English Teachers’ New Year Resolutions

Teacher's Experience/anecdotes

Every January first, people all over the world celebrate New Year in many different ways. Making resolutions is one among many things that most people do. A resolution is a promise to change or do something different in the coming year.

People from all walks of life make New Year’s resolutions as it is a common tradition today. In a recent training, we spoke to participant English teachers about their resolutions, hopes and wishes for 2015.

Priyanka Pandey, one of English teachers, talks about her New Year’s resolutions. She hopes to complete her masters’ thesis and build on her vocabulary. 

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Another participant, Padam Bahadur Nepali, who teaches English to secondary level students, resolves to explore, learn and practice effective techniques to teach grammar. 

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Parista Rai, like Priyanka, wishes to complete her master’s thesis and translate the knowledge from the recent training into practice. 

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As a primary level English teacher at DAV School, Divya Nakarmi, who originally hails from Birgunj, makes New Year’s resolution to make 2015 a memorable year by collecting and developing a lot of materials for different activities of English language learning and teaching.

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 Making her classroom more interactive and engaging is New Year’s resolution for Sashi Kyasthya. 

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Similarly, Sodhika Dhungana’s New Year resolution is to make the best use of americanenglish.state.gov to learn different techniques to enhance her language skills.

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Prajwal Singh Thapa also makes similar New Year’s resolution like others. He wants to exploit the website ‘americanenglish.state.gov‘and get benefit largely.

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Attending different teacher training to develop professionalism is one among other New Year’s resolutions  Prasanna Karki makes.

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Like Prasanna, Ganesh Kumar Khanal has similar New Year’s resolutions.

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Leela Moktan, a student from Janakpur, who is doing her masters from Tribhuvan University, wishes to complete her studies and find a teaching job in 2015 as her New Year’s resolution.

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Like all the teachers I spoke to, Yuwaraj Belbase, one of our valued readers, writes on the Facebook of ELT Choutari, his New Year resolution is to implement some innovative and strategic techniques inside and outside the class.

Meanwhile, Umes Shrestha, one of Choutari editors, shared his New Year’s resolutions. He said:

 My new year resolution as a teacher is:

To become better at dealing with teenage students
To practice more to become a better presenter and a public speaker
To explore the concept of entrepreneurship in teaching profession
And, to make a lot of mistakes.

Last but not the least, on behalf of Choutari, my resolution here is to wish all of our valued readers, contributors and well wishers a happy, healthy and productive New Year 2015. May all of our resolutions bear fruit in the year ahead. 

Welcome to December Issue of Choutari 2014

Editorial

EDITORIAL

Every old year ends with a new resolution. One month ends and another begins. One year ends and another begins. The cycle in the calendar keeps on revolving. The ELT practice in the shed of Choutari is a push that we, as ELT practitioners, need to do is to keep on moving like the calendar. As we move, we leave the familiar grounds and find us into a new territory. The more we move ahead, the more we grow.

In the new territory, our past learning and experience contribute to our continuous journey, the journey of ELT. We, the team of Choutari, are always ready to explore new possibilities to accelerate our journey. As we look back, we can reflect on how we have been moving and how we can move since the terrain has changed. We need to look into how we used to do things and explore the possibilities of how things can be done now. In order on to keep moving, we might have to keep aside the things holding us and move forward to welcome the changes. We are committed toward embracing the changes even if they are not pleasant.

As we move, we grow. As we move, we evolve. As we move, we get fit. Maxwell Maltz has put it precisely in words “Man maintains his balance, poise and sense of security only as he is moving forward”.

Here is the list of articles for December issue that reminds us to keep on moving:

  1. How to teach language functions, by Raju Shrestha
  2. Issues and Challenges of Teaching Creative Writing, by Sudip Neupane
  3. Teacher as a Reader,  compiled by Santona Neupane
  4. Issues and Challenges in Teaching Reading in EFL Classrooms, by Gyanendra Prasad Yadav
  5. Do you want your students to like you?, by Umes Shrestha
  6. Confession of an English Teacher, by Santona Neupane

December is a month of ‘letting go of the old’ and ‘looking ahead to the new’.  We may move slowly or move fast. We may run a mile in matter of days or only crawl an inch or two in a year. As long as we move, we will continue to grow.

Last but not the least, I would like to thank our contributors of this issue and also urge our valued readers and contributors to please share your comments/views on the blog posts, SHARE them with the community, and press LIKE buttons on social media.

Happy Reading!

santona
Santona Neupane, Editor, December 2014

How to teach Language Functions

Teaching Tips
Raju Shrestha
Raju Shrestha

As a teacher of English, I have often noticed my students having problem in learning functions of language. Theoretically, they learn even much better than we expect but practically they are found struggling with basic functions of language. Almost three or four months ago, when I joined a new school to teach, I was shocked the first time when I heard students having difficulties in choosing and using appropriate language functions. Here basically students were found to have lack of knowledge of language functions. When I came to realize this, I started to talk to my colleagues and principal of school. They also agreed with it and asked me how to make the students learn language functions creating such environment so that students would be able to use them fluently and accurately in practical life. Since then I started to think of and look for the proper ways and techniques of teaching language functions in order to make them capable to use in appropriate time.

Therefore, I as a teacher read different articles and books regarding how to teach language functions to make it easier for my students to use language functions and came up with some ideas. So here in this article, I would like to talk about what language functions are,  how language are presented, ways of practicing them, what are the stages of teaching language functions and some activities to teach language functions. Continue reading How to teach Language Functions →

Issues and Challenges of Teaching Creative Writing

Creative Writing, Teaching Tips
Sudip Neupane
Sudip Neupane

Writing simply refers to the graphic representation of language. It is taken as an act of transmitting thoughts, feelings and ideas from mind to paper. As a student of ELT, I cannot write a paragraph, compose a poem or even narrate a short story. I have been practicing to write for more than fifteen years but I cannot write what I want, and how I want. The problem I was facing with regard to creative writing encouraged me to look out for the issues and challenges in teaching creative writing. Had my teacher taught me about creative writing while I was in school, I would have been able to write creative writing such as poetry, drama, story and so on. Creative writing is personal writing where the purpose is to express thoughts, feeling and emotions. Creative writing is expressed in an imaginative, unique, and sometimes poetic way. According to Harmer, “The term creative writing suggests imaginative tasks, such as writing poetry, stories and plays.” So it represents teaching writing of all genre of literature such as drama, fiction, poetry, personal narration, story and so on. According to Gaffield-Vile (1998), “Creative writing is a journey of self-discovery, and self-discovery prompts effective learning” (p. 31).

Morley (2007) states, “Some people believe there is something new or untested about the discipline of creative writing” (p. 7). Teaching creative writing is a very challenging job to the teachers even though they have lots of knowledge about subject matter. It is because of developed form or genre of language which expresses ideas, information and thoughts by graphic representation.  I believe that the aim of teaching creative writing is to make the students able to express themselves in different literary forms. If a teacher gives imaginative writing tasks to the students, they will be engaged and self motivated to write frequently, so it is effective way to improve their skill and ability of language. There are so many issues and challenges of teaching creative writing like critical analysis, formation and structure, wider area, individual variation, untrained English teachers, insufficient time for instruction, lack of resources and materials which are discussed below in details.

Issues and Challenges of teaching creative writing

Harmer (2008) states, “The kind of writing we ask students to do (and the way they we ask them to do it) will depend, as most other things do, on their age, level, learning styles, and interests” ( p. 112).

Different Genre/forms of literature

There are various branches or forms of literature which is called genre. Harmer (2008) states, “A genre is a type of writing which members of a discourse community would instantly recognize for what it was. Thus we recognize a small ad in a newspaper the moment we see it because, being members of a particular group, or community, we have seen many such texts before and are familiar with the way they are constructed” (p. 113).  These genres have their own rules, regulations, norms, values, principles, theories, structural patterns, features, types, formations and so on. The teachers have to build creative writing. For this they have to engage the students with creative writing activities which are easy and interesting to take part in, so it helps students to achieve the success in their writing. When students have gained sufficient knowledge of creative writing they can develop writing habit. Therefore the teacher should have the knowledge to teach different genres to make his/her students able to write creative writing.

Individual difference

Different individual may produce equally good results through widely different process. This means that there is probably no one ‘right’ system of writing that we should recommend; rather, we should suggest available various possible strategies, encouraging individuals to experiment and search for one that is personally effective (Ur, 1996).

Lack of Motivation

Motivation is commonly thought of as an inner drive, impulse, emotion or desire that moves one to a particular action. It is the main determinants of teaching creative writing. “It is easier and more useful to think in terms of the ‘motivated’ learner: one who is willing or even eager to invest effort in learning activities and progress” (Ur, 1996 p. 274). The more you motivate the students the more students are motivated and get ready for creative writing so it helps the teachers to teach creative writing effectively. Motivation promotes students’ active participation, so it helps the students to give uniqueness in learning, background for creative writing, and process of creative writing. Motivation helps teachers to provide ability to the students and make learners  write creative writing. So we can say that motivation aids the students to achieve success in their creative writing attempts.

Untrained English teachers

The untrained teacher cannot teach the process of different genre of literature as equal as trained teacher. S/he lacks proper knowledge and will not be able to provide good ideas to write creatively and use different strategies and techniques to involve the students in creative writing. For example there are various ways of teaching poem like, acrostic poem (a poem where certain letters in each letters spells out a word or phrase), opposites poem (a poem where two opposite things can exist side by side in a person or situation), group poem (a poem written in a group where at least a line will be contributed by one person of a group) and so on.

Insufficient time for instruction

Teachers and students have limited time for their teaching and learning process in given time framework of institutions. Both students and teachers are inhibited by time, so creative writing is compelled to be taught only for the completion of the lessons. As a result, all the composition lessons are given to the students as homework and another aspect to the students’ difficulties is the perception that taking much time to write a composition is a sign of failure on their part. Unfortunately, students and teachers apparently fail to utilize the opportunity to process writing to fulfill their tasks satisfactorily. “The lack of the use of time to develop students’ creative writing skills led problems in teaching creative writing”(Adeyemi, 2012).

Focus on Surface Errors

Teachers are habituated to assess the students’ writing on surface errors by their profession. They give feedback to the students regarding spelling, punctuation instead of students’ creativity which doesn’t help to improve students’ creative writing ability. As the main focus is on structure as opposed to content or meaning, the students’ compositions will be meaningless and valueless. So intentionally or not, unsatisfactory message goes to the students, which indicates their lack of grammar, structure, punctuation rather than main issues or students’ intention of creative writing. Their intention, their creativity, their ideas and their effort goes unnoticed as teachers mostly focus on the surface errors and fail to acknowledge the hard work the students have attempted. It makes students hesitate and frustrated in themselves in their writing because of spelling, surface error, and punctuation marker. Certainly, there is more to composition writing than the mere issues of spelling and punctuation. Thus it indicates that it is not easy to teach creative writing to the students.

Writing Process

Writing process is also an issue in teaching creative writing. Some of the learner differences are because of their age, practice, motivation, cultural background, particular group etc. These create challenge to teach writing process to the students. Harmer (2008) states that, when students are writing for writing, we will want to involve them in the process of writing. In the real world; this typically involves planning what we are going to write, drafting it, reviewing and editing what we have written and then producing a final version. We will need to encourage students to plan, draft and edit for teaching creative writing so it is very challenging task for the teachers.

Prevention of issues and challenges of teaching creative writing

In order to prevent these issues and challenges, I have discussed some prevention and solutions in detail.

Assessing creative writing

Assessing creative writing helps students know their position and about their creativity through writing. So the teacher should evaluate creative writing by using the same criteria as for different genre. Morley (2007) states that, essays and examination materials tend to be assessed using the same criteria as for an expository essay. Creative writing is judged mostly by literary criteria, and these criteria may fit the critical mind but are not always sympathetic to emotional and personal matters (Hunt, 2001). They should give more emphasis on the importance of original creative writing and evaluate to give appropriate grade by feeling, imagining and involving as like as a real writer of creative writing.

Effective Instruments

Students must have access to high quality instruction designed to help them meet high expectations regarding creative writing. So the teachers should employ different strategies such as motivating; providing opportunities to write creative writing, providing concepts and teaching them to write creatively and employ those concepts; providing imaginative thinking and writing that connects their writing across different genre of literature and providing individual guidance, assistance, and support to fill gaps in background knowledge of creative writing.

Clinical Teaching

Clinical teaching takes place in the context of patient care. It is an intensely personal relationship between students and teacher so it is carefully sequenced. First teachers teach skills, subjects, concepts and process of creative writing; then they re-teach different strategies or approaches to the students to involve them in creative writing such as poetry, story, and drama to those who fail to meet expected performance level of creative writing after initial instruction; finally, they evaluate and provide feedback of creative writing to the students. Teachers conduct creative writing assessment to monitor the students’ progress and instruct them to modify their writing if necessary. Teacher should deal with anxiety, challenges to authority, and lead stimulating discussions and labs. To teach effectively, the teacher should respond appropriately to shy, withdrawn, or disruptive students and use technology more and more for clinical teaching effectively.

Collaborative Writing

Collaborative writing makes the students active in writing that helps teacher to teach creative writing to his/her students in effective way. Harmer (2008) states that, students gain a lot from constructing texts together. For example, if teacher sets up a story circle and provide the hints or starting line and asks the students, the students easily form or construct whole story by discussion and prediction. Strip story activity also helps to teach story to the students in a collaborative way and helps students to engage in creative writing with their full interest.

Creative writing exercise

Teachers should offer some well-tried classroom activities that may motivate students to want to write in English. It proves, ‘practice makes a man perfect’. Likewise doing some creative writing exercises during the class and in leisure can help the students’ to write creatively. If the teacher asks the students’ to write lots of creative writing exercises, it can give support their creative writing and generate in them creative ideas. So the very best method to teach creative writing is by providing creative exercises to the students.

There are different types of teaching writing; guided writing, parallel writing and free writing that will help students to produce appropriate texts even with fairly limited English. However, as their language level improves, we need to make sure that their creative writing begins to express their own creativity through different genre of literature.

Conclusion

Teaching creative writing is very challenging task to the language teachers because of lack of time, motivation, lack of training and building the writing habit as well as creative writing involves various genre of literature such as drama, fiction, poetry, personal narration, story and so on. So it is very difficult to teach creative writing to the students. The main problems in teaching creative writing are different genre/forms of literature, individual difference, lack of motivation, untrained English teacher, insufficient time for instruction, focus on surface errors, writing process and to prevent these issues and challenges of teaching creative writing we can employ assessing creative writing, effective instruments, clinical teaching, creative writing exercise, instant writing, collaborative writing, writing in other genre, using music and pictures and so on.

The author is perusing his Master’s degree in ELT at Kathmandu University School of Education (KUSOED). Currently, he is teaching in a private school in Kathmandu as a secondary level English teacher.

REFERENCE

Harmer, J. (2008). How to teach English. Longman, England: Pearson Education Limited

Hunt, C. (2001). Assessing Personal writing, Autobiography

Mills, P. (2006). The Routledge Creative Creative writing Coursebook . Routledge .

Morley, D. (2007). Introduction to Creative Writing . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Spiro, J. (2004). Creative Poetry Writing . Great Clarendon Street, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Ur, P. (1996). A Course in Language Teaching. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

 

Teacher as a Reader

Interview, Teacher's Experience/anecdotes

compiled by Santona Neupane

My learning accelerated as I learnt to read and more I read, more I understood, more I understood more I found my horizons expanding. As my horizon expanded, I realized that I could impart my knowledge and experience to others. My learning was aided by reading and I believe as I teach, my teaching will be aided by my reading. A teacher is first a reader than only a teacher. Here are the views of the two teachers and a learner on a teacher as a reader: 

Saroj Mandal:

Teachers help students to get knowledge for the fulfillment of their needs, desires, wishes etc. in their life. So, one can say they totally depend on their teachers. Students always learn from elders not because elders are always right but because they have more experiences of being wrong. Elders express their ideas, thoughts, opinions etc. through various literary forms. Among them one of the effective forms is print like newspapers, magazines, books, articles, poems, stories, essays, novels etc. More teachers will be in touch with these sources, they will have more practical and up to date knowledge which they can use in their profession. If teachers are good readers then not only can they recommend some reading materials to their students but they can also be mediator between students and the writers. Without teachers recommendation students may select inappropriate reading items which can demotivate them or lead them to a wrong paths. That’s why teacher needs to be a good reader as well.

Pabitra Gurung:

It was the color that attracted me
the amazing sounds
the heterogeneous meanings
that I was amused by

I was mistaken by the comics
blindfolded by the text
irritated by the comprehension
I hated and rejected because of exams

happy, encouraged, excited for the first class
struck by some new words I gasped
hurriedly looked into the dictionary
WHAT!!! I already knew it

continued the text, so many words,
already read but never had thought

now on more than 100th books,
teacher has a very less new word look
“you are confused, read the sentence
UNDERSTAND, don’t be amused”

Teachers know everything, yes they should and must,
no, teachers are human not gods,
I doubt,
if you are teaching then you should know,
or teach the level you can help them grow

I am a teacher and I am proud
I read because I have to make my knowledge sprout

Read then you understand your child,
Read then you love into the wild,
Read then there won’t be new words,
Read then you speak your guts,
Read then you will understand the world
Read then you will understand you

It’s better if you are reader then teacher
but when you are reader,
you won’t be a teacher,
you are facilitator or creator,
BUT
if you are teacher and reader,
you are satisfied and happiness transmit
you are knowledgeable and the learned one
whom all understand as the case already done

Jiwan Subedi:

He took out a notebook from his back pocket and dictated his lecture of the day. It did not take long for the class to decipher that the data he provided was ten years old. The notebook was in tatters. This was a lecture in the first week of my University. We stopped attending the Professor’s lectures. A decade back, he had switched into being a one-way organism that had stopped taking in and only gave out information and ideas. They said, he had become a Professor with promising credentials, and was then an embodiment of excellence. The person had changed when he stopped reading; the once-stellar brain received nothing to process and fell into disuse. 

Issues and Challenges in Teaching Reading in EFL Classrooms

Teaching Tips
Gyanendra Yadav
Gyanendra Prasad Yadav

Throughout my school life in a government school of Nepal, I never felt the need of reading English language in classroom. Those days are still fresh in my mind when my English teachers used to paraphrase and translate reading texts into Nepali and students had to remember words meaning, answers to the questions asked and other tasks. It was teachers who would read the text and make us understand the content, especially by translating them in Nepali and Maithili. Generally, we did not have anything to do with reading the text. It would be teachers’ job to read the text, answer the questions and finally write those answers so that we could copy those in our notebooks and remember them for test. English used to be the toughest subject for almost all students because we had to remember so many things like vocabulary, question answers, structures, rules, examples etc. In spite of such hard effort, we could hardly pass in English test. The students would be considered very bright and talented if they could get pass marks.

Furthermore, while teaching reading text, teachers used to ask us to read aloud in the class and we would do it. However, we would rarely understand the text given to us. I am not sure whether we were not up to the level or the difficulty level of the texts provided to us were beyond our comprehension. But in both cases, we had problem in making sense out of those texts, hence we did not like reading. Sometimes, when we were asked to underline the difficult words, we would have many underlined words in the text and teacher used to write meaning of those words, make us learn them by heart and then he would deliver very long and fine lecture on the content of the text.  I passed my school days without even knowing the necessity of reading English texts. I had neither any reason nor any interest to read those difficult and boring texts.

Most of the students, especially those studying in government school of Nepal, have faced similar situation in school level.  Now equipped as a language teacher, when I reflect back on how I had been taught reading passage, I can easily notice so many problems in teaching reading in our context. Therefore, in this article, I am going to analyze issues and challenges in teaching reading in EFL classroom of Nepal especially focusing on the issue of selecting right kind of reading text and designing appropriate tasks for it. Continue reading Issues and Challenges in Teaching Reading in EFL Classrooms →

Do you want your students to like you?

Teacher's Experience/anecdotes
umes
Umes Shrestha

Do you ever wonder why you like some teachers and why you absolutely dislike others? Why some teachers inspire you and why some sap your enthusiasm? And now that you are a teacher yourself, do you ever wonder why some students love being around you and why others try to dodge you when they see you coming?

Back in my school days, I remember being fond of my English teacher. He was into rock music and horror movies. I liked my Nepali teacher too. He was ‘haudey’ and friendly. He also told funny jokes. I liked my head-teacher because he had a visible halo of intelligence around him and looked like Morgan Freeman with chubby cheeks.

Students like teachers for various reasons. For a teacher’s absolute authority, command over the subject, confidence, personality, character, even gender, age and background. Or because the teacher does not nag students for grammatical mistakes… doesn’t pressure the students with assignments and deadlines. In college, we liked teachers who gave us notes. A friend liked Sociology ma’am because she was unmarried. My female friends liked a teacher because he had a unique British accent. There could be so many reasons.

So why we end up liking (or disliking) a teacher? There must be some explainable reasons. In this article, I claim that one of the reasons is non-verbal communication between the teacher and the students.

What the theories say:

We communicate in two levels: verbal and non-verbal. We might think that the verbal part matters the most. Thus, a teacher focuses on delivering the content. The what part. However, we overlook the other one. We infact completely neglect it. Gestures, eye contact, body language, distance, social norms, expectations and so on. The how part. Non-verbal communication is about ‘how’ you share the message rather than ‘what’ message you are sharing.

Teaching is an act of communication between the teacher and the students. This happens in both verbal and non-verbal levels. Therefore teaching depends on both ‘what’ and ‘how’ part of the delivery. But do we know if teaching was meaningful? George Bernard Shaw had said that the single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place. By lecturing our content to the students, we may delude ourselves into believing that learning has taken place. But the non-verbal part of teaching might have gone completely awry, impeding the communication process and obstructing the sharing of knowledge. That’s not meaningful. And, students don’t like that.

But when teachers communicate effectively on the nonverbal level too, students learn from the teachers and reciprocate by liking the teachers. And hence, dear teachers, granted that you are well qualified and you know your content inside out, here are three simple aspects of non-verbals you can consider, and implement them to make your students like you even more.

Eye contact:

Back in my school days, I had a teacher who, it seemed, believed in not looking into the eyes of the students. His preferred method of teaching was writing everything on the blackboard and making us copy word by word. Or he would spit out from his notebook and we would have to copy them. Naturally, his eyes were often buried deep into the notebook and textbooks. There was no rapport. There was no trust. I didn’t like that teacher. I don’t remember his name either.

When a teacher looks into the eyes of the students, the students feel warm, cared and respected. It makes them feel understood. It does not matter if it’s a large class or a small class. Eye contact works like magic.

Movement:

I used to move a lot. I would constantly pace around the classroom, from one corner to another, from front to the back and from one side to another. I thought that I needed to move around for two reasons – to control the class from noise makers and to get near to each and every student.

I also realized that such pacing was a result of my own anxiety, fear and nervousness. On the days when I was not properly prepared for the class, I would be pacing more than on the days when I was completely prepared and confident.

What we need to do is controlled movement, or let’s call it – movement with purpose. Instead of going for a morning-walk around the classroom, one can stand firm for a few minutes and then change the location. This type of movement is also necessary for the eye contacts.

The opposite of this also holds true. There are teachers who sit on a chair or stand still on one side of the room and deliver their lecture. Students might get completely tuned out and get lost in their own mental vacation.

Facial Expression

Emotions are contagious. Remember the proverb: when you smile, the world smiles with you. And when you frown, the world frowns back at you.

The most visible outlet of the emotions is our face and therefore positive facial expression matters a lot. I always enter a classroom with a big smile in my face. In some days, even when I don’t feel like it, I just force myself into a smile and try to keep the first five minutes of the classroom positive and happy.

But when a teacher lets her negative emotions win over and starts showing anger, resentment, frustration and even boredom, the class too quickly gets contaminated with these emotions. And as a result, the whole class gets put off and tuned out. We don’t have to be Einstein to figure this out. There were some teachers who never smiled. I didn’t like them.

Now here’s the nugget of gold.

Non-verbal communication, just like any normal communication, is always two-way. The non-verbal signals of the sender and the receiver are constantly interacting and giving feedback to each other. If your non-verbals send happy signals, the students also return happy signals. The more positive the interaction is, the more effective the whole communication becomes. But if you send disinterested signals, you can guess what happens. Therefore, be conscious about the non-verbal signals you are sending to the students.

So, to sum it up:

Proper eye contacts: When you have proper eye contacts with the students, they also respond by looking at you. This creates a positive psychological space between you and the students. And it elevates the quality of the interaction you are having. They feel acknowledged, cared and respected and in return, you feel they are more ready to listen to you.

Controlled movement: When your movement is controlled and relaxed, you feel confident and easy. But in the contrary, when you start pacing around showing nervousness, the students too feel nervous and lose confidence in you.

Positive facial expression: With a conscious attempt to keep your facial expression friendly, warm and empathetic, you can win your students’ warmth, love and trust.

Happy teaching!

—

And, please watch these video if you haven’t yet:

—

The author is one of editors with ELT Choutari.

Confession of an English Teacher

Teacher's Experience/anecdotes
santona
Santona Neupane

“I’ll miss you,” I told my colleague on her last day at work.

“Why would you leave such a good job?,” I further inquired.

Little did I know, that question would produce such a response that would also force me to leave my comfort zone and follow my calling. “Yes, the job is good but it’s not what I want to do. I took this job because I want to teach but if I can’t then what is the use hanging on.” That evening when she walked out of the door I couldn’t help but notice the radiant smile on her face and the bounce on her step. Seeing her like that, I vowed to myself that one day I will have that smile on my face and bounce on my step. Not long after that, I resigned from my administrative duty and resolved to follow my dream: to teach.

With bubbles around my head, I set out to follow my dream. Do I love teaching? Yes I do.  And did I have what it takes to be a teacher? I thought I had. I got my first teaching job on grounds of my passion for teaching, not on grounds of my experience. I was all set and ready to show the world I could be the best teacher ever. But little did I know, I had a long way to go.

The first mistake I made was to assume that I would make a good English teacher just because I loved English.  Confidently I walked in to the class adorning all the English I have ever learnt: Ready to bombard my students with every possible missile of English. The first class ever in my career and I start off talking about myself. My students were just sitting there silently as I told them about their new teacher, the ways they will be taught and the teacher’s expectations. Unknowing to me, by then my new students had already labelled me a boring teacher; one they might never relate to. I talked and talked without ever giving them chance to have their say. I just forgot to create rapport with them. I might have created an impression of someone with good English but at what cost? I was already put in a box labelled teacher not a facilitator. I assailed them with English without realizing their fluency and proficiency level. I was making them bored instead of making things interesting. Instead of teaching them, I was showing off and they recognized me for what I was – a phony show-off.

My school year was dominated by teacher centred teaching. My teachers showed off their English, they made an impression on us and made us feel like a criminal if our English was not as good as theirs. I made it a point in my study to polish my English and people started complimenting me on my English. I never even stopped for a moment to think if my English was as good as they said it was. And I just assumed I would make a good English teacher because people said I had good English. And then I also assumed that teaching English means talking in English. Without even realizing I became what I did not like- My teachers – and did what they used to do. English, English, English, Blah Blah, Blah.

As an English Teacher we have every authority and necessity to use English. Without English our class will not function but with English also if we are not careful about how we use and with what attitude, there will definitely be teaching but I doubt if there will be adequate learning.

My first class went off without a hitch but even on the first day of my career I was quick to spot how little difference I had made in their learning. My class lacked enthusiasm and most of the students were elsewhere.  Had there been a technology to illustrate their thoughts in a balloon like they have in cartoon strip, I would have seen one of my student eating lunch, another one fighting a WWE match, the boy in the corner would be facebooking, some would be rapping and some snoring where as others would be dreaming about their crush and others might be lost in their own world.

I might have been good with my language but my language will not singlehandedly deal with my classroom. My language will not help them learn. My language will only be a tool in facilitating learning. I was boxed and labelled a ‘Teacher’ and to get out of that box, I realized I have to be armed with more than good English.

I made lots of mistakes and in course of teaching I learnt from my mistakes.  There are lots of mistakes I have committed. An important lesson I learnt was that good language may be effective tool in teaching but if it is not accompanied by other teaching tools it will be useless.  As much as language matters in an English class, I also learnt that how certain things are taught matters most. I made a mistake in assuming good English will automatically make us a good English teacher but I learnt that continuous, contextual learning makes one a good teacher.

 The author is one of the editors with ELT Choutari.

Welcome to November Issue of Choutari

Editorial

Editorial:

World Teachers’ Day 2014: Invest in Teachers, Invest in Future

Having the right academic degrees on the subjects we want to teach doesn’t make us effective teachers. We also need to involve in professional development activities such as mentoring, training, publication, researches, interaction, and networking within our professional community.

Teachers’ involvement in professional development program not only enhances their capacity, but it also ultimately contributes in improving the quality of education as a whole. This fact was implied in the theme of The World Teachers’ Day 2014 last month–“Invest in Teachers, Invest in Future.”

Teachers and educators have contributed five different pieces of their writings for the November issue of Choutari. Here’s the navigation list of the blog entries included for November.

  1. World Teachers’ Day 2014: Investing in Teachers, by Praveen Kumar Yadav
  2. How mentoring helped me become an effective teacher today , by Camila Licchesi
  3. Too many knowers? by Shyam Sharma
  4. Hiding the Gold Coins: A reflection on a Choutari Writing Workshop for teachers, by Umes Shrestha
  5. How can effectiveness of In-Service Teacher Training be maximized?, by Jeevan Karki

We hope you find the articles insightful, interactive and interesting to read. We’d be grateful to our valued readers if you could please share your comments/views on the blog posts you have read, SHARE the ideas with the community, and press LIKE buttons on social media.

We wish you all a very Happy World Teachers’ Day 2014.

Happy Reading!

Choutari Team

World Teachers’ Day 2014: Investing in Teachers

Education in General, Global thought, Teacher's Experience/anecdotes
praveen
PRAVEEN KUMAR YADAV

On October 5, we celebrated World Teachers’ Day with the theme “Invest in the future, invest in teachers!” Since long, it has been observed in the academia that teachers and education policymakers are at loggerheads. But it is high time for both to come together and start a discourse in order to confront the issues they are currently dealing with. Teaching has undergone drastic change over the last few years, as the old procedures and methods used in teaching are no more applicable in the new contexts.

This is the digital era of technology. Today the challenge facing the teachers is to bring latest technologies to the classroom. If the teachers, who claim themselves educated, are not able to use technologies and fail to integrate them for pedagogical purpose, they are to be taken as illiterates. Lots of technological tools can be used for educational purpose but lack of competence and knowhow about those tools can make teachers outdated. As children of our times are exposed to latest technologies, teachers must go a step ahead.

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Photo: Republica, (I originally published the article in Republica National Daily.

Today’s children and adults have diverse learning needs driven by new contexts. Hence, in facilitating their learning needs teachers require skills, knowledge and support. Therefore, investment in teachers is a must as it will have direct bearing on future of children they teach.

Needless to say, deficiency in teachers undermines quality education of a country. According to the UNESCO Institute for Statistics, 1.4 million teachers are missing in classrooms and they are needed to achieve universal primary education (UPE) by 2015. The UNESCO Institute of Statistics (UIS) and the Education for All Global Monitoring Report (EFA GMR) on October 6 jointly released a paper stating that countries will need to recruit more than 4 million more teachers to achieve UPE by the deadline. To replace teachers leaving the profession, 2.6 million would be needed while filling new positions. The remaining 1.6 million is a must as well. There should be no more than 40 pupils per teacher. The paper also claims that at least 27 million teachers should be recruited even if the deadline is extended to 2030.

Another challenge facing us is the lack of qualified and trained teachers. Thus achieving quality education has been a far-fetched dream for many countries.

As the 2015 deadline of Millennium Development Goals (MDG) is nearing it is high time to shape new development agenda for which investment in teachers should be a priority. World Teachers’ Day this year was themed with the same notion.

Realizing the urgency for investing in educators, heads of different UN agencies have issued a joint statement this year. The agency chiefs say that an education system is only as good as its teachers, calling for more rigorous training, better conditions for employment, quality-based teacher recruitment, thoughtful deployment and attracting new teachers and talents, especially young people and women from under-represented communities. “Innovative, inclusive and results-focused teaching is crucial for 2015 and beyond,” the statement reads.

Likewise, Global Thematic Consultation on Education in the Post-2015 Development Agenda states good conditions of employment including appropriate contracts and salaries, prospects for career progression and promotion, good work environment based on creating school contexts that are conducive to teaching, high-quality pre-and in-service training for teachers based on respect for human rights and the principles of inclusive education, and effective management, including teacher recruitment and deployment as essential conditions for supporting teachers’ effectiveness.

Teachers require support in enabling themselves to become professionals through their involvement in various trainings, workshops and conferences, journal writing and research publications. They can also develop professionalism by getting associated with professional forums of teachers, which often organize professional enhancement programs for their members.

Such associations not only help strengthen their professional capacity but also influence policymakers to reform policies for teachers’ welfare. Policymakers need to engage with both teachers and the teachers’ unions to devise policies in their favor for ensuring future of children and learners.

The author, one of Choutari editors, is communication coordinator at college, & also with Republica

How mentoring helped me become an effective teacher today

mentoring, Teacher's Experience/anecdotes
Camila
Camila Lucchesi , English Teacher/Teacher-in-charge at Minds English School, São Paulo, Brazil

My first mentor was my mom. She taught me things ranging from the letters of the alphabet to how to look at complex issues in the world. She taught me that even with a simple action, you can open the skies to a person, if you know how. Inspired by my mother, when I was six, I decided to be a teacher. I told everybody that I would be that girl, like my mom, who would open people’s mind to new worlds and make them achieve their dreams.

My first teaching in a real class was when I was 17. I had no idea about what I was doing or how it was supposed to be done. I just knew that it was my dream coming true.

My mentor, amazing teacher with all the background of big teachers, sat in front of me. After the class he had watched in silence, he looked into my eyes and said:

“You know, you are the worst teacher I´ve ever met. You are terrible. You can´t teach this way, because to be a teacher, you have to be the best. Nothing more, but nothing less than the best.”

I remember the taste of the tears coming down my face while he pointed all my mistakes and when he stopped, I did not know what I was doing there.

“Do you really want to be a teacher?” he asked me, and I just nodded.

“So I will teach you. Call me your mentor for now, but don’t expect me to be your daddy or anything like that.” And then he stood up, went to the board and taught me the class, the same that I didn’t know how to teach.

First thing I learned that day: being a mentor is speaking the reality no matter how hard it is. Because you are just going to learn if someone tells you how to do it right or show you how to start that. If you don´t tell the truth, you are just creating a little monster who will never be able to listen and improve.

Second thing I learned that day: there is nothing more important than a feedback, especially when it is  given by a person who is interested in your improvement. Only when you can get better people are going to share their time and experiences with you; otherwise, what´s the point? And, when you give feedback, always come up with solutions to the problems you see. If you don´t know how to solve it, take notes, search for the solutions and just then tell the person. Trust me, it´s much better if you do this way.

Third, it doesn´t matter who you are, but if you mentor someone well, you could be like a God to them. They are going to look at you waiting to learn more. You are the example. They watch your classes, don´t accept less than the best from you. And that´s a good thing. I used to not care about myself before being a mentor, but now I see that there is more to be shared than just feedback. You have to be hardworking, committed to the person you mentor, giving your best support.

With my mentees, I learnt stories of improvement, challenges and successes. I could share with them stories of people who came from nowhere and became the best in their areas. I could see people struggling to be better, fighting for a better future. Sometimes, I became a absorbed their excitement and strength to improve and cheer  myself up.

It doesn´t matter who you mentor, you learn more than you share. I remember once when I mentored a teacher who didn´t have had any experience before, and he made so many questions that I got dizzy. Just few days later, he asked to watch his class just to show me how he improved. And actually, I got surprised with how far he had got.

I remember how many times mentees come to me sharing their lives´ stories, or their problems, or just to talk about their future plans and dreams. They always become mentors´ inspiration to succeed and get better every time.

I think being a mentor is sharing whatever you have, but it´s also improving yourself. As for me, I became the mentor I would like to have, plus the person people expected me to be. As a mentee, I could learn how to listen to people. I learnt that a person interested on you is going to help you no matter what. I learnt that being the person people expect you to be is not so easy, and teaching is a complicated science that you are going to spend your whole life to master it.

As a mentor, I learnt that it does not matter how good you are, there is always a challenge expecting you somewhere. I learnt that people are different, but you are just yourself, and there are many ways of helping others. And I learnt that there is nothing more beautiful, exciting and rewarding than the sparkle in someone’s eyes when they are under your mentoring, getting the opportunity and support for them to continue to improve.

Too many knowers?

Education in General, Teacher's Experience/anecdotes
SHYAM SHARMA

I came home from school one day to find my father and uncle Padam sitting beside the beautifully decorated Tulasi platform in the front yard that my mother, sister, and I had built the day before.

Uncle Padam [speaking to my dad]: Brother, you have such great artistic skills, you know. Look how beautiful that muth is!

Daddy: [smiles and continues to smoke]

Me: No, uncle, dad didn’t build that. Mom did, and sister and I helped her decorate it.

Uncle: Hey, phuchche [little kid], don’t be a janne [knower]. Go to play.

The social condition where some people are expected to be “knowers” and others are not—which I call socio-epistemic structure—has drastically changed in our society today. Thanks to democratic revolutions, increased education, and most recently and perhaps most significantly, the rise of alternative social spaces where (seemingly) anyone can say what they like, Uncle Padams aren’t likely to be able to shut down twelve year olds (or others with less power/privilege in society for that matter) that easily anymore.

Unfortunately, as I argue in this piece, the disruption of the traditional socio-epistemic structure has not always translated into general productivity of knowledge, benefit to social institutions such as education, and the enhancement of social justice in areas such as gender equity and intercultural harmony.

In the traditional society, the priest was literally called the knower (janne, who knew the scriptures, rituals, and higher learning). The shaman was another janne (who had direct knowledge about the cause of people’s sickness, as well as their past and future) from the gods. Older people were supposed to be jannes in front of the youth; men were jannes in the presence of women; rich men in relation to the poor; and upper caste in relation to the lower. More recently, the teacher in formal/modern education systems (even if the person is not an older, upper-case, richer) has been added to the list of jannes (though the word is no longer explicitly applied now).

By contrast, in our time, traditional jannes have lost their exclusive privilege over knowledge. Some of them (such as members of the upper caste) now acknowledge the knowledge of others as legitimate, and yet others (such as men, relative to women) don’t seem to have visible advantage in certain domains and contexts. Disruption is in the air today. The new democratic environment, the alternative virtual spaces, the communities of discourse that cross national and cultural borders, and newly visible groups (such as the LGBT community) have all contributed to the disruption of the socio-epistemic structure of Nepali society. Children learn from many more sources than school, college students can create their own purpose-driven communities, and people involved in political and social action can reach out to many more people and make far greater impact with what they know. In a society that leapfrogs from word of mouth to microblogging in a matter of a few years, the bypassing of socio-epistemic order is fast becoming the new norm. While the affordances information technologies provide are also new in developed societies, their impact on the socio-epistemic structure is much more striking in less developed societies like Nepal.

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Photo: Republica

The most obvious scenario where we can see the uncertainty of benefit from the disruption of socio-epistemic structure is social media. As research on social media use has shown in other societies, increased access to alternative avenues of knowledge and knowledge-making does not in itself translate into social consequences. For example, Facebook hasn’t made people “connect to the world” as many assume or claim. Instead of crossing national and cultural borders to learn about other societies and cultures, and increase empathy and understanding, most Facebook users “deepen” rather than “broaden” their network and may become more entrenched in their worldviews. Indeed, the company has rolled out features that increasingly emphasize family connections, like-mindedness, and a monocultural worldview through design and content selection.

In the field of education, increasing irreverence toward figures of authority could and should have translated into more and more productive generations of scholars and professionals. But we haven’t seen such a difference. The problem here lies not just with younger people’s inability to be productive but the society’s failure to tap their energy to transform educational institutions. Schools continue to teach for exams even when they don’t have to, universities don’t allow younger scholars to lead the charge, and older men continue to dominate almost all fields of knowledge. Whatever boost in epistemological agency (or the ability to create new knowledge) that we see among younger generations, we see it unable to translate into change in the system. Instead, increased knowledge seems to lead many people into increased negativity and nonchalance.

The social and cultural spheres seem to be no exception. In place of a society based on objectionable hierarchy, discrimination, and prejudice—a society where the upper caste the aristocrats, and newly rich blatantly dominated the rest of the people—we now have a nation where those structures of power are replaced with ethnic disharmony and multifaceted conflict among different social and cultural groups. Instead of a society dominated by speakers of one language, followers of one religion, and a socio-economic minority dominating most of the social institutions, we now have a society where linguistic, religious, and social/cultural groups clash for power (rather than work together toward common national/social goals).

Often, groups that are just becoming visible (such as individuals who want to pursue their “personal freedom” of walking around with piercings and tattoos all over their bodies—and therefore evoke responses ranging from confusion to fear among the general public) reject the very notion of tolerance toward others. More alarmingly, in place of “traditional” value systems (which certainly needed updating), many groups just try to impose values from what they believe are more “advanced” societies, never considering if they could draw on the best from both sides. Their knowledge about the outside world, their irreverence for the local society and culture, and their ability to challenge tradition doesn’t seem to make them contribute anything positive to society: they just reject the local and never question the “global” (which is often local somewhere else).

Just a few years ago, when social media was gaining traction (and access to tools and networks was rapidly spreading) across Nepal, I presented a paper at a national convention of literary scholars in the US, describing the disruption of the traditional socio-epistemic structure in Nepal as a possibly ideal model of social change in the twenty-first century—one that may be worth studying. I am not so sure anymore. 

The author, one of founders of ELT Choutari, is an assistant professor of Writing and Rhetoric at Stony Brook University (State University of New York)

Hiding the Gold Coins: A Reflection on Choutari Writing Workshop by Hem Raj Kafle

Reflections, Teacher's Experience/anecdotes

umes
UMES SHRESTHA

He is tall. Very tall compared to my height. He looks into the world through a pair of slightly shaded glasses. Those glasses probably let him filter all the negativity around him and help him see a vision – a vision of a teacher, a writer and a mentor. He speaks gently and seldom smiles. He stands in the middle of the class and with his words; paints an exciting picture of characters, themes and conflicts; and walks us through the colorful fields full of metaphors, similes and hyperboles.

 He is one of those rare teachers who writes a lot. His blog is a testimony of his prolific writing habit. Even his facebook statuses, usually very short poems, reflect his creativity. Then, it makes me wonder. May be creativity is a verb, not a noun. One has to constantly work at it. It’s just my perception. His creativity could be as natural as breathing.

I had met him back in 2012. He taught me Fiction in my M.Ed. ELT first semester and since then I have had a renewed interest in reading, interpreting and analyzing literature. I started becoming passionate but critical of the texts I came across. In addition to that, he has inspired me to write down my own fictional works.

Naturally, I was pretty excited about the workshop. I had always wanted to be in his classes one more time and the workshop was it. Even though the focus of the workshop was “Academic Writing”, I knew he would have his own twist on it, with a few pinch of strange concepts sprinkled around here and there.

So he started the workshop by asserting that writing is not an isolated activity, but it is an activity integrated with reading, listening and speaking. “The key word is perform. Writing is a performance, it is an action of hands as well as an action of minds,” he added. And most importantly, he continued, “Performance doesn’t mean a writer’s activity alone… it is about a reader’s action also”. This made so much sense that it immediately struck a chord with me. A writer has to let readers perform too. Otherwise, what’s the point in writing at the first place? An effective writer thus leaves enough clues here and there in the text for the readers to come up with their own knowledge.

Hem Kafle Workshop

Writing is a performance because the writer has to make sure that his/her ‘authorial presence’ and credibility are visible in every word and every sentence of the text. Moreover, a writer has to make sure there are implicit and explicit moments of communication with the reader. He/she has to constantly facilitate the reader towards understanding and creating new perceptions. Similarly, a writer has to represent his/her community and contribute towards adding new knowledge and scholarship. Therefore, writing is not merely scribbling texts on a sheet of paper, it is a performance that involves both the writer and the reader.

 Next, he talked about some of the common attributes every writer exhibit in some ways. For instance, the ‘writer’s block’ which he also labeled as the ‘blinking cursor syndrome’ for those who keep staring at the computer screen searching for words to start with. Similarly, every writer has the irresistible urge to tell the background or the whole story. Next, most of the writers can’t decide on the choice of diction – whether to use big or small stock of words, or on the choice of sentence – short sentences or longer sentences.

And to come to the main focus of the workshop, he talked about the process of creating an argument in academic writing and substantiating one’s stance. He gave an instance of Stephen Toulmin’s elements of a proper argument: claim, ground, warrant, backing, rebuttal, qualifier and final claim. A good paragraph is a combination of all or some of the above elements. The concept of ‘rebuttal’ is quite interesting. Apparently, acknowledging opposing views and giving them a small space in one’s argument adds more strength to one’s argument.

At the end, he gave us eleven tips on how to improve one’s writing. I am reflecting on these points from my perspective.

  1. Write aloud.
    It helps shape the quality of writing.
  2. Speak – record – transcribe – Edit
    This is very useful when one is facing the imminent ‘writer’s block’.
  3. Toulmin uncle really works!
  4. Three is enough.
    Three examples, three explanations, three stories.
  5. Keep the big below you.
    This is quite interesting. Start a paragraph with your own sentence and end it with your own. Keep the citations and ‘big’ personalities underneath your first statement. Don’t ever start your paragraph with a citation because this just weakens your stance.
  6. Kill the subordinates.
    If your main info goes to the subordinate clause, rewrite the sentence. Bring your info to the front.
  7. Passive is lousy.
    I also hate sentences in passive voice. I always try to write everything in active voice.
  8. Let the verb stand high.
    Let the verb ‘speak’, rather than ‘be’.
  9. Do not repeat a word if there’s a replacement.
  10. Hear me between the lines
    Make your presence felt. Don’t let the reader forget about the writer.
  11. Dump me if I let you go!
    Challenge: I will not bore my reader. I will not break my reader’s heart, effort, money, etc.

After attending this workshop, I now feel the urge to go back to all my writings and scrutinize them strand by strand – to find my ‘authorial presence’ in them. I had never thought about this aspect of writing – that the author has to be present in the text. Similarly, I am going to try speak-record-transcribe method whenever I feel stuck in the rot. I will also make sure none of my paragraphs start with a citation but with my own sentence. In addition, I will use these techniques in presentations and in writing scripts for speaking as well.

Writing has always been an elusive grape for me. I feel like I am always getting ‘there’ but never near enough. I always go back to my texts, interact with them and revise them. That singer from Rolling Stones is probably right. I can’t get no satisfaction out of my writing. But just like Hem sir once said during his class, “A text is always in the making”. May be it’s not about getting ‘there’ and being satisfied after all. It is a process… a continuum… a journey. And our job as a writer is just to enjoy the ride.

The author, one of editors with Choutari, is a teacher, writer, & blogger.

How can effectiveness of In-Service Teacher Training be maximized?

Interview, Native Perspective, Professional Development
invert me
JEEVAN KARKI

…..opportunities for in-service training are crucial to the long-term development of teachers as well as for the long- term success of the programs in which they work…”

–Richards (2005)

In-service teacher training (ISTT) is essential for teachers to enhance their professional skills and update themselves with the latest trends in pedagogy. In order to serve the purpose, government of Nepal formally established National Council for Educational Development (NCED) in 1993 under the Ministry of Education (MoE).

The NCED is an apex body responsible for human resource development in Education, especially in pedagogy. One of the major activities of NCED is to provide ISTT to in-service teachers in different phases for their professional development.

Every year, ISTT programs are conducted to in-service teachers across the country through NCED itself or Lead Resource Centers (LRC) and Resource Centers (RC) based in district levels. However, it is reportedly argued that the effectiveness and impact of such trainings in the classroom remains yet to be capitalized on. For this interactive article, I have made attempts to bring views and opinions of the concerned stakeholders including Dr Anjana Bhattarai, Head of English Education, Central Department of Tribhuvan University (TU), Dr Laxman Gnawali, Associate Professor at Kathmandu University (KU) School of Education, training expert from NCED, teacher educators, and Resource Persons and teachers.

They were asked:

“The government of Nepal offers in-service training to teachers but there is not much visible improvement in the pedagogy in classroom. What can be the causes behind it and how can the in-service teacher training be made highly effective and productive?

DR ANJANA BHATTARAI  | Head of English Education, Central Department, TU, Nepal

anjanabhattaraiIn my perspective one of the most important factors contributing for ineffective in-service teacher training is the attitude of teachers. Most teachers (not all because few are active and work hard) do not feel such training as an opportunity for their professional development, whereas they feel it as a chance to earn extra money. It is a tragedy that we are yet unable to make them feel the importance of it. Therefore, teachers need to change their attitude and apply the skills learnt in training in their classroom. I think a possible solution for this problem can be a good head teacher. If a head teacher has positive attitude towards training and encourages his teachers to apply new ideas in classroom, teachers cannot afford to be reluctant to transfer the skills in the classrooms.

Weak monitoring system is yet another factor for this problem. Despite having Resource Persons (RP) and supervisors, the government is unable to make monitoring effective. Classroom inspection and supervision are not taken seriously. The RPs do not observe classes minutely and offer constructive feedback to teachers, whereas they meet teachers (in some cases they meet in paper only), ask how they are doing and teachers obviously say they are doing wonderful. How can this ensure teachers are transferring the skills in their classes?

The next contributing factor is existence of impunity. We do not have strong and effective mechanism to reward those who are doing well and penalize irresponsible ones. This eventually discourages the teachers who are willing to do something.

I think there is some problem in our parents too. Parents need to visit schools, show their interests in the activities of school and raise question behind weak performance of their children.

To sum up, if we can change the attitude of teachers, make our monitoring system efficient, encourage parents to raise questions in schools and make provision of reward and punishment, the impact of training can be better than now.

Dr Laxman Gyanwali | Associate Professor (ELT) | School of Education Kathmandu University

 

nelta-conference-16A few classroom visits in Nepal can tell us how ineffective the impact of the government-run in-service training has been. When I ask my graduate students why such a wastage of resources, they say the training does not directly link to the real classrooms, ignores local contexts, and does not address trainees’ mental constructs,  their needs and expectations. I fully agree with them. However, for me the main culprits for the ineffective teacher training are the trainers. You may ask why.  No trainer has been trained to be a teacher trainer. Each of them has a degree on pedagogy not on andragogy. They do not have a faintest idea of adult learning. Because the trainers in the government system have a permanent position, they do not bother for their own development. And they pass on their attitude to the teachers who they train.

There is only one solution to rectify this situation. Let’s set requirements for the entry as well as for the promotion for teacher trainers. They need to have a degree on training and andragogy and they also need to undergo periodic CPD, just as the teachers do. For me, training is as effective as the trainer involved in it. 

Balram Adhikari | translator, and a lecturer at Mahendra Ratna Campus, Kathmandu

1924893_829718523720484_26654504_nThe in-service teachers should count themselves fortunate for getting the opportunity to learn and to teach at the same time.  Also, they should be gratitude to the concerned authority for providing them with such opportunity. However, it is a sad fact that take away from the training session is less and its translation into the actual classroom teaching is even lesser. There could be multitude of causes behind this ranging from training policy to classroom pedagogy. Since the limited space prevents me from digging depth into the issue, I point out two areas of training drawing on my own experience of teacher and teacher educator both. The first is attitudes. It is not uncommon to hear in the training the participant teachers saying, “It only works here in the training hall, not in our schools”.  Most participants have this ‘it doesn’t work’ attitude.  First, the training should aim at inculcating positive attitudes in teachers. Only the positive beginning can lead us to the positive ending. Here I am reminded of Thomas Friedman’s famous saying, “If it is not happening, it is because you are not doing it”. 

Second is the nature of training itself.  Training should be based on target demands needs. By its very nature, training implies equipping a specific group of teachers with specific skills, strategies, knowledge and resources to help them address specific problems in a specific teaching-learning context. That is, everything is specific in teacher training. Only specific training packages can address specific teaching-learning problems. The specificity in training calls for involvement the target teachers in framing the training package.

 Parshu Ram Tiwari | NCED Trainer of English

ParashuramNCED conducts many in-service teacher trainings out of them TPD is the nationwide training program. These trainings actually implemented by Educational Training Centres (ETC), LRCs and RCs under the guideline developed by NCED. Except TPD, other several training programs like CAS training, MLE training, MGML training, training for the teachers using English as MoI etc.

It is not fact that there is zero transfer of teacher training in classroom. Some teachers who are devoted to their profession have brought newness and innovations in their classrooms due to knowledge and skilled learned in training. However, effectiveness in classroom hasn’t been noticed as the training expects.

There are some inhibiting factors to the transfer of teacher training, which are as below:

  • Especially roaster trainers in RC level are not efficient to conduct training.
  • In ETCs and RCs, there are not well equipped training hall to use modern technology for delivering training.
  • Teachers demand general needs, not academic and pedagogical needs. Very few teachers demand technical needs but they are not addressed properly.
  • District education office puts the training program in low priority.
  • Teachers have no dedication, motivation and willingness to implement training skill and knowledge in the classroom and they are reluctant to change their traditional ways of teaching with modern ones.
  • Training has not been linked with teachers’ career path.
  • No provision of follow-up support mechanism
  • No support and encouragement from school (Head teacher and SMC) to teacher for implementing training in classroom.
  • No rewarding system to those teachers who teaches using methods and techniques learned in training.

Suggestions

  • Training needs to be conducted only in LRCs and ETCs.
  • Training program needs to be well monitored and supervised.
  • Incentive for teachers who complete training successfully and transfer it effectively in the classroom.
  • Training needs to be linked with the promotion and upgrading
  • Training centers need to be equipped with modern technology and resources.
  • Follow up and support mechanism need to be developed.
  • School must support the teachers to transfer training skill in classroom by providing resources and making the classroom environment conducive.
  • Teachers need to develop collaborative learning and sharing culture among teachers.

 Govinda Prasad Chaulagain | Resource Person, District Education OfficeSolukhumbu

GovindaAs a resource person, I see there are a couple of reasons why in-service teacher training is not helping to improve the pedagogy in classroom. First of all, the student-teacher ratio in some school is very high. In few schools there are up to 120 students in a single class! Therefore, it is quite challenging to make classroom interactive. When a teacher tries to do something new in group/peers classroom goes out of control and hence they return to old method. Besides, teachers also have to teach more than usual number of periods because of lack of teachers. Therefore, they are not encouraged to try something new because of more work load.

Lack of materials and resources is another problem. Schools do not have even basic things to develop teaching-learning materials. Similarly, in some schools, there are not even reference materials for teachers. So they are compelled to depend on textbooks fully. The textbooks are clutch, a survival kit and everything for them.

There is also problem with permanent teachers working for long. They are comparatively more inactive than temporary or contract teachers in terms of transferring skills in the classroom. Not only that sometimes, they manage to skip trainings too.

I think there is problem in the present Teachers Professional Development (TPD) modality for in-service teachers. There is a top-down approach in designing training package. The trainers design training package that does not correlate with the actual needs of teachers. On the other hand, teachers themselves also cannot spell out what are their actual needs and always talk about the same issues like large classroom, unavailability of resources and materials and so on.

Finally, to make our in-service training highly effective, we should not forget to address the issues raised above.

 Ashok Raj Khati  | Training Specialist at REED  Nepal, & adjunct faculty  at Gramin Aadharsha Multiple Campus, Kathmandu

AshokFirst of all, I am quite convinced that in-service teacher-training programs can never be ineffective because they definitely provide some visions and frames for teaching. A trained teacher approaches to the students with some sort of framework, philosophy and guidelines; he or she could deal with students even on the way or on a bus far better than untrained ones.

However, to what extent the effectiveness of a particular teacher-training program becomes visible inside the classroom is an important aspect. It is true that some teacher training programs are more effective than others. They are primarily so because of positive attitude and motivational orientation of participants and facilitators toward professional learning. There are always a few people who assume that their qualification and experience could be adequate to teach in a specific context. This tendency does not produce effective training outcomes.

In addition, if teachers’ socio-cultural contexts and interests are encapsulated in teacher training programs, they are likely to be more effective. In recent years, new trends in teacher training programs such as in-school support, collaborative approach, researching and conferencing have been proved successful in mitigating the specific challenges faced by teachers in Nepali contexts. Similar type of training modality for years creates monotony on the part of teachers and they find training as a form of ‘ritual’ in their career.

Bhupal Sin Bista | Faculty of English, Shree Phutung Higher Secondary School, Kathmandu

The government has envisioned the provision in-service teacher training for the community school teachers for the efficiency and efficacy of teaching methodology exploited while conducting classroom lessons. The considerable amount of national budget allocated in the education sector has been separated for this purpose. Every year such trainings are conducted in RCs, LRCs and educational training centers on need based. It should have resulted in the tremendous improvement in the educational sector of the nation by now but the reality is something beyond our imagination. That is to say, the in-service teacher training does not have tangible impact on the teacher’s educational pedagogy. There can be several factors behind it. Some of the factors that bring about this gap might subsume:

  • Lack of training needs assessment
  • Lack of expertise in training guidance
  • Lack of appropriateness of training content
  • Lack of instructional aids
  • Lack of persistent monitoring and supervision
  • Lack of stick and carrot approach
  • Lack of learning culture
  • Classroom dynamics
  • Physical facilities of the school
  • Classroom size
  • Lack of adjusting training with TPD, including career development

These are the crucial issues seen with regard to the transfer of teacher training inside the classroom teaching. To improve the existing scenario, such issues are to be addressed decently meeting the needs of the individual teacher and the school. Furthermore, teachers should be encouraged to do so with diminishing the digital divide via appropriate and feasible policy, strategy, guideline and programmes.

Sakun Joshi | Faculty of English, Shree Sitapaila Higher Secondary School, Sitapaila 

SakunEvery year, the government invests a good amount of budget to provide in-service and refresher training to in-service teacher aiming to increase educational quality of the nation. In spite of having such efforts, there is still not much visible improvement in the pedagogy in the classroom. Some prominent causes behind the present situation can be as follows:

  • Improper classroom size to perform different techniques in classroom.
  • The large number of pupil in the classroom is another problem, which makes difficulty to manage lesson and prepare sensible teaching aids and demonstrate them in classroom.
  • The administration of many community schools does not show interest towards innovative teaching and learning.
  • Sometimes teachers knowledge on the content is also a constrain to successful teaching learning
  • Lack of creativeness and professionalism among teachers due to insecurity of their job.
  • Lack of regular and continuous supervision from the monitoring body.

I think fulfillment of the following requirements can help bring improvement in the pedagogy in the classroom:   

  • Give proper concern towards the improvement of the physical condition of schools including availability of enough materials and references.
  • School administration should be enthusiastic towards bringing new technology in school.
  • Teachers should be given every opportunity to exercise their lesson as per their needs.
  • There should be provision of strict supervision following with reward and punishment to teachers.

The stakeholders highlighted on different causes and proposed ideas above to make ISST effective and productive. Here I urge our valued readers to please feel free to share if you have something to say on the issue. Please express your views in the comment box. 

Welcome to October Issue of Choutari

Critical Thinking, Editorial

Critical Thinking Special

EDITORIAL

Whether or not we should include critical thinking in English language teaching (ELT) is still a matter of debates and discussions among pedagogues and cognitive psychologists. Those standing for the argument opine that, like in other subjects such as science, social studies, economics, business studies engineering, medicine, etc., learners should develop their critical thinking abilities, because while learning language, they do not only learn through interactions among speakers, but also through reading various kinds of texts. Therefore, they can hone their critical thinking abilities in course of reading those texts. Another reason they put forward is that learning language means being very creative as well as critical. For example, while learning language, learners derive a certain set of rules involving themselves in series of analysis and synthesis activities. Once they have formed the rules of their own based on the input they have received, they start to use the rules they have consciously formed. Not only do they form the rules, they also verify whether their rules are correct listening to the other people speak. Also, they believe that learning language can be accelerated if learners are involved in critical thinking activities.

On the other hand, those who are against the inclusion of critical thinking in ELT counter argue that learners can have double difficulties if we wish to foster critical thinking in foreign or second language learning. They believe that students will have burden of learning and enhancing critical thinking skills simultaneously, for instance, the students who do not have good proficiency over the English language cannot be involved in pro-critical thinking activities such as debate, discussion, argument, counter argument, etc., let alone understanding the implied meaning of a discourse.  These people believe that it can be best done in the disciplines that are taught in students’ native language, because they just need to think of gathering ideas. It is because they do not need to worry about the words and structures required for expressing those ideas.

In order to shed lights on this issue, Choutari of this month has included posts on various aspects of critical thinking. It includes six entries altogether. The first entry is an interview with professor Kedar Bhakta Mathema in which he maintains that teaching and learning activities carried out in our schools to universities do not seem to be sufficient for enhancing critical thinking skills, because they are mostly limited to developing students’ abilities to recall and understand only. Furthermore, learners have become just the passive recipients of knowledge; because they are rarely provided with opportunities to think independently and carry out certain tasks on their own. In addition, he very strongly argues that the concept of critical thinking can be introduced in ELT as well. The reason that he gives is that learning language does not necessarily mean knowing words and structures only, but also using those words and structures creatively.

In the second entry titled Why to Be Critical Thinker, Ramesh Khatri shares his own experience of using critical thinking while making a decision in a difficult circumstance. Having shared his experience, he presents some of the theoretical aspects of critical thinking such as standards of critical thinking, fundamental critical thinking skills, characteristics of a critical thinker; and advantages of becoming a critical thinker.

Yadu Prasad Gyawali in the third blog post Critical Thinking from Theory to Practice discusses different tools such as Bloom’s taxonomy, Socrates’ questioning techniques, etc. that teachers can use for stimulating ideas, which is essential for the development of higher order to thinking in learners.  Also, he presents his experience of using critical thinking strategies for both secondary level students and university level students and argues that the incorporation of critical thinking strategies in EFL classrooms can be very beneficial for the development language and thought.

 In the fourth blog Critical Thinking Strategies for Resolving Challenges in ELT, Rajan Kumar Kandel overviews the ELT situation of Nepal and enumerates a number of challenges that are likely to be found in our schools and colleges. He thinks that all those challenges can be resolved if we implement the steps and strategies that are followed while teaching English focusing for the enhancement of critical thinking skills in learners.

Bishnu Kurmar Khadka’s reflective blog Let Learners Think Critically in fifth entry presents his experience of handling the course New Directions: Reading, Writing and Critical Thinking designed for the B. Ed. first year major English students. As the title suggests, he puts forward his idea that teachers should follow student-centered method of teaching so that they can help their learners to foster critical thinking in them. Furthermore, he claims that due to the traditional way of teaching in which students focus on examination; rather than real learning, he was forced to give notes to his students.

Finally, Lal Bahadur Rana in his blog post titled Teaching Reading Texts through Critical Thinking Perspective remarks that many students of the public schools have very low proficiency over English, as they have too limited exposure. He believes that the amount of exposure in English can be remarkably increased with the implementation of critical thinking strategies in those classes. Most important of all, using these strategies in our classrooms, we can make students independent learners.

 Here is the list of articles we have included for October Issue, especially focused on critical thinking in ELT.

  1. Critical Thinking for Good Citizenry: An Interview with Kedar Bhakta Mathema
  2. Why to be critical thinkers?, by Ramesh Khatri
  3. Critical Thinking from Theory to Practice, by Yadu Prasady Gyawali
  4. Critical Thinking for Resolving Challenges in ELT, by Rajan Kumar Kandel
  5. Let Learners Think Critically, by Bishnu Kumar Khadka
  6. Teaching Reading Texts  through Critical Thinking Perspective, by Lal Bahadur Rana

Now I, on the behalf of Choutari, would like to take this opportunity to extend our sincere thanks to all the contributors and also urge our valued readers and contributors to please share these articles among your social network and leave comments.

Enjoy readings!

Finally, we wish you all a very happy, prosperous and creative Dashain, Tihar and Chhath 2071 B. S.

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Lal Bahadur Rana   Editor,  October Issue

Critical Thinking for Good Citizenry: Prof. Kedar Bhakta Mathema

Critical Thinking, Interview

Undoubtedly, we all agree that critical thinking is one of the life skills in the 21st century. However, there are debates and discussions on how this very skill should be included in education system so that students, from the very beginning of their schooling, learn this skill subconsciously and become rationale citizens. Also, there are controversies whether or not we can promote this skill in second or foreign language teaching and learning, for example, learning English in the context of Nepal. With a view to shedding lights on these issues,  Lal Bahadur Rana, ELT Choutari coordinator for October issue, had a chit-chat with Prof.  Kedar Bhakta Mathema, who is the forerunner of introducing the concept of critical thinking in Nepalese academia. Here is the excerpt : 

Lal: Welcome to the October Issue of ELT Choutari. This special issue, we have focused on how critical thinking can be used in ELT. As the forerunner for the implementation of critical thinking in the context of Nepal, could you please tell us the how you conceived of it?

kedar-sir_20140321091819Mathema: Well, thank you very much. It’s my pleasure to be interviewed for the special issue. Critical thinking is something important in an education system. I think for the past several years, since beginning, I would say, we have been putting emphasis on lower level of thinking such as recollection of facts. We never encouraged students to think independently and creatively. Similarly, we never encouraged students to synthesize or analyze anything. As far as English teaching is concerned, I remember my days at the university while teaching to the student in the faculty of education, I used to bring extracts from the newspapers such as Herald Tribune and New York Times and teach those texts to the students. Although these texts were very difficult for the learners, I would make them read. At first, very general questions such as What is the text all about?  were asked.  Later on, I would ask them difficult questions in the second, third, fourth or fifth reading, especially implied questions. When I was the Vice-chancellor of Tribhuvan University, I came to realize that our education system right form schools to university focused lower level of thinking. Then I thought of introducing critical thinking in the university. But, unfortunately, I somehow could not introduce there.

Lal: You said that you tried to implement critical thinking pedagogy at TU. What factors caused you to try to implement at T. U.; not to other institutions? Continue reading Critical Thinking for Good Citizenry: Prof. Kedar Bhakta Mathema →

Why to be Critical Thinkers?

Critical Thinking
New Picture
Ramesh Khatri    Lecturer in English Mid-Western University Surkhet, Nepal

Two years back I was offered to facilitate a course titled ‘Critical Thinking and Analysis in Management’ at Masters of Business Administration (MBA) in the Faculty of Management Studies, Mid-western University, Surkhet. In the beginning, I did not accept the offer since the subject seemed to be quite new. Later, despite a number of challenges I dared to teach the course to the MBA students at the University. As I started teaching, I had a hard time in preparing and delivering the contents relating it to management. I was about to discontinue my teaching after two weeks. Nevertheless, I thought critically over my teaching career, faced the challenges, and turned it into an opportunity. My critical thinking helped me survive in my profession. Since then when I am faced with any problem, I think over the case critically, make an informed decision, and implement it into practice. It helps me a lot to select the best alternative and make an informed decision in life. So it has become a “life skill” for me.

Before we discuss what critical thinking is and why to be a critical thinker, let’s read the following brainteaser.

AT THE BUS STOP Continue reading Why to be Critical Thinkers? →

Critical Thinking from Theory to Practice

Critical Thinking
Yadu Prasad Gyawali
Yadu Prasad Gyawali

 

This post discusses critical thinking as a conceptual fruit for practice of several activities in planning a course. It simply deals with traits, questioning modes, practices, and critical sketches of general ideas for generating the real flavor of learning.

 

 Introduction

Critical thinking is a part of creativity and variety creations on any thematic ideas, especially the thoughts of varieties. It is an essential component of personal and professional development. To me, it leads to the creations of thoughts on the basis of perception and reflection. It surely denotes the concept of multiple realities because it is the concept of seeing the same thing through different perspectives and making rationale decision. So critical thinking is the collection of ideas in each perception of doings and happenings. In my opinion, it anticipates, collaborates and browses similarities and differences on bringing out the ideas. Continue reading Critical Thinking from Theory to Practice →

Critical Thinking Strategies for Resolving Challenges in ELT

Critical Thinking
Rajan Kumar Kandel
Rajan Kumar Kandel

 

This is a short narrative write-up in which I attempt to explore some challenges emerged in the Nepalese ELT context based on my experiences and observations of more than a decade. Here, I reflect on how critical thinking strategies proved very useful for helping my students learn English. In addition, I have included a lesson plan along with the materials. 

 

 Background

Teaching English in Nepal was started during Ranarchy from Darbar High School hiring English teachers. It was further expanded during post-democracy era when schools mushroomed in Nepal. Then, English was taken as a stimulating vehicle of an ideal culture and development. It was formally introduced in schools and colleges after the recommendation of National Education System Plan (NESP) 1971. At that time, it was taught as a subject; rather than a language for communication. Neither language skills nor aspects were focused; but the content was solely focused. The trend exists even today after more than two scores of years.

Nowadays, English is being introduced as a medium of instruction form primary schools to universities in Nepal. Thus we can say that there has been paradigm shift in English language teaching in Nepal, because it has become a means to achieve certain ends. Nevertheless, whether or not we should use it as a medium of instruction has already become a matter of debate and discussion. To comply with the new tradition, new methods and pedagogies have been searched; and courses have been prepared with a view to preparing learners compete globally. However, teachers who handle those courses have still hangovers of their experiences, which is why they encounter many challenges in their classes. These challenges have caused students’ poor performance in English. Continue reading Critical Thinking Strategies for Resolving Challenges in ELT →

Let Learners Think Critically

Critical Thinking
Bishnu Kumar Khadka
Bishnu Kumar Khadka

Exploring the context
As being a facilitator of English course not only of school level learners but also of university level learners, I did not find myself in the position of creating opportunities to think critically on various subject matters; but in the position of preaching the content without letting learners think even a single minute during my time frame of teaching.

When I was a student of both my school level and university level, I wished my teachers provided me opportunities to share something on the subject matters they were imparting to us. At that time, I would think that I could contribute something participating in different activities. However, our teachers used to come in the class with empty hands, ask for the textbooks from us; and start the lesson directly without consulting their learners. We used to listen and watch the teachers’ activities during the class period. After sometime, they used to ask some questions and if there were no accurate answers from us, we had to be ready for the punishment decided as per their whims.
After completing my school life, I got an opportunity to be a university student. Though a regular student of my class, I was hardly introduced with my teachers; and got chances to share something among a large number of classmates. When I got an opportunity to be a university level student of teacher education, I got the exposure of various dimensions of learners, learning strategies, teaching principles and strategies, current trends of teaching learning practices and findings of researches and experiments.

As soon as I graduated from the university, I got an opportunity to teach in Surkhet Campus (Education), a constituent campus of Tribhuvan University, as a part-time teacher where I was assigned to teach the course entitled Reading, Writing and Critical Thinking in B.Ed. first year. This is the course studied by the students, who are specializing in English Education. As its name suggests, this course is highly based on the reading, writing and critical thinking activities with active participation of the students. Before I began to teach the course, I thought of going through the course thoroughly; and then plan and present the lessons so that I could present overview of the course; and make them feel that I could teach them well. I did as I had thought and prepared my first lesson and then went for the presentation. Here, I am going to share with you all how I presented my first lesson on the course. Continue reading Let Learners Think Critically →