I USED TO HATE MY OWN LESSONS
I was accepted to study English at Oulu University in 1974 thanks to my passive skills in English. I could not speak English at all because we had never practised it at school. Neither could I write English well since in all my years at school I had written only one text which was a joke. The first book I read in English was the entrance exam novel ’Brighton Rock’ by Graham Green. I had to buy a DX radio to learn to understand spoken language in the BBC programmes. In brief, my learning of English at school was a joke in itself.
”I swore to myself that I would not let the same thing happen to my own students.”
I started my teaching career in 1977 but it took many years before I realized how to apply the principles of communicative language teaching in full.
REVELATION ON THE TRAIN
In the autumn of 1986 I was sitting on a train heading for Oulu, my hometown in Finland, after attending an in-service course in Heinola, southern Finland. For the first time in my career as an English teacher I felt puzzled but still hopeful because of a lecture given by Professor Irma Huttunen. She had been studying autonomous learning for years and I was fascinated by the ideas she had put forward.
Luckily we lived in the same city and she happened to be in the same coach on the train as me. Consequently we spent more than four hours talking about student-centered teaching and learning. I had, of course, read a lot about communicative language teaching but now I realized I should be applying the principles much more effectively.
“The results of my students were good but I felt something had to be changed. But what and how? I had a lesson to learn.”
Secondly, I also realized that I had wanted to play safe and I did not fully believe in the CLT ideas presented in books. Thirdly, deep down inside I hated the way I was teaching English but I had known of nothing better. On the surface level it seemed there was no need to make changes in my teaching since my students’ results were very good. Still, I felt I had to make a lot of changes but I just did not know how to get started properly.
”I was afraid of becoming a laughing stock in my school. But I had to take the risk. I could not go on the next 30 years teaching the way I was doing.”
ONLY I HAD THE KEY TO THE CLASSROOM – and TO MAKE THE CHANGE
I spent the following weekend making plans how I could change my way of teaching English. In those days we did not have the Internet or many additional sources so our teaching was mainly based on the textbooks we used. I assume that is still the case in most classes all over the world. The use of internet sources, for example, requires many skills that are actually learnt gradually when we use student-oriented methods.
The next Monday morning I had a double lesson, 90 minutes, with my 16-year-olds and spent all of it telling my senior high students that I really hated the way I had been teaching them English and that I wanted to try something new with them for a month. They were amazed and sat quietly listening to me explaining how the lessons would be changed and why. I tried to argue clearly and told that I was not absolutely sure how everything would work out and was very willing to get feedback from them. In the end we agreed to have a trial period and besides we could always go back to the old system. But we never did.
“The only thing my students would not be able to do in the English lesson was to open the door. Only I had the key.”
So what I did in practice over the weekend was that I went through all the stages in my lessons thinking how the students could be more active at that point. To my horror it dawned on me that just about the only thing the students could not do was to open the classroom door because only I had the key.
OH, THE JOY ON THE STUDENTS’ FACES
Homework was checked in groups or pairs, much more quickly than under my supervision. The new chapter was listened to together and I taught a shy and weak student how to use the CD recorder. Oh, how proud he was when he was in control. After listening differentiation stepped in when understanding of the text was checked. I felt I had no right to hold back those who understood the text perfectly so they made a group of their own and skipped the translation, some students checked a few sentences and I translated nearly the whole chapter with the weakest students.
“Who am I took slow down the learning process of the best ones? No, I had to learn how to use differentiation in my lessons.”
I had anticipated all of this and I had a list of things on a flip board for the students what to do next . In brief, after listening to the chapter every group made progress on their own following my instructions. First I was scared but in the end I was relieved and pleased: the students understood they were working for themselves but still enjoying the lesson and each other’s company.
Next the students read aloud any part of the text they wanted in their group at their own pace instead of me telling them what to read. I took control of the weakest students again and made them read parts of the text aloud. In two weeks time no translations were needed in any lessons and the questions presented to me reflected true understanding and it often turned out that it was the writer’s fault, not the students’, that some part of the text was found hard. Teaching strategies on how the students could learn English more effectively was something I myself learnt to teach little by little.
NO FEAR OF MAKING MISTAKES
The next stage was ’questions on the text’. I felt some students found these questions too easy and even boring so I had to differentiate again and had thought of offering three options: 1) Ask each other and answer the questions on the screen OR 2) Explain in your own words what the text is about and give your opinion about the ideas OR 3) Discuss the text-related topic given in pairs or groups and/or make a mind-map of some key ideas.
“The older generations are still afraid of speaking in English because they were punished for making mistakes. As a result they stopped talking. The CLT message was: Stop worrying about mistakes. We all make them.”
I can still remember the first lessons and the joy on the students’ faces when they were freely talking and doing things at the level they wanted. No fear of making mistakes, finally putting their passive knowledge of English into active use. ’But the preparation takes a lot time’, you say, don’t you? Well, not really because I had to think about the questions about the text anyway.
I had been in the habit of telling my students what to underline in the text but now I told them to underline anything they found worth underlining. Why should they underline something with me that they already knew? How did they learn the underlined words and phrases? Well, by using them in their own oral sentences. Who checked the utterances? Their pair or others in the group. I interfered only if I was asked something.
TEACHING WITHOUT TEACHING by making learning possible
First I found my new role akward because I was not actively teaching everyone at the same time but simply observed what was going on and offered help when needed. Was this the new role I had to take having studied at the uni for many years? Yes, definetely it was. Of course, I had to do some planning at home and organize the activities in class but on the whole I had finally assumed the CLT teacher’s role as an organizer and fasciliator of learning.
“First my new role felt strange but then I started to enjoy it and learnt new methods in group work.”
In short, I started my true CLT career by changing the flow of my text-based lessons to a great extent. Later on we had a lot of variations in the lessons doing station work, co-operative learning, task and inquiry-based learning and flipped learning making use of the internet and computer programmes at the same time.
The whole atmosphere in my classes changed drastically and class control was not needed in the traditional sense. I tried to remember to serve visual, auditive and kinesthetic students in every lesson, started to teach learning strategies as well and assessment became a continuous process with much less stress on it. My lessons were completely different from the ones I had attended and the years and excellent learning results proved my decisions correct.
Learning is enjoyable in a relaxing atmosphere. The more the students are active, discuss matters in groups and work at a level that they find challenging enough, the more they learn. It may be challenging for the teacher to talk less and let the learning of English take place in pairs and groups, as a by-product of the process.