"Every lesson should have a general umbrella topic" - very well said and I completely agree and finally I can also implement the same strategy after years of using textbooks. It has been so liberating that I can choose my own topics for the lesson now. What has kept me wondering is how am I supposed to have an umbrella topic so far as I teach from popular textbooks? There are no topics like that in the first place in the textbooks and they don't seem to be just pure grammar guides either. They use several mini topics in each unit. They typically start with an article of a certain topic, followed by a bunch of exercises typically dealing with entirely different topics. One solution would be to have the same mini topics in the lesson, but in that case it is extremely difficult to change them if they don't fit the students' interests. Another way would be to stretch the topic of the main article over the rest of the lesson and slightly alter the other exercises to fit the topic. Perhaps I can also change the entire topic and somehow just teach the vocabulary from the article which I have experienced already from a certified teacher, who taught the entire vocabulary from a certain unit using his experience living in Jamaica. Ultimately though, I find a lot more effective to just read a couple of articles on the web and extract the vocabulary from them rather then "bending" the existing set of vocab in the textbook to fit my chosen topic. That "bending" process is what I find particularly exhausting, at the same time risking that some of the words don't really fit the topic and are forced into the topic because of the book. I probably overcomplicate it too much to the extend it is laughable to some people, but in many cases I really feel I have to grapple with the textbook rather that cooperate (which has changed having moved mostly online). I am not going to blame the book but to me it feels like somebody forced me to use chainmail, for instance, to protect myself and me barely able to stretch and move in it or perhaps shoes of a different size. It helps some teachers to prepare faster for lessons, but I see little benefit in them.

I'm so in love with this page, it is a fantastic way to learn more about how to be a better teacher. It is helping me so much, I just love it. Thank you!!

This is my favorite channel. Thank you for helping me become a better ESL teacher.

Intros were hard at first and I knew going in activities speaking activities help but I realize doing the same thing over and over every week can get boring and not as engaging for the student. My lessons and intro would be slow and have no purpose so I changed it up every day where we did new activities and intros. Card games role play music props debates interview etc. keeping them engaged and on their toes. Giving them energy and being out of my comfort zone isn’t something I good at especially being introverted so I changed that as well and become more energetic.

I adore this channel, thank you Chris

You are an amazing instructor I have ever seen. I hope to be like you I am teacher too.

Excellent sir

Thanks man 😊🌷🌷

You're the one

The music is so distracting!

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None of this works well when your students come from a problematic background.

@TheLanguageHouseTEFL

9 ай бұрын

I'm not sure how that would change anything. Can you please elaborate?

@ijansk

9 ай бұрын

@@TheLanguageHouseTEFL planning a class, many times doesn't work at all in high schools because many times many of the students are problematic and a teachers cannot change that and a teacher shouldn't even have to deal with their bad behaviour. There is a reason why many teachers quit teaching and end up hating it. As a former teacher said, teaching is toxic.