Describing teachers A What is ‘teaching’? Itis often helpful to use metaphors to describe what teachers do. Sometimes, for example, teachers say they are like actors because they feel as if they are always on the stage. Others talk of themselves as orchestral conductors because they direct conversation and set the pace and tone. Yet others feel like gardeners because they plant the seeds and then watch them grow. ‘The range of images — these and others ~ that teachers use about themselves indicates the range of views that they have about their profession. Many trainers are fond of quoting from The Prophet by Kahilil Gibran. ‘If the teacher is indeed wise’ Gibran writes, ‘he does not bid you enter the house of his wisdom, but rather leads you to the threshold of your own mind’ (Gibran 1991: 76). Such humanist sentiments expose a dilemma in the minds of many teacher trainers and trainees. Is teaching about the ‘transmission’ of knowledge from teacher to student, or is it about creating conditions in which, somehow, students learn for themselves? To put it another way, if you were to walk into a classroom, where would you expect to see the teacher ~ standing at the front controlling affairs, or moving around the classroom quietly helping the students only when needed? Zoltan Drnyei and Tim Murphey see the business of teaching as the exercise of group leadership (Dérnyei and Murphey 2003: Chapter 6). It is our role as group development practitioners that really counts, they suggest. One of our principal responsibilities, in other words, is to foster good relationships with the groups in front of us so that they work together cooperatively in a spirit of friendliness and harmonious creativity. But how can this best be achieved? Dérnyei and Murphey suggest that ‘a group conscious teaching style involves an increasing encouragement of and reliance on the group's own resources and the active facilitation of autonomous learning that isin accordance with the maturity level of the group’ (2003: 99). When teachers and groups first meet each other, they suggest, students expect leadership and direction. This gives them a clear focus and makes them feel secure at the same time. But as groups develop their group identity, teachers will want to relax their grip and foster more democratic class practices where students are involved in the process of decision- making and direction-finding. “Two things need to be said about this view of the teacher's craft. In the first place, being democratic and letting students participate in decision-making takes more effort and organisation than controlling the clas from the front, Furthermore, the promotion of learner autonomy (where students not only learn on their own, but also take responsibility for that learning), is only one view of the teaching-learning relationship, and is very culturally biased. In some situations both teachers and learners (and society in general) may feel more comfortable with a more autocratic leadership style, and while this might not suit the 107108, eae 6 —<- preferences of some, especially methodologists, itis highly attractive to others itisworth pointing out that being ‘democratic’ teacher (where the teacher shares some of the leadership with the students) is simply one style of teaching, informed by strong belies of course, but nevertheless only one way of doing things. Some teachers are effective when teaching in this way, but others may find it more difficult. ‘Whether or not we are more autocratic or democratic as teachers, we are called upon fo play many different roles in a language learning classroom. Our ability to carry these out effectively will depend toa large extent on the rapport we establish with our students, and on our own level of knowledge and skill. In the classroom “students can pick up much from the way their teacher walks into the room at the start ofthat first lesson? writes Rose Senior (Senior 2006: 53). The way we dress, the stance we adopt and our attitude to the class make an immediate impression on students. In this sense We need to make some kind of distinction between who we are, and who we are as teachers. This does not mean that we should somehow be dishonest about who we are when we face student There will always be a need to be ‘congruent’ (Rogers 1961), that is being honest to oneself and appropriately honest with our students. But it does mean thinking about presenting @ professional face to the students which they find both interesting and effective. When We walk into the classroom, we want them to see someone who looks like a teacher whatever lst they look like, This does not mean conforming to some kind of teacher stereotype, but rather finding, each in our own way,a persona that we adopt when we cross the classroom threshold: The point is that we should be able to adopt a variety of roles within the classroom which facilitate learning, Some of these roles, a se roles come naturally whi haveto be thought about more carefully. aturally to most teachers, while others hav The roles of a teacher Apes a i term fait to describe a particlar kindof teaches one who ra star and one who fosters learner autonomy through the or by acting as more of a resource than a transmitter of Teenteageramevet ince we can ay thatthe sim ofall commited teachers is facilitate go about it, it makes more sense to describe different teacher roles it mote detail and say what the etal a are useful for, rather than make their effectiveness in terms of thei ‘facilitator credentials ‘atu ogemenss spo . Controller: when teachers act as controllers, they are in charge of the class and of the activity taking place and are often ‘lead scking pean on eating fom the front. Controllers take the register tell Ota ene ae ills ed sloud andi variousher way xempiy the quis Teachers who view their job pence i —- as ae transmission of knowledge from themselves to theit rememberteachen toner or ewith he mage of themselves as controllers. Weeana} inspted we through they ean ad if for just sucha kind of instruction and who this ability to inspire, and in eige and their charisma. However, not all teachers posts >and in less charismatic hands, transmission teaching appears to haveless obvious advantages. For a start, it denies students access to their own experiential learning by focusing everything on the teacher; in the second place, it cuts down on opportunities for students to speak because when the class is acting as a whole group, fewer individuals, have a chance to say anything at alls and in the third place, over-reliance on transmission teaching can result in a lack of variety in activities and classroom atmosphere. Of course, there are times when acting as a controller makes sense, for example when giving explanations, organising question and answer work, lecturing, making announcements or bringing a class to order. Indeed, such leadership may have a highly beneficial effect on a group, especialy in the early stages. In many educational contexts itis the most common teacher role, and many teachers fail to go beyond it since controlling is the role they are used to and are most comfortable with. Yet this isa pity because by sticking to one mode of behaviour, we deny ourselves and the students many other possibilities and modes of learning which are good not only for learning itself, but also for our students’ enjoyment of that learning. Prompter: sometimes, when they are involved in a role-play activity for example, students lose the thread of what is going on, or they are ‘lost for words’ (ie. they may still have the thread but be unable to proceed productively for lack of vocabulary). They may not be quite sure how to proceed. What should teachers do in these circumstances? Hold back and let them work things out for themselves or, instead, ‘nudge’ them forward in a discreet and supportive way? If we opt for the latter, we are adopting some kind of a‘prompting’ role. In such situations we want to help but we don’t want, at that stage, to take charge. ‘This is because we are keen to encourage the students to think creatively rather than have them hang on our every word. Thus it is that we will occasionally offer words or phrases, suggest that the students say something (e.g. Well, ask him why he says that) or suggest what could come next in a paragraph a student is writing, for example. Often we have to prompt students in monolingual groups to speak English rather than use their mother tongue. When we prompt, we need to do it sensitively and encouragingly but, above all, with discretion. If we are too adamant, we risk taking initiative away from the student. If, on the other hand, we are too retiring, we may not supply the right amount of encouragement. Participant: the traditional picture of teachers during student discussions, role-plays or ‘group decision-making activities, is of people who stand back’ from the activity letting the learners get on with it and only intervening later to offer feedback and/or correct mistakes. However, there are also times when we might want to join in an activity not (only) as a teacher, but also asa participant in our own right. ‘There are good reasons why we might want to take part in a discussion, for example. It means that we can liven things up from the inside instead of always having to prompt or organise from outside the group. When it goes well, students enjoy having the teacher with them, and for the teacher, participating is often more enjoyable than acting as a resource. “The danger when teachers act as participants, of course, is that they can easily dominate the proceedings. This is hardly surprising since teachers usually have more English at their disposal than their students do. But it is also due to the fact that even in the most egalitarian classroom, the teacher is still frequently perceived of as the authority’ and tends to be listened to with greater attention than other students. It takes great skill and sensitivity 109cuaPrERs to by-pass this perception for the times when we wish to participate in the way we are suggesting here. «Resource: in some activities itis inappropriate for us to take on any of the roles we have suggested so fax. Suppose that the student ae involved in a piece of group writing, or that they ae preparing fora presentation they are to maketto the class. In such situations having the teacher take part, or try to control them, or even turn up to prompt them might be entirely unwelcome. However, the students may till have need of their teacher asa resource, “They might need to ask how to say or write something or ask what a word or phrase means ‘They might want to know information in the middle of an activity about that activity oF they might want information about where to look for something ~a book or a website for example. This is where we can be one of the most important resources they have. “Two things need to be said about this teacher role. Firstly, no teacher knows everything about the language! Questions like What's the difference between X and Y? or Why cart! say 2? are always dificult to deal with because most of us do not carty complex infermation of thiskind in our heads. What we should be able to offer, however, is guidance as to where students can go to look for that information, We could go further, however, and say that one ‘of our really important jobs isto encourage students to use resource material for themselves and to become more independent in their learning generally. Thus, instead of answering every question about what a word or phrase means, we can instead direct students toa good dictionary. Alternatively, we need to have the courage to say I don't know the answer to that right now, but I'll tell you tomorrow. This means, of course, that we will have to give them ae the next day otherwise they may begin to lose confidence in us. en we are acting as a resource, we will want to be helpful and available, but at the same time we have to resist the urge to spoonfeed our students so that they become over~ reliant on us. aan Sener are working longer projects such process writing (see Chapter pointing them in ectons th he debate, we can work with individuals or small grou pointing he in eto the havent et thought of king. In such tuations Wt are mining the rkesf prompterandresorce—in other words acting stor relationship than a ae ina very large group since the term implies a more intimate small groups or in of a controller or organiser. However, when students are working group or individual offer the son round the class and, staying briefly with a particular eur ox individual ole the sr of general guidance we are deseribing, Care neds © be the stadents who have not nad individuals ot groupsas possible are seen, otherwise fadents who have not had acess tothe tuto may bepino fel aggrieved. this more ee ne from time to time, however difficult tis may be 12 Coe nas e learners have a real chance to feel supported and helped: and i fneal cass atosphre gel enhanced sare Nevertheless wth Pomptng ‘ahah ages astaruse we need tome sure that we do nt intrude either to aes le learner autonomy) or too litle (which will be unhelpful). role that we take oni achieve. Where some: asa ce have seen, on what it is we wish the students (© others haven chance of choca a oreanise without the teacher acting as controll no we take aless domineering role, There are times whe®Be — pescrisine TEACHERS wwe will need to act as a prompter where, on other occasions, it would be more appropriate to act as a resource. A lot will depend on the group we are teaching since our leadership style may well depend on the particular students we are working with; whereas some students might be more comfortable with using the teacher as a resource and a tutor, others may hunger for us to adopt a more controlling role, ‘What we can say, with certainty, is that we need to be able to switch between the various roles we have described here, judging when it is appropriate to use one or other of them. And then, when we have made that decision, however consciously or subconsciously it is done, we need to be aware of how we carry out that role, how we perform, Organising students and activities ‘One of the most important tasks that teachers have to perform is that of organising students to do various activities. This often involves giving the students information, telling them how they are going to do the activity, putting them into pairs or groups and finally closing things down when it is time to stop. ‘The first thing we need to do when organising something is to get students involved, engaged and ready. In most cases, this means making it clear that something ‘new’ is going to happen and that the activity will be enjoyable, interesting or beneficial. At this point teachers will often say something like Now we're going to do this because ... and will offer a rationale for the activity students are to be asked to perform. Thus, instead of just doing something because the teacher says so, they are prepared, hopefully with some enthusiasm, for an activity whose purpose they understand. Once the students are ready for the activity, we will want to give any necessary instructions, saying what students should do first, what they should do next, etc. Here it is important to get the level of the language right and try to present instructions in a logical order and in as Unconfusinga way as possible. Itis frequently a good idea to get students to givetheinstructions back, in English or in their own language, as a check on whether they have understood them, ‘An important tool in instruction is for the teacher to organise a demonstration of what is to happen. If students are going to use a chart or table to ask other students questions and record their answers, for example, getting a student up to the front to demonstrate the activity with you may be worth any number of complex instructions. Demonstration is almost always appropriate and will almost always ensure that students have a better grasp of what they are supposed to do than instructions can on their own. Then it is time for us to start or initiate the activity. At this point students probably need to know how much time they have got and exactly when they should start, Finally, we stop the activity when the students have finished and/or when other factors indicate that itis time to stop. This might be because the students are bored or because some pairs or groups have already finished before the others (see Chapter 10, B4). Perhaps the lesson is coming to the end and we want to give some summarising comments, At this point, itis vital to organise some kind of feedback, whether this is merely a Did you enjoy that? type of question (a vitally important question, of course) or whether it is a more detailed discussion of what has taken place. | ‘Teachers should think about content feedback just as much asthey concern themselves with the tse of language forms in form and use feedback. The latter is concerned with our role as assessor MIna B3 ‘cuaerer 6 ——————— (see below), whereas the former has more to do with the roles of participant and tutor _ When organising feedback, we need to do what we say we are going to do oe jer this concerns the prompt return of homework or our responses at the end of an oral activity. Students will judge us by the way we fulfil the criteria we offer them. ‘We can summarise the role of organiser as follows: ngage — instruct (demonstrate) —» initiate —> organise feedback The teacher as performer . In an article published at the end of the 980s, Christopher Crouch described his experiences of observing his student teachers on teaching practice in Madrid. One of them, whom he called W, was obviously full of energy and he writes of how she ‘rubbed her hands together and ‘advanced on the front row with a question, almost aggressively ..’. Later on, ‘.. seeking students to come out to the front of the class, W strode up aisles, literally hauling individuals out of their seats’ (Crouch 1989: 107). Yet amazingly, Crouch reports, the students didn't seem to mind this at al on the contrary, they were pleased to join in and were clearly fascinated by her behaviour! ‘W was different from student teacher X who was'relaxed, at ease, but his non-verbal gestures were exaggerated, larger than life. He seemed to empathise with his students, gazing into theit eyes, and generally being more laid back’ than his colleague. But like W, he, too, was popular ‘with students, Many of us will be able to remember teachers whose classroom behaviour was exaggerated in a way not unlike W or X - or indeed some mixture of them both. ‘We can be sure that neither W nor X behaved in the same way when they were walking along the street as they did in the classes that Christopher Crouch observed. On the contrary, they clearly went into ‘performance’ mode when they entered the classroom. When, in a piece of informal research, | asked a number of teachers Are you a different person in the classroom than you are out of the classroom, the responses I got all suggested that the teachers thought of themselves as more energetic, humorous and creative in class. Frequently, too, they described themselves as ‘actors’ (Harmer 1995). If, then, teachers are all performers in the classroom at some level, what does this mean. for a teacher who wants to promote learner autonomy? Can we ‘perform’ and still act a8 a resource? What kind of performance should we adopt when giving feedback? Does ‘performance’ automatically mean that we must be standing at the front of the class putting ‘ona show? For cleatly if this was the case, teacher performance would describe only one kind ‘of teacher role and might be criticised for the very transmissive and teacher-centred behaviour it demonstrated, But as W and X show, different teachers perform differently. Not only that, but any one teacher probably also has many different performance styles, depending on the situation. One minute we may be standing at the front commanding or entertaining, but @ few minutes later we will be working quietly with a pair while the other students are working in their own pairs. Knowing that different teachers act differently and that individual teachers vary their behaviour, depending upon what they are doing, It suggests that an alternative to say hhow they should be playing gives us insights into classroom behaviout. ‘ing what role teachers should be playing is to describe - Just as stage directions give actors an insight into what lines‘mean, so similar descriptions in teaching may give us insights into how activities can best be managed. Thus, for an activity where the students are involved in a team game, we will want to behave energetically (because a game needs excitement and energy), encouragingly (if students need a nudge to have a go), clearly (because we don’t want the game to fail through misunderstanding) and fairly (because students care about this in a competition situation). Ion the other hand, students are involved in a role-play, we should ‘perform’ clearly (because students need to know exactly what the parameters of the role-play are), encouragingly (because students may need prompting to get them going), but also retiringly (because, once the activity has got going, we don't want to overwhelm the students’ performance) and supportively (because students may need help at various points). Figure 1 shows how we might describe these and other activiti [ Activity How the teacher should perform 1 Team game Energetically, encouragingly, clearh 2 Role-play Clearly, encouragingly, etiringly, supportively 3 Teacher reading aloud | Commandingly, dramatically, interestingly 4 Whole-class listening | Efficiently, clearly, supportively riGuRe Describing teacher performance styles ‘What seems to be clear is that while we certainly need to be aware of the roles and tasks we described in B1 above, and while we need to be able to use each of these different roles, itis also vitally important to consider how we actually behave during their performance. Rapport In order to work well with the different roles we have been describing ~ and if we wish to develop a good learning environment in the classroom — we need to establish an appropriate relationship with our students, We need to spend time making sure that teacher-student rapport is positive and useful. Rapport means, in essence, the relationship that the students have with the teacher and vice versa, Although it may be, in Jim Serivener’s words, ‘notoriously difficult to define or quantify’ (Scrivener 2005: 23), nevertheless we can recognise it when we see it: a class where there is a positive, enjoyable and respectful relationship between teacher and students, and between the students themselves. In part, successful rapport derives from the students’ perception of the teacher as a good leader and a successful professional. If, when teachers come to the class, students can see that they are well-organised and well-prepared (that is, they have thought about what they are going to do in the lesson), they are likely to have confidence in their teacher. Such confidence isan essential component in the successful relationship between students and their teachers. It extends as well to the teachers’ demonstrable knowledge of the subject they are teaching and to their familiarity with classroom materials and equipment. All of these things tell the students that they are ‘in good hands: , However, rapport (and effective classroom management, as we shall see in Chapter 9) also depends on the way that we interact with students. We might be the most well-prepared and n3a a — cuapteR 6 ——— knowledgeable teachers in our school, but if that interaction isn't working well, our abihityta help students to learn will be seriously compromised, Successful interaction with students depends on four key characteristics: Recognising students students want their eachers to know who they are. They would ike their teachers to know their names, of course, but they also appreciate it when teachershave some understanding of their characters. It is extremely difficult for teachers to know the names of all their students, especially atthe beginning ofa term or semester when they have, say, nine large groups. As a result, teachers have developed a number of strategies to help them cope with this situation. One method is to ask the students (at least in the first week or two) to put name cards on the desk in front of them or stick name badges to their sweaters or jackets. We can also draw ‘upa seating plan and ask students always to sit in the same place until we have learnt theit names, However, this means wecan't move students around when we want to,and students ~ especially younger ones ~ sometimes take pleasure in sitting in the wrong place just © confuse us. ‘Many teachers use the register to make notes about individual students (Do they weat glasses? Are they tal? etc.) and others keep separate notes about the individuals in their classes. Some teachers study the register or lass seating plan before the lesson startsor when itis finished to try to fix student names in their heads, There is no easy way of remembering students’ names, yet itis extremely important that ‘we do so if good rapport is to be established with individuals. We need, therefore, to find ‘ways of doing this that suit us best. But knowing students’ names also involves knowing about students. At any age they will be pleased when they realise that their teacher has remembered things about them, and has some understanding of who they are. Once again, this is extremely difficult in large classes, especially when we havea number of different groups, but part of a teacher's skillis to persuade students that we recognise them and who and what they are. © Listening to students: tudents respond very well to teachers who listen to them. Although there are many calls on our time, nevertheless we need to make ourselves as available as we can to listen to individual students’ opinions and concerns, often outside the lessons themselves, But we need to listen properly to students in lessons, too. And we need to show that we are interested in what they have to say. Nothing demotivates a student more than when the teacher is dismissive or uninterested in what they have to say. Of course, no one can force US tobe genuinely interested in absolutely everything and everyone, but itis part ofa teachers professional personality ~ part of our skill as teachers ~ that we should be able to convince students that we are listening to what they say with every sign of attention. As far as possible, we also need to listen to the students’ comments on how they are getting on, and which activities and techniques th just 9 on teaching the same thing day pe ea after day without being aware of idents’ reactions» it will become more and more diffi eee eet eee lifficult to maintain the important for successful classes, Fapport that is so impot Finally, weshould point out thalisteningisnotjust done with the eats! We need t sho—— prscainine reacuters that we are listening and paying attention to our students, and this will mean approaching them, making eye contact and generally looking interested. As Hongshen Zhang points out, ‘eyes talk’ (Hongshen Zhang 2006). Respecting students: correcting students is always a delicate event. If we are too critical, we risk demotivating them, yet if we are constantly praising them, we risk turning them into ‘praise junkies, who begin to need approval all the time (see page 138). The problem we face, however, is that while some students are happy to be corrected robustly, others need more support and positive reinforcement. In other words, just as students have different learning styles and intelligences, s0, too, they have different preferences when it comes, to being corrected. But whichever method of correction we choose, and whoever we are working with, students need to know that we are treating them with respect, and not using mockery or sarcasm ~ or expressing despair at their efforts! Respect is vital, too, when we deal with any kind of problem behaviour (see Chapter 9). We could, of course, respond to indiscipline or awkwardness by being biting in our ctiticism of the student who has done something we do not approve of. Yet this will be counter-productive. Itis the behaviour we want to criticise, not the character of the student in question. “Teachers who respect students do their best to see them in a positive ight. They are not negative about their learners or in the way they deal with them in class. They do not react with anger or ridicule when students do unplanned things, but instead use a respectful professionalism to solve the problem. Being even-handed: most teachers have some students that they warm to more than others. For example, many teachers react well to those who take part, are cheerful and cooperative, who take responsibility for their own learning, and do what is asked of them without complaint. Sometimes teachers are less enthusiastic about those who are less forthcoming, and who find learner autonomy, for example, more of a challenge. Yet, as a teenage student once told me,‘a good teacher should try to draw out the quiet ones and control the more talkative ones} and one of her colleagues echoed this by saying that ‘a good teacher is. someone who asks the people who don’t always put their hands up’ “The reasons that some students are not forthcoming may be many and varied, ranging from shyness to their cultural or family backgrounds. Sometimes students are reluctant to take part overtly because of other stronger characters in the group. And these quiet students will only be negatively affected when they see far more attention being paid to their more robust classmates, At the same time, giving some students more attention than others may make those students more difficult to deal with later since they will come to expect special treatment, and may take our interest asa licence to become over-dominant in the classroom. Moreover, it is not just teenage students who can suffer from being the ‘teacher's pet. ‘Treating all students equally nat only helps to establish and maintain rapport, but is also a mark of professionalism. usee cuarran 6 D The teacher as teaching aid Ina language classroom there are specific ways in which we can help our students both hear and understand language. D1 Mime and gesture One of the things that we are uniquely able to do on the spot is to use mime, gesture and expression to convey meaning and atmosphere. Itis not difficult to pretend to be drinking or to pull a sad face, Demonstrating words like frightened or old is fairly easy for many teachers Shrugging the shoulders can be used to indicate indifference and we can use gestures to indicate the meaning of words such as big, small, short, tall, etc., as well as to suggest concepts such as past time (a hand pointing backwards over the shoulder) or future time (a hand pointing forwards). | Miming ‘indifference’ Being sad? Showing tall” FiGunE 2: Mime, expression and gesture Mime and expression probably work best when they are exaggerated since this makes their meaning explicit. However, gestures do not necessarily have universal meanings, and what might seem acceptable in one situation or place will not be appropriate in another. We need, therefore, to use them with care. One gesture which is widely used, but which teachers should employ with care, is the act of pointing to students to ask them to participate in a drill or give some other form of response rough it is quick and efficient, especially when we are having trouble with our students’ ames, it can seem aggressive and it may make it depressingly obvious to the students that, in having failed to learn their names, we are less than respectful of their identity. In many cultures it is, anyway, just plain rude. An alt s ys n 7 lternative is to ye and | | | | *——____Including ‘“1GuRe 5: Pointing and including 16De D3 ——————— brscnisine Teachers The teacher as language model Students get models of language from textbooks, reading materials of all sorts and from audio and video tapes. But we can also model language ourselves. This does not only mean the giving of a clear language model as in the PPP procedure described in Chapter 4, A2, but also, for example, the performance of a dialogue or the reading aloud of a text. ‘One way in which we can model dialogues is to draw two faces on the board and then stand in front of each of them when required to speak their lines (see Figure 4). For such activities wwe should make sure that we can be heard, and we should animate our performance with as much enthusiasm as is appropriate for the conversation we are modelling. We should judge the appropriate speed, too, making sure that however slowly we speak, a natural rhythm maintained and normal intonation patterns preserved as far as possible. Hello John. How are you? igure 4: Board face dialogue Many of the same requirements apply to reading aloud, a skill which some teachers have tended to ignore. Yet the reading aloud of a particularly exciting or interesting excerpt can be extremely motivating and enjoyable fora class, especially when students have been encouraged to predict what they are going to hear. Poems, too, are very engaging for many students when teachers read them to the class. ‘Anyone who doubts the power of such activities only has to look at the reading circles in primary classes where children group enthusiastically around the teacher to enjoy the experience of listening to a story. Story-telling and story/poem-reading can work with adults, too, though the content and the way itis handled willbe significantly different, of course, Reading passages aloud to students can capture imagination and mood like nothing else, but in order for this to work we need to ‘perform’ the reading in an interesting and committed way and, as with so many other activities, we must be careful not use this activity too frequently. The teacher as provider of comprehensible input ‘An isste that confronts many teachers in classrooms is how much they themselves should talk, and what kind of talk this should be. Of course, there are times when teachers have to take the register, ask for quiet or suggest that students should get into pairs and groups, But there are also times when teachers simply talk to groups, engage in conversation with them, discuss the topic under consideration or ask them about their weekend, etc. ‘On most training courses a distinction is made between student talking time (STT) and teacher talking time (TTT). As we shal see in Chapter 10, it isthe concern to maximise the former that leads many teachers to use pait- and groupworks it has been assumed that on u78 EES cuarrer6 ——— the whole we want to see more STT than TTT, since, as trainers frequently point out to thei student teachers, ‘you don't need the language practice, they do!” it is certainly true that some teachers talk too much and that this is not necessary advantageous for their students, especially since what those teachers say is unlikely tobe always interesting, However, as we saw in Chapter 3, it is widely accepted that a vial ingredient inthe learning of any language is exposure to it. The mote comprehensible input the students ge the better Yet where can they go for such language input? In the world outside the classroom English if they have access to it, will frequently appear incomprehensible, especially when they ace ata low level. They need something or someone to provide language which has bees “roughly-tuned’ to be comprehensible to them, And we are right there in the classroom to give them just that! ‘As teachers, we are ideally placed to provide appropriate input since we know the students in front of us and can react appropriately to them in a way that a coursebook or an audio track, for example, cannot. We know how to talk at just the right level so that even if our students don’t understand every word we say, they do understand the meaning of what s being said, At such times the language gains, for the student, are significant. Asa result, it may be a good idea to consider not just how much the teacher talks, but also teacher talking quality (TTQ). It is the quality of what we say that really counts. As t© when we say it, that depends on how it fits in with the need for students to get production opportunities and all the other myriad aspects of the curriculum. Basing a lesson on using ourselves as language models and providers of input, as in the examples above, clearly has the enormous advantage of not being susceptible to technical malfunction (though that can happen!), power cuts or unavailability. However, an over” reliance on what we ourselves can offer places excessive demands upon us. It is hard to be permanently motivating and amusing, and it is taxing to have to offer a perpetually varied diet of voices, gestures and expressions. Nevertheless, the ways in which we use our voice and the ways in which we model language and employ gesture and expression are all basic and important teaching skills. Native-speaker teachers and non-native-speaker teachers Jacinta Thomas, a professional with years of teaching experience and a PhD under her bell writes of the situations where she and other non-native-speaker teachers of English have (© establish their ‘credibility as teachers of English’ because they are not seen as‘native speakers: She tells the following story of life in the USA: ‘A.95-year-old neighbour of mine, a dear sweet old. lady, recently introduced me to her daughter as a college teacher and qui “ iy ier era cg quickly added ‘Guess what she teaches? t ‘English. Imagine so i i a heen gine someone coming from India to teed with a sweet chuckle, For many iti ey Years an opposition has been created between natve-speaker teachers of English sa non mative peer teachers. And for much of that time, many non-native-speaker sense of injustice and sometimes even inferiority at what they perceive (Thomas 1999:2)as the assumed superiority of the native speaker (this is the ‘enervating inferiority complex’ described by Rajagopalan and quoted on page 17 of this book). Although, if and when we reach the age of 95, we might expect people to treat our opinions a little more leniently than before, nevertheless we can say that Jacinta Thomas’s neighbour demonstrated a widely-held prejudice born out of ignorance about what teachers do and what effect they can be expected to have on their students. Her neighbour would have been unaware, too, of the discussions about the role of English in the modern world and the growing importance of World English (see Chapter 1, A3) which have taken place since she made her remark. Nevertheless, what Adrian Holliday calls native-speakerism — which he describes as ‘a pervasive ideology within ELT, characterized by the belief that “native speaker” teachers represent a “Western culture” from which springs the ideals both of the English language and English language teaching methodology’ (2006: 385) ~ is still alive and well in some quarters, not least in the minds of some students, who seem to think that being taught by someone who has English as a mother tongue will somehow help them learn better. But the world is changing, as we saw in Chapter 1, and English is no longer owned by anybody in particular, least of al the native speakers of the world who are in a minority which is becoming daily less significant - at least in numerical terms. Itis clear, therefore, that any superiority that native speakers might once have had is rapidly becoming less sustainable. In the end, the value of a teacher depends not just on their ability to use a language, but also on their knowledge about that language and their understanding of how to facilitate both that ability and that knowledge in the minds of their students. This is not to suggest that there is anything intrinsically wrong with native-speaker teachers; on the contrary, good native- speaker teachers are worth their weight in gold. But then so are good non-native-speaker teachers, which is the whole point. Non-native-speaker teachers have many advantages that their ‘native’ colleagues do not. In the first place, they have often had the same experience of learning English as their students are now having, and this gives them an instant (even if only subconscious) understanding of what their students are going through. Where they teach a group of students who speak their own native language, they are able to maximise the benefits of Lt and La use in the ways wwe will discuss in Chapter 7 (although many primary and secondary school classes around the world are becoming increasingly multilingual, especially in urban areas ~ see page 16). Non-native-speaker teachers are frequently considerably more familiar with local mores and learning styles than visiting native speakers are. Native speakers, on the other hand, often have the advantage of a linguistic confidence about their language in the classroom which non-native-speaker teachers sometimes lack ~ indeed, it may be differences in linguistic confidence which account for some differences in teaching practices between the two groups, as Peter Medgyes suggested many years ago (Medgyes 1992). In certain circumstances, a native-speaker teacher's inability to communicate effectively in the students’ La (because they have only recently arrived in the country they are working in, for example) has a positive rather than a negative effect im much the same way as multilingual classes provoke inter-student communication in English, Native-speaker teachers are often ~ but not always ~ seen in a positive light by their students (which can have a good effect ‘on motivation), and by their non-native colleagues. David Carles, for example, reporting ns120 CHAPTER 6 ‘on NET (Native English Teacher)/LET (Local English Teacher) peer teaching in Hong Kong primary schools suggests that there area number of reasons why the primary school can be a positive site for NET/LET collaboration’ (2006: 335). As recently as ten years ago it would have been impossible to find a single non-native- speaker teacher working in a language school in, say, Britain or Australia, But that is no longet the case. Progress may be slow in this respect, but there are signs of such progress. In the end, provided teachers can use the language (and know about it), itis the quality of their teaching that counts, not where they come from or how they learnt or acquired English. Chapter notes and further reading © Teacher’s roles An important book on teacher roles is T ‘Wright (1987). © Teacher talking time As long ago as 1985, T Lowe was discussing the value of teacher talking time as roughly- tuned input. On classroom language, see B Winn-Smith (2001). On the nature of teacher talkin more facilitative classrooms, see J Clifton (2006). Native-speaker teachers and non-native-speaker teachers ‘Apart from the references in this chapter, see G Braine (ed) ( who talk about team teaching with native and non-native s Davies (2003) and ¥ Park (2006), Icy Lee (2005a) discusses emy and J Suarez (2000), 1999), A and Y Tajino (2000) speakers in a Japanese context, A who asks whether non-natives will ever get a‘fair chance. powering non-native-speaker teachers. See also M Szwaj (1999)