Second Language Teaching Philosophy

Throughout my own education, I have had teachers who have demonstrated different aspects to teaching and their philosophy behind them. While there was material I learned from years of repetition or from personal enjoyment of the subject, there is one aspect of their teaching that made me realize the importance of what I was learning and helped me to remember it to this day. This idea can be summarized in three words and makes up the premise of what I want my teaching philosophy to be: real world application. As an educator, I would want my students to realize the importance of what they are learning as it would have an impact on their daily lives and design curriculum and learning activities that would help to prepare students to apply their acquired knowledge in real situations. This is especially true in the case of ESL students since the development of their English language skills will be used everyday. 

In order to ensure that my teaching philosophy is properly applied and successful, there are several goals I have in mind. The first of these goals is to help students gain agency in their learning. In order to achieve this, I would have my students give feedback and participate in designing certain aspects of their learning. For example, for a writing assignment, I would allow for students to have freedom on choosing the topic of their writing or even the form in which they write. Doing so would allow for the students to have agency in their learning by actively participating in deciding how they are going to learn. My second goal would be to help students realize the importance of learning English. Obviously, if the students are in these classes, the purpose is to improve their understanding and skills in the language. However, I would want them to see just how crucial their need to learn the language is. I would create activities that are based on everyday situations. For example, I would have students practice speaking in pairs about their day at work. This would allow them to practice conversing about things that would be commonplace outside of the classroom. While there are other goals, giving students agency and real scenario learning methods are my main goals. 

There are factors that I believe would help to improve the chances of success for my teaching philosophy. The first factor to consider is the age and proficiency of my students. Since the age and proficiency of students may vary, the way I teach should vary as well. Using a previous example, I would have older students practice speaking about their work day and have younger students speak about their day at school. The real world application that makes up my teaching philosophy would be different depending on the ages of those whom I am teaching. Another factor to consider would be finding ways to have my students engaged with the learning process. Aside from just focusing on the real world applications of using English, I would need to design lesson plans and activities that students enjoy to keep them motivated. While this may vary depending on the students, I would want my teaching to be something that they looked forward to too. Doing so would encourage them to learn more and find enjoyment and fulfillment in their progress towards improving their English language skills and understanding. 

I believe that there is true value to attaining knowledge in its many forms. However, if people are unable to apply the knowledge they have acquired, then I would have failed as an educator. Especially In the case of ESL, I want to be able to ensure that my students have the knowledge and the means necessary to use the English language in their daily lives with confidence and pride. I believe the best way to make this possible is to design curriculum and activities that present real world scenarios that allow for students to practice using English in the ways one would need to in their everyday life. Reinforcing this idea is the premise behind my teaching philosophy since the knowledge people acquire and use on a regular basis is the kind that stays with them throughout their life and continues to improve. This idea, with the support of my teaching philosophy, is what I hope enables me to ensure the success of my students in ESL.