Harnessing The Expertise of Professional Teachers? Some ideas.

[issemiyaki]

With regard to such classes it matters where you are, what the TL is, where it is taught and under what circumstances (course and student), and what the entire drive is behind the course in question.

In general I think teachers have a wealth of knowledge to impart and are a valuable resource for answering difficult questions and shedding light on things, but they are also people, not machines. They also need stimulation to be the best they can be and a class of eager, committed, curious, positive, cooperative, positively-critical students makes a world of difference. Yes some of that has to come from the teacher, but also the students.

Bravo! Every word of it.

Actually, every word of your entire post was so thoughtful.

Thank you.

[issemiyaki]

issemiyaki, if you found a good teacher, then use the opportunity to the max, and don't worry about anyone else's bad experiences (or even the bad experiences that you had in the past). No need to justify anything!

Thank so much, Irene. There are a few language acquisition journals I'm headed over to the university library to check out.

That have such a large collection. So, I look forward to getting lost in the aisles for a few hours. You can't take the journals out of the library because they are considered reference works, so, I'll have to read them there.

Thanks again.

[rdearman]

I would like to point out to issemiyaki and Cavesa that you appear to be speaking of two completely different types of teachers. Having read all the posts I get the impression that issemiyaki is talking about one-two-one lessons with a teacher or tutor. But Cavesa appears to be speaking (mainly) about teachers in the classroom.

Teachers doing 121 classes with a single student can and do modify their programs to suit the abilities of the student. But teachers of a classroom full of people have to cater to the lowest common denominator. I suspect this is the primary reason for the issues Cavesa has experienced in the classroom. A classroom teacher isn't going to be able to give tailored study to 30 students individually. Even the world's greatest teacher if they have to teach multiple students at the same time cannot please everyone.

I honestly think that if Cavesa and me were in a class together, then Cavesa would find the class and teacher frustrating and useless. Not because the teacher is crap, but because the teacher has to deal with a thicko like me and explain every lesson 2-3 times before it goes in. Cavesa would have probably read 8 grammar books, watched 200 films and read 9 books before I managed to get through the second lesson of the course book.

I think the same scenario would happen to issemiyaki, because his beloved teacher who is the fountain of all knowledge would have to spend 70% of the class time with me, Mr Thicko.

In reality, I think you are comparing apples and oranges, and they are never going to be the same. I suspect that Cavesa has had some good experiences with 121 tutoring, and issemiyaki has had bad experiences with classroom education.

[garyb]

I would like to point out to issemiyaki and Cavesa that you appear to be speaking of two completely different types of teachers. Having read all the posts I get the impression that issemiyaki is talking about one-two-one lessons with a teacher or tutor. But Cavesa appears to be speaking (mainly) about teachers in the classroom.

I remember very similar rants in threads about one-on-one tutors too, so that's a pretty big assumption to make.

Anyway as much as I agree that many (perhaps most) teachers are bad and much research especially but not only in the social sciences is trash, and don't doubt any of the negative experiences reported, it's clear that many people have also had good experiences and I don't think it's acceptable to deny them and claim that all studies that go against one's own opinion are flawed. I think that how to make the most of teachers is a very worthy subject to discuss so it's a shame that every time it comes up it quickly decends into this sort of toxicity.

[Irena]

I think that how to make the most of teachers is a very worthy subject to discuss so it's a shame that every time it comes up it quickly decends into this sort of toxicity.

Hear, hear! You don't have to use teachers. No-one is forcing anything on anyone. But if you choose to work with a teacher, then try to find one who is a decent fit, don't expect perfection (are you yourself perfect?), and make the best of that teacher. Help the teacher help you. My first Italki experience was actually pretty bad (long story short: the teacher was a very nice guy, but he hated grammar, which meant I kept making the same basic mistakes over and over again, until I burned out and dumped the language). But hey, even that wasn't totally useless! I learned what to look for in a teacher, and I learned how to help a teacher help me. This experience, bad as it was, was very useful to me once I needed to learn Czech. I didn't repeat my mistakes, and I made far better progress.

[Le Baron]

It's perhaps only a nuisance if you e.g. really need a certificate - for a job or whatever - and the only way to that is to sign up for a course guiding you through the exam, but the tutor/course turns out to be not your sort of thing. Then it's more like a hindrance than a help. Although even in that situation (which I've been in) you can just push it in a certain direction to get more of what you want. Had I said nothing, I would have been sitting in an A2 class for 6 months. As it is I pushed for a second assessment and got moved to a higher level, much smaller class with a different plan of action entirely.

That's a classroom situation. I have very limited experience with online/personal tutors. I've used two and it didn't last long. I'm certain that if a student finds the right teacher for their requirements and gets on with them, it will be very useful.

[galaxyrocker]

it's clear that many people have also had good experiences and I don't think it's acceptable to deny them and claim that all studies that go against one's own opinion are flawed.

Exactly. I never would've learned Irish if it wasn't for the great teachers I had in university. Both in the classroom itself and in the immersion classes I took. I'd argue the same is true for French -- the immersion classes and that teacher did more for me than my self-learning ever did, and more than CI has done so far too. In fact, I think going back for longer would be much more beneficial for me at this point, especially for speaking, etc.

Classes aren't the pure evil and teachers aren't as awful as some make them out to be, just because they had bad experiences. In fact, it's often not the teacher but the class setup, as rdearman mentioned! Try teaching 30 unmotivated kids in any subject and see how far you get or how good things go.

Edit: Also, as someone with a masters degree in both teaching and the hard sciences, there's just as much trash research in STEM as there is in the social sciences. I'd be willing to be a good chunk of it wouldn't be replicable (especially nutrition and medicine), but somehow they think they're immune to it.

2nd Edit: Also, calling all teachers dumb, and not looking at the other possible issues. Granted I was a (non-language) teacher, but c'mon.

[Irena]

Classes aren't the pure evil and teachers aren't as awful as some make them out to be, just because they had bad experiences. In fact, it's often not the teacher but the class setup, as rdearman mentioned! Try teaching 30 unmotivated kids in any subject and see how far you get or how good things go.

Yup. That's why I'd be very reluctant to sign up for a commercial group class: there's generally no way to eliminate students who don't show up regularly, don't do their HW, etc. Universities are better in this regard. But anyway, these days, I just take private lessons. Then you don't have to worry about the useless classmates! (Not that all classmates are useless. Far from it! But if you have a few who are, and the teacher is somehow obliged to keep them on board in order to keep collecting their fees - yikes.)

[galaxyrocker]

Yup. That's why I'd be very reluctant to sign up for a commercial group class: there's generally no way to eliminate students who don't show up regularly, don't do their HW, etc. Universities are better in this regard. But anyway, these days, I just take private lessons. Then you don't have to worry about the useless classmates! (Not that all classmates are useless. Far from it! But if you have a few who are, and the teacher is somehow obliged to keep them on board in order to keep collecting their fees - yikes.)

Yeah, I got lucky with smaller uni classes in Irish (and it was night and day compared to the Spanish one I audited), but I think immersion courses or courses as an adult fix this problem. Generally, you're paying to be there, sometimes a good chunk of money, so you get people who are a bit more motivated. And, at least in Dublin, they keep class sizes relatively small (granted, I haven't taken any, just looked into the details at the AF).

[issemiyaki]

I would like to point out to issemiyaki and Cavesa that you appear to be speaking of two completely different types of teachers. Having read all the posts I get the impression that issemiyaki is talking about one-two-one lessons with a teacher or tutor. But Cavesa appears to be speaking (mainly) about teachers in the classroom.

Teachers doing 121 classes with a single student can and do modify their programs to suit the abilities of the student. But teachers of a classroom full of people have to cater to the lowest common denominator. I suspect this is the primary reason for the issues Cavesa has experienced in the classroom. A classroom teacher isn't going to be able to give tailored study to 30 students individually. Even the world's greatest teacher if they have to teach multiple students at the same time cannot please everyone.

I honestly think that if Cavesa and me were in a class together, then Cavesa would find the class and teacher frustrating and useless. Not because the teacher is crap, but because the teacher has to deal with a thicko like me and explain every lesson 2-3 times before it goes in. Cavesa would have probably read 8 grammar books, watched 200 films and read 9 books before I managed to get through the second lesson of the course book.

I think the same scenario would happen to issemiyaki, because his beloved teacher who is the fountain of all knowledge would have to spend 70% of the class time with me, Mr Thicko.

In reality, I think you are comparing apples and oranges, and they are never going to be the same. I suspect that Cavesa has had some good experiences with 121 tutoring, and issemiyaki has had bad experiences with classroom education.

Great point.

Interestingly enough, some of the ideas that I have used, I learned the in a group class environment, and then I used those same techniques with my one-on-one tutoring sessions.

In fact, during my time in Paris, at the Alliance Française, I was very careful to note down HOW they taught the class to deconstruct articles, how they taught us to go about reading certain documents. I basically stole the pedagogy, their ideas, if you will, and used it on a one-one-one basis with my tutor.

That has pretty much been my main message on this thread to begin with. Steal / borrow the ideas used by teachers and try them out to see how they work. (If you want, of course. It's just a suggestion.) Doing this has given me ideas on how to better interact with the text, how to make my language exposure more meaningful.

Granted, I was assuming that most people here were either studying on their own or one-on-one with a tutor. So that could have been some cause for a bit of disconnect.

So, thanks for these comments. Again, great points.