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Home » Blog » 2018 » June » THE CHALLENGES OF TEACHING TEENS
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Teaching teens is very different to teaching other age groups. We could say that about all ages but there’s something about teenagers that makes them more challenging than other classes. We’ve all been teenagers so we know what it’s like to go through that stage of life. But even though we can empathise with them it doesn’t make it any easier for us to teach them.
There is probably no bigger insult than speaking to a teen like you would a child. Teenagers are most certainly not children and should not be treated as such. Try not to be condescending towards them or baby them. Rather err on the side of age and talk to them the same way you would talk to your adult students . Take their opinions seriously and listen to what they have to say.
Each student in your class will be experiencing something different in their day-to-day lives. Whatever happens outside the classroom will have a huge impact on your students’ behaviour inside the classroom. Try to remember that your students might be dealing with issues which may affect their behaviour.
This is possibly the biggest reason teaching teens is difficult. There are a load of physical and emotional reasons teens act out. Even though we may treat them like adults they can still sometimes behave like children. In these situations it’s best to explain the rules of the classroom and potential consequences of their ill-discipline carefully and calmly.
One way to try to avoid discipline issues is to make sure your students are interested in the lesson. This is really important for teens. Adults can pay attention to be polite or because they know they should. If teens aren’t interested, they won’t bother trying to fake it. They will just get on with whatever they want to do, even though that may have nothing to do with the lesson.
Following from this, you need to make sure your lessons are relevant to your students. Try to keep up-to-date with who and what are trending with the younger generation. Don’t rely on your coursebook to provide you with popular culture references because chances are, it’s outdated. By talking to your students you should be able to keep up with what’s hot and what’s not in their lives.
All teachers enjoy teaching different age groups. Each age group has their own challenges and rewards. Teens, however, seem to get the raw end of the deal in terms of reputation. Don’t let others put you off teaching teens until you have tried it yourself. You may find them more rewarding than you expected.
The one thing that many people are surprised by when they do their TEFL course ...
No matter how well you did on your TEFL course, your first day teaching english ...
In my experience working with teenagers, it has been really good, as most of the time I try to get on well with them. When you sympathy and empathy, they low down their guard and let you enter into their world.
It is a great challenge as you mention, buty also a great opportunity to help the world to be better raising teens eager to help others.
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It’s one of the biggest stereotypes in education.
And in parenting. And in the media.
You’ve probably been hearing it yourself ever since your 13th birthday:
There are a couple of commonly cited reasons for this belief, especially from a classroom perspective. You might hear that teenagers are apathetic—too cool for activities. They want to spend all of their time on social media. They’ve got enough on their plate and learning English isn’t a priority for them.
Well, in my experience… that’s simply not the case.
Teenagers can be a passionate, energetic group. They often want to succeed, even if it doesn’t outwardly look like it—especially if they’re hoping to land a job or go to school in an English-speaking environment in a few years.
As English teachers, our job is to channel their energy and potential into a love for language, and ideally, towards fluency.
In this post, I’ll show you three practical tips for doing just that.
Download:
This blog post is available as a convenient and portable PDF that you
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Click here to get a copy. (Download)
Depending on where you are, you can usually expect teenagers to have a pretty solid foundation in English. The most advanced students I’ve ever had were between 15 and 18 years old. Communicating in English at this point is enjoyable—for them and for you.
Teen classes are fun and full of laughter. They typically start with some small talk—catching up after the weekend or telling me a funny story from school that day. It doesn’t take long for them to start making jokes (in English… or with my help, a mediocre translation that isn’t really funny in English but it’s funny for us). It’s every teacher’s dream! A class communicating in a very real way , integrating it into their own conversations with a hint of their personality and humor.
My teen students have also given me my most memorable thank yous and really made me feel like I was making a difference. They wanted my advice on studying abroad, asked if they could stay a few minutes longer to go over their paper for school and some even asked for personal recommendations for college.
There’s nothing to be scared of when teaching teens. Once you create a space to share opinions and have a little fun, you’ll be surprised not just by how willing they are to learn, but how much you can learn from them, too.
You will have some shared interests, whether it’s music, TV, movies or Trump’s latest tweet. One of my best students discovered “Grey’s Anatomy” at age 16 (as did I in 2005) and not only was I super impressed with her ability to keep up with everything that happens on that show, but it also gave me some great material to work with in class.
After some get-to-know-you conversations, you should be able to land on a few common interests. Now make those interests your inspiration for activities. For example:
Once you’ve had a laugh doing that, turn the sound on and have a listening activity prepared. Any surprises once they hear the real thing? Were they close in their interpretations?
I doubt they have the same life experience as Eleven from “Stranger Things!”
It's got a huge collection of authentic English videos that people in the English-speaking world actually watch regularly. There are tons of great choices there when you're looking for songs for in-class activities.
You'll find music videos, musical numbers from cinema and theater, kids' singalongs, commercial jingles and much, much more.
On FluentU, all the videos are sorted by skill level and are carefully annotated for students.
Words come with example sentences and definitions. Students will be able to add them to their own vocabulary lists, and even see how the words are used in other videos.
For example, if a student taps on the word "searching," they'll see this:
Plus, these great videos are all accompanied by interactive features and active learning tools for students, like multimedia flashcards and fun games like "fill in the blank."
It’s perfect for in-class activities, group projects and solo homework assignments. Not to mention, it's guaranteed to get your students excited about learning English!
Sign up for a free trial and bring FluentU to your classroom today.
Early in my teaching career, I realized that the debates and scenarios in the book just didn’t cut it with teenagers. You can’t rely on a textbook to keep teenagers engaged and motivated. Their motivation and willingness to participate will be a direct result of your creativity and ability to adapt.
While teens often have an even more advanced level of English than adult students, when it comes to discussing current events or debating common issues, they struggle much more than older learners. Sometimes they haven’t given it enough thought to have developed opinions yet, and sometimes they honestly just don’t care. (Did you care much about politics at 15?)
At their age, I’ve found conversation and debate topics need to cover something they have direct experience with . It’s hard for them to sustain the kinds of hypothetical debates we typically have in adult speaking lessons.
If you want to get them talking, engaging with one another and motivated to get their point of view across clearly… you have to learn as much as you can about them and what gets them fired up . Here are a few tips to help you get started:
Listen, learn and then gear debates and essays towards topics they’ll have an opinion about.
…or rather, teach them when to break the rules. And I’m taking about both grammar rules and classroom rules.
One of the most fascinating things about learning a language is learning what’s not in the books. Does everyone you know speak perfect, grammatically correct English all the time? Probably not. You probably don’t either. Language is constantly changing and that’s what makes it so interesting. Bringing English into the real world means throwing the rulebook out every now and then.
This is easy (and fun) to do when teaching English to teenagers because one of their biggest references to the English language is music. Music is full of “incorrect” usage. I couldn’t begin to count the number of times I’ve been asked by students what “wanna” and “gonna” mean because they want to learn the lyrics to their favorite song.
One way to take advantage of this is to build lessons around music lyrics , whether it’s having them try to transcribe a song as you play it or giving them printed lyrics to parse out in small groups.
And students won’t just find grammar “mistakes” in music—they’ll hear people speak that way in real life, too.
As teachers, we tend to speak very clearly and pronounce every syllable perfectly so our students can understand. While this is a good habit when working with beginners, be honest with your teenage students: not everyone is going to speak clearly or correctly.
Don’t be afraid to introduce some slang or colloquialisms when you want to shake your lessons up, and encourage students to ask you about non-standard English whenever they encounter it.
First a confession: I used to be a serious stickler for the rules. I wasn’t the type of student that would interrupt or make a joke in class when I was a kid, so I was quick to shut down those side conversations as a teacher.
But here’s the thing… if you can get them to do it in English , is it even a bad thing?
If they go off topic, let them run with it! At least for a few minutes. Give them a new phrase to express what they’re trying to say better (or to make that clever joke).
Same with cell phones. Don’t freak out about them using their phones. Set a policy that seems fair and encourage them to use them when it can support learning. Let’s be honest: that’s probably where they’re seeing a lot of English anyway via social media.
Meanwhile, integrating mobile technology into the classroom opens you up to tons of online material, apps, games and activities.
There’s no doubt that teaching English to teenagers has its own unique challenges and differences when compared to young kids or adult learners, but I promise you: if you become the teacher that all the teenagers want to have class with, you’ll have a competitive advantage.
Teens want (and deserve) the same respect you want from them. Aim for that place of mutual respect, set high expectations while giving them their fair share of freedom and be creative in your choice of material and activities. It’ll be worth it.
Download:
This blog post is available as a convenient and portable PDF that you
can take anywhere.
Click here to get a copy. (Download)
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