joe Petrisko, whose constructive suggestions contributed greatly to its development. His thorough critique of my book drafts helped me to see which parts of it were weak or strong. Many times he proposed improvements to the original drafts and showed me how to communicate my ideas more clearly.

I also received extremely helpful comments from my proofreader Catherine Hagman, who was always readily available to listen to my concerns and clear up any doubts I may have had.

I additionally wish to thank all my students, especially those who attended my course How to Teach a Language at the Buenos Aires Association of Sworn Translators, who inspired me to write this book and encouraged me during the project.

I would also like to thank my loving parents. Although they are no longer physically with me, I feel that they still guide me and are proud of my achievements.

Lastly, but most importantly, I would like to thank God for helping my dream of writing this book come true.

Introduction

I have learned that my calling in life is to make it easier for people to communicate effectively in English. As English is spoken all over the world, we as instructors, by enabling students to learn the language, significantly contribute to facilitating global understanding.

This resource book is based on my own extensive experience and active involvement in the field of English language teaching over the past 30 years at the primary, secondary, tertiary and university levels; in corporate training rooms; and in teacher-training workshops and gatherings before different audiences in various parts of the world. This book is a readable and practical resource to help teachers who are not specialists in the fields of English as a Foreign Language (EFL) and English as a Second Language (ESL) understand the needs of Spanish-speaking learners and determine which available options would be the best ones to use according to local learning conditions. To illustrate principles and theories, throughout the book I have described scenarios of real classroom events involving actual students in Latin America, the United States and Japan.

CHAPTER 1

Focusing on the Teacher

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Qualities of Effective Teachers

For a long time most teachers thought that the most important elements in teaching were the right method, the right strategy, the right technique and the right material. In recent years researchers have discovered something that might seem obvious, but for a long time was taken for granted: They determined that the most crucial factor that actually makes a difference —much more than do the teaching methods, strategies, techniques or materials— is the quality of the teacher. Although certain qualities are inborn —for example, the natural passion of a teacher that in turn inspires students— the art of teaching can be learned. We learn how to teach not only by attending graduate education courses, but in actual real-life teaching when we must face and deal with everyday class situations.

Teachers have the ability to exert a huge and long-lasting influence on their students. They can influence what and how students learn as well as students’ interaction with their classmates. Teachers can both positively and negatively influence learners’ behavior and motivation; the truly great teacher keeps the influence positive in nature.

Think about one of your favorite past teachers. Try to visualize that teacher. Why do you still remember him/her? Which qualities made him/her special? Make a list of those qualities on a piece of paper and put it aside. After reading this chapter, go to your list again and decide which of those qualities you would like to emulate as a teacher.

Effective teachers often show the following positive qualities:

- Caring. They support and devote time to every student.

- Patience. They are endlessly patient, giving learners the necessary time to process information and answer questions.

- Empathy. They are willing to listen attentively to what learners say, identifying with their problems.

- Authenticity. They show themselves as the person they are outside of their teaching role.

- Sensitivity. They are sensitive to students’ learning needs and strive to fulfill them.

- Enthusiasm. They are energetic and dynamic. They enjoy giving their classes, show a real passion for their job and convey that passion to their students.

- Respect. They always treat students with consideration.

- Trust. They can rely on their students, and in turn their students rely on them.

- Flexibility. They do not always need to follow a fixed agenda and have the self-confidence to adjust their plans to changing circumstances.

- Organization. They can organize how time, space and materials are to be best used in their classes.

- Positive attitude. They cultivate optimism in the learning atmosphere.

- Fairness. They deal with all learners equally and impartially.

- Openness. They are not afraid of showing their feelings, and they accept others as they are.

- Responsibility. They effectively manage lessons and groups.

- Professionalism. They conduct themselves with integrity and always keep in mind what is best for their students.

Teaching Style and Philosophy of Teaching

Every teacher has his/her own unique style of teaching, which is composed of individual personality and preferences, background, personal experiences and values. Some teachers believe classes should be teacher-centered, where the teacher is the authority in presenting information; others believe in a learner-centered approach, defining the teacher’s role as that of a facilitator of student learning. Although most individuals have a dominant preferred teaching style, they will sometimes include some elements of other styles. Teachers who want to use an integrative approach in their teaching prefer to adopt a mix of various styles. It should be noted, however, that as a teacher changes as a person, his/her style of teaching may also change.

Teaching environments as well as subsequent personal experiences may also lead to an alteration of teaching styles. Teaching a class of 20 students will be completely different from teaching a class of 40, for instance. Another example would be teaching adults versus teaching children: children require more story-telling and music in their classes.

Which is your teaching style?

As a way of defining your own teaching style, complete the following five sentences:

- In my classes I see myself as …

- My students see me as …

- I think learners are …

- I am eager to encourage my students to …

- I believe learning is …

Your answers are just a first draft. As you try to apply those answers to your everyday teaching environment, you will learn a lot more about your own teaching style.

Our teaching style is reflected in our teaching philosophy, which includes our goals, methods and long-term vision. Reviewing and revising our former statements of teaching philosophy can help us to reflect upon our personal growth and renew the goals and values that we hold.

As people are different, so are our teaching philosophies. We are not talking about a one-size-fits-all remedy here. We all have our own goals, methods and visions which form our personal philosophy. Therefore, my own philosophy (immediately following) should not be construed as a standard for all teachers.

My Philosophy of Teaching

All my life I have been studying and trying to grow personally and professionally. Being a teacher for 30 years has given me the unique opportunity to learn a lot about my students and myself, as well as reflect on my daily teaching. Based on this ongoing learning and reflection, my philosophy of teaching begins with the development of positive relationships and affective bonds with my students in a democratic participatory classroom, where different cultures may be accepted and everybody can learn from each other.

One of the most stimulating things about teaching is that one never stops learning (Brown, 2001). Every time I teach I learn something that makes me reflect on my teaching style and the changes which I need to introduce in order to improve my classes. Reflecting on my lessons every day keeps me aware of the strategies I should continue using and the techniques that need to be changed. Writing down my reflections after my classes and sharing ideas with my colleagues give me a different sense of perspective to view my teaching.

I also learn a lot from my students’ ideas and comments on my daily lessons, which allows me to have positive relationships: my students see me as one more learner in the class. Teacher and students take advantage of the opportunity to learn from each other in the class in a permanent dialogue through which sometimes the teacher is a student and the students are teachers (Freire, 1985).

In order to attain these reciprocal benefits through positive relationships with my students, I use the democratic participatory approach to empower them and let them decide on content and activities to include in the syllabus. Thus students are active participants in their learning process and reflect on their needs, goals and interests. I encourage my students to choose the topics related to their objectives, and explore the strategies that best work according to their learning styles. I train my students to identify their own learning styles and give them different choices from a variety of activities, respecting their preferences and cultural backgrounds. Every culture has different pedagogical views which are reflected in the classroom.

When two or more people come from different cultures with differing views on a given topic, there may be a cultural clash. For example, when I teach EFL in Argentina, I am accustomed to emphasizing students’ punctuality since under the school rules students must be in class before teachers. If someone arrives at class even five minutes late, he or she must explain why and it is up to the teacher to accept the explanation. When a student gets to class 10 minutes late, he is considered to be absent from school. On the other hand, if I decide to teach EFL in Japan and have the same expectations of punctuality, there will be a cultural clash because Japanese students sometimes arrive at class 15 or 20 minutes late without offering any excuses and other times show up only to sit for the exams. In this case I should change my expectations and either accept this new situation or try to negotiate with the Japanese students to reconcile the differences. In the latter case I will have to give reasons why attendance is important, for example, in a speaking class. I always do my best to understand my student’s expectations regarding classroom behavior.

In situations where my students and I may have different learning presumptions, we need to talk about these differences and work towards an agreement between the two sides. As McKay (1992) suggests, I may do pragmatic ethnography and ask native people from another culture about a certain topic, comparing their ideas with my own.

The pragmatic ethnography procedure goes through three different stages of research: inquiry, reflection and application. During the inquiry stage, the teacher collects information on researching and carrying out interviews. Based on this information and his own values, the teacher makes a reflection on the topic and introduces gradual changes if necessary. Finally, during the application stage, the teacher puts into