General Principles that lie behind my teaching. The value of the individual.

Each learner is of great worth, but they are all very different. The most skilled teacher is one who can adjust to the widest range of student ability, and teach each student well. My role as teacher is to find where my students are now, in terms of their educational achievement in the subject I teach, and where they need to go, and to help them achieve their goals. If necessary I can help them to set some more definite and achievable goals in line with their general aims. The centrality of the Learner. For learning to have value the learner must embrace it, grapple with it, and use it. There is a place for a pragmatic attempt to master a necessary skill, but it is of greater value to have an ambitious goal that requires great endeavour. If this comes from the Learner herself/himself it can inspire to great achievement. Imposed from outside it may drive the Learner to despair. The teacher must be sensitive and ensure that the ownership of the learning remains with the Learner. The importance of an ethical relationship My relationship with my students is a contract. I should keep my side of that contract, whether or not they keep theirs. I should teach them to the best of my ability, within the constraints of present reality. How people learn best It seems that people learn best when they feel safe, they feel interested and they feel involved. As a teacher therefore I should try to create these conditions within my classroom. I try to ensure that a joke and a laugh is a common occurrence in my class. Learning itself is a matter of creating pathways within the brain. I should therefore ensure that I always plan my lessons so that I include plenty of repetition and revision. Whilst trying not to be so predictable as to be boring, nevertheless I normally begin each lesson with a review session. Learning does not take place in isolation but is part of building a structure within the brain, so it is important to provide students with frameworks and structures to support their learning, and to link the work with their prior knowledge. It is extremely important that the learner gets involved and uses his/her learning. I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand. I try to plan my lessons to include plenty of relevant student activity. The teacher also needs to provide regular review lessons to consolidate learning, adding imaginative touches to prevent boredom. How I can teach well. For me to teach well, I need to ensure that I never lose the joy of learning. I need to be explicitly and openly on the learning journey myself, to encourage others to follow me on that journey. My teaching should be managed well. It should reflect the management cycle of Planning, Action, Evaluation and Review. I am accountable and I will keep records of

this planning cycle in whatever format my employers require, or if tutoring privately, I will keep my own records. My teaching will be guided by my assessment of my students achievement, before after and during each course of study, and my purpose for assessment will in the main be formative, so that I can teach each student according to their needs. As far as is possible I will differentiate the work I set to meet the different abilities of students. .My teaching will be set in the context of a planned curriculum. The curriculum in TESOL will cover the four skills of listening and speaking, of reading and writing, and also the building blocks of vocabulary and set phrases and the rules of grammar. It will describe a route of progressive mastery through these aspects of communicative skill in English My teaching will be guided and informed by the best practice of others. I will read widely and use a wide range of teaching resources, such as books pictures videos and audio recordings and student activities. The value of the teacher. To teach others well I will take care of myself. I will remain interested in the world, in my students, and in learning. I will plan realistically, and seek recreation and refreshment. I will develop myself professionally through networks of fellow teachers. I will be ambitious to be and to do the best I can be and do for my students.